The station master watches as the old lady walks past the ticket office on her way out of the station. At her full height, she would be over six foot tall, but the top of her spine is curved, reducing her to his height, five foot seven on a good day. He’d noticed her arrive ten minutes before the 1628 from London. She didn’t appear to have met anyone, she’s picked up a timetable from the stand in the ticket office, gone out to platform two where the London trains stop, stayed for twenty minutes and now she’s leaving. He noticed because he makes it his business to notice. His father always used to say, ‘son, you can take your body to work every day, push the paperwork from a to b, or you can take your soul to work, and thank God for the sun in the sky, the people around you and the sheer joy of being alive.’ 

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Now his father was an idealist, a dreamer who believed that the world would look after you if you looked after it. Everyone on his street knew his dad, had a story to tell at his funeral of the time Bert had lent them money, fixed their dripping tap, took their kid in for a weekend, organised games of football in the cul-de-sac, always on hand with solicitous advice or a shoulder to lean on. His dad was a hero to him. It was only after he died, leaving his mother a widow and him without a father at the tender age of eleven, that he began to see that the real hero was his mother. She had been the one with the steady job, who came home in time to put tea on the table for them every day, who ran the house, who taught him to read, who loved his father with all her heart, but said to him, ‘son, don’t let this world take advantage of you.’ Enough said. 

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He likes to think he has applied his mum’s work ethic and his dad’s kind and sunny nature and the combination of both, had seen him through. Six more months and he would retire. He’s trying not to think about it.

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It’s this inherited blend of DNA that makes him notice the details. And the detail he notices today, is that his old lady has left behind a bunch of daffodils on the bench. 

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‘Excuse me! Excuse me!’ He has grabbed the daffodils and is running after her out of the station. He reaches her, out of puff, touches her arm and holds out the daffodils, unable to speak as he tries to catch his breath.

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She frowns, shakes her head and makes to move on.

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‘You left these,’ he gasps.

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‘I meant to,’ she responds, her face caught between a frown and a smile. 

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‘Oh.’ The station master wonders suddenly if there is a detail he has missed. There is a reason people leave flowers, but that is usually at roadsides or graves, not in his station.

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Her pale blue, watery eyes appear to consider him for a moment or two. He looks back at her, afraid he may have offended her, but this day in history is not registering on his internal calendar of events, the reason for her flowers still therefore unknown, a detail with a loose end.

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‘They made me think of my late husband, and how he would have smiled as he gave them to me. He loved the springtime. I bought them and thought perhaps someone else might pick them up and smile.’

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He looks down at the flowers in his hand, the paper they are wrapped in crinkled in his grasp. He looks back at her, her eyes smiling at him now, and he smiles back, feeling awkward, not knowing what he should do, wanting to ask her why she came to the station but didn’t get on a train. Why did she leave her flowers here, in his station? These are the details he would like, but doesn’t need, so he doesn’t ask.

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‘Why don’t you keep them? Is there someone in your life you can give them to?’ Her hand is on his arm, exerting a firm but friendly pressure.

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He thinks of Julia, counting down the days to his retirement, planning the trips they will go on in the camper van she wants them to buy. ‘Yes, I do.’

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‘Well then.’ She starts to walk up the hill.

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‘Thank you,’ he calls after her.

 

When his wife unwraps them, she finds a scrap of paper and on it is written, ‘I love you so very very much that I hardly dare hope to be loved myself half as much.’ He doesn’t have the chance – or the heart – to say they are not his words as his wife hugs him, tears in her eyes.