I am waiting for a bus at a station in rural Australia. Trains from the city stopped running to this station decades ago. From here, it is about three hours by bus to the next town, where the railway now ends.
Behind the station runs a river marking the state border. A large jade-green river, flowing slowly without a sound. Across from the station are a few hotels, restaurants and bars. At a large restaurant, the outdoor seating area is covered by a wooden framework, with vines of deep red leaves growing all over it and down the side facing the road. There are only a few people around. Tall palm trees sway in the wind.
People with large bags gradually begin to gather around the station roundabout. A large woman and her small daughter cross in front of me and catch my eye. The mother, heavily tattooed on her arms, her jet-black hair gathered into a round bun high on her head. The daughter, with tight curls, a little like a mischievous boy. There is something brilliant about her.
A large coach pulls into the roundabout. The driver opens the luggage compartment with practised ease and begins taking bags from the passengers. As I watch, I notice a family of three on the other side of the roundabout, beyond the bus. A young father and two girls in the first few years of primary school. The girls seem to have nothing much to do, passing the time drawing something on the ground. For some reason, the father has a slightly hard look on his face, staring at the bus.
The door of the bus opens and the passengers begin to board, one after another, taking their seats. Towards the end, the mother and daughter I noticed earlier get on and sit directly in front of me. Outside the window, the young father and the two girls are still standing there. The father doesn't wave and remains stiff, staring at the bus. The girls just stand beside him, with vacant looks.
In front of me, the mother is sitting by the window, constantly reaching up to the overhead rack, taking out blankets, children's toys and food, then putting them back again. When her daughter says she wants the window seat, she says, "This is Mummy's seat." When the girl says she wants to go to the toilet, she says, "Go by yourself. You'll be fine." She keeps busy rearranging their things, occasionally turning right around to wait for her daughter to come back.
Outside, a rather dull pale-blue sky and grey clouds go on and on. Pastureland everywhere, with eucalyptus trees. The mother in front begins talking away on the phone with some people. The phone screen is reflected in the window. The brightly lit faces of strangers on the screen float there in the glass, suspended in the air, swaying.
The bus arrives at the station in the next town, and I board the train already waiting there. Passengers keep coming aboard, and an older man sits down beside me. A cap on his head, greying hair falling to his shoulders. Silver glasses over a large nose. Behind the lenses, his eyes look unusually large and somehow far away. As soon as he sits down, he begins talking to me and barely stops. He never looks me in the eye.
Then a young woman, perhaps a university student, comes over.
"I think that's my seat."
It seems I am in the wrong seat. A little relieved, I go to find my own. Across the aisle, I find the mother and daughter from the bus.
The afternoon train sets off. Sunlight breaks through here and there in the cloudy sky. As the train travels along the tracks towards the city, the colour of the earth changes. The red soil I have been travelling through gradually fades into an ochre with a trace of red.
The mother and daughter spend their time talking, listening to music, and going back and forth between their seats and the kiosk. After a while, perhaps tired, the little girl falls asleep. Her mother stops talking on the phone and quietly turns the pages of a magazine.
Outside, the sky slowly deepens to indigo, and the lights inside the carriage begin to show in the window. Every now and then, a dark silhouette passes by. Then it becomes completely dark, and there is nothing more to see. In the window, only the brightly lit carriage.
As we come closer to the city, lights begin appearing here and there in the distance. Across the aisle, the girl has woken up and is becoming a little unsettled. She sits on her mother's lap for a while, held against her, almost enveloped by her large body. Her curly hair covers her mother's shoulder. The mother rocks slowly, talking to her quietly.
"Yeah... it's tiring being on a train for this long, isn't it..."
After a while, the girl begins wandering up and down the aisle.
"Hey, Indie, come back here!" her mother calls out.
Before long, a middle-aged conductor comes out of the driver's cab. He notices the girl and starts talking to her mother. Now and then, he makes the girl laugh as she wanders around, distracting her.
When we arrive at the central station, the mother hurriedly begins gathering up their things. The girl is in the aisle, talking to the conductor. I get up and start towards the train doors, but she is blocking the aisle, so I stop.
"Indie, move over a bit. Let the lady through," the conductor says.
The mother suddenly looks over at me.
"Sorry, we're in your way."
She smiles.
Her large, full face stays with me for a little while afterwards.
