Chapters will get progressively longer.
Reading and reviewing is much appreciated.
Oh, and I don't own South of Nowhere.

A train holds a medley of people.

The mother with the little child who won't just shut up for two seconds. She tries to give him a cookie or a toy. But the child doesn't want it. Maybe, he wants something more. Children are greedy like that. The mother looks exasperated, willing someone to just tell her what to do as her child jumps on the seat next to her. This child is obviously untainted and oblivious to the world and the horrors and heartbreak, loneliness and despair it holds. I am envious of that child.

The man in the suit with his brown briefcase clutched closely to his side. He talks on his cell phone in whispered tones and makes hushed hand movements. The pinstripes down his jacket tell you he's wealthy, but a dickhead. Maybe he's talking to his wife. Or perhaps he's talking to a lover, to obtain some sort of pleasure before he's rushed into a busy work day. His coffee is in a traveling mug and you wonder if it's cold or lukewarm. I hate lukewarm coffee. He's not even sipping it, it's just sitting in his hand. And when he runs a hand through his salt-and-peppered hair, you can see the winkles around his eyes tighten just for a moment, like he's trying to push away bad memories or indiscretions.

The kid with his guitar case sits with his legs propped up on the seat across from him. You wonder, can he actually play the guitar? Is he going to school for it? Or maybe he's just going to go the park and strum a little in the sunlight as people pass him and think look how peaceful. When really, he's just strumming away frustration, because that's the only thing he knows how to do. Maybe his heart is broken. Maybe he has just broken a heart. His songs are melancholy, you're sure of this, and they're originals. Made up from pieces of broken relationships and past events. Part of you wants to go follow him, see if he really does go sit down in the park. But you have more important matters to deal with besides watching some kid play a guitar.

The old lady sits tiredly by the window. Her eyes open and close every now and then, and you wonder whether she had a hard time sleeping. It is early, after all. But then again, don't all old people get up at the crack of dawn, read the newspaper, and catch the soap operas on TV? Living through characters who have so much drama going on that they just can't seem to see what's really important. Her bag is big, and full. And you wonder what she could possibly have in there. Maybe she's going to visit her grandchildren and give them presents. Presents like packages of cookies or Caramel candies, rosary beads or trinkets from the last casino she had just come home from. She had a whole life, a full life. And you wonder what you'll be doing when you're her age.

The young woman dressed in a pants suit with ear buds in her ears, iPod in her hand. She has on heels, but not the crazy tall ones, the more comfortable ones. She's going to her internship, you think. Maybe at a law firm. She spent years and years in college and in Grad school only to end up on a train early in the morning to a job where she'll be getting coffee for the partners. Perhaps this is what she wanted. She feels accomplished, that she's actually going somewhere with her life instead of sitting on her couch at home, like many of her fellow graduates. Law school was tough, but she soldiered on. She's proud, but she's nervous. Because what if she screws up? She hasn't come this far to get yelled at for putting whole milk instead of low fat milk into a coffee that her boss probably doesn't need.

The couple in the back are huddled together in a comforting fashion. The girl has a small smile on her face as her boyfriend whispers something apparently funny or witty into her small ears. She loves him, it's obvious. Her hands are splayed about on his chest, playing with the collar of his green jacket. Their actions and intimacy reveal that they've been together for a while and they know nothing else. They're naïve enough to think that they'll be together forever. They want to get married, have the puppy, the 2.5 kids, the white picket fence surrounding the quaint house in a suburban neighborhood, the swimming pool, the Volvo in the driveway. Or maybe the Civic. You can't be sure.

Sometimes, when you're on a train, watching all these people about to engage in their everyday lives, you're bitter. Because you see all of them and they seem to play a role or have some purpose. You even wonder what people think of you, sitting by the window, your head back on the headrest, your eyes closed. What do you look like to them?

Do you appear to be the young girl, heart hurting, about to go home and then visit your mother in the city who you only sporadically see? Do they know you're dreading it? Are they aware of the fact that you don't get along well with your mother?

My eyes start to close, but just when they're about concealed, the mother yells something that I can't make out and I hear a splash of liquid on the ground. I look over and the child has spilled his juice cup, juice leaking down the floor.

Cue memory.

"Why are we doing this, again?" I asked Spencer as we stood in her kitchen one Sunday morning.

"Uh because." She answered absentmindedly, stirring the contents of batter in a bowl.

"For a writer, you're not s good with the words my friend."

"Shut up Ash." Spencer chuckled, her face scrunched, still stirring.

We were making French toast. It was so…normal. Sunday morning, and Spencer had called me because she said we had to do something important. So I got to her house and it turned out she had tricked me into coming over to make food. "I was bored." She had said, smirk placed firmly on her face as she opened the door to reveal me with tired eyes and messy hair. "When something really important does come up, I'm not going to come. Like, the boy who cried wolf." I had said. "Except the girl who cried wolf." Spencer answered, closing the door behind me.

I sat at the kitchen table, watching her stir and cook and read and fry and whatever other breakfast things were going on in this kitchen.

"Come here please, lazy. You're no good to me just sitting." Spencer said over her shoulder.

I grabbed my cup filled with apple juice and made my way to the counter, close to her, reading the book over her shoulder.

"Alright." I said with mock annoyance in my voice. "What's going on here babycakes."

It wasn't abnormal for me to refer to Spencer with terms of endearment. It wasn't weird, it was just…common. Because calling her just Spencer or Spence didn't do it. She was more than that to me. Something more intimate, a more intimate version of the best friend I had always known.

Spencer smiled softly at me. "Here, pour this in." She handed me a cup full of milk.

I felt oddly domestic. Like making French toast in a kitchen can make you feel. My apple juice just added to that feeling. Sweatpants, loose t-shirt, converse. All added to that simple feeling of being domestic. Could it get any more domestic than standing in the kitchen while the sun shone through the window above the sink?

I didn't think so.

I moved my head to pour the liquid into the bowl, and that's when the bright sunshine caught my eye and I couldn't see. I managed to spill half the milk into the counter and it dripped down. Spencer jumped back instantly, my hand grabbed the towel on the counter, the towel that I had placed my juice cup on top of. The juice cup dropped ot the floor and juice ran through the cracks in the tiles of the floor.

"Ashley!" Spencer exclaimed as she moved her bare feet to avoid the moisture on the floor.

I laughed, I couldn't help it. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry." I grabbed the towel and started to mop up the mess I had made.

"Do you have to cause disaster wherever you go?" She asked me, her eyes narrowed, watching me bend to the floor. But her eyes were sparkling playfully and I knew she wasn't mad.

"Come on Spence, you should know the answer to that by now." I chuckled.

Spencer shook her head and pushed me from my bending down position so I fell into the puddle. "Douchebag!" I yelled as I felt the cold liquid infiltrate my previously dry shirt. I threw the soppy towel at her and it hit her right in the chest, her eyes wide in surprise, mouth agape.

She pretended to not help me clean it up for about fifteen seconds before she changed her mind.

My memory ends right as I am stepping off the train. It was a meaningless memory. Honestly, no significance to anything, except to the way we used to be. So, really, significant to everything.

When I finally get into the city, my feet take me the rest of the way to my mother's building. When I finally arrive, my eyes look up at the pretty building, deep orange door, black railings, curved steps down to the sidewalk. The nice little trees lining the street indicate that she does, in fact, live in the expensive part of New York. There's something about those steps that make me want to just sit down on them and have a cigarette. Maybe that's a Sex and the City kind of fantasy that I feel I have to play out.

So I do.

I sit on the steps in the slightly chilly fall weather and watch the leaves sway on the trees. I don't know why my mother called me to come over here for the day. I don't totally hate my mother, no. It's just that I don't feel the need to sit in her expensive apartment sipping martinis while she asks me over and over again through subliminal messaging why I'm so shitty and bitter.

Maybe today I'll tell her.

But I know I won't.

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Just a little note: I totally wasn't anticipating writing a new story so soon. But I randomly got this idea, and I had no choice but to start writing it. Hope that's okay with everyone =P