The subway incident

 I went down to the subway. The time was about eleven o'clock in the evening. As usual, there was a lot to do at work on Friday, which is why I came home so late. Very tired, I entered the last carriage. Ignoring everyone, I sat down on an empty seat, turned on the player at full volume and closed my eyes. Fortunately, it was necessary to go along one branch — however, to the very end.

I must have dozed off. When I woke up, the train had already stopped. I noticed that there was no one near me. Looking around, I saw that I was the only one in the carriage. This alarmed me, but then I looked into another carriage and calmed down. A large group was sitting there and discussing something. The train began to accelerate, and I finally calmed down. But then a song went through the player, followed by another one... I knew that we had a long commute between stations on the line, but it was only for a little over two minutes, and both songs lasted at least three minutes. The train was still traveling at the same speed.

I went to the glass between the carriages and looked at the company from the front carriage. They looked calm, but something about them seemed strange to me. There were three of them—two girls and a guy. One of the girls was sitting with her back to me, facing the others. Suddenly, I realized what had confused me: the girl sitting with her back was moving her arm too rhythmically. Every fifteen seconds, she raised her hand, twirled it, explaining something, and lowered it again, like a wound-up mechanism — with precision to the second. Then I noticed the same pattern in the guy. He nodded his head with the same frequency. I knocked on them, but they were doing the same thing at regular intervals.

"I like trains," came a voice from behind.

A chill ran through me. I forced myself to turn around. A boy of about six years old stood near one of the doors and looked out the window.

 I could barely manage, being absolutely sure that there was no one in the car a minute ago.

—Alexey,— he introduced himself seriously, looking at me with green eyes. Then he turned to the window and stared in fascination.

— Why are you alone, where are your parents?

"My parents left without me," he sighed. — Mom was crying, but they couldn't take me away...

The boy sighed again and continued:

— The station is coming soon, and I'll go for a ride, — he looked at me and smiled. — I really loved riding the subway and on the train to visit my grandmother...

Suddenly I woke up, sitting in a crowded carriage. I stood up, giving way to a lady, and stood all the way home, looking at the people crowding around me. When I got home, I poured myself some hot tea and went online. I spent an hour typing queries for the name of the station, stage, and nearby stations — until finally, on one of the news feeds, I found a mention of the boy's death right in the train carriage on the stretch between stations. There was a picture of a boy on the side. Alexey was looking at me from the monitor screen.

Since then, I have been unable to sleep on the subway and, driving along the stretch between these stations, I always remember the boy with green eyes who loves to ride trains.