This happened this summer. It was a rainy Tuesday, and since I had a day off in lieu, I was spending a rare, relaxing weekday at home. My wife was working her part-time job, and the kids were at school. Not knowing what to do with my long-awaited alone time, I decided to just step outside.
An old man walked past the front of my house. The moment I saw him, even though I had been planning to go out by car, I suddenly felt like taking a walk outside. A weekday afternoon, in the rain, on an empty road—these elements filled me with a deep sense of nostalgia, and I opened my umbrella and started walking.
As I wandered aimlessly, a small tram station appeared right before my eyes. Feeling nostalgic about that too, I went inside. An empty platform and the sound of the rain... I suddenly wanted to ride a train, so I bought a ticket. I had nowhere to go, so I decided to ride three stops to the station near my parents' house.
Sitting on the platform bench waiting for the train, I noticed someone who looked like the same old man sitting on the opposite platform. Paying him no mind, I just spaced out, thinking about how I might walk to my alma mater once I got off the train.
Casually glancing to my left, I saw that the old man who should have been across the tracks was now sitting on the bench right beside me. The footbridge connecting the opposite platform to mine was to my right. No one could have crossed over without me noticing, yet there the old man sat.
Even though I should have been terrified, for some reason, I wasn't scared at all. In fact, I didn't even pay it much mind, as if it were the most natural thing in the world... In the countryside, daytime trains only run once an hour on weekdays. They take a while to arrive.
I looked to the side again. No one was there... Thinking, "Huh?", I looked to my right, and he was sitting right next to me.
That finally startled me. But more than being surprised, the old man looked like someone I knew. "Wait, who was it again?" I found myself thinking about it seriously. Just then, the train arrived.
I got on the train, but the old man made no move to board. Figuring he would catch the next one, I gave it no further thought and spent the train ride trying to figure out who he looked like.
I thought and thought, and at the second stop, it finally hit me.
It was my old man, who had passed away four years ago.
It's a mystery why I hadn't recognized him right away. A strange, surreal atmosphere had definitely hung over that place at that moment.
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