The Photograph

She sat on the platform bench waiting for a train to arrive. Waiting to see her brother who left to start a new life twenty-five years ago. She brought a photograph of herself for him to have when he went back home. Stillness engulfed the station as she waited alone there. The hiss of an old steam train filled the quiet air as along the track it came like a dinosaur from the past and stopped at the station. A group of young soldiers disembarked to stretch their legs and grab some fresh air. One young soldier approached her. He was sixteen if he was a day. He smiled as he sat beside her. “You’re a pretty lady.” He said. “Thank you.” She replied. “Off to fight some battles? ” “Yes, but I am not really sure where. They say a lot of us might not be coming back” “That is sad.” She replied. “Especially when you have no one to think of you.” “You see I am an orphan and have no family or a girlfriend come to that. No one to think of me when the great battles come.” “Now that is sad, ” She said looking at him. Then she realized the photograph for her brother was in her handbag. She reached in and removed it. “Take this and think of me when your great battles come.” “I will keep it with me always. Now I must get back on the train.” As the train whistle blew. He waved goodbye as the steam engulfed him. Then the train was gone as quickly as it had come. The stillness that had engulfed the station now dissipated to. Suddenly there was noise everywhere. She looked around as if waking from a dream. She looked back down the tracks. The mournful hoot of the electric horn herald the arriving electric train. She watched it intensely as it slowed to stop at the station. Two passengers alighted, a man and a woman. Her brother and his wife. She greeted them with a smile, but her brother’s wife looked at her in shock as if she had seen a ghost. They hugged one another, and then left the station to go to her home. Arriving at her home her sister-in-law looked at her again. “Sorry if I look mystified when I look at you. I have something I must tell you. My grandfather before he died asked me to find any relatives to a lady in a photograph. It was given to him when he was leaving to go to war over seventy years ago. He carried it with him everywhere he went. He said the photograph protected him like a good luck charm. He swore one day to return it, but events made that impossible. He immigrated when the war was over and never got the chance. He wanted to let her family know of the kind deed she did” “But that does not explain the way you looked at me.” She removed the photograph and handed it to her. It was the photograph she had given the young soldier only hours before. 9 April 2009