Ol' Shaky

Devious Keen often wondered about his name. It was unusual, to say the least, and he was curious as to whether it had shaped him into the boy he was today.
          Devious was sitting on a train, looking at the old coloured man across from him. The man wore thick rimmed black sunglasses above three day grizzly stubble and held a grubby four pronged walking stick in his dry white palm. Devious was looking straight at him, trying to figure out if he was blind or not. He figured that if the man could see, he would eventually react. Devious imagined he was some sax toting New Orleans jazz cat from the 60’s or 70’s or whenever it was that jazz was popular.
          The unflinching black of the man's glasses held Devious’ stare. Eventually Devious looked away, to the flaking white paint on the roof and the fossilised wood beneath it. The paint quivvered as the train slowed, then shuddered to a halt. The door at the end of the carriage creaked open, and an imposing bald man lurched in. He looked too big for the train, and the sight of him reminded Devious of the time he attacked his sister's doll house with his trolls. The bald man, dressed in military garb, walked along the passageway and sat down next to the jazz man. The big man smiled at Devious, who smiled back, noticing the small array of gold and silver stars and circles hanging from multicoloured stitching on the man’s lapel.
“Shaky” he said, putting his arm around the old man. "Great day for it."
“Sure is,” said Shaky. His voice was old and crackled like a dusty record.
The train entered a tunnel and the echo of the engine reverberated through the carriage so that nothing else could be heard. Devious twiddled his thumbs nervously. About twelve twiddles in, that the lights inside the train began to flicker. The engine slowed. Devious' eyes went wide, watching the odd couple in front of him flash in and out of existence like an old movie. The lights fluttered, stayed on for a few seconds, and then went out. There was nothing but darkness and the engine, slowly whirring to a halt. Although nobody could see it, his thumbs stopped twiddling.
In the darkness the bald man chuckled.
“Somebody shoulda changed their oil,” he said.
“Or maybe just not let your fatass on board," said Shaky
“The alternator? You outta control man”
          Devious Keen was an enterprising and adventurous young boy, and he had been from the word go. By the age of 5 he had started his own chain of lemonade stands in surrounding streets, and by 7 he had become the most popular boy in his school after facing down Edgar “the claw” Robbins in a playground stand off. But he had a secret. He was afraid of the dark. His imagination was simply too keen for it.
So he sat, frozen in mid twiddle, trying to distract himself from the inky void around him by listening to these odd stranger's banter. Suckered tendrils slid along the floor. He lifted his feet up onto his chair.
“This kinda reminds me of that time back in India,” said the bald man.
“I damn well hope it don’t turn out like that time in India," said Shaky.
In the dark Devious’ eyes went wide. Panthers prowled around the seats and inches from his face, a stone masked witch doctor bared his brown flecked teeth.
What happened in India?” He asked.
Shaky chuckled.
“Baz you wanna tell it or should I?” he said.
“You tell it,” replied Baz, “I ain’t got the voice for that kinda story.”
“Aight then.” Devious pulled his attention from the flesh eating slugs on the window, and listened as hard as he could.
“We was twenty years old and in the heart of an Indian summer. We had tickets home, but our airport was a hundred miles away in Pakistan. Problem was Baz had spent all our money on smokes and naan bread so we had no way to get there."
"So what did you do?" asked Devious. He could feel the hair or his skin standing to attention
"Well in the middle of the night we followed a group of fellas onto some old wooden freight train. It had one of those big sliding doors like you see in the movies, but it kept jamming so we could only get in one at a time. It's a miracle Baz here got in at all."
"Kiss my ass you old coot," said Baz. Devious smiled.
"Watch your language. Anyway, when we finally squeezed this sucker in, there must have been a hundred Indians, all cramped up and starin straight at us. I don’t think they’d seen a white or a black man before, and definitely nobody of Baz's...stature. They was all ribs and knuckles, skin stretched taut over the top. There whole families all huddled together for warmth and watching us out of the corners of their eyes. It was real tight in there, and as we set off all we could hear was the ‘ka kunk a kunk,’ of the train's wheel over a sea of Indian whispers. We was talkin’ about baseball or football or somethin’.”
“Baseball,” said Baz.
"So you were talking about balls," said Devious.
“What'd you say?" said Shaky.
"Nothing." Baz laughed; Devious smiled.
"Well if you don't wanna hear the story that's fine by me."
"Aw don't be a baby," said Baz. Silence filled the carriage and the smile on Devious' face disappeared. In its place his lips were flat, millimetres from a black widow that hung from the ceiling.
"Sorry," he said.
Shaky chuckled.
“It's aight. Anyway for some reason the train started slowing down. The sound of the wheels got wider and wider until the train came to a full stop. Everyone had stopped talking - I guess they thought the police were coming or something. So we're sitting there in dead silence in the middle of a hundred starving Indians. A beam of moonlight is shining through a hole in the roof, giving everything this pale, ghostly glow. And then Baz let loose the biggest goddamn fart you've ever heard in your life.” Baz and Devious started laughing uncontrollably. “It was loud as all hell and it was reverberating off a hundred odd Indians. They though it was pretty funny at first, but man, they had no what they was in for. I did. I covered up my face as best I could while he sat there belly laughing like the fat ass buffalo he is. Just like he’s laughin’ now actually.” Baz wheezed and choked and cackled himself onto the floor with a thud. Devious was laughing too. He couldn't stop. He was laughing so hard that his sides hurt.
“So what happened then?” he asked between breaths.
“Baz shut up I’m tryin to tell a story.” Baz quietened down but Devious could still hear his stifled whimpers.
"Well," continued Shaky, “Then the stink came. It was like the Devil had shot up from hell and dropped a deuce right in the middle of our carriage. When they realised they shut up pretty fast. As soon as it hit my mouth I started to retch, but I mean I'd been exposed before. For everyone else it was their first time. And you never forget your first time." Baz had started laughing again, but Shaky continued over the top
"You could exactly how fast it was moving, cos one by one, in a circle spreading out from Baz’s dirty ass, people started throwing up. All over the place, vomit and the stink of dirty fart. And this  guy just sat there, laughin’ his ass off“
Shaky chuckled to himself while the others rolled around their seats. While he waited for them to calm down he rolled himself a cigarette and struck a match. A warm light spread shadows through the carriage. His lit his cigarette, shook out the match, and it was dark again, leaving just a round pin of orange ember, illuminating his dark glasses and the creases of his face.
“And then shit got real,” he continued. “The men came up to us and started shoutin’ at us, and Baz just kept laughin’, fartin’ along like a steam train. They was angry man, and kept pushing us and pointin’ at the door. I shook my hands and tried to apologise, but they didn’t understand. One got right up in Baz’s face, yellin’ and pushin’ and sendin’ out little balls of spit with every word. Then this guy, this retard, grabbed the little feller and threw him across the carriage. That was it. They was on us like a swarm of ants, kickin’ and punchin’ and no doubt swearin’ while I tried to protect what I could and Baz here bowled around like a dying elephant, four of ‘em hangin’ off him like goddamn Christmas decorations. When he finally went down every man woman and child ran over and tried to get a foot in where they could. I dunno when it happened, but at some point someone musta hit the wrong guy, because before I knew it,” he choked out a ball of smoke and laughter. “Before I knew it there was all fightin’ each other. I remember looking up and seeing this huge tangled mass of brown fists and limbs and high pitched yelps all flyin’ around like asteroids. It was beautiful.”
“Amen to that,” said Baz, letting out a humble toot.
Devious' eyes went wide.
“Don’t worry, he don’t make ‘em like he used to,” said Shaky.
The lights spluttered back to life and the empty carriage reappeared. It was quite bland really. Seats, lights, windows. Devious wondered what he had been afraid of. He heard the 'clunk' of the engine as it sprung back to life. It started moving.
“So what did you do then?” asked Devious.
“We pulled ourselves out of the door and onto the dirt. Then the train started up and disappeared into the night”
"Did you make it?"
Shaky smiled. He had very white teeth.
“Well that’s a whole ‘nother story."
The train pulled out into the sunshine.