The Train to You

The 7:45 AM train was always packed, yet somehow, Mia always found herself sitting across from the same man.

He had dark, wavy hair, a sharp jawline, and always carried a worn-out paperback. Some days, he’d be engrossed in his book. Other days, he’d stare out the window, lost in thought. And every single day, Mia wondered what it would be like to talk to him.

One morning, in a burst of courage, she scribbled a note on a small piece of paper and, as she left her seat, slipped it into the pages of his book.

“What are you always reading?”

The next day, she held her breath as she took her seat. To her surprise, there was a note waiting for her, placed carefully on the seat across from her.

“It depends on the day. But today, it’s poetry. Do you like poetry?”

Her heart raced. She quickly wrote back.

“Only if it makes me feel something.”

And just like that, their silent rides turned into something more.

Each morning, a new note waited for her.

“What’s your favorite book?”

“Hard to pick. But I love stories where people find their way to each other.”

“Fitting. That seems to be our story, doesn’t it?”

One day, as the train screeched to a stop, she found a longer note waiting for her.

“I think I know you now in a way that words on paper can only express so much. But I’d like to hear your voice. Meet me at the last station today?”

Mia’s pulse pounded. The final station was twenty minutes away. She had never gotten off there before. But today, she did.

As the train doors slid open, she stepped onto the platform, searching the crowd. And then, she saw him—standing by a bench, holding a book in one hand and a note in the other.

He looked up, met her gaze, and smiled.

“I was starting to think you wouldn’t come,” he said.

Mia laughed, feeling the kind of warmth she had only read about in books. “I couldn’t miss the ending.”

He held out the book. “Then let’s make this the beginning instead.”

And in that moment, as the city bustled around them, Mia realized that sometimes, the best stories weren’t just found in books.

Sometimes, they were written between train stops.