petrel isle

the branch ends here, on a pier that runs out into the water and stops. the rails stop with it. the last sleeper is salt-bleached and a foot above the tide at noon. you change here for the ferry, or you do not change at all and walk back along the line.

the village is a single street of five houses, four of them occupied. it lives off ferry summers and goes very quiet between november and easter. the train runs twice a day in winter and five times a day in season, and the timetable, taped to the inside of the waiting-room window, has columns for both.

the stationmaster is the ferry captain's brother. he wears both uniforms folded on the same hook. the brothers do not talk about it.

field note: at low tide, the bell-buoy answers the platform clock by a beat or two; at high tide it answers nothing. the lighthouse is visible from the bench in clear weather.