This is a story.

My best friend’s uncle lived on a train for thirty years. He had a hammock hung up between two carts. There he would sway, weather permitting, and read. He loved to read, especially children’s books. All the classics, not longer than 20 or 30 pages. He loved the pictures, the words, the rhymes, all of it. He would read grown up things too, if he came across them. If a passenger happened to leave a book behind, or if someone gave him a book as a gift, he would devour it with a great appetite, and then he would sleep in his hammock, weather permitting.

My best friend’s uncle loved the idea. He thought it was nice that I would write him a story about his life, about the life he had imagined for himself, about the life he had never lived. My best friend’s uncle never stepped foot on a train. He had always wanted to. To take a train someplace, to see what it would be like, that was his dream. But he had a family to support, two kids and a wife are no joke. He was afraid if he stepped foot on a train he would never step off. Never. And what for? he thought. There is nothing you can’t find on a train. All you need can be found there, all and everything.

My best friend’s uncle recently passed away. They put him in a coffin that they put on a train with which they sent him across the country. He was on the train for a couple of weeks. When he came back home they wanted to take him off but couldn’t find the body. It had vanished mysteriously, not leaving a trace. Later, passengers would report sightings of a hammock made of mist, and a man sleeping in it. They swore they saw him waving at them as the train pulled into the station.

My best friend’s uncle thought it fun, thought it would be nice if he did do that after death. If he managed to come back as a ghost, to do that which he couldn’t in life. But he said, “I’d rather they burnt my body in a fire fueled by Beatles records.” He loved the Beatles, and was hoping that his body would meld with the melodies on those records, and he would forever sing them in the wind. He said he hoped it would be the song Strawberry Fields Forever that they’d sing the most, as that was his favorite one.

My best friend’s uncle was buried in a usual ceremony: no fire, no Beatles, and no train. I thought it sad. But to be fair he never told anyone about his wish, no one but me that is. My best friend’s uncle died a long time ago, long before I was born. On a train from somewhere to someplace I ran into him. We spoke at length about his life and death. He read me his favorite book, as Strawberry Fields Forever played in the background. He showed me his hammock. We waved at the people on the platforms together, as the train pulled into the stations.

My best friend’s uncle said he’d stay on the train from somewhere to someplace until it stopped running. He was hoping that it wouldn’t for a long time. He said, “I recently got a letter from your mother. She’s well. She says the bottom of the ocean is more beautiful than she could have imagined. She said, “I miss my little fish, but they’ve surely grown by now. If you happen to see one, tell him or her that I don’t plan on coming back. Tell them they need not worry about second chances.” I don’t know what she means by it, do you?”

No, I said, not really. Maybe she meant that life is a story, and that after it is done there is nothing else: no bottom of the ocean, no train, and certainly no hammocks. Maybe she means that all those things are here, now, and can never be there: no second chances, no second lives. This is a story, the rest is simply the end.

-Jakob Lint.