The Last Stop. #1 : End of the Line.

The Last Stop.

The old engine groaned one last time before it died completely.
The bus driver turned to the young man and said,
"End of the line, kid. Come on, off you go. We don't go any further."

Prem, the young man, blinked awake sluggishly at the sound of the driver's voice.
He rubbed his eyes lightly and glanced around.
There was no one else left on the bus.
Only him.

Though he felt a bit puzzled—Why does the bus line end way out here?—he still got up, grabbed his small backpack, and obediently stepped off the bus.

The moment his feet touched the ground, Prem stretched his whole body with a long lazy twist, then rotated his shoulders and waist to ease the stiffness. After that he looked around, hoping to spot another traveler who might be heading to the same village and need to transfer to another bus.

But he quickly realized he was standing alone on a deserted road that stretched straight out to the horizon.

On both sides lay dry, barren rice fields. Only the wind moved, bending the grass in slow waves. Prem raised a hand to shade his eyes and squinted at the scenery. He couldn’t see a single house. No bus shelter. No sign. Nothing at all.

He tilted his head up, about to shout to the driver and ask where exactly he’d been dropped off—but the bus had already pulled away at speed. The wheels grinding over the parched dirt road kicked up clouds of red dust, forcing him to lift his arm and cover his nose.

“Cough, cough!!! What is this place? How far is it from Grandpa’s house?”
He stared ahead at the road, which ran straight and narrow alongside the dried-up fields, stretching on so far it felt like it would never end.

“Alright then. I’ll just wait for the next one. It’s not that late yet—there’s gotta be another bus coming through. Worst case, I’ll hitch a ride from someone around here. People in the countryside are usually pretty kind anyway.”

With that thought, Prem swung the backpack straps onto his shoulders and plopped down by the roadside.

He was exhausted. He’d been up since five in the morning to catch the long-distance bus at the Southern Bus Terminal in Bangkok. After hours on that coach, he’d finally arrived in this province—only to have to hop onto this local bus to get to the village where his grandfather lived.

Now Prem sat there in the oppressive heat. When he turned to look back the way he’d come, he saw the same endless strip of road disappearing into the distance. Waves of heat shimmered up from the asphalt, hitting him in the face again and again.

“Hours have passed. Why hasn’t a single vehicle come by? Not one?”
He grumbled internally, annoyed.
He’d been sitting there so long he felt like his butt had gone numb.

—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Prem was a 19-year-old who’d grown up in Bangkok.
For the past several years, he’d felt nothing but frustration with his family.

His father was strict and constantly nagging.
His mother was anxious to the point of being exhausting—always worried he’d fall in with the wrong crowd, worried something bad would happen if he came home late, always calling him like he was still a little kid.

His kid sister was a crybaby, bursting into tears over the smallest things.
Prem felt suffocated. He didn’t really want to be home much at all.
So when the school term ended, of course he had to find an excuse to go somewhere far away—anywhere that would get him away from these ridiculous family members, at least in his eyes.

As a child, Prem had spent many school breaks at his grandfather’s place. Grandpa was kind and warm-hearted. His house was in a remote rural area, and that place had always been where Prem felt most at peace.

Every visit, he’d be greeted with a smile and gentle, comforting words.
Not only that—he also had childhood friends there who loved running around and getting into mischief with him.

And because it was real countryside, the games rural kids played were completely different from those of city kids.

He used to go play in the stream—even though it was shallow and the current wasn’t strong, it was his favorite thing in the world. Back in primary school he’d been pretty small, so that shallow stream had felt like a deep river to him.

When he got tired of swimming, he’d climb up onto the muddy bank to catch his breath, then jump back in again like any carefree child. And then there was working in the rice paddies, catching crabs and fish like the villagers did.

The kids all thought it was a blast.
The adults, who actually depended on that catch for food, saw Prem and his friends as annoying pests more than anything.

“You little brats again! What are you doing playing in the water here? Look at this, all the fish are gone!”

That was the kind of shouting they got from the villagers whenever they went to splash around too close to where people were casting their nets.

Those days were some of his best, most precious memories.
He’d always wanted to go back to visit Grandpa and those old childhood friends again.
Though by now, they had probably all grown up and gotten jobs. Some of them might even have gone to study in the city like him.

Just before the end of his first year at university, Prem had received a letter from his grandfather.
The letter was very short, but full of concern and affection:

“Grandpa misses you so much. If you’re free, come visit me sometime.”

That was the reason he’d decided to leave home on his own and travel out to this far-flung countryside to see Grandpa.

—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sunlight gradually faded into a reddish orange.
Prem grew more and more uneasy as not a single vehicle passed by—not even a motorcycle, not even someone riding a cart.

“This is insane. Is no one going through here or what? I mean, sure, it’s rural—but there’s gotta be limits. Not even a single human or dog in sight?”

He grumbled inwardly.
“I’m starting to get hungry…”

He opened his backpack, which was filled with clothes. Inside was a small bottle of water and one bag of snacks he’d bought back at the bus station. He ripped open the snack bag and started eating ravenously.

Inside the bag was a freebie: a cute bear sticker. He didn’t like it at all, and he didn’t understand why they had to include useless stuff like that.

“How pointless. Instead of giving us more snacks, they give us this stupid thing.”

He peeled off the sticker anyway and slapped it on his water bottle.

“Not only is there barely anything in the bag, it doesn’t even taste good. And it’s so dry it scratches my throat…”

His inner monologue was full of irritation as he twisted off the cap and gulped down water in big, thirsty swallows.

After sitting for a while longer and realizing he had no other options, he finally decided to get up. He brushed the dust off his pants, hefted his backpack onto his shoulders, and started walking along the road, relying on his vague memories of the route to Grandpa’s house—even though absolutely nothing about the scenery in front of him matched what he remembered.

Still, he kept walking, hoping he’d eventually come across at least one house.

“Let’s hope this road doesn’t run all the way to the edge of the world…”

As the sky slowly darkened, the silence of the place began to press down on him.
No cars. No people.
Not even the usual chorus of crickets, cicadas, frogs, or any of the small creatures you’d expect in farmland.

There was only the sound of his own footsteps on the cracked asphalt.

Shff, shff… shff
Shff, shff… shff

“What the hell is that?” Prem felt something was off.

Shff, shff… shff
Shff, shff… shff
Shff, shff… shff

Every time he took a step, there was another sound layered just behind the sound of his own footfalls—as if someone, or something, was walking right after him.

Am I really walking here alone?

He wondered, and tried taking another step.

Shff, shff… shff

There it was again.

There really was something walking behind him.

He slowly turned around, wanting to see clearly what was following him.

The empty road cut through the open fields.
A faint hot wind blew through the dry grass, making it ripple like waves.

Prem scanned the area carefully, puzzled.

Maybe it’s just an echo from my shoes? Maybe it’s so quiet here that my hearing’s playing tricks on me…?

He tried to reason with himself, even though it didn’t make much sense. He forced himself not to overthink.

He kept walking, with that trailing footstep sound nearly always overlapping his own.

His hands, gripping the backpack straps, were tense.
Cold sweat trickled in a thin line from his forehead. The mix of heat and anxiety pierced through him like a needle.

—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------