Train to Nowhere Else - By Feiyang Zhang

Written By: Feiyang Zhang

Category: Short Story

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

Feiyang Zhang presents "Train to Nowhere Else," an evocative short story featured in the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. As a poignant exploration of memory and identity, the narrative unravels against a backdrop of nostalgia and longing. Feiyang's work stands out for its rich imagery and emotional depth, inviting readers to journey alongside its characters. This entry into the competition showcases Feiyang's ability to weave a tapestry of human emotion and connection, capturing the essence of past experiences and the uncertainty of the future.

About the Work

"Train to Nowhere Else" is a vivid exploration of memory, identity, and loss. Through its lyrical prose, the story paints a haunting picture of a place called Nowhere Else, a town of contradictions and unfulfilled dreams. Feiyang Zhang masterfully combines rich imagery and a reflective mood to craft a narrative that lingers with readers, exploring themes of love, tragedy, and the relentless passage of time. The story's evocative language and emotional resonance make it a compelling read.

Train to Nowhere Else

Original Submission by Feiyang Zhang

Train to Nowhere Else

As the sun sinks over the quiet harbour, I can’t help but think of us still naive at sixteen, Maria.

The train hums under my feet, restless. There is a transit map mounted on the rattling wall, routes extending out in spindly arms like a jellyfish suspended in stasis. I’m not sure why I keep glancing at it; Nowhere Else is the only place we’ve ever known, and it rests on the curled yellow edges of the map, where the universe folds in on itself.

Outside, the horizon dribbles over the sea like warm honey, casting waxy swirls of earth and fire across the azure plane. I think it’s the way the falling sunshine melts into the water that reminds me of us, Maria. The Nowhere-born used to say that rivers coursed through my veins and sprouted through my scalp in tendrils of seagrass, whilst the bridge of your nose caught the dying embers from your licks of flaming hair. We were yin and yang, arguing who was which until dusk settled like black dew over our small town.

I: The Fire Sermon

Nowhere Else is a town of contradictions, so perhaps it was only natural then that we too would be born the same.

It is a wasteland. A prison. Where migrant prayers go to die, where priests drown their sorrows on park benches and where children linger for a taste of the unfinished excess. It is where you go after you fight tooth and nail across oceans, and discover there is nowhere else

left for you on Earth. The stagnant puddles that mar the thirsty dirt, the rattling tin walls, the barbed fence that holds us in its grasp; it is the only home I have ever known.

You were only fifteen, waist-deep in the Yamuna river, when I first saw you. The cold autumn rain was rolling over, and your flaming hair was sodden like rivulets of tears running down your neck. I was tempted to ask why you were there, why you were wading into the heart of the unforgiving current. Why, in that moment, you looked more like a ghost than a fifteen year old girl, swallowed whole by the suffocating tides.

I wonder, Maria, would you have kept walking if I didn’t call out? Then: Would you still be alive now, if our worlds hadn’t collided - brilliant and deadly - in a burning pile of ambition, of love and loss? Axioms say water and fire can’t mix, so perhaps it was the way your feet were planted in the riverbed that was already enough for our tragedy to start.

The sun has set now, and someone has sprinkled salt across the sky. The train crawls through city arteries, winding around sprawls of glitching billboards and cars lined like fire ants in the late evening traffic. Life seeps into the cracked skyscrapers, allowing concrete jungles to broadcast the production of a thousand unwinding hearts across the skyline.

There is a man in front of me, bald and stout, with his arms locked tightly around his spouse. They speak of strange words: of love, of forever, of watching the sunrise on the harbour docks. For a moment, the air around me disappears and the only world I can breathe in is ours at sixteen, on the Hill when the summer nights still screamed.

You were shivering in that lace dress, breaths shrouded in mist whilst miles and miles of rolling pastures stretched out before us. Even far away, you couldn’t escape the glint of barbed spikes and shattered bottles across the sunken pavements .

Yamuna, you whispered. I wasn’t sure what was sweeter; the sound of my name rolling off your tongue, of escape coursing like ecstasy in my blood, or of watching the sunrise on the city docks together. Maybe all of them could be real, I thought.

I realise now that naivety is believing Eden has a rabbit-proof fence.

II: Death by Water

The train enters a tunnel, the liminal tube spitting me into my first sights of the countryside since I left. Rain lashes viciously against the windowpane, and the west wind still howls.

The carriage gently sways, and for a brief second, I see your reflection next to mine in the rain-streaked windows. There is a rusted pole between us, some continental divide that chases me across every fleeting memory.

When I think back to that night, it wasn’t the vicious barbed teeth of the Fence that hurt most, but the silence. The silence as we let the constellations brand themselves into our skins for the last time on the Hill. You rolled over, and I could see the Southern Cross in your eyes.

“Promise you’ll keep running if I get caught?”

I don’t reply.

The silence after you were gone, and the world outside swelled so infinitely big it exploded at the seams.

Outside, stations blur between stormclouds and thunderclaps. The sky sags low and grey, soaking my bones with the bitterness of autumn. When I pass the crumbled sand dunes of Wattle Hill, the dry-lipped Murray Basins, the weeping meadows of Waratah Plains, I can't help but see you next to me at fifteen again, running barefoot in your lace dress with the wind wild in your hair. The guilt is alive, thrumming under my feet; a traction city that devours my mind.

In this life, and maybe every other, you are dead.

The train accelerates. Haystacks tumble past, and I see myself clearly for the first time in years. My black hair gleaming in the cerulean glass, the foreign ocean churning in my eyes and the brackish water that tosses relentlessly in my blood. A grotesque daughter of boat and bush.

A decayed church, prostrating its steeple to an ironbark forest, passes by and I wonder if you’ve grown.

Suddenly, I wonder a thousand things. What happened after you were caught. Why you stood waist-deep in the river again, letting it carry you somewhere neither of us will ever know. If

you’ve forgiven me for my sin, or if you’ve buried your hatred in the soft Yamuna riverbed. My sin, in a way, is choosing to be free.

The train begins to slow. The sky bleeds red, making the dry mountain ranges in the distance look as if they’ve been beheaded. Nowhere Else begins to take shape, details trickling in like watercolour: mist-veiled cow pastures, a sullen wheatfield and the Fence extending toward the inferno skyline. Then I see our Hill and a thousand tents screaming in the wind and a priest drinking and two gap-toothed children running, running, running, hoping the fence will disappear. I turn away because the girl with the red hair looks too much like you.

The train grinds to a halt. Gravel crunches, but the carriage is quiet. Through the thick smoke of salt-choked pipes, the station holds her breath, waiting.

Against a backdrop unchanged by the decade, I see you next to me again with your eyes embellished by dawn’s fire crawling across the sky. You reach for my cheek, and your hand grazes mine. This time, it doesn’t burn.

Do you miss me?

Yes, more than I remember you.

We’re sitting on the edge of the docks, watching the sun soar over the city whilst the heartbeat of the ocean thrums beneath our feet. The sunrise. The end of our beginning, where water and fire aren’t tragic, but equally beautiful. Like the horizon over the sea.

Without warning, the train doors seal and wheels turn beneath me, chasing the sun back to the city harbour. Suddenly, you’re reduced to a rushed brushstroke of saltbush, of a barbed iron fence and of a glittering Yamuna river careening southward before I can even say goodbye.

Past the windowpane, the sky is holding everything flying and falling at once, and I can’t help but mourn us again, naive at sixteen. The train hums under my feet, restless. A transit map rattles, but I don’t know where to go anymore.

I think there is nowhere else left, Maria.

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 by Hashtag Kalakar celebrates diverse voices and innovative storytelling from around the world. This prestigious event seeks to highlight exceptional talent in poetry, short stories, and creative writing, offering a platform for writers to share their unique perspectives and literary artistry. Participants are encouraged to push creative boundaries and captivate audiences with their original works.

We extend our heartfelt thanks to Feiyang Zhang for sharing "Train to Nowhere Else" with us in the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. Your narrative's emotional depth and evocative imagery have left a lasting impression. We appreciate your contribution and look forward to witnessing your continued journey in the world of storytelling.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.