I was woken up by an announcement from the conductor of the train.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it is now twelve o’clock,” the conductor said. “This will be the last announcement for the day. We are expecting to reach the midpoint of our journey by seven thirty in the morning. Please enjoy your night, and thank you for traveling with us.”

Taking a deep breath, I got up and sat at the edge of the bed. My cabin was completely dark, save for the occasional light coming in from the window. It had been more than two hours since I had come back to lie down and, luckily, the migraine I had been suffering during the afternoon seemed to have subsided.

When I was younger, I would often say that I really enjoyed traveling by train: feeling the movement over the tracks, watching the incredible landscapes passing by, enjoying the overall atmosphere on a train. Yet, traveling due to work tends to be a completely different experience. Excitement is replaced by exhaustion, more so considering the frequent trips across the country where one would only get brief moments of respite.

After turning on the small lamp over the bed, I opened the door to the small bathroom embedded into the room and washed my face in the sink. My mind wandered as I remembered meeting her earlier that day in the restaurant car. She was seating by herself next to a window, her brown hair tied with a dark blue ribbon, and her blue eyes captivated by the book she was reading, only moving away from it to take a sip from the cup of coffee in front of her.

On one of those occasions, she saw me sitting at the opposite table, with my own cup of coffee. She put away her book and asked me to join her, saying it would be great to have someone to converse with, as she had read that book at least a hundred times. I obliged and took the seat in front of her. We shared what the purpose of our respective trips was: I explained I was traveling for work, and she told me she was on her way to meet a relative. We discussed what we did for a living, what we liked doing in our free time. We talked about countless things for hours on end. I was surprised at myself, that I’d feel so captivated by someone I had just met.

By late afternoon I was starting to feel a migraine and had to excuse myself, much to my dismay. “I wish I could have continued talking to her for a while more,” I said as I dried my face.

Seeing how it was midnight, the dinner service would have ended already, and most of the people would have already returned to their cabins. But I wondered if she might still be at the restaurant car. I got changed and, after locking my cabin behind me, started walking in the direction of the car. I felt both nervous and a bit stupid. What was I expecting would happen? What was I even planning to say if she was, in fact, there when I arrived?

The path towards the car had never seemed so long. In fact, it seemed too long. There were only three cars between mine and the restaurant, but I had clearly crossed four cars at that point. Moreover, they had all begun to look exactly the same, even though the train company always made sure to alternate some decorations between the different cars. Thinking I could have been mistaken, I pressed on, but I was soon proved wrong when the number of cars I had crossed had surpassed the total number of cars that composed the train.

“What the hell?” I said.

Suddenly, I heard a voice from behind. “We are all trapped by our own decisions.”

I turned around and saw her in her green dress, carrying her book, and with a blank expression.

“W-What? What do you mean? What is going on?!” I asked.

“Words that were never said. The regret that comes from a bad choice. The shadow behind everyone’s mind: ‘what could have been?’” She slowly walked towards me, until she was standing right in front, her gaze fixed in mine. “And so, we run, fleeing from that voice that longs from something that we can never obtain,” she whispered.

Feeling a shiver running down my spine, I instinctively turned around and started running. I was breathing heavily, running through the cars I had just been through, in a desperate attempt to return to my own cabin. Along the way, I noticed that several cabin doors were now open, and managed to catch a glimpse of the people inside them. All of them were crying, their eyes fixed on something: an old man was sitting on a chair staring at a picture frame he was holding; a young woman, on her knees, leaning over her bed where several letters had been torn; a small boy curled on his bed, hugging his teddy bear.

None of them noticed me run past their cabins, and with each car I crossed, the scenes were similar. Yet, no matter how much I ran, I didn’t seem to reach my cabin, much like I had experienced before when attempting to go to the restaurant car. After ten cars, I came to a halt, exhausted.

Panting heavily I looked around and, once again, saw her in front of me, although this time I felt as if her expression was gloomier. “How did you-?”

“It’s no use,” she said. “You cannot outrun yourself.”

This time, she briefly looked behind me and started walking backwards, until she went through the door that led to the next car. Confused, I turned around and saw the lights of the car flickering, as they were being extinguished one by one starting from the far end of the car. It was as if a cold shadow was coming after me.

I started running in the direction she had walked towards. When I opened the door to the next car, I found myself outside of the train, on the back. I could see the tracks before me, but no ground beneath them. I was trapped. Whatever was chasing me and devouring the lights in the train would soon catch up and I had no place to run.

“Choose,” a voice whispered in my mind.

Hesitating, I looked behind me. No more lights remained in the train. I was out of time, so I made my choice and jumped out of the train.

I woke up in my hotel room, completely covered in sweat, and breathing heavily. Never had I had such a vivid dream.

Walking to the window I opened the curtains. It was still early in the morning, so there was not much traffic in the streets. “Ah, that’s right,” I thought. “Today is Saturday.”

As I took a shower I kept thinking about that dream, or was it a nightmare? Maybe the work had finally been taking its toll on me. I liked to believe that I could take on the world if I had to, but I often forgot that everyone has their limits. Even me.

It was eight o’clock, so I decided to go to the hotel restaurant and have breakfast. A waiter greeted me by the entrance and led me to a free table before asking me if I would like some coffee. I accepted his offer and he went to the kitchen to get the coffee pot.

While I waited, I had a look around the restaurant and saw a woman wearing a green dress with a dark blue ribbon on her head, reading a book by the window.