Crossing The Line
by
Jane Croft

 

They were half cut when they dreamed up the idea, the three of them high on alcohol and bravado. Beyond them lay the silent railway line and the glinting steel tracks: forbidden, dangerous and alluring, leading the eye towards infinity. Tom laughed, knowing the idea was madness and relishing the risk anyway. One glance at Gary and Dan revealed the same thought. Like him they were fifteen, his mates. Like him they were ripe for challenge: Gary, the chubby carrot-topped prankster, Dan, lean and dark haired like Tom, all of them sporting the black tee shirts and ripped jeans that identified them as a group.

‘So you’re up for it?’ Gary’s voice was eager, challenging.

‘Yeah,’ replied Tom. ‘Yeah, I’m up for it.’

‘Because you don’t have to, not if you don’t want to,’ Gary went on. ‘Not if you’re scared.’ The mockery in the words was belied by a mischievous grin.

‘Piss off!’ Tom returned the grin and swung a mock punch which his friend ducked with ease. Then both of them looked at Dan.

‘Count me in,’ he said.

‘Knew we could rely on you, old mate,’ said Gary.

It was true, thought Tom. They’d always been able to rely on each other. Ever since junior school they’d shared every adventure together: trail bikes; camp fires; swimming in the forbidden river and, later, the dizzy heart-stopping climb two hundred feet up Gritstone Edge.

He never shared these escapades with anyone else: adults were not to be trusted. They inhabited a different plane where glib talk and double standards were the accepted currency, where they hurt each other and everyone around got caught up in the fall out. He could be dispassionate now because he was older. Betrayal happened, families were split. That was life and anyway he had his mates. They were the family he had chosen for himself.

The railway shelter was their latest adventure. Originally intended for maintenance crews, it comprised three walls and a roof over a concrete floor. It was set back off the track amid tall grasses and nettles and screened from the lane by hawthorn bushes. It was their place, discovered one hot afternoon when the school holiday was dragging and they’d vaulted the chain link fence to explore the forbidden land beyond. Risky and exciting it beckoned, offering something quite different. It was a place no-one came, an ideal hangout, remote, illicit and filled with possibilities. They’d staked their claim in writing, inscribing their names on the back wall in red spray paint. After that they just hung out - talking, smoking, drinking, fooling - and time was punctuated by the passing trains: long slow goods wagons, small cross-country runabouts and the powerful Intercity 125s. From the latter was born the idea that lifted challenge into another dimension. And so they timed the passing trains between the shelter and the grey gantry further up the track. The answer was always the same. Five seconds. Five seconds to cross the line.

Gary glanced up from the watch and looked at the others. ‘So is everyone still up for it?’

They nodded and thus committed themselves irrevocably. After that all they had to do was choose their moment.

Tom would never forget their first time: a hot day, the sultry air heavy with the smell of oil and dust and hot metal, and waiting by the side of the track, silent, tense with anticipation, staring into the middle distance where the grey gantry stood. That was the marker. Five seconds from there. Five seconds to cross the line. Beyond it the rails stretched away into infinity, reduced to a single dark point on the edge of vision. Then the point began to grow and expand and suddenly the train loomed swift and deadly as a hunting shark. He remembered the massive adrenalin rush of the forward leap beneath its bullet nose, the heart-stopping shock as it bore down on them in a blurred streak of steel and glass, rending sense in a savage blast of air and a thunderous gut-tearing roar that obliterated all thoughts but awe and terror. And afterwards time was drawn into the slipstream and there was only silence and exhilaration as the train diminished, speeding away towards infinity. Thrilling with reaction and dislocated from reality they were held in the moment forever bound by a shared rite of passage.

And the moment stayed with them and from it grew all the others for danger offered the awful rush in which terror became sublime. Tom understood now that proximity to death made him feel most alive. Nothing he’d experienced in his life before compared with the incredible buzz he got from the trains. In his mind they assumed an almost god-like status for they were the undisputed lords of their realm, guarding fiercely what was theirs, remorseless, ready to kill without a qualm. Intercity 125: the name was both identity and purpose. It was a recurring challenge that must be answered. Five seconds. Five seconds to cross the line. Thus the ritual came into being.

They walked to the edge of the track. It was empty, silent, waiting, the steel rails glinting in the late afternoon light, the sultry air heavy with the smell of oil and dust and hot metal. Tom’s gaze was drawn to the signal gantry and then beyond it to the place where the lines met: vanishing point. He smiled, waiting, his entire being buoyed with anticipation, thrilling to the echo of the previous rush. Glancing at his mates he could see in their expressions a reflection of his own excitement. Words had become unnecessary for now he knew their thought, felt their readiness.

He had no idea how long they waited: the track was empty and then it wasn’t. Out of nowhere the black speck grew larger like infinity rising to meet him. He stood quite still and let it come, waiting for it, knowing the rising surge of excitement as it bore down on him, the awe and the terror as he leapt forward and then the savage rush of raw energy that hit him as the train slammed through. And afterwards he knew again the exhilaration, the feeling of being supremely alive. Best of all it didn’t hurt now, not like the first time.

© Jane Croft, 2009

 

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