Lili Pozsár
Patrik heard the song first in a train station in Marseille, half-drowned in announcements and footsteps. Someone’s speaker was playing 500 Miles, soft and slightly distorted, like it had travelled too far already. He almost didn’t notice it. Then the line caught him—five hundred miles, five hundred miles—and stayed. He was on his way to see his father. They hadn’t really spoken in months, at least not properly. Just short messages that ended before they started anything real. The train ride made everything feel longer than it was. Fields, frozen rivers, small towns sliding past like they didn’t belong to anyone. The song kept coming back in his head, not loudly, just steady enough that he couldn’t ignore it. Five hundred miles sounded ridiculous for a country that wasn’t even that big. But it didn’t feel like geography. It felt like a gap. When he arrived, his father was already there, waiting near the exit. They stood for a second too long without moving. First, his father greeted him, then Patrik said hi. That was it at first. That night, his father played music in the kitchen while making soup, like he needed something filling the silence. When the same song came on again, neither of them changed it. Patrik sat down anyway. And for the first time in a while, the distance between them didn’t feel like something fixed. Just something they were still walking through.