Gustave Daste (Hugo Fan Fic)

Gustave knew he was late. The sun had sunk below the horizon, leaving the lane in an eerie twilight. Orange and pink plastered the underside of the clouds above, but below, there was nothing but shadows and dark shapes. The air was cold on his lips, and his breath came in little puffs of steam, short and sharp. His chest rose and fell as he drew in frantic breathes, pumping his legs as fast as they could propel him, until his lungs felt like balloons fit to burst.

His clothes were in tatters. His coat was ripped, one sleeve hanging by a single thread, the other missing entirely. His knees poked out of tears in his trousers, bony and pale. An assortment of sticks and leaves decorated his hair, swinging madly as he sprinted down the laneway towards his home. One foot scraped awkwardly, the ankle bent at an odd angle. It screamed at him at agony with every step, getting worse with every swing of the leg. His teeth were gritted at the pain of the break, but he had no time to stop. Mamma would give him more broken bones if he was late for tea.

Rusted gates were set into the hedges that bordered the lane on both sides, rising high above Gustav’s head, seeming to him like they were leaning inwards, channelling him towards his doom. He counted off the gates as he passed them, the numbers painted on them too faded to see in the dusk. He reached ten then started again, holding out a finger to remember how far he’d counted. It wasn’t until he’d reached three out-stretched fingers, and then the number five on his next count that he skidded to a stop. Mamma’s house.

He frantically clawed at the gate’s latch with half-frozen fingers, desperation derailing his attempt to open it smoothly and quietly. Instead, the rusted hinges squealed like an almighty banshee, and Gustave’s heart thudded an extra loud beat. He hesitated, waiting for the screech of Mamma’s anger. It wasn’t forthcoming, so he scampered up the garden path, almost hopping across the broken flagstones as the pain of his broken ankle finally hit home with full force. Long weeds rose from the cracks in the path, offering an extra hazard that threatened to tangle his feet and trip him. Through sheer determination, he made it to the house.

He ignored the front door. Mamma would know if he came in that way. Instead, he detoured around the house, squashing the overgrown grass, one leg dragging behind. He fell once, as he tried to round the corner of the house, adding scratches to those already covering his elbows and palms. He stayed quiet though. He couldn’t let Mamma know he’d been out. He came to the window of his bedroom, a thin slit of grubby glass that hid the view inside. He’d wedged it open with a couple of wooden chess pieces, a knight and a rook jammed between the sill and the sliding pane. He pushed it further up, just enough room to squeeze his shoulder through, with a little bit of a wriggle. He tumbled to the floor of the room, broken ankle held high to protect it from banging on the wooden slats. He let out a relieved breath, staring up at the ceiling, badly plastered with peeling paint.

Mamma’s red face entered his field of vision, brows drawn close together in anger. Gustav’s heart stopped, an extreme away from the staccato rhythm it’d just been playing.

Mamma said not a word, instead letting out something of a low growl, revealing brown teeth, half missing. She bent down and gripped his thin shoulders, long fingernails digging into his skin, drawing rivulets of blood. Gustave squealed as his ankle dragged along the ground but Mamma just tightened her fist. She wasn’t his real Mamma of course - she had died when he was born, his father long abandoning the two of them. Mamma had raised him since then, barely acknowledging his existence, using him as little more than a slave.

She dragged him out through the doorway and down the hall, into the kitchen. A large pot simmered atop the cheap gas stove, emanating the smell of boiled vegetables and off-cuts of meat. Gustave’s mouth watered and his stomach growled, but he told it to stop it. With a sinking feeling, he knew he wasn’t going to get any food tonight.

The tiny cupboard that Mamma opened turned out to be the basement stairs, a narrow, rickety set of planks that led downwards into a dark void. She thrust Gustave onto the stairs, where he teetered for a brief, delightful moment, before he cascaded down them. This time he did scream, as his broken angle punched into hard wood not once, not twice but three times, over and over again. He could feel fragments of bones shift around in his leg and, when he finally rolled to a stop in the dust at the bottom on the stairs, he couldn’t feel his toes at all. He lay face down and sobbed into the dust, grime caking his face.

It wasn’t until three hours later until the pain subsided enough that he felt he could sit up, carefully manoeuvring his legs until they were safely positioned in front of him. It’d been years since he’d been thrown into the basement, and then only for a few minutes at a time. Now, he guessed Mamma would leave him there all night. A tiny bit of light seeped in from the doorway above, but not enough to see by. But, if his memory served him correctly…he leant sideways and searched with his fingers along one of the shelves that lined the basement. He found something soft and squishy, and then, further along, the hard wax of a candle. A book of matches sat beside it and he prayed that the years hadn’t ruined him. He cleared a space on the floor and struck a match across the rough floor. The first attempt yielded nothing, but the second blossomed a sickly flame, which he applied to the wick of the thick candle, careful not to extinguish the comforting flame.

The candle took hold, and he sniffed back his tears. Things weren’t all bad, then. He raised the flickering flame and looked about himself. The basement was mostly bare, except for the shelves covered in long-abandoned bric-a-brac. An assortment of boxes was pushed against the far wall, which piqued his curiosity. He pushed himself along on his backside, the dust providing a sort of bizarre lubrication which aided his passage. His foot dangled uselessly at the end of his leg, and he refused to spend too long looking at the tibia that was twisted the wrong way.

The boxes were sealed with tape which had long since lost its stick, easily removable. He pulled open the flaps and peered inside. He gasped. Something metallic glinted back at him. Rows and rows of miniature railway filled the cardboard the brim. Excitedly, he pulled open the next box, finding more tracks. Hundreds of tracks. The last box he opened contained stacks of different rain carriages, and, right at the bottom, a red locomotive wrapped in cotton wool, its surfaces still gleaming with polish. He sat back, a smile plastered on his face, pain forgotten.

It took him an age to construct even a little bit of the track, just a straight followed by a simple curve, as he figured how the bits linked together. It quickly made sense to him however, and he soon had a completed circuit, nothing more than a small oval. It was enough to start with, however, and he lined up three carriages - two passenger cars and a caboose. The locomotive was powered by clockwork, with a silver key that stuck out the top. He slowly wound the key, fearing at any second the insides might break, but the locomotive was well made. Holding the wheels, he coupled it with the rest of his train and released it. The train took off, making tiny click-clack noises that sounded like the real thing in the silence of the basement. He threw back his head and laughed with joy. Something fun, at last. The locomotive chugged round and round, and he got to work constructing the rest of the track, adding loops and intersection, sidings and climbs, using the boxes as hills and tunnels.

By midnight, the entire basement was filled with a complex network of train tracks. The locomotive carried on, stopping frequently to be re-wound. Gustave sat in the middle of it all, his broken leg outstretched and his fingers dancing on little lever to control the rail switches to move the train onto different parts of the track. His candle burnt out, but he found another. He didn’t care about his growing hunger, or the tiredness tugging at his eyelids. This was the life. He wished he could do this forever.

· · ·

Thirty years later, Gustave stood awkwardly as a red locomotive pulled onto the platform of the station. His lame leg itched. Broken first in his childhood and then again in the war. It had never healed properly. In his hand, he held a cane, which he used to scratch at the scars beneath his trousers, never quiet soothing them. The rusted mechanism that should’ve helped him walk barely worked anymore.

The train in front of him eased to a stop and let out a single whistle to alert those inside it was safe to alight. Gustave nodded to the passengers as they got off, smiling with crooked teeth. None of them spoke to him; they already knew where they were going. The collar of his uniform was stiff, irritating his neck. The platform quickly cleared, leaving him alone to stare at the locomotive, the beautiful machine venting steam into the air.

With a sigh, he turned away. No one wanted a broken man to drive their trains. Instead, he could watch them, offering assistance to the passengers, clearing rubbish, and selling tickets. He was close enough to touch the trains, but to actually operate them, to control them - that was too much for someone like him. With solemn eyes, he gazed at the clock above the main hall of the station. Halfway through his shift.

Movement flickered behind the clock face. Gustave frowned. Had he just seen a young boy up there?