The Last Metro Ride

Prochaine station: nowhere

It's 1 AM on a Friday night in Montreal, and the metro is nearly empty. The train skates through the tunnels, the sound a steady rhythm that matches the beat of my heart. Across from me, a woman is crying quietly. She's holding a book in French, but her tears are universal.

I want to ask her what's wrong, but I don't. Instead, I watch as she wipes her eyes and tries to compose herself. The train stops at Lionel-Groulx, and she gets off without a word. I wonder if she's okay, if she found what she was looking for in that book.

But then I notice something on the seat where she was sitting. A bookmark, with a handwritten note: "La douleur est une île. On y naît seul, on y vit seul, on y meurt seul." Pain is an island. We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone.

But in that moment, on the metro, we weren't alone. We shared a space, a moment, a silent understanding. And maybe that's enough.