When the arrivals board blinks out again, Audra is still eating pear drops. She lets them melt on her tongue, the sugary coating smoothing, the way Lola liked—likes—to. Pear drops are Lola’s favourite.
“Ma’am, the station’s closing now.”
“Ten more minutes,” Audra says, boiled sweet clacking against her teeth. She waves him away and when he does not go, she ignores him, popping another pear drop into her mouth. Lola does the same when they argue—Audra never did let Lola speak with her mouth full.
“Ma’am, I’m so sorry. There are no more trains tonight. It’s time to go home. Come again tomorrow?” The station attendant dithers from foot to foot. He touches her shoulder—
Audra rears back and tears the paper bag between her clenched fists. “I said ten more minutes, I—oh.”
She stares, unblinking, until the pear drops are a puddle of broken pieces on the floor. Audra sinks to her knees, shards of sugar digging into her shins. Her eyes are wide as she scoops them up, shoving them in her bag, her pockets, her mouth.
“Ma’am… Audra—”
Audra holds up a finger, swallows. “They’re for my daughter. She’ll be here in a moment. Her train is due any minute now. It’ll come. I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”
“I know,” he says, “I know.”
“She got on a train, you see. So I’m waiting.” Audra looks out at the empty tracks, at the dark tunnel down the line and wonders, is that a light?
Elou Carroll is a graphic designer and freelance photographer who writes. Her work appears or is forthcoming in The Deadlands, Baffling Magazine, If There's Anyone Left (Volume 3), In Somnio: A Collection of Modern Gothic Horror (Tenebrous Press), Spirit Machine (Air and Nothingness Press), Ghostlore (Alternative Stories Podcast) and others. When she’s not whispering with ghosts, she can be found editing Crow & Cross Keys, publishing all things dark and lovely, and spending far too much time on twitter (@keychild). She keeps a catalogue of her weird little wordcreatures on www.eloucarroll.com.
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