With just one passenger less, there was not much more space in the train than before. But this time, the woman had boarded earlier and had the chance to pick a seat.

“Hello, can I sit?” she asked an older-looking gentleman, whom she recognized from the station.

“Of course, of course!” the man immediately replied with a wide, sincere smile on his even wider face. It seemed so heartfelt that the woman had to smile back.

“Did you not want to see the first stop?” she asked, realizing she hadn’t seen him under the pavilion.

The man laughed. “No, no. If I were an Irish milk cow, then maybe, but alas, I am not.”

“I do hope, though, that the next three stops will be a little more interesting,” he added, looking down. The woman followed his gaze and found three brown papers cradled in his hand.

“Not much, is it?” the man asked, noticing her look, disappointment lingering in his eyes.

“The number of tickets doesn’t mean anything,” the woman replied.

“Well, it does mean one thing: I can’t be very picky,” he clarified, stuffing the tickets back into his pocket.

“From that point of view, I am spoiled for choice. Now you can decide which is better.”

The remark made the hint of a smile appear on the man’s face.

“I’ve always had enough of everything, so I was spoiled for choice, as you say, throughout my entire life. But now I only pray for my stop not to be a bank.”

“A bank?” the woman inquired. “Why that?”

“I was a banker, and I’d prefer eternal peace, not eternal work,” the man explained with a cheeky grin.

His words made the woman laugh. “Understandable,” she agreed. “I wouldn’t wish that even upon my boss.”

The woman knew his stop wouldn’t be his work. His stop would be infinitely crueler and more personal, a forever-hungry monster that had already started stretching its claws toward him, waiting impatiently to sink its teeth into his flesh. It would bite and never let go—not for an eternity.

The train slowed down, and both the man and the woman looked out of the window. Instead of green grass and luscious pastures, there were now rows and rows of trees—an orchard of sorts. But neither the man nor the woman could yet see what kind of fruit they yielded.

“Do you want to have a look around here?” the woman interrupted his silent thoughts.

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Sighing, the man replied, “I probably should.”

The woman looked back out of the window. Bare branches stretched out from the trees like giant claws, waiting to dig into the flesh of unsuspecting victims.

The air outside was fresh and smelled like rain. When she looked up, the woman saw dark clouds gathering. In front of them lay a seemingly never-ending orchard, with trees lined up like undead soldiers crawling out of the ground. Their weapons were the branches, and their ammunition was the fruit they held. But instead of apples, figs, or cherries, they bore little brown pieces of paper—tickets.

The man nearly stumbled upon seeing the thousands upon thousands of tickets.

“My prayers, they were answered!” he cried out, immediately scurrying toward what he thought was his savior. Tripping over his own feet, he ran to the closest line of trees and started plucking its fruits. At first, he picked them individually, taking each one and adding it to the others in his pocket. Soon after, he began ripping them off in bulk, breaking off branches and arching the wood with the force of his pulls.

The small papers glided down, gathering in a neat little pile. Except for the short-haired woman, no one seemed to notice that the pile didn’t grow but instead slumped down with each new handful of tickets being thrown onto it. And for every little paper plucked from the tree, another two appeared.

Some of the other passengers eagerly helped themselves to a few more tickets. They hoped that this little miracle could somehow save them from what awaited them or at least let them choose the lesser evil.

Others stayed inside, watching it all unfold from behind the safety of a glass window. They either didn’t trust miracles or preferred to believe in themselves and their fate enough not to dare change the path they were on. Some of them would later come to regret that decision. Some would forever come back to the memory of this place, playing out all those "what ifs."

But they all had one thing in common. No matter the number of cards they took, the number they had before, or the number they would lose to others, all their actions would only bring them closer to their stop—a place their actions already had chosen for them.

A sharp whistle blew through the air, making all heads turn back. It sounded like the whistling of a conductor before a train departs for the next stop. It was time to leave.

The woman turned to the banker, whose movements were growing more panicked by the moment. He ripped the papers off the tree with such force that they tore apart, and only their ravaged pieces made it to the ground. Following the coasting papers, her gaze fell upon the little pile next to him. Only a few brown papers remained in the pile, while the trees seemed fuller than ever.

“So much more here, so much more to have…” he mumbled to himself, completely unaware of his surroundings.

She gave the man one last silent look before turning away. He had found his stop, and the hungry monster had buried its claws into his soul, ripping it slowly apart, as it had done while he was still alive.

The same hunger that had made him successful in his job, had started to nibble at his relationships, his high spirits, and, in the end, even ate up the career it had built for him. A trap so obvious it could only be missed.

The doors closed behind the woman as soon as she entered the train, and the heavy vehicle began to move.

Through the windows, she could still see the man desperately trying to peel the brown papers from the trees to make his little pile grow. He will not stop even after the train will have vanished into the distance, or after his fingers have become numb and bloody from plucking. Not even after a year had passed, or two, or three. He would forever keep chasing a treasure he could never possess, and which had grown worthless an eternity ago.

The woman turned away from the window, facing the inside of the train. Her gaze wandered through the rows of seats filled with passengers until she found the one she was looking for. With a few smooth steps, she moved closer to the old lady.

“Hello, can I sit?”