Uncle Marvin and Aunt Wanda lived in a small but tall house next to the railroad tracks in Marmet, West Virginia. I was little but my recollections are big. Like going to sleep upstairs with my brother and sister and cousins and being awaken in the middle of the night by a shrill train whistle and the screech of the coal train’s wheels on the steel tracks just outside and the reflection of its bright headlight bouncing back and forth on the walls inside the bedroom where we slept.
The noise was deafening, filling the house with vibrations and an ominous sense that something sinister was about to happen. Then it all faded. The room was dark, again, and the last thing I remember before falling back asleep was the faint shrill whistle far in the distance, the ratatat of the steel wheels on the tracks less and less something I could hear or needed to fear. Sunshine through the windows woke me the next morning. Dust fairies floated in the light slicing through the room that looked out over the train tracks. When we were all awake, my cousin Wade rushed us to get dressed, then hurried us to the tracks where he picked up pennies he had laid on the rails the evening before, each flattened by the train that had haunted my sleep.
The pennies were now magical oblong slivers of copper the size of our thumb print and nearly as thin as a sheet of paper. I was mesmerized! “You got a penny, Richard?”, Wade, asked. “I do!” “Then it’s your turn.” With my penny on the track, I laid down that night as excited as if it were Christmas Eve. I fell asleep dreaming of the return of the coal train, the echo of its whistle, and the screech of its steel wheels and their fading ratatat on the tracks.
I love this. I remember those tracks and late night trains so well. ❤️
What a magical story. Hope it is true! Loved it