I fall asleep stretched on the row of brown seats after Verona. My sleep is half worried and it reproaches me.
My friend V., painter and madman, whom I wanted to visit in Venice, is in fact in Moscow to see his mother and get a haircut. This is a bit of a letdown. Suddenly, hearing his voice on the phone, I felt a pang of nostalgia for our conversations and his twisted Russian sense of humor.
I wish this train was going straight to Moscow, I think, that shitty city. The direction is right after all. I dream about it awaken for a second by the bell of the snack vendor rushing down the second class corridor.

I wake up again as the train slows down in the station of Mestre, ten minutes from the Lagoon. I stand up in the dark compartment, it's past 10 pm, I pick up my stuff, not entirely awake I climb down the train. The sidewalk is wet of rain and the iron smell of the rain evaporating in the warm evening fills my nostrils.
On the other side of the sidewalk is a pendolino waiting, filled with light and empty of passengers. The train conductor is lurking at me from there, whistle in the hand, foot onto the ladder.
He whistles. His short bristled black mustaches bend in a circle around the silver whistle.
I ask him if the train goes to Trieste.
"Sure," he says, removing the whistle from his mouth.
"Can I take the train without a ticket" I ask him.
"If you pay for it!" he exclaims.
"I mean do I pay a fee?" I know this is the rule if you want to get aboard a superfast pendolino train without reservation.
"Oh! Not at this hour," he says, now with a reassuring smile, meaning he will make an exception.
This is so typical Italy, I think climbing the ladder. You can't understand it if you're not Italian.

Later I am finally waking up. I'm on a different train, there's a bar without a barman, empty seats in the lounge, in every coach, and a random destination. To be continued.