The Woman on the Train: Part 1

Fiction

Photo by Tomas Anton Escobar on Unsplash

You’re receiving this newsletter because you signed up for Writer’s Notebook. This is a post from my Fiction LaunchPad newsletter. Keep watch for my non-fiction writing and Abstract Art. You can always adjust what newsletters you receive by going to the Manage subscription on your profile page while on my Substack. But I hope you stick with all three. You’ll enjoy it here!

In August 2023, I wrote a fiction short story (500 words) on a real-life incident portrayed by

Terry Freedman

. That story was titled “The Woman on the Train”.

At the time, I thought I could probably expand greatly on the story. I had a ton of ideas of how I could do it. A few of my subscribers threw in some ideas in the comments section too.

I finally got time to work on it and it has ballooned to over 14,000 words. It’s still a work in progress for the rest of the story plus the ending. But I want to have people start reading the whole thing.

I’m going to start posting each part every few weeks.

If you read the first version, this part adds a lot of additional text so you’ll definitely want to read this whole thing.

I have no idea how many “Parts” this will end up being. That’s part of the trouble, trying to figure out where to cut each part at.

I hope you enjoy this story and I appreciate any feedback.

I was on the train early Saturday morning. It was seven a.m. The skies were gloomy and it looked like it would be overcast most of the day. I wasn’t supposed to be on this train. But I was. I was going to points unknown.

Then, she appeared. A young woman carrying a book bag. Her long brown hair swept over her shoulders and down to her waist. She came through the train doors and settled in a seat next to the door. I was on the opposite side of her. I looked her way. She was wearing a blue pantsuit. As I looked away toward the right, I noticed an older gentleman with glasses looking intently at her. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her. I wondered if he was enamored with her looks. Then he reached into his bag. I started to get up. He produced a cell phone. He typed something into it and then put it back in his bag. He was wearing a brown jacket. He had gray hair and blue jeans on. I sat back down.

Then he noticed I was watching him. He looked directly at me. He nodded toward me. I wasn’t sure what to do so I looked away. I looked to my left and besides all of the other riders, I saw another guy who looked out of the ordinary. He had a backpack on and was looking intently at the woman. I looked back and forth between the two guys. They looked at each other. Glasses guy was mouthing something to backpack guy. I couldn’t read his lips.

The train moved along on its merrily way. When the train came to a stop at the next stop, people started piling off. The young woman stayed seated. The two guys moved further down the train car. I stayed put.

As the train started moving again, there was an endless number of announcements coming across the speaker system. I was not used to all of this having been from the United States.

The train made another few stops and we were now surrounded by many people. A lot of them had to stand and grab one of the pulls to steady themselves from falling down.

I noticed glasses guy moving closer to the young woman now. I looked to the left and saw backpack guy still in his original location. All of the sudden the train came to a screeching halt and stopped abruptly. The sound was deafening. The lights went out briefly and then came back on. I got up and someone pushed me. I was now on the floor. I looked around attentive to finding glasses guy. He was wearing some distinctive black boots and I tried to find them. I saw him walking toward where the woman was seated. I could see that she was still there. I looked back through the legs of the other people to see backpack guying approaching the woman too.

I quickly got up and pushed the people in front of me toward glasses guy. They were shocked when they got pushed. This caused mass hysteria. The people on my left started yelling. Thankfully, backpack guy retreated. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do to get him back.

“What are you doing?” the people said to me.

“Someone pushed me down. I lost my balance getting back up. I’m sorry,” I said lying.

Glasses guy looked point-blank at me. He was reaching into his book bag again. The antennas on my ears shot up. I didn’t know what his plan was. I watched him. I turned around to look at backpack guy. He was missing. I looked around all the people. I couldn’t find him.

“Did anyone see the guy with the backpack?” I asked.

“I think he went to the other train car,” said a man with a red ball cap.

Glasses guy was now using his cell phone again. He was texting.

After about thirty minutes, the train started back up. The next two stops eliminated most of the standing room only crowd.

With the train moving again, everyone stayed in their appropriate spaces.

Everything changed when we got to the next stop.

The train stopped. The doors opened. The young woman stood up and started for the door. Glasses guy started toward the woman. I got up and stood between them.

“Hey man, what are you doing?” I said as I intervened.

As I pushed him back, the bag he had fell to the ground. A small black gun shot across the train floor. Backpack guy re-appeared and ran toward me. The young woman exited the train. I followed closely behind her. Backpack guy reached down and grabbed the gun. Quickly, I turned around and grabbed the gun, kicked him in the groin, and took the gun out of his hands. I took it with me. The young woman had a head-start on me but I was able to catch up to her. I found a trash bin and dumped the gun.

As we exit the Sloan Square Station, I’m still hot on her tail. I can’t let her get out of my sight. There’s a booth set up with someone selling flowers. My senses are activated. I’m looking all around as I walk behind her. There are a bunch of guys on a bench in front of the stores as we walk down the sidewalk. There’s a couple of red phone booths. I didn’t even know they still had those. We got rid of those a long time ago. I guess England is different than the United States.

“Checking in,” I say.

“What took you so long?” the man on the other line says.

“I had some complications.”

“Bad?”

“Two goons. One with a gun.”

“Is she alright?”

“Yes. I dislodged the gun from the guy and I slowed the other guy down.”

“Be careful Patrick. I told you this was going to be dangerous.”

“Don’t worry. I got this.”

“She hasn’t caught onto you yet, has she?”

“No. She’s safely back in her dorm room now.”

“Let’s keep it that way,” he said as he hung up the phone.

I ventured back to my hotel room to rest. It had been an eventful day. I sat down in the chair at the desk and contemplated my next steps. There was a bodega down the street and I got some dinner. Later that night, there was a knock on the door. I immediately got up from the bed, grabbed my gun and went to the door. As I held the gun in my right hand behind my back, I looked through the peephole. There was a short woman outside. She kept looking around. I didn’t see anyone else. I hoped she would just go away. Then she knocked again. I watched and waited. My senses were piqued. My finger rested on the safety on my gun. I was ready and willing to put up a fight. Finally, she left. Hopefully, she had the wrong room. The rest of the night was uneventful and I fell to sleep quickly, albeit with my gun on the nightstand, within easy grabbing distance.

END PART 1

Conclusion

I hope you liked this part of story. There is a lot more to come. It’s fun to finally get back into doing a long extended fiction story. Hopefully reading this will make you want more!

Thank you for reading. Let me know what you think.

If you know of someone who likes reading fiction, please feel free to share this link.

Until next time, happy reading!

-Matt