THE SECRET TRAIN - A BEDTIME STORY

“Bed time!” The words that Matthew always hated. “Can’t I stay up a bit longer”, he pleaded but his mother could not be persuaded so, reluctantly, he made his way up stairs, brushed his teeth, donned his super hero pyjamas and jumped into bed. Matthew had learned not to make too much fuss. If he did as he was told, sometimes his mother would let him stay up a bit longer to finish a game or read a story but if he was difficult she became even more strict.

Matthew felt restless but he lay down and closed his eyes trying to nod off to sleep. “I wish our house had secret doors and passages”, he thought so that I could sneak out of bed and explore. He lay there imagining all sorts of adventures that he might have when suddenly he was startled by a bright light on the wall opposite his bed. He rubbed his eyes and, to his amazement, he saw that the light had become a shimmering door. Unable to contain his curiosity, he slid out of bed and approached noticing a large crystal handle that seemed to tell him to turn it and step through the opening.

Matthew opened the door and stepped onto a colourful raised platform above a yellow train track. Before Matthew could take in these strange new surroundings, a voice came over the loudspeakers dotted along the platform. “Next train is for Adventure Land stopping at Susie’s House, Doll City and Teddy Town”. Susie was Matthew’s friend who lived in the next street and he wondered why she had never mentioned that she had a secret station there. As he was thinking about this, he heard a noise to his right and looked up to see a big wooden train with red wheels and a tall blue funnel. It was pulling five open topped carriages in different colours. Green, purple, pink, red and orange. Behind this was a bigger, covered carriage painted blue with a guard poking his head out of its door.

The train stopped at the station and the guard shouted, “All aboard” in a booming voice that sounded very important. Matthew jumped into the red carriage which had four comfy seats, two facing forward and two backwards. Matthew liked to face the direction that the train was travelling so he took his seat just before the guard blew his whistle. The train started rolling and entered a long, dimly lit tunnel. In no time at all, it emerged from the tunnel and into another station where there were lots of flower baskets and pretty paintings on the walls of the waiting room. “Susie’s House”, a voice sounded. “This train is for Adventure Land stopping at Doll City and Teddy Town”.

Matthew’s friend Susie emerged from the waiting room carrying her favourite doll. He was dressed in nothing but a small white nappy and was bald apart from one clump of fair hair that fell into a big curl on the top of his head. Susie often carried him with her and said that his name was Charlie Brown. The name had been given to the doll by her grandfather and had always seemed appropriate so was never changed. Susie caught sight of Matthew and waved. He waved back and opened the carriage door for her to join him in the red carriage although he suspected that she would have preferred the pink one.

“Hello Susie, hello Charlie Brown”. Matthew greeted them with a smile. “How come you have never told me about this train?” he asked trying not to sound annoyed. “It’s a secret train”, replied Susie “and you are only allowed to know about it if the dream weavers build a platform at your house. They will only build one if they know you can keep a secret and if you have been good and are ready for night time adventures”. With that, the guard’s whistle blew and the train pulled out of the station at Susie’s House.

“Where are you going?”, enquired Susie. “Don’t know”, said Matthew. “Might go to Teddy Town. I lost my teddy the other day. Perhaps he is hiding there. What about you”. “I’m off to Doll City”, she replied. “I’m taking Charlie Brown to see some of his friends who live there”.

The train picked up speed and the wind blew through their hair as they passed fields of toy farm animals and buildings made from Lego and Meccano sets with paper mache rocks and hills behind them. The train soon pulled into Doll City where the streets were full of all sorts of dolls the like of which Matthew had never seen before. He waved goodbye to Susie and Charlie Brown as the train moved on across more fields and rivers until he heard a voice announcing, “Next stop Teddy Town”. The train slowed and chugged into the station.

Excitedly, Matthew jumped out, left the station and started off down the main street. It was market day and the town was crowded with teddies of all shapes, sizes and colours. Not just teddy bears, mind you, but all sorts. Elephants, donkeys, monkeys, gollies, bunnies and even a rather frightening looking alligator. Just as he thought he would never find his own teddy, Bertie Bear, in such a crowded place, he spotted him by an ice cream van with a big cone of cookie dough ice cream. It was all over Bertie’s nose and was dripping down his cheeks as his long tongue scooped up another dollop of his favourite treat. “Typical”, thought Matthew. “Trust Bertie to find an ice cream van”. Mind you, the ice cream looked so tempting that Matthew ordered himself a large chocolate chip cone topped with nuts and joined Bertie, savouring every lick of the best ice cream he had ever tasted.

“Wakey, wakey!” a voice rang in Matthew’s ears. “Oh, I see you’ve found Bertie. Where was he, in the cupboard where I told you to look yesterday?” “No, I found” a bleary eyed Matthew started to say but he stopped. He remembered that the train was a secret and he wanted to be sure it was still there every night when he went to bed.