The Night Walk Men Read Online Free

souls.
    On this night, nearly the
same as any other, they talked for a good long while. A good long
while, for sure. And then Obo the Hobo did what he always did. He
stood up. He led Braille back out onto his ages-old stoop, where,
on this night, a misty rain had begun to blow in, laying a blanket
of damp down. Braille’s dark glasses clouded with spittle and he
moistened the reed with his tongue and his lips. For these rare
occasions when Obo was present, he would stand facing the tracks,
his back against the brick – and not the other way
‘round.
    “Play me a tune, old
friend,” Obo said, “Play it slow, so I can learn the notes and
remember them when I’m on the road and away from my
home...”
    And so Braille played. And
on he played. Loud and proud, for an hour or more, giving
everything he had left to the song. And to his friend.
    As he played, Obo moved in
closer to him. Minutes of long languid music would pass and still
he played. And Obo would move in closer. More minutes of music
would ring out. And still Obo the Hobo would move in closer. A
bridge and then a heartfelt solo. Obo moved closer. And then a
return to the first verse. Obo moved closer. And then back up into
the heights of the song. And here was Obo, his lips wet from the
rain next to Braille’s ear, so close they were almost
touching.
    “Someone dies,” He said to
His friend. “Every day, every minute. Every continent, every
island, every everywhere. Could be you.”
    And then He was
gone.
    Brailled stopped
playing.
    He crept out from his spot
near the brick wall. He called out for his friend. But Obo was
nowhere. The station was empty.
    Where did He go? No trains
had come for him, Braille knew that much because he knew the
schedules like he knew the keys on his sax. A train would arrive in
moments but wasn’t here to pick up passengers yet. So where did He
go? And what did He mean? What was He saying?
    The rain came harder
then.
    It doused the old
man.
     
     
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    Fifth: Gabriela The
Great
     
    Little Gabby was running
from her brother when she took a tumble on the cold tile of the
train station. Her parents were taking her and Galbraith on the
early train out to Dow Lake where they owned a sizeable resort
home. Braille the Rail’s long drawling music had faded for the
moment and a light rain had begun and turned harder.
    The twins were three now,
old enough to know better but young enough to still stir trouble
up. When Gal threw Gabby’s dolly over the edge of the train
platform, the children’s daddy was at the ticket counter asking if
their train was still running on schedule and their mommy was
digging in her purse to find a hairbrush or a bit of lipstick or
some other trivial necessity.
    Gabby didn’t think twice
about moving out from under the overhang and into the rain then
right over the edge of the concrete and tile platform. She did it
without thinking, as three-year-olds do. She had scraped her knee
when Gal had been chasing her moments before but that pain didn’t
stop her, didn’t even make her cry, so why would the edge of the
platform and a bit of rain hold her back now? She had no idea how
deep the pit was and over she went, onto the dirty tracks below
with a bad thumb, bruising her hip and bloodying her arm from her
elbow to her armpit. Her beautiful summer dress was scuffed and
filthy now, black with dust and wet with the rain. And her hat took
a breeze and landed some twenty feet down the track in the mouth of
the train tunnel which led out of the station and into the rest of
the world.
    But Gabby reached
– strained —to get
hold of her favourite dolly, thinking only that she would be in
trouble from mommy for getting her dress dirty and losing her
hat.
    When her fingers touched
the hem of the doll’s dress, that’s when she felt the first rumble
and that’s when her mommy let out a scream.
     
     
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    Braille the Rail had let
the reed of his friend’s saxophone fall from his