Have you ever wondered what happens after you die?
Some people talk about a blinding white light or divine judgement with God. Others say your brain simply shuts off—game over, and that’s it.
Instead, I’m sitting on a subway train.
Strange, isn’t it?
If this is the afterlife, it’s far less dramatic than I expected.
The train glides forward, elevator music playing in the background. The car appears empty except for a man sitting across from me. At first glance, I mistake him for a homeless man—possibly drunk, asleep, or maybe even dead.
Outside the window stretches an endless field of green dotted with red flowers. Their crimson petals curl like flames, as though guiding lost souls along the tracks.
I’m pretty sure I’m dead.
The problem is, I can’t remember much—not how I died, or the important parts of my life. Did I have a family? Maybe. Or perhaps I was just the lonely cat lady next door.
The possibilities feel endless, but none of them belong to me.
With a sigh, I study my reflection in the glass. Auburn hair. Chocolate-brown eyes. Familiar features attached to a stranger.
All I know is, that I’m stuck in this train towards God knows where.
A faint buzzing fills my ears.
At first it sounds distant, like wind? Whispers?
The harder I listen, the sharper the pain becomes.
It’s close, almost outside the train, but they make my head ache. I press a hand against my temple as pain shoots through my skull.
A cough pulls me from my thoughts.
The man across from me sits upright.
Not homeless.
Not drunk.
Definitely not zombie-looking.
Dark hair. Blue eyes behind black-rimmed glasses. A white shirt and navy jeans. Mid-thirties, maybe. The kind of man you’d pass in an office hallway and secretly glance at twice.
I look down at myself.
Oversized sweater. Skinny jeans.
I don’t exactly scream elegance. More like a nostalgic millennial with questionable fashion choices.
He notices me staring.
“You’re awake,” I mutter. “Not drunk or homeless.”
One eyebrow rises.
“And you are?”
“Not sure,” I admit. “But I think we died.”
The words tumble out before I can stop them.
“Death?”
He jumps to his feet.
“See, this is why I don’t work in HR. Wait. How do I know that?”
He gives me a strange look.
“For a dead person, you have an odd sense of humor.”
“I joke when I’m nervous.”
“I can tell.” He looks around the train.
“Do you have any idea who you are?”
“James…I think” he says more to himself than to me.
“So what brings you here? Business trip? Leisure travel?” I tease awkwardly.
“Have you checked the other cars? Found someone?”
I shake my head. “Not exactly.”
“Maybe that would’ve been more productive than inventing theories.”
“Rude.”
A faint smile appears on his face. “What’s your name?”
The question makes my head pound again. “I… don’t know.”
His expression softens. “Are you okay?”
Another wave of pain crashes through me.
The whispers return. Louder. When I open my eyes, he’s kneeling beside me. Damn. He’s even more handsome up close. How did I mistake him for a homeless drunk?
“I hear voices,” I whisper.
His expression shifts.
“Does that happen to you?”
“No.” The certainty in his voice sends a chill through me.
Then I notice it. A thin red thread wrapped around my pinky finger. I follow it with my eyes. It stretches across the aisle. Connected to him.
And suddenly—
“Sarah.”
The name slips from my lips.
His eyes widen.
I raise my hand. “Can you see this?”
He stares for a moment before his expression changes. “Yes.”
The thread glows faintly between us. My heart pounds.
“What does it mean?”
He studies it for a moment. “Maybe we’re soulmates.”
The joke catches me off guard. “This is a terrible place to meet one.”
“What? The afterlife?” He sits beside me.
“Yeah. Pretty awful timing.”
For the first time, we both smile.
“Do you remember anything else?”
He closes his eyes. “I used to go to the movies alone.”
“No wife? Girlfriend?”
“Neither. I think I was divorced. Or widowed.”
His voice softens. “I was alone.”
Something about that makes my chest ache.
“I had a picture of Italy on my fridge,” I say.
“You’ve been there?”
I shake my head. “I always meant to go…never did.”
Regret settles heavily in my stomach. “I was always working.”
I laugh bitterly.
“Maybe my life was boring.”
“And you’ve decided that because you had a stable career?”
I stare at my hands. “I kept postponing everything. Dreams. Relationships. Life.”
He studies me carefully. “Trust me. You’re not boring.”
“You’ve known me for ten minutes.”
“Long enough.”
I feel warmth rise to my cheeks.
For a moment, neither of us speaks and the silence feels surprisingly comfortable.
Then the question slips out before I can stop it.
“Can you care about someone you’ve only just met?”
His gaze drops to the thread connecting our hands.
“Maybe that’s all love really is,” he says softly. “Meeting a stranger and deciding they matter.”
The train suddenly plunges into darkness.
A tunnel. Light flashes through the windows. Something breaks loose inside my mind as images crash into me.
Rain.
Sirens.
Screeching tires.
Twisted metal.
I gasp.
“Sarah?”
James grips my shoulders.
“I remember.”
His expression tells me he does too.
“It was raining,” I whisper. “I was driving home from work.”
“I wasn’t supposed to go out that night,” he says. “My friends convinced me to come with them.”
“I heard a horn,” I add.
“The truck lost control,” he takes my hand.
“Then everything went black.”
“We were in the same accident,” he says quietly.
A tear slips down my cheek.
“We’re really dead.”
His silence says everything. The truth lands heavily as the thread tightens. Pain explodes behind my eyes, and the voices return.
Only now they’re clear.
“Sarah.”
“Wake up.”
I clutch James’s arm. “They’re back.”
He wraps his arms around me.
“The voices.” I tremble.
Before he can answer, an announcement echoes through the train.
FINAL STOP: PURGATORY.
The doors slide open. Together, we step onto the platform.
The landscape steals my breath. Red spider lilies blanket the earth in every direction. Like drops of sunset spilled across the world between life and death. The flowers remind me of the thread connecting us.
Fragile.
Beautiful.
Impossible to break.
Or so I thought.
Suddenly James stops walking. His expression changes. Like he’s remembered something important.
“James?”
He looks down at me. And I know something is wrong.
“I remember.” His eyes glisten.
Confusion twists inside me. “What do you mean?”
A small smile appears on his face.
“You’re not dead, Sarah.”
My stomach drops.
“No.” My voice cracks. “I died. We both did.”
“You almost died.”
The distinction shatters me.
“They’re calling you back.”
I grab his hand desperate.
“We never even met while we were alive.”
His smile softens.
“I think that’s why.”
“Why?”
“Because if we had…” He swallows. “I wouldn’t have let you go.”
A second train arrives on the opposite track. Its doors slide open.
James walks me toward it. Every step feels unbearable.
“I wish we’d met under better circumstances.”
My throat closes. “What do you mean?”
His smile trembles.
“You’re coming back too.”
The sadness in his eyes tells me the answer before he speaks.
“No.”
The thread between us begins to unravel, one strand at a time.
“You have to go.”
My voice breaks. “We just met.”
He glances toward the red flowers behind us, uncertain. “I know.”
“Then come with me,” I beg.
He rests his forehead against mine. “It’s too late for me.”
Tears blur my vision as he cups my face gently. “Don’t leave.”
“Maybe we’ll meet in our next life.”
His lips touch mine softly. Briefly. Heartbreaking.
I don’t want to leave him.
He gives me one final push as the train doors close and the red thread snaps.
I slam my hands against the glass as the train begins to move.
James stands among the spider lilies.
Smiling.
My eyelids feel impossibly heavy. White fluorescent lights, monitors beeping and the smell of antiseptic. Pain throbbing in my head.
A tube is pulled from my throat.
Voices surround me as air burns in my lungs. The doctor says there appears to be no brain damage despite the days I spent in a coma.
I should feel relieved.
Instead, tears stream down my face. A grief I can’t explain settles inside me.
Then I see them. On the table beside my hospital bed. Red spider lilies.
The memories return all at once.
The train.
The accident.
The final station.
James.
He was dead.
I wasn’t.
Our lives had always been close to one another, yet somehow we never met.
Like parallel lines running side by side, never meant to cross.
Somewhere beyond those tracks, a stranger I had known for only a few hours had become the love of my lifetime.