She Takes The Train
The city was a geode of a trillion shimmering gemstones; amethyst pinks, lazuli blues and diamond whites against the cavern wall of the skyline. Like stalagmites, the buildings — from the little apartments to the towering skyscrapers — jutted out from the cavern black in uneasy formations, dotting the view with their cascade of hues.
In her old age, she looked upon the city and saw a multicolored alloy of shifting lights, like a prism of quartz shifted from light source to light source.
In her younger days she would've more easily seen the darkness. She looked away from the city, its lights illuminating her purse. She rifled through it and produced her glasses and her ticket — she slid her glasses over her nose, and looked back out the window. The fairy lights hung on every pub and every bakery were clear now; the hazard lights of new automobiles parked in alleyways; the industrial light of the warehouses; but most of all that great cavernous darkness that seemed to rise into the sky forever, only dotted with the twinkling citrine of stars.
The train lurched under its own weight, rising into that cavernous dark.
"Excuse me, ma'am," A voice snapped her from her trance. She frowned and turned to it— a young woman in a tight fitting skirt and button-up, a train attendant, she presumed. "I've got my ticket here." She grumbled in response, handing it over. The young woman smiled and handed it back. "Thank you so much, we appreciate your—" She waved her away and turned back to the window. The attendant left silently.
She smiled and laid her head against the train window as they passed a particular pub. It was rundown, now, just burnt wood and sapphire brushes of purple across its exterior. She squinted to see if she could see it, before the moment passed, and she could:
That little sign that hung above the parlor doors was still there.