Taylor Ashton

‚Grey Lines‘ At 31 her life had become a treadmill, each morning indistinguishable from the last, every day another loop of exhaustion and obligation. Two toddlers at daycare, she boarded the train alone, the rhythm of the rails matching the pulse of her own fatigue, muted by years of routine. Her husband, once the man she had loved, had become a ghost in their home, a shadow she barely recognized, late nights stretching longer, silences colder, the warmth they once shared fading into habit. She suspected infidelity, though nothing was ever confirmed, and he had no idea she had taken a small job to carve out a fragment of freedom for herself. The train was a gauntlet: crowds pressed in, commuters hunched over screens and earbuds, lives locked in parallel isolation. Yet he always appeared, two stations behind her, like clockwork, slipping into the carriage with fluid confidence that made the gray morning feel electric. Their eyes met again and again, fleetingly at first, shared glances across the press of strangers, small sparks she tried—and failed—to ignore. Sometimes she found herself thinking of him even when he wasn’t there: at the grocery store, in the quiet of her apartment when her husband actually showed up for dinner. Anticipation had become part of her routine, a pulse beneath the monotony, and when he wasn’t there, a strange disappointment lingered, subtle but insistent. Today he was there again. Their eyes met as he pushed forward through the crowd, weaving with effortless confidence. Her heart hammered in her chest, every nerve alert as he closed the distance. Up close, he was even bigger than she expected, and then she noticed the dimples that appeared when he smiled—a disarming, dangerous softness. He stopped just a breath away. “Morning,” he said, casual, like he owned the air between them. She swallowed, pulse spiking. “Morning,” she managed, voice tighter than she intended. (26,6‘2, image from Pinterest)