Martha’s Version
Something brushed against my foot.
I woke to see a guy in the door of our train compartment.
He apologised. My first thought was that he was just checking to see if there was a seat free, and when he saw us sleeping he apologised for disturbing us. But when I looked on the floor and saw our day packs missing, I immediately put the pieces together. It was our day packs in the hands of that thief that had brushed against me!
I jumped up, ran out of the compartment, at the same time yelling to Matt “Our bags, where are our bags!”
I ran down the train in the direction that I was pretty sure the thief had gone. When I reached the doors connecting the train cars, I realised that I was in bare feet. Pretty fucking frantic at this point, I ran back to our compartment to find a very dazed and confused Matthew looking under the seats for our bags.
I yelled at Matt to run, to find the guy.
“What guy?”
“The train guy, quick, we’re pulling into a station!”
Matt ran, and I put my shoes on.
I followed. When I got to the section between the cars, there were two guys there having a smoke. They must have been there when the thief ran by.
“Did you see somebody take our bags?”
No response.
“Our bags! Some guy took our bags did you see him run by!”
Shakes of the head. Not very convincing. I was quite suspicious. I began to imagine a brilliant sting, and that every one on board was involved. Like I said, I was frantic. If this was a sting, then maybe the day-bag thefts where just a diversion to get us out of the compartment so they could really work on our big packs! I ran back to the compartment, stood there for a second, and realised that I was being completely paranoid. Matt’s jacket, which he had been using as a pillow, was the only stray object, so I put it on. At this point the train came to a stop. I got off the train and ran to the next open door, where a train guy was standing.
“Someone stole our bags!”
He ignored me completely. I guess he was doing his job or something, but I felt totally invisible. Or maybe he was in on the sting too!
I ran back into the train, back to our compartment, and just stood there. Ok, so I’ve lost my digital camera, and all the books, and it will suck not having our day packs, but really we will survive. That’s when Matt came back, the gallant hero, gasping for breath, clutching our day packs. It was like a dream. For a second I thought, well maybe the thief dropped them in another compartment or something, but when Matt told me he chased him down, I was literally dumbfounded. I kissed him over and over and told him that he was the most amazing person ever! Which he is.
A little while later, while we were hanging out in Brindisi, waiting for our ferry that would take us to Greece, I laughingly said to matt, “Sure we may loose our bags every now and then, but we always get them back!” (referring to a canoe trip we took a little over a year ago). “I can’t believe you said that!” yelled Matt, who I’ve noticed has become more and more superstitious of late, as he jumped up to look for some wood to knock.