The Train Violinist

The train was bound for somewhere far away. The sounds of the engine and the wheels, the chugging, were all anyone could hear for miles and miles until the violinist started to play.

Anthony heard it first while asleep, head leaned up against the window, slipping down every now and again to half-wake him with a jolt before he settled back again. He hadn’t been able to afford the bed car, but he had settled his belongings all around him to dissuade any new arrivals from sitting with him. The last two days had passed in a haze of cornfields, patchy hours of sleep, and occasionally getting up and walking around the car.

Murder on the Orient Express sat on the table in front of him. It was almost a joke, but he had thought now would be the time to finally catch up on it, a book he had half-read in high school. How many times would he make a cross-country train journey, anyway? But this Amtrak wasn’t half as glamorous as the Orient Express, and the cornfields outside his window were not the Alps. It had been a little easier to pretend while they were going through Utah.

But the violinist changed things. Woke him up from this half-aware stupor of traveling in a cramped seat. He put on his backpack, left his suitcase behind, and went in search of the music.

One thing was for sure, it wasn’t coming from the car he was in. It wove in and out, here louder, here quieter, but sound was odd that way. The next car was empty of violinists, and the next. The one after that was the dinner car, so Anthony sat down and ordered himself a steak. It was twenty-five dollars, and he laughed at himself, but he couldn’t regret it even though the steak was overdone a bit and smeared with A1 sauce because it hadn’t been salted correctly. He still felt like Hercule Poirot eating it.

Afterwards he kept moving through the cars. Towards the end of the train he couldn’t hear the violinist at all, so he doubled back. They had left cornfield country behind, and all he could see out the window now were hills and ridges and lightning streaking through half-dark, half-bright blue sky. The electricity in the air made the hair on his arms stand up.

In the car just before the dinner car, Anthony could hear the violinist as if they were standing right in front of him. For a moment, that was all he needed. He closed his eyes. He began to dance in the empty car, slow and awkwardly at first, but then he let go. It was the steak, he thought, and the electric air and the drama he had always craved but denied himself. Why should he? What was the use in not letting himself have what he wanted — not even letting himself want what he wanted?

He raised his head up, spread his arms, and greeted the sky through the metal roof of the train, and then he saw it. The door. The passage to the roof.

It was going to take some doing for someone who already wasn’t very tall. Anthony started to poke around. He found a small ladder in a storage area by the stairs, and hobbled it over to stand under the trapdoor. Then he climbed up into the sky.

The wind was so loud at first that it deafened him. He clung to the metal of the roof, eyes squinted shut, inching his way along the paneling. It was a moment before he was even able to hear the violin at all. But it was there, louder even than before, weaving its way through the wind and the scattered droplets of rain. Anthony opened his eyes. A flash of lightning lit the sky, and he saw the violinist.

A boy his own age, maybe a year or two older. His hair was wild and red, full of static electricity, haloing his head in orange fiery color. He sat cross-legged a few panels down, secure against the rail, playing with all his heart.

After a long time, he finished playing. He opened his eyes and saw Anthony and jumped.

“Hello,” said Anthony.

“Hello,” said the boy.

A silence. Anthony sat cross-legged to mirror him. “You play beautifully,” he said.

The boy grinned at him. “Feels right to be up here. I’m sure they’ll catch me in a few miles.”

“Where are you headed?” Anthony asked him.

“Omaha. You?”

“Chicago.” There was another short silence. “How long have you been up here?”

The boy shrugged. “A day or so? I packed some food. I’ve just been having myself a picnic. It’s very nice, really. I like to spend time on top of roofs. If I don’t for awhile, I start to go a little wild. I start to get bored. And really, why should I? When there’s violins and the sky looks like this and I can do anything in the world.”

For a long moment they looked out at the horizon. Anthony pulled his sweater closer around him.

“Play another tune,” he told the boy. “Play the lightning.”

The violinist began to play.