The Last Train Out: Again

AUTHOR’S NOTE

I wrote the original version of The Last Train Out on August 26, 2025, for a Reedsy prompt about time travel.
I was working in detox then, less than a year after losing my father to addiction. I was depressed, restless, and trying to turn some of the noise in my head into something that could exist outside of me.

It became the first short story I published.

A year later, I still don’t want to fix it.
I want to haunt it.
So I left the original exactly where it was.
And took the train again.

•••

The last thing the nurse says before I sign myself out of treatment is, “You won’t make it to morning.”
She does not say it cruelly.
That would have been easier.

At 2:17 a.m., I am standing beneath the departures board at Union Station with my discharge papers folded into quarters in my pocket and twelve dollars to my name.
Still breathing.
Technically, she was wrong.

Union Station looks built to outlive everybody who passes through it. Marble ribs. Echoing bones. Brass fixtures dulled by a million hands. The ceiling disappears into shadow. Somewhere above me, a pigeon beats its wings once. Then there is nothing. Los Angeles after midnight has always looked temporary. A city held together by extension cords and unfinished arguments. The B Line arrives almost empty. I know where it goes. That is why I get on.

Four of us in the car.
A woman in a red dress holds a pair of silver heels in her lap. One strap is broken.
A boy sleeps with his cheek against a backpack, headphones leaking static.
Across from him, an old man hums under his breath.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

And me.
Hood up.
Head down.
Trying not to look like somebody leaving something behind.

The doors close. Union Station slides away. Outside, Los Angeles assembles itself in pieces. Neon laundromats. Liquor stores. Pawn shops behind metal grates. A mattress beside a bus stop. A woman smoking beneath a streetlamp. A taco stand glowing under a crooked OPEN sign. Everything looks fragile. Everything looks permanent. Somewhere past Civic Center, the train jerks. The lights go out.

For half a second, the windows become mirrors. I see the woman. The boy. The old man. Three reflections. Then the lights return. There is no fourth. I remain very still. The glass shows an empty seat where I am sitting. No hood. No hands. No knees. Nothing. I raise one hand. The window does not.

Outside, the city has changed. A billboard advertises a nightclub that closed before I learned to drive. The cars below us are long and bright, chrome sharks moving through black water. The map above the doors is wrong. Same line. Different stops. VERMONT/SUNSET. HOME. AGAIN. A final black square. No name.

The speaker crackles.
A woman announces the next station backward.
The red-dress woman does not look up.
Neither does the boy.
The old man hums.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

The boy’s headphones whisper static.
Then my name.
Softly.
Once.
I look at him.
He sleeps.

•••

At Vermont/Sunset, there are advertisements for pagers. A Blockbuster display leans crookedly near the stairs. Someone has taped a photocopied flyer to the glass. RAVE IN THE RAVINE. Pink glitter pen around the edges. I remember that flyer. Not one like it. That one. I stole it from a telephone pole because I liked the handwriting. I was seventeen. Warm malt liquor beneath an overpass. Two white pills in a stranger’s palm. A drainage tunnel. Gravel embedded in my cheek. Blood on my shirt that did not belong to me. For years, I told that story like it was funny.

The doors open.
Bass trembles somewhere beyond the station.
Someone outside calls my old nickname.
I stand.

The woman in red says, “You already went.”
I look at her.
She is studying the broken strap of her shoe.
“What?”
“You already went.”

The doors close. The train moves. Her dress is burgundy now. Longer. The silver heels in her lap have become black patent leather. The boy is younger. Maybe twelve. The old man has not changed.

“What year is it?”
Nothing.

I ask again. The old man stops humming. He looks at me. His eyes are cloudy with age. Or distance.
“You keep asking the wrong question.”

“What’s the right one?”

He turns toward the window.
“When do you think you got out?”

•••

A movie theater passes outside.
Jurassic Park. OPENS JUNE 11.

Then I am ten. Not remembering ten. Ten. My feet swing above sticky carpet. My fingers shine with popcorn butter. My mother sleeps beside me. A dinosaur screams. I kick the seat in front of me. Once. Twice. Again. A man turns around. My mother wakes and says my name through her teeth. I blink.

Train.
Vinyl seat.
Empty hands.

The boy across from me is eight now. His backpack is covered in dinosaurs. He opens his eyes. They are my father’s. Exactly. I do not say anything. Neither does he. He smiles. The lights flicker. Sixteen again. Headphones. Asleep.

I close my eyes. Behind my eyelids, something moves past the window. Not darkness. Not a tunnel. A hospital corridor. My father in a bed. My father as a boy. My father standing in my kitchen after his funeral. I open my eyes. The old man has started humming again.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

The woman in red says, “You always do that.”
“Do what?”
“Wake up.”

•••

There are routes through a city that your body learns before your mind does. Turn here. Transfer there. Two stops. Three. Don’t get off at that station after dark. Don’t carry cash in your wallet. Never use alone. Always use alone. Call your mother. Don’t call your mother. Promise her. Mean it. Lie. Disappear. Return.

People like to think addiction is about choosing where to go.
They can see you walking there.
They cannot see the tracks.

•••

The next station does not exist. The doors open onto the Los Angeles River. Concrete. Chain-link. Graffiti. My tag beneath the 7th Street bridge. Fresh paint. Bubble letters. Blue outline. I remember shaking the can. I remember tearing my jeans climbing the fence. I remember believing permanence meant putting your name somewhere nobody could wash it off. Seventeen-year-old me stands below. Spray can in one hand. She looks up. Straight at me. Smiles. Then puts one finger to her lips. The old man stops humming.

The doors remain open. Hot concrete. Aerosol. River water that is not really river water. I take one step toward the platform. The girl outside shakes her head. No. Then points behind me.

I turn.
Every seat is empty.
The woman.
The boy.
The old man.
Gone.

My reflection remains in the black window. Only it is not facing me. It is facing the aisle. Watching something I cannot see. I do not turn around. The doors close. When I look back, the river is gone. So is the graffiti. The concrete beneath the bridge is clean. My name was never there.

•••

After that, the train stops obeying years. 1997. Tomorrow. A motel room I have never seen. My first rehab. A bathroom with blood on the tile. A grocery store at Christmas. My third rehab. A parking lot where I once slept in my car. A hospital. A beach. A funeral.
Mine.

The doors do not always open. Sometimes I only get the window. A clipboard. An intake bracelet. A plastic bag containing shoelaces. My mother’s handwriting. A Styrofoam cup.
Someone saying, “You’re lucky.”
Someone else saying, “Not again.”
A woman I do not recognize holding my hand while I die.

At one platform, a woman in my hoodie waits alone. Same scar beside her mouth. Same bitten fingernails. Same face. Older. Maybe. She places her palm against the glass. Black ink.
DON’T GET OFF.
The train begins moving before I can reach her. Her face changes. She pounds against the window. The platform disappears.

When I turn around, the old man is sitting across from me again.
“You saw her.”
He says it without accusation.
“Who was she?”
He shrugs.
“Was she me?”
He begins humming.
I hate him for that.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

•••

My first treatment center appears outside. It burned down eleven years ago. Tonight every window is lit. Twenty-two-year-old me stands by the entrance in hospital socks. Arms folded. Waiting. I remember detox. Sweating through sheets. Hearing my dead dog barking in the hallway. Calling my mother at dawn. Begging her to come. She said she was on her way. She never came. Except she did. I remember her coat. I remember falling asleep against the passenger window. I remember her hand on my knee. I remember waiting alone until noon. I remember both.

My younger self looks up at the train. Her lips move. This time I hear her. Not through the glass. Inside my own mouth.
“You missed your stop.”
The words come out in my voice.
I cover my mouth.

The old man smiles.
Not because he is cruel.
Because he remembers.

•••

The air changes. Hotter. Wet. Metallic. Old pennies. Scorched sugar. My body knows before I do.
“No.”
The woman in red is young again.
Silver shoes.
Broken strap.
The boy is sixteen.
The old man watches me.

The train slows. Outside, yellow streetlight collects on bare concrete. Chain-link. Bodies sleeping against buildings. Skid Row. Before the tents. Before the outreach vans. Before Narcan came in bright plastic shells. Before anyone I loved learned how to say harm reduction.

The doors open. There I am. Seventeen. Bones sharp beneath a hoodie two sizes too big. Bent spoon. Bic lighter. Three people beside me. Two dead before thirty. One before twenty-one. I remember every one of their funerals. I remember none of their birthdays.

My younger self cups one hand around the flame. I know this night. I know the hospital. I know the charcoal. I know my mother crying beside the bed. I know the bill she could not pay. I know the promises afterward. I know the next relapse. And the next. And the next. I know every road leading away from this wall. I know every road leading back.

The old man says, “This is your stop.”

My younger self looks up. She can see me. For a while, neither of us moves. Then she laughs. Quietly. Mine.

“You always say that.”
I walk toward the doors.

“Don’t.”
She looks back down at the spoon.
“Please.”

Her face changes. Not dramatically. Just enough. For one second she is older. My age. Then twenty-two. Then ten. Then my father. Then me again.

“You’re late,” she says.
“For what?”
She smiles.

The doors begin closing. I step onto the platform. Inside the train, the old man stands. For the first time. He puts his hand against the glass. Black ink across his palm.
2:17

I step toward him.
“What does that mean?”

His mouth moves. The train is already leaving. I cannot hear him. The last thing I see is the empty seat beside him. Then there are no tracks.

•••

The street is empty. My younger self is gone. So are the others. No spoon. No lighter. No bodies. The wall behind me is blank. I look down at my hands. There is black ink across my palm.
2:17 A.M.

Underneath:
AGAIN

A streetlight flickers.
Darkness.
Not long.
Long enough.

•••

Morning. Vinyl mattress. Sun through cheap blinds. A cart squeaks somewhere in the hallway. Someone laughs. Someone asks when breakfast starts. I lie still. Same room. Same dresser. Same evacuation plan. The clock says 7:42. My discharge papers are gone. I walk into the hallway barefoot. The nurse from last night stands behind the desk. Relief rises so fast it hurts.

“You.”
She looks up.
Polite smile.
“Can I help you?”
“You discharged me.”
She tilts her head.
“I just got here.”
“No.”
“My shift started ten minutes ago.”

The posters on the walls are wrong. Different colors. Different fonts. The counselor running morning group is somebody I have never seen. A patient walks past carrying a welcome folder. The logo is almost right.

“What day is it?”
He tells me.
Three weeks earlier.
My first day here.
Again.

I return to my room. Dresser. Bathroom. Trash. Nothing. I put my hands into the pockets of the hoodie hanging from the bedpost. Paper. A Metro ticket. Union Station. Stamped 2:17 A.M.
On the back:
ONE TRANSFER REMAINING

Something hums beneath the building.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

I walk to the window. Los Angeles is bright outside. Palm trees. Traffic. Blue sky. The city looking innocent because the sun is up. My reflection stares back. For a moment, she is exactly right. Then I raise my hand. She doesn’t. Behind her is an empty subway car. The old man sits beneath the fluorescent lights. The woman in red beside him. The sleeping boy. One empty seat. My seat.
The old man lifts his palm.
HOME.

My reflection smiles. Not at me. At somebody standing behind me. I do not turn around. Outside, the city flickers. For half a second there is no Los Angeles. Only tunnel. Tracks. Dark. Then morning.

The clock clicks backward.
7:42.
7:41.
7:40.

The humming continues beneath the floor.

Three notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.

And I understand, finally, why every question has felt wrong. Not where does the train go. Not what year is it. Not how do I get out. Something in the glass moves closer. My reflection presses her palm against mine. Her skin should stop at the window. It doesn’t. For one second, I can feel the heat of her hand.
She whispers:
“You never left.”

The clock continues backward.
6:13.
5:02.
3:41.
2:18.

Then stops.
The whole building becomes quiet.
My reflection looks past me again.
This time, her smile disappears.
2:17.

Somewhere very close, the doors open. I smell hot concrete. Aerosol. Old pennies. And beneath it all, popcorn butter. My mother says my name from a room that burned down eleven years ago. My father starts humming. The city goes dark.

In the window, the train is waiting. Its doors are open. The empty seat is no longer empty. Someone is sitting in it. Hood up. Head down. Discharge papers folded into quarters in her pocket.

Trying not to look like somebody leaving something behind.