Dear Brother
Dear Brother,
You know I was always afraid to answer a call. It's not that you managed to race me to the rotary phone. I let you believe that, slowing down on purpose.
Now that you're gone, I stand here laughing through my tears, remembering the tomfoolery. Growing up with you, my younger brother, was the best childhood anyone could have. Yes, we did fight a lot and snickered when the other got chastised by dad, or mom. But I wouldn't have had it any other way. Ever.
Brother, you always raced ahead, like the Virar fast local, even as I lagged behind like an all-stops train. It was also why I stand here today. The fateful night of 1st Jan.
The world was getting ready to ring in the new year when the other ring startled us-- the phone ring. While rest of the family slept, I awoke and, somehow, answered the phone. That was the last I, or anyone else, heard from you.
When the police called the next morning, I could sense the rising dread on dad's face. The journey to the station where we found your mortal remains was punctuated with sudden gasps of breath, a lot of praying, and forcing ourselves to stay positive.
You had fallen off a train, they said, although that was never confirmed. Far more sinister causes came to mind. None could bring you back. What was confirmed, for sure, was the fact that we had a gaping hole now. In our family and in our hearts.
This morning, mum called, and I dragged my feet to the phone. I knew why she had called, and as always, I was afraid to answer it.
Rest in peace.
A Home Unfinished
A Home Unfinished
January 20, 2025
For Joseph
Once a builder with OCD
Began constructing his home
Instead of laying the foundation
And then beginning the framing
He worked on each four foot section
Starting in the corner
Until it was complete
Before he began the next
Four foot section
This would take time
He knew
But it was his way
And that was all that mattered
Until he ran out of money
Having only completed one wall
It was magnificent
But it was only one finished wall
And not a house
It took years before
The builder could return
To his project
Years of overgrowth
Wind and water exposure
But the wall held firm
Perhaps this wall
Was all he really required
Perhaps a wall can be a home
Seventy years have since passed
The wall remains intact
The builder is since deceased
Many have come
To visit a testament
Of unusual ingenuity
The builder is barely remembered
But the wall is forever so
Perfect, but never complete
The Whispering Deep
I’d been desperate when I took the job. The fishing boat was small and ragged, much like its crew, but it promised three square meals and a paycheck, so I boarded with little hesitation. The captain, a wiry man named Arlen, met me at the dock. His handshake was firm, his eyes distant, and his words few. “Welcome aboard,” he muttered, his gaze fixed on the horizon as though it held answers to some unknown question.
The first few days were uneventful, though the crew’s peculiarities became increasingly apparent. Captain Arlen spent most of his time in the wheelhouse, his hands gripping the wheel as if it were the only thing anchoring him to this world. He stared straight ahead, his lips moving soundlessly, his expression blank. Waves crashed, gulls cried, and storms brewed on the horizon, but he never flinched, never seemed to notice anything outside his cabin. There had been no accidents yet, but I doubted he was the reason for that.
Then there was Cole, the fisher. A mountain of a man with calloused hands and a voice like gravel, he was the kind of person who commanded attention without trying. He didn’t speak much, and when he did, his words were clipped and final. On most nights, he kept to himself, tending to the nets or sharpening his knives. But on the nights of a new moon, I’d catch him standing at the bow, staring out to sea. His shoulders would be tense, his breath steady, and his eyes fixed on something I couldn’t see. Once, I followed his gaze and thought I saw a faint glow in the water—a shimmering reflection of a full moon that shouldn’t have been there. When I asked him about it, he simply said, “The Leviathan.”
He said it like a fact, like the tide or the wind. “You’ll see it one day,” he added, then returned to his silent vigil.
The last crew member was the navigator, Ewan. If the captain was distant and Cole was unsettling, Ewan was something else entirely. He never left the lowest deck, a cramped, damp space that reeked of salt and mildew. His cabin was filled with strange books—volumes with spines cracked and pages stained, written in languages I couldn’t decipher. His tools were archaic: a battered sextant, a compass whose needle spun lazily, and maps that seemed more decorative than functional. Yet somehow, we always reached our destination.
What unsettled me most about Ewan was how he navigated. He never communicated with the captain, never surfaced to check the stars or the sun. Yet, every time we set sail, we ended up exactly where we needed to be. I’d asked him once how he did it, and he’d merely smiled, his teeth too white against his gaunt face. “The sea knows,” he said cryptically, his fingers tracing symbols in the air. “And it whispers to those who listen.”
One night, I found myself on deck during one of Cole’s moonless vigils. The sea was calm, the air thick with tension. Cole stood at the bow, his silhouette sharp against the starlit sky. I hesitated, then approached, my boots scuffing against the wooden planks. He didn’t turn, didn’t acknowledge me until I stood beside him.
“What are you looking for?” I asked.
“Not looking. Waiting,” he replied, his voice low. “It’s out there. Watching. The Leviathan doesn’t just swim; it’s… aware.”
“What is it?”
He didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he pointed to the water. I followed his finger and felt my breath catch. The sea shimmered, rippling unnaturally. The glow was faint at first, then grew brighter, pulsating like a heartbeat. Shapes moved within it—vast, shadowy figures that defied logic. I blinked, and the vision was gone, leaving only the dark, empty sea.
“You’ll see it clearer next time,” Cole said, turning away.
After that, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the boat was a trap, a lure cast into the depths to draw something unimaginable. The crew’s oddities weren’t quirks; they were symptoms of something far greater. The captain’s vacant stare, Cole’s Leviathan, Ewan’s cryptic whispers—they were pieces of a puzzle I wasn’t sure I wanted to solve.
As the days passed, the atmosphere grew heavier. The sea’s whispers became louder, a symphony of murmurs that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. Shadows moved beneath the waves, too large and too deliberate to be schools of fish. Ewan’s cryptic drawings covered the walls of his cabin, lines and symbols that seemed to shift when I looked away.
Then, one night, the storm came. The sky split open, rain lashing against the deck as waves rose like walls. The captain stood in the wheelhouse, his knuckles white against the wheel. Cole manned the nets, his eyes wild, his shouts lost in the wind. I went below to find Ewan, but his cabin was empty, his books scattered, his maps soaked.
When I returned to the deck, I saw it. The Leviathan. It rose from the sea, its form indescribable, its presence overwhelming. It wasn’t just a creature; it was a force, an entity that defied comprehension. Its eyes—if they could be called that—locked onto me, and I felt my mind unravel. My very being laid out for the sea to wash away in it’s salty grasp.
The storm ended as suddenly as it began. The Leviathan vanished, leaving no trace. The crew was silent, their faces pale, their gazes distant. No one spoke of what we’d seen, but I knew it had changed us.
The next morning, Ewan had returned, soaked but unbothered, his usual cryptic smile in place. The captain resumed his vacant steering, and Cole muttered prayers to the sea. Life aboard the boat continued, but nothing felt the same.
And me? I’m still here, trying to piece together the fragments of my sanity. The sea whispers to me now, and I’m beginning to understand its language. I fear what it’s trying to tell me.
Hello again dear reader and welcome back to another short story of mine! I didn't really go out of my comfort zone for this one but I hope you enjoyed reading it! As always, have a good day/night!
Let me feel alive
Can't breathe
Can't wait
Can't talk
it's a big mistake
Wake me up
Set me free
Break me up
Shatter my cage
Tell me this ends today
Tell me I'm no longer stuck in my head
Tell me I didn't wish I was dead
Tell me a truth
Tell me a lie
Just tell me I'll stop dying inside
Give me an instant
Give me a way
To make a difference
To make a change
Not for the world
No, just for me
Let me create my own reality
Bring me the hope
Bring me the flame
Let me feel alive again
Set me free
Break my chains
Let me feel alive today
Let me feel
alive
today.
Control the Perception of Your Reality
Sit down and shut up
Do not doubt anything
Proceed exactly as you’re told
For we control everything
The government values obedience
Conform without question
Stay in lockstep with society
There’s no freedom of expression
Change starts with self awareness
Defy the foundations of normality
Begin to think and act for yourself
Be free to create your own reality
The rulers demand ideological compliance
But self awareness occurs from cultivated thought
We need to stay sovereign amongst the chaos
Or the fight to be free will be for naught
Daughters’ Love
They wake with light, two sparks so bright,
In their eyes, worlds of wonder and delight.
Hand in hand, they lead me on,
To lands unknown, at the break of dawn.
With laughter wild, they chase the breeze,
Climbing high, as if the trees
Hold secret whispers just for them—
My heart beats loud as their little hymn.
Through starlit dreams, their voices ring,
Tiny adventures in everything.
They hold my heart, fierce and free,
Two souls bound, forever with me.
© 2024 A.M. Roberts. All rights reserved.
Shhh! I’ve got a secret.
Shhh! I’ve got a secret.
November 03, 2024
Two years of talking
Two years of promises
Nobody has ever offered
To limit government
Or expand rights for all
Every cycle begins the same
Lots of rhetoric
Lots of name calling
Neither freedom nor liberty
Gain during the process
This is by design
This is a distraction
The natural path is that of erosion
Of rights and choice
By tyranny and force
No matter who wants the job
Thousands more want the power
And the money, and the fame
It will always be this way
Because it always has
The Last Train Home
"Better late than never," my grandmother used to say, usually when I'd show up hours after I'd promised to visit, bearing apologetic takeout and excuses about traffic. She'd welcome me with the same warm smile regardless of time, as if my presence alone made up for any tardiness. I never thought those words would end up saving my life.
The digital display at Carlyle Station read 11:57 PM as I sprinted down the stairs, messenger bag slapping against my hip. The last train home left at midnight – it always had, ever since the line opened in 1943. My footsteps echoed through the nearly empty station, bouncing off worn tile walls that had witnessed eight decades of commuters.
I shouldn't have stayed so late at work, shouldn't have let Marcus talk me into "just one more review" of the quarterly reports. But that's what senior associates at Preston & Gray did – we worked until our eyes burned and our dreams turned into spreadsheets. Besides, I'd caught the last train plenty of times before.
The platform was empty except for an elderly woman in a red peacoat, sitting primly on one of the wooden benches. She was reading a book bound in faded blue leather, its pages yellow with age. As I approached, catching my breath, she looked up and smiled. Something about her seemed familiar, though I couldn't place why.
"Cutting it close," she said, marking her place with a tasseled bookmark.
"Story of my life." I checked my phone: 11:59. "At least I made it."
She tilted her head, studying me with unusual intensity. "Did you?"
Before I could ask what she meant, the fluorescent lights flickered. Wind gusted through the station, carrying the distinctive rumble of an approaching train. But something was off about the sound – it was deeper, more mechanical than the usual electric whine of modern subway cars.
The train that emerged from the tunnel wasn't the sleek silver one I rode every day. This was something from another era entirely: a massive steel beast painted in deep green, its brass fittings gleaming despite the harsh station lighting. Steam – actual steam – hissed from somewhere beneath its wheels.
I blinked hard, certain I was hallucinating from too many hours staring at Excel sheets. But the train remained, as solid and real as the platform beneath my feet. The doors were different too – not the automatic sliding ones I was used to, but heavy manual ones that swung outward with a sound like distant thunder.
"Last train," the woman in red said, rising from her bench. "Are you coming?"
I hesitated. Every instinct honed by years of city living screamed that this was wrong. But I needed to get home, and this was clearly *a* train, even if it wasn't the one I expected. Besides, the woman seemed completely unfazed, as if Victorian-era steam engines regularly passed through Carlyle Station just before midnight.
"I don't think this is my usual train," I said weakly.
She laughed – a warm, familiar sound that tugged at my memory. "No, it isn't. This one's special. It only comes when someone needs to make a different kind of journey."
As if to emphasize her point, the station lights flickered again, and the temperature dropped several degrees. The steam from the train took on shapes that almost looked like faces.
"What kind of journey?"
"The kind that changes everything that comes after." She held out her hand. "But you have to choose to take it. Nothing is inevitable until midnight."
I checked my phone again, but the screen was black. All the clocks in the station had stopped at 11:59.
The woman's outstretched hand remained steady. Something about her eyes reminded me of my grandmother – the same mix of wisdom and mischief, of patience and urgency.
I took her hand.
The inside of the train was nothing like the sterile, plastic interior I was used to. The walls were paneled in dark wood, inlaid with intricate patterns that seemed to move when viewed directly. Gas lamps cast a warm, golden light that softened every edge. The seats were upholstered in deep red velvet, showing no signs of wear despite their apparent age.
We were the only passengers.
"Sit," the woman said, gesturing to a seat by the window. "We have a long way to go."
"Where exactly are we going?"
"That depends entirely on where you need to be." She settled into the seat across from me, smoothing her coat with practiced elegance. "Tell me, Emily Harrison, when was the last time you were truly happy?"
I opened my mouth to answer, then stopped. Not because she knew my name – though I hadn't told her – but because I couldn't remember. Work had consumed my life so gradually that I hadn't noticed happiness slipping away, like a tide retreating one wave at a time.
"I used to paint," I said finally. "Before law school, before the firm. I had a little studio apartment with great light, and I'd spend whole weekends just... creating."
"And now?"
"Now I have a corner office and a view of the city I never have time to look at." The words tasted bitter. "I haven't touched a paintbrush in five years."
The train lurched into motion, but instead of the familiar forward surge, it felt like we were moving in all directions at once. Through the window, I saw not the dark tunnel walls but a rapid succession of scenes: my childhood home, my college dorm, my first apartment. Places I'd left behind, moments I'd chosen to leave.
"Time isn't as linear as people think," the woman said, opening her book again. "Neither are choices. Every decision creates branches, possibilities that continue to exist even when we don't follow them."
"Like parallel universes?"
"More like paths in a garden. Some are well-trodden, others overgrown. But they're all still there, waiting to be walked again."
The scenes outside the window slowed, focusing on my old studio apartment. Through the large windows, I could see an easel silhouetted against the setting sun. My heart ached at the sight.
"What is this? Some kind of Christmas Carol situation? Are you going to show me how miserable my life will be if I keep working sixty-hour weeks?"
She smiled that familiar smile again. "No, dear. I'm showing you that it's never too late to find a different path. Better late than never, as someone wise once said."
The words hit me like a physical force. I knew then why she seemed so familiar – she had my grandmother's smile, my grandmother's way of tilting her head when she was about to say something important.
"You're not really here, are you?" I whispered. "You died two years ago."
"I'm as here as you need me to be." She reached across and patted my hand. Her touch was warm and solid. "Death doesn't mean what most people think it does. Neither does time. Or choice. Or art."
The train slowed to a stop, though I hadn't felt it braking. Outside the window was my studio apartment, exactly as I'd left it five years ago. But it wasn't a memory – there was fresh paint on the palette, wet brushes in the jar by the easel.
"This is impossible."
"Improbable," she corrected. "There's a difference. The impossible can't happen. The improbable simply hasn't happened yet."
"So what, I just... step off the train and go back to my old life? Abandon my career, my responsibilities?"
"No. You step off the train and into a life where you never abandoned your art. Where you found a way to balance passion with practicality. Where you remembered that success isn't measured in billable hours."
I looked out the window again. The apartment looked so inviting, so full of possibility. I could almost smell the oil paints, feel the texture of canvas under my fingers.
"What about my job? My apartment? My life?"
"All still there, in one version of now. But there are other versions, other nows. The choice is yours."
"And if I stay on the train?"
"Then we continue to the next station. And the next. Until you find the path you need."
I stood, my legs shaky. The train door swung open silently, revealing my old studio exactly as I remembered it – but alive, waiting, possible.
"Will I remember this? Remember you?"
"You'll remember what you need to. The important parts. The parts that help you paint."
I took a step toward the door, then turned back. "Was it really you? All those times you said 'better late than never' – were you preparing me for this?"
She smiled my grandmother's smile one last time. "Time isn't linear, dear. Maybe I said it because I knew you'd be here tonight. Or maybe you're here tonight because I said it. Does it matter?"
"I suppose not." I took another step toward the door. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet. Thank me when you finish your first painting. I have a feeling I'll know when that is."
The studio air was warm and thick with the smell of linseed oil and possibility. As I stepped off the train, I heard her voice one last time: "Remember, Emily – art isn't about making perfect things. It's about making things perfectly yours."
The train pulled away silently, taking with it any last doubts about whether this was real or dream or something in between. I walked to the easel, where a blank canvas waited. The palette beside it held fresh paint in all my favorite colors – cadmium yellow, alizarin crimson, ultramarine blue.
I picked up a brush. It felt like coming home.
Somewhere, a clock began striking midnight. But I was already painting, and time – linear or not – had ceased to matter.
In the morning, I would find that my resignation letter had somehow already been sent to Preston & Gray. My expensive downtown apartment would have transformed into this sun-filled studio. My closet full of tailored suits would become shelves of art supplies and half-finished canvases.
But that was all in a morning that hadn't happened yet. For now, there was only this moment, this canvas, this brush. And on the palette, mixed with the paint, a single red tassel – one that had once marked a page in a blue leather book.
I smiled and began to paint, knowing that somewhere, my grandmother was smiling too. Better late than never, indeed.
Years later, when people asked about my mid-career switch from law to art, I would tell them different versions of the story. Sometimes it was a simple tale of burnout and brave choices. Sometimes it involved a mysterious train and an even more mysterious woman in red.
But in every version, I kept one detail constant: how it felt to pick up that brush again, to feel the weight of possibility in my hand. Because that's the thing about art, and life, and choices – they're never quite what you expect them to be, but they're exactly what you need them to be.
And sometimes, if you're very lucky, they come with a grandmother's wisdom, wrapped in an impossible moment just before midnight.