the sound of train's cry

People say everyone is afraid of something.

Spiders. Heights. Darkness. Ghost stories whispered after midnight.

For a long time, I believed I had none of those fears. I told myself I was fearless—that nothing supernatural, nothing unseen, nothing unreal could ever touch me. Ghosts were just stories. Death was a word people used carelessly, like it had no weight.

But I was wrong.

I didn’t realize it back then, not as a child, not even as I grew older. My fear didn’t have a face. It didn’t wait in shadows or appear in nightmares. It came as a sound.

The sound of a train.

Since childhood, that distant, dragging roar has done something to me—something I never had words for. The moment it reaches my ears, my chest tightens, my breath turns shallow, and my body forgets how to move. It’s not loud enough to hurt, not close enough to threaten. Yet it makes me miserable in a way nothing else ever has.

I used to tell myself it was just imagination. An illusion. A meaningless reaction to noise. Trains pass every day. People stand near tracks, talk, laugh, live. Nothing happens.

So why did it feel like something was closing in on me?

Every time I heard that sound—metal screaming against metal, the low rumble rolling through the ground—I felt trapped. Like the world narrowed into a single moment I couldn’t escape. My mind would go blank, yet my heart would race as if it knew something I didn’t.

Death always felt unreal in real life. Too distant. Too abstract.

But in those moments, when the train cried out into the air, death felt close—not visible, not certain, just… present. Lingering. Watching.

I never told anyone. How could I explain a fear I didn’t understand myself?

So I stayed quiet.

And the sound stayed with me.

Ii. How do people travel by train so easily?

Sometimes I wonder if it’s only me—or if others feel it too. That sudden uneasiness in the heart, like it skips a beat. Like time pauses for a second and forgets how to move forward.

I’ve watched people sit near windows, headphones on, eyes calm. I’ve wondered if their hearts ever freeze the way mine does, if their thoughts ever dissolve into nothing at the sound I can’t escape.

Then came the dreams.

One night, I woke up somewhere that wasn’t real, yet felt more vivid than reality. I was standing on top of a strange mountain—tall, cold, and unfamiliar. Across from me stood another mountain, the same height, just as unsettling. They faced each other like silent witnesses.

Between them was nothing.

A hollow space. Dark. Deep. Endless.

It wasn’t just a gap—it was an abyss. The kind that doesn’t promise an end. The kind where infinity feels closer than the ground beneath your feet.

I looked down and felt my balance slip, even though I hadn’t moved.

Then I heard it.

That sound.

The same sound that follows me from childhood into waking life, now echoing through my sleep. The low, dragging cry. The vibration that doesn’t just reach the ears but crawls into the bones.

My body reacted before my mind could understand. I lost balance.

I fell.

The air rushed past me, but I wasn’t screaming. I wasn’t even thinking about death. What terrified me more was the thought of never reaching anywhere at all—of being stuck in that fall forever, suspended between beginning and end.

The ground was impossibly far. Too far.

I love mountains in real life—their silence, their strength, the way they make you feel small but safe. But the mountains in my dreams don’t resemble the ones I love. These are hollow. Watching. Unkind.

Every time I hear that sound while sleeping, I return to that place. Every time, I fall.

And every time, just before I can find out what waits at the bottom, I wake up.

I never reach the end.

Maybe that’s the cruelest part—not the fall, not the fear, but the unanswered question.

What is this sound trying to show me?

And why does it follow me even into my dreams?

iii. After every dream, I wake up the same way—heart racing, hands cold, breath caught somewhere between fear and relief. The room feels unfamiliar for a few seconds, as if reality needs time to prove itself. I lie still, listening. No train. No echo. Just silence.

But the silence never comforts me.

I start thinking—maybe the fear isn’t about trains at all. Maybe the sound is only a key, unlocking something buried too deep for words. Something my mind remembers but refuses to explain.

In the dream, time behaves strangely. The moment before I fall stretches endlessly, like the world is holding its breath with me. My heart doesn’t beat faster—it slows. Everything slows. It feels like the universe pauses, giving me one last second to understand something important.

But I never do.

The abyss isn’t just darkness. It feels aware, like it’s waiting. Not to kill me—but to keep me. To trap me in that falling state, where there’s no ground, no sky, no escape. Death feels simple compared to that. Ending feels kinder than being suspended forever.

That’s when I realize something terrifying.

I’m not afraid of falling.

I’m afraid of being stuck.

Stuck between two mountains that don’t belong to me.

Stuck between sound and silence.

Stuck between life moving forward and time refusing to.

When I wake up, the fear doesn’t disappear. It lingers in my chest throughout the day. Sometimes, even when I’m fully awake, I swear I can hear it—a distant vibration, faint but familiar. My body reacts before my mind can argue. My hands tighten. My thoughts scatter.

I ask myself questions I never asked before.

Why this sound?

Why since childhood?

Why does it only find me when I’m most vulnerable—half asleep, half awake?

Maybe the dream isn’t warning me of death.

Maybe it’s reminding me of something I’ve been running from.

And maybe one day, I won’t wake up before reaching the end.

Maybe one day, I’ll have to face what’s waiting in the depth—not to fall anymore, but to finally understand why the sound chose me in the first place.

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