Smoke at Heiko Station | [A Tanuki's Short Story]
There is no timetable at this station where I work.
There are no rails for trains to slide into, nor bells to announce departures.
Only the sound of the wind blowing across the platform and the quiet breathing of the occasional visitor fill the space beneath this rusted roof.
The people who come here carry no tickets; they simply stand in places of their own choosing.
Though they are under the same roof, everyone sees a different world, and their respective times continue to flow without ever intersecting.
An old woman, who closed her eyes in the corner of an old bench and took a deep breath as if to confirm something, had tears well up at the scent of white chrysanthemums drifting softly through the air.
A young man staring at the place where the tracks should have been smiled, as if he had caught the scent of nostalgic coffee.
I wonder if my senior takes pride in the task of simply wiping away the traces of tears that people have left behind here with the cloth he always carries.
After he finishes wiping, he just starts sweeping up fallen leaves, never saying a word.
His profile always seemed to be on the other side of a pane of glass.
I feel that a kind of miracle dwells in this place.
During my shift, every time the wind changes direction, I see a thin wisp of smoke constantly rising from the back of the station building.
It is an indescribable, odorless presence, unlike any scent that brushes against my nostrils.
It is something akin to pure air, left behind after all other scents have burned away.
Once I had laid eyes on it, I was transfixed by this smoke.
One sunny afternoon, the granddaughter of a neighbor visited the station, looking down.
Standing at the edge of the platform, the granddaughter sobbed as if a dam had broken.
「It smells like sweet olive. It smells like Grandma's garden.」
Watching her trembling back and the smoke rising into the sky alternately, I found myself overcome with an irresistible urge to step beyond the ticket gate, a place I had always been forbidden to enter.
I cautiously made my way past the creaking door, but as expected, there were no tracks.
A stone-paved path simply led to a solemn and quiet building, from whose roof a single white chimney stretched straight toward the sky.
When I turned back, I could see the sign of the ivy-covered station building.
On the back, worn away by wind and rain, there were faint traces of other characters that had once been carved there.
As I hurried back to the platform, my senior silently handed me a dry cloth.
I took it and began to quietly wipe the pillar where the granddaughter had been leaning and crying just moments before.
🔻 I have brushed up my past works.
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🔸 Recommended! (Tap the image) ⬇️
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