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Hollis woke up painless, so he got ready and left.

The trains ran mostly on time, and he knew he wasn’t late. He’d have heard the whistle from his house on the way over. The wind blew hard, cutting through his down overcoat to chill his bones. Under his mittens he knew his hands were turning blue, but he stayed rooted to the spot.

Nothing else seemed to work.

Hollis’s uncle used to do this too, so maybe it was a family thing. A gambling-with-death thing. Waiting for the train like this.

The dry leaves whispered against each other; Hollis curled his hands into fists and closed his eyes.

Freight trains were faster than commuter trains when they needed to be. You can’t jump on them; they’ll break your legs. If you stumble, the wheels are like surgical knives. They could fill graveyards with the people who have tried.

Whistle and the light. Steel against steel, the warmth of sparks and gravity: relentless as the tide. Hollis leaned forward to taste that speed at the front of his teeth.

The gust tossed his thin brown hair into tangles as the cars rushed past, scented his clothes oily with smoke, and beckoned him forward lover-soft. Even as he stepped back, heart aching.

Annie asked him once why he didn’t just jump, when she was mad at him for doing something so dangerous.

He didn’t answer her.