The Six Forty Eight straight though to Euston by Stella Turner

 

Silence alarm clock, empty bladder, quick swill, shave, neck a cup of coffee; grab his lunch, out in record time. No kissing his wife goodbye, she complains, it wakes her. She isn’t a lark. Neither is he. He tells his kids he drives Thomas the Tank. They don’t believe him. He has to believe. He’s following his father’s giant footsteps. He wants his own footprints. The noisy commuters crowding on his train, the guard waiting to give the signal, he slips back onto to the platform running towards the future as if his life depends on it. The guard waving his arms, making hand signals at his disappearing back. Damn he’d left his lunch in the cab!