The last train on a Tuesday is a different species from every other train.
It's not full, and it's not empty. It's sparse in the specific way of people who didn't mean to still be out.
You are on this platform because of a book.
There is a bookshop two streets from the office, the kind that keeps odd hours, and tonight they felt like closing at 11:42pm.
The platform is empty except for you and one other person.
He's standing further down, away from the shelter, as if he decided at some point that he didn't need it.
You become aware that you have been watching him for an amount of time that would be embarrassing to quantify.
You look at your phone. Two minutes.
He stops beside the shelter, not quite under it, and he looks at you at the same moment with the expression of someone who knows he's been seen and isn't bothered by it.
"The bookshop?" he says.
He nods toward the bag in your hand. There is only one shop nearby that uses that particular shade of forest green.
"What did you get?"
You consider this an oddly intimate question for 11:58 on a Tuesday platform. You tell him anyway.
"Is it good?"
"I don't know yet. I was standing in the aisle reading the first page when they told me to leave."
"How far did you get?"
"Third paragraph."
He smiles. It just lands somewhere warm and stays there.
The train appears at the far end of the track, a single bright eye in the dark, and he gestures as if to say, after you.
You walk toward the yellow line, very conscious of him one step behind you.