Lieya

The rain was hammering against the window of the midnight train when I noticed the man sitting across from me. He hadn't moved in forty minutes. He just stared at a pristine leather briefcase resting on his knees, his knuckles white from gripping the handle. I was trying to focus on my laptop, but the sheer tension radiating off him was impossible to ignore. When the train screeched around a sharp bend, his grip slipped, and the briefcase tumbled onto the dusty floor between us. It popped open. Out rolled dozens of small, hand-painted wooden figurines. Each one was meticulously detailed, painted to look like an ordinary person in a modern city: a woman in a red coat, a teenager with a skateboard, an old man holding a cane. "I'm so sorry," he muttered, scrambling to gather them. His hands were trembling violently. "It's fine," I said, crouching down to help. I reached for a tiny figure resting near my shoe. I froze.  It was a man sitting on a train, holdi...