Ethan took the 7:10 train every morning. Same seat, same platform, same half-warm coffee balanced on the wooden bench beside him. The little station on the edge of town was hardly more than a platform, a waiting room, and a ticket counter.
Beyond it stretched open fields and a single pair of rails that cut straight through the countryside toward the city. He liked the quiet before the day began. The hum of the power lines, the wind tugging at the wheat, the faint metallic scent of the tracks. Out here, time moved differently. Slow, patient. Predictable.