Page 15 of Leaving the Station

I found this charming when we were alone, but around my queer friends it was different. I knew it was wrong, but I wanted

him to change, if only for this dinner, so that he could better meet their expectations.

But he was who he was, and I liked him that way.

“English,” Alden said finally. “I’m majoring in English.”

Everyone nodded, and the conversation petered out.

“Should we get food?” Shelly suggested, already standing up from the table.

The other Tees agreed, and off they went.

Leaving me behind with Alden.

“I feel like I failed a test,” Alden said as he opened the door to his room. I’d gone back to my dorm to change out of my

so-called funeral clothes, and now we were both wearing pajamas.

I was so relieved to be alone with him that I nearly collapsed.

“It was fine,” I said, though we both knew that was a lie.

If he’d failed a test, then I had too. The Tees had no reason to continue being my friend.

I’d always felt slightly out of place with them, but with Alden I could be... someone different. Not fully myself—I didn’t

know who that was—but I could at least bask in his easy nature.

We played cards and listened to the playlist he’d made for me. It was nice.

I couldn’t manage everyone’s expectations, so I would manage only his. He was easy enough to understand. He didn’t need me

to be the perfect future doctor, or someone who knew everything about themselves.

He was simple when nothing else was.

“Do you want to make out a little?” he asked after a few too many rounds of a card game I didn’t fully understand.

I appreciated him asking. He always did—he never rushed me or leaned in without my go-ahead.

“Sure,” I told him, scooting closer.

He put his hand on my waist, and I let him do most of the work. Kissing, I’d learned, was kind of nice. It was better than losing at a card game.

I leaned into him and put my hand on his stubbly cheek, imagining having stubble of my own.

That thought stopped me short, and I pulled back.

“Are you good?”

“Yeah,” I told him, blinking hard, willing the thought that had popped into my head to leave.

It would not.

“Just kind of tired.”

“Oh.”

I could tell I’d disappointed him, and I had to fix that. He was the last person on earth—other than Randall—who wasn’t even

a little disappointed in me.

I knew how to make it up to him. “Would it be okay if I stayed over tonight?”

His face was close to mine, and when I said it, he smiled wider than I’d ever seen.

Like me, Alden had a single room, so neither of us had to worry about roommates. We could’ve been having sleepovers this whole

time, but I hadn’t floated the idea, and he hadn’t brought it up.

“You seriously want to?” he asked, but before I could say yes, he was already pulling a box out from under his bed and grabbing

a toothbrush. “My mom packed me like one hundred extra—she’s really concerned about dental hygiene. This one could be yours

when you’re here, if you want.”

Here was this boy, with his floppy bangs, his skinny arms, and his tilted head, holding a bright yellow toothbrush out to me with all the hope in the world.

“Thank you,” I told him. “Seriously.”

Once we’d brushed our teeth, we both stood in front of his bed.

“We don’t have to do anything,” he said quickly. “Just, like, sleep.”

I nodded, grateful. “That’d be nice.”

He was the first to jump onto his raised bed, and I crawled in next to him. We were a few inches apart, and he closed the

distance between us by turning on his side and wrapping an arm around my waist.

I let him hold me, and there was something comforting about having another living, breathing person in bed with me.

It was the best night’s sleep I’d had since I left for school.

Tuesday, 7 p.m., La Crosse, WI

We arrive at the Mississippi River crossing in total darkness. That doesn’t stop Aya from nearly bouncing out of her seat

with excitement. Her mom seems to have all but surrendered her to me and Oakley, and I’m not mad about it.

“This is the greatest bridge of all time,” Aya says, knees folded on her seat.

“Oh yeah?” I ask. “Why’s that?”

I love that she’s a child with a favorite bridge.

“It’s a swing bridge, and before it existed you needed a ferry to get across the Mississippi River.” She jumps up from her

seat. “But that was in the way olden days.”

“What’s a swing bridge?” I try to sound interested, but the longer Aya speaks about bridges, the more I wish I could talk to Oakley alone about her time in New York.

But Oakley had quickly moved on from that conversation, and maybe that’s for the best. I don’t need to know about her life

before this train trip. She’s just the blond girl I met in the dining car.

If I keep thinking that, maybe I’ll convince myself it’s true.

“I think you can figure out what a swing bridge is,” Oakley says in response to my question. She sticks out her hand and pivots

it at her wrist joint. “It’s a bridge that swings.”

“Exactly,” Aya adds, sounding smug.

“Love that you two are ganging up on me now.”

“We’re not ganging up on you,” Oakley tells me.

“My dad always tells me and my mom that we’re ganging up on him,” Aya says. “Like, girls ganging up on boys.”

Based on how Aya’s saying it, I’m not sure if her dad says this as a joke or because he’s an asshole, but either way, don’t

love that.

Then Aya adds, “And my friend Cayden—you know, the one I was telling you about who has two moms—he says that when people do

that kind of stuff, like they’re annoying you or whatever, it means they have a crush on you.” She finally inhales, but she’s

not done speaking. “And he says that when someone’s kind of mean to you, that’s how they tell you they like you. Like how

my dad does with my mom sometimes. That’s what Cayden said.”

It’s official: I want to punch Aya’s dad.

Still, I couldn’t help but smile at her monologue, and I try to hide my expression behind my hand as Oakley’s face turns serious. “And do you believe Cayden?”

“Well, yes.” Aya shrugs. “He’s pretty smart.”

“Listen.” Oakley leans forward, and Aya does too, so their heads are close together. “When you love someone, you don’t have

to pretend to be mean. You can tell them you love them every single day. You can compliment their outfit or their hair or

whatever else you like about them.”

“Um, okay,” Aya says, leaning away. “I’ll try to remember that for when I’m, like, forty.”

“Please do.” When Oakley sits back, her posture loosens and the urgency from the previous moment is gone as quickly as it

arrived.

Oakley and Aya talk about their favorite Percy Jackson characters and if they would join Artemis’s hunt (yes for both of them).

I have to admit that it’s cute, but I’m thinking about Oakley’s serious tone, about the way she tried to impart this information

to Aya like it was the last thing she’d ever do.

After we cross the bridge, Aya gets bored of the observation deck and runs down to the snack car to bother Edward.

“All right,” I say when Aya’s gone. “Are we gonna talk about that? Also, we’re on the same page about Aya’s dad, right? He

needs to get a knuckle sandwich.”

I hoped Oakley would laugh at my use of the phrase “knuckle sandwich,” but her serious expression returns.

“You know how I told you I have five siblings?” Oakley asks.

I frown. “What does that have to do with Aya?”

“I have five older sisters ,” Oakley says again. “And all of them are married. I watched them find their husbands. They would come home one day and say

they’d met some righteous returned missionary, and weeks later they were talking about marriage. I watched my sisters become

subservient; I watched them be belittled by men they’d sealed themselves to for all of eternity.” She shakes her head. “I

don’t want that for anyone I care about. I don’t want Aya to think that’s what love has to be.”

I’ve never met someone who holds love in such high regard, like it’s a basic human right, next to food and water, to have

people who love you unconditionally and who you love in the same way.

I nod, unsure of what to say, but after a while of staring out the dark window, I do what I do best: I deflect. “I know this

is going to sound like another smooth-brain thought, but I wish I could turn off nighttime for the train ride,” I tell Oakley.

“There’s so much I want to see that I’ll never be able to because of the schedule. Aya didn’t even get to see the swing bridge

in daylight!”

“No, that makes sense,” Oakley says. “I want to see everything too.”

I nod, wondering if she means off the train as well as on it.

“It’s nice in the observation car, though,” I say, looking around. “The curved glass roof reminds me a little of the greenhouse

I worked in.”

I hadn’t meant to tell Oakley that, but it came out anyway.

“You worked in a greenhouse?” she asks. “How come you didn’t mention it?”

“Sorry, I didn’t realize I was supposed to print out my resume and hand it to you at the start of the trip.”

I’m deflecting again.

When Oakley doesn’t respond, I continue. “There’s this plant there; it’s called a corpse plant. Well, really, it’s called

an Amorphophallus titanum , which means ‘giant misshapen penis.’” I look over at her. “But you probably already have all the Latin names of plants and

their translations memorized for when you’re on Jeopardy! .”

“I don’t,” she says. “I guess I still have a few categories to work on.”

“I guess,” I say, staring at the floor.

When I look back up, her eyes are wide and curious. “Can you tell me about it?”

So I explain that my corpse plant came from seeds genetically identical to corpse plants all over the country, and that sometimes,

if the conditions are right, they all bloom at the same time. I tell her that it’s the largest flowering plant in the world,

that it looks almost alien when it comes alive.

“That’s amazing,” she says, and she’s looking at me like I’ve given her a gift.

I’m watching her file away new knowledge in real time. I gave her trivia that she can use on someone else.