The silence after the last train

It’s 1:15 and the yard’s gone still. Not quiet—still. Like the air itself is holding its breath between shifts. I stood by the west gate just now, boots on cold concrete, watching the steam from a valve fade into nothing. There’s something in that moment—the way the rails hum when they’re not under load, how the old switch points creak like bones settling. I don’t know what it means. Maybe nothing. But I keep coming back to it, like it’s a signal I’m supposed to hear but can’t quite translate.