At that moment his right leg seemed to cramp and twitch. He lifted his shoe from the ground. Then I watched, wide-eyed, as he turned around. I was frozen to the spot, my legs shaking violently, and I heard an awful noise that could only have come from me (why wasn’t I wearing trousers?). My lips trembled. I didn’t know what to say. I was waiting for him to step down from his post and grab me. But as soon as he recognised me beneath my cap he greeted me with a warm smile. My lips twitched again as if there was something I desperately wanted to say, but instead I merely shook my head meekly.
‘Are you all right?’
I nodded and continued walking over to him. Most likely he was lonely, had no one to share his secrets with.
As soon as I’d walked my body past the guard, my limbs relaxed and demanded that I run. There’s nothing more painful than trying to control that kind of instinct. I lifted each foot stiffly before putting it back down again. One step at a time, I kept going onwards. Once far enough away, I tried going a bit faster, but I was still scared that he might see. I imagined him watching me walk away. He’d just started his shift so he hadn’t seen the girl come in, otherwise he would have realised that the scream must have come from my place. After me like a rocket. Kick me to the ground. Twist my arm behind my back. Pin me down.
A taxi pulled up. I threw my suitcase into the boot and slid into the back, slamming the door shut behind me. Suddenly, I was paralysed.
The driver turned around. ‘Where to?’
‘The train station, quick,’ I gasped.
The taxi slipped along street after street and up onto a trunk road, flying along like a motorboat on a wide stretch of water. I looked back a few times to make sure no one was following before removing the battery from my phone and throwing it, along with my cap, out of the car window.
Outside the light was more beautiful than any I’d ever seen and the people more kind and gentle. They were like innocent children running in a field of flowers, singing and dancing. I imagined shaving my beard at the train station, changing into my suit. The plan was working and soon my transformation would be complete.
On the Run I
I got to the station entrance with only a minute to spare before they would be closing the platform gates and in front of me was an endless line of army recruits waiting to go through the security checks to enter the station. I thought about cutting in, but decided against it. What was the point? The passengers would be passing through the gates like the last drops of sand in a funnel and the staff would be making their last checks, walking up and down the aisles, locking the doors.
When I was finally inside the station terminal, I pulled my suitcase through to the waiting room for confirmation that my plan was falling apart if nothing else. But the passengers were still sitting around, the train number was still hanging at the ticket gate. Then I became aware of the announcement blasting over the station loudspeakers.
Delayed. My train.
Fortune was smiling on me.
I dumped the T-shirt, shorts and shoes in the toilet and changed into my shirt and suit, fastening my belt and tying the laces of my leather shoes. I combed my hair and applied some gel, sprayed a few spurts of cologne and put on my glasses. With a slim leather document folder under my arm and my suitcase behind me, I made my way back to the waiting room. My shoulders kept slumping involuntarily and I tried ordering them to straighten up. I felt awkward. But then I caught sight of a middle-aged man watching me and I didn’t feel so bad. In his eyes I was an educated young person with a steady job. We started chatting and he asked what I did for a living.
‘I work for an IT firm,’ came my reply. And I sounded convincing. He looked ready to give me his daughter’s hand in marriage, if he had one.
The noise in the waiting room grew louder. I went in, patted the banister and looked as angry as the rest of them. We had to wait considerably longer for two members of staff to come striding down the corridor and open the gate. I rushed forward, but then turned back around. There was no need. There was no one there: no police, no security, not even anyone from the railways. I waited for the rest of the passengers to pass through before sauntering behind them, as if shepherding a flock of ducks along the corridor, down the steps and onto the platform. A green train lay in wait, breathing out an air of faraway freedom. I pretended to be reluctant to board and climbed up into the second carriage.
Everywhere people were standing on seats, shoving their luggage into the overhead racks, or else edging their way around each other carrying steaming cartons of instant noodles.
I waited for them to settle and walked down the corridor towards the three last rows of empty seats. In the middle of the carriage I passed a poor farmer, his brow covered in sweat, his hands shaking. His clothes were wet, as if he’d just washed them, and he leaned on his side, groaning. A young girl tried to give him a bottle of patchouli oil, but he grimaced and shook his head. He was probably dying. I sat down in the last row.
But the train didn’t leave. The conductor retreated into her cubbyhole and locked herself in.
I wanted to go over to her and say, ‘I was on time. What about you guys? Do you know how serious a delay like this is?’
After a while, the train began moving away noiselessly. Or at least I felt a breeze. But then I looked out and saw the train beside ours leave the station. An optical illusion. It felt like a knife twisting in my chest. Any second now, I was going to explode. Trapped. Like a man stubbornly pushing his cart through the mud as it rained.
The platform outside my window was empty, silent. If the police came to take me away, I decided, I’d shout, ‘Thank you. Thank you railway department and thank you train!’
Kong Jie’s mother must have contacted the police by now. School gets out at 5.00 and it was 6.00. The police would be able to trace Kong Jie to my place using satellites. I wish I’d never done it. I could have taken her mobile with me, dumped it somewhere. Why did I have to let the signal go cold at my house?
I tried to sit myself down and make myself believe, just as Kong Jie’s mother would still be clinging to the picture of her daughter’s upcoming graduation, that it didn’t mean anything. She was probably out of battery or spending time with friends. ‘That daughter of mine has just forgotten to call. But I’ll give her a good talking-to when she gets home.’
I started counting. By the time I get to two hundred the train will have left, I said to myself. Six hundred. We were still at the same platform. Just as I had decided to get up and ask the steward if she could let me off the train, a long whistle broke the silence. I froze. Then pure joy, as if in that moment I’d become another person. The sun had nearly disappeared and the sky was turning a dark blue. Branches were retreating, houses receding, the moon was trailing behind us. The world was finally on the fucking move.
But suddenly I felt alarmed. I wasn’t leaving, I was cutting myself off. A forever goodbye.
So began my life on the run.
I fell asleep amid the train’s clanging.
I’m walking towards the security check with dread like a stone in my stomach. The old policeman pats me down and tells me to go, impatience in his voice. I want to raise my arms and hoot, but I sense one of the other officers looking up at me. A pair of young eyes filled with a frightening sense of duty. Sweeping searchlights. They come to a stop on my back – ten more steps to safety – and I keep walking under the heat of his suspicion.