The Matchbox
The cold winter wind howled angrily as it threw great gusts of snow through the air, covering the ground with white powder only to pick it up again and throw it some more. The temperature had dropped twenty degrees in the past hour alone, but in the passenger cars of the train, a number of about 10 kids sat without a care in the world, warmer than they'd ever remembered being.
But not everyone was happy as a clown. No, there was one "passenger" who was definitely feeling the effects of the cold winds and icy pellets. For atop the Polar Express, the glorious machine that rattled almost gracefully over the slick rails, there was a man.
He sat hunched over on an old wooden crate, staring dismally at a small pie of measly sticks that simply refused to become the rip-roaring fire he so desperately needed.
He glanced yet again at the rapidly-diminishing pile of matches remaining in the matchbox he clutched in his hand. Only three left. Not that he'd started out with very many; the crummy matchbooks in the train stations never provided many sticks inside them.
The man heaved a sigh that would have had great gusto if it had not been immediately lost to the shrieking winds. What he wouldn't give to be inside one of the cars, sipping steaming hot chocolate from a porcelain mug and warming his chilled bones! But such wistful thoughts were of no use to him. He was a hobo, a tired, grungy homeless man who had not a dime in his worn pocket to pay for a ticket to ride on such a train. So he'd had to "hop" the train, hitching a ride in the cold in an effort to get away from the last train station, presumably only to find himself in an almost identical station. And repeat.
Sighing again, he withdrew yet another match. Shielding it as best he could, he struck it against the side of the matchbox. A small, flickering, orange flame appeared, and, like a pack of wolves descending on a helpless lamb, the wind began earnestly trying with al its might to devour that spark.
The hobo, relentless, covered it with his hand and held it down to the sticks gathered at his feet. He held is breath and waited.
There! Finally, what he'd been waiting for all along! The flames began to leap up from the wood, sparking and snapping in defiance to the wind's influence. The man allowed himself a small grin and reached out his hands to warm them with the fire's heat.
Suddenly, the train began to rattle and shake, and the hobo glanced over his shoulder too late to realize that they had come to a tunnel's entrance.
He didn't have time to throw himself flat on the roof. It wouldn't have helped him anyway. There was but one inch of clearance between the roof of the train and the roof of the tunnel.
So he died a silent death, and was blown away by the howling wind. His fire, that he'd worked so hard to build, surrendered itself to the wind and blew out.
And later, when the fireman came to shovel another heap of coal into the fire, to his great surprise there was a small, crummy matchbox mixed in with the coal.
It only had two matches left inside.