A Midnight Mind

Chapter 2: Shirewood

Ethan had almost fallen sleep again when vertigo snapped him awake. The train was slowing down, grinding on the rails. Ethan realized he reached the city station.

Travelers mingled beyond the window, pulling along wheeled briefcases, their noses in their cellphones, shouting for their children to keep close. Normal people. Everything was normal again. There were no nightmares here.

Ethan moved to get up when he felt something on his thigh. He jolted when he saw the face of the dream man. It took his brain a second to catch up.

He picked up his sketchbook and sighed. Why did I draw this? he wondered. Like I need this stupid face haunting me....

Still, the sketch turned out surprisingly well, given that he drew it in a state of exhausted terror. He hadn't had much light to see what he was drawing, either, and he had no reference beyond a fading dream-memory. All things considered, it was a sketch to be proud of, even if he didn't want to look at it.

Finally the train screeched to a full stop. Ethan closed up the sketchbook and stuffed it in his duffel bag, wishing he had more time to sleep. The sun wasn't even up yet. The days were getting so short this far into autumn.

He followed the herd of passengers as they exited the train, then took a deep stretch. He had always wanted to travel by rail rather than plane or bus, but after hours of staring at flat prairies, he was over it.

"Ethan!"

Someone was standing up from a nearby bench, waving at him. An older man matching Ethan's height, with a hooked nose and a full head of silver hair. He was in trim shape despite his age, dressed in a dark blue turtleneck, black topcoat, jeans and dark boots, with thick-framed glasses. The man was both familiar and unfamiliar, but not in the same way as the dream man.

Ethan waved back and walked over to him. "Hey, Uncle Vic," he said, mirroring his uncle's broad grin.

Uncle Vic was Ethan's father's older brother by several years. Ethan couldn't remember the last time he saw him, except that it was when Ethan was in early junior high. 

"Hey yourself, little man," said Vic, clapping a paw on Ethan's shoulder.

"I'm not little anymore, Uncle." Ethan clapped Vic's shoulder just as heavily.

Vic groaned in mock pain. "Oof, and I'm not young anymore, so take it easy on me." He laughed. "How's the trip?"

Ethan thought about his dream, but it seemed silly to mention. Nightmares were kids' problems. And like Ethan said, he wasn't little anymore.

"Was good," he said instead. "Kinda boring."

His uncle pursed his lips. "Novelty wears off quick, eh? Train rides aren't much different from car rides when you're just sitting there waiting to get where you're going. Just another window and a bunch of land passing you by."

Ethan nodded, smiled, shrugged. He didn't know what else to say. Re-introductions were awkward.

Uncle Vic twitched his head as a motion for Ethan to follow, so he did. "Want me to take your bag?"

"I got it."

"Alright, big man. Car's just outside."

They weaved through the crowds as they made their way to the station exit. Vic's car, a polished green Lincoln probably older than Ethan waited for them in a parking lot by the train station. Uncle Vic popped the trunk and Ethan filled it with his duffel bag.

Just as cars can have new-car-smells, old cars have old-car-smells, but this old car didn't have either. It had a warm, pine-fresh air to it. Not artificially so, like from a new air freshener, because there was no air freshener, but more of a used, lived-in pine smell. Like from a pine tree that had lived a while, had seen a thing or two in its time, rather than a new, emerald-green pine tree with something to prove.