Page 22 of Leaving the Station

Neither of us have slept much since we kissed earlier. Oakley keeps stirring and pulling me closer, as if I might return to

coach if she lessens her grip.

“I’ve never been to North Dakota,” I whisper as the conductor wakes the sleeping train to announce that we’re pulling into

Fargo.

Oakley laughs, and the puff of air tickles my neck. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”

“Okay, but have you ?”

She’s silent for a moment. “Well, no.”

I flip over so that we’re facing each other, bodies pressed close under the thin Amtrak-supplied blanket. “Know-it-all.”

She shoves me, and we’re both laughing, and then we’re kissing again, more gently than we were a few hours ago.

When we’re touching like this, my brain is blissfully quiet. I’m not thinking about who I am, or who I’m not , or the string of bad decisions I made to wind up here.

The only thing in the world is Oakley’s hand on my waist, mine in her hair, our legs twisted like snakes.

My body feels like my own when it’s pressed against hers.

“When I booked a room in a sleeper car, I knew I’d get some perks, but nothing like this,” she says, grinning with puffy lips. “I’ll have to leave a good review so Amtrak knows to continue

this service.”

“What can I say?” I try and fail to keep a straight face. “We offer only the best to our Empire Builder clientele.”

I know it’s a joke, but it makes me think about how I haven’t offered my best to many other people.

I turn to the other side so that Oakley can spoon me again. I don’t want her to see the look on my face as my thoughts turn

sour.

My parents have no idea there’s anything wrong because I’ve hidden it from them. They think I’ll be heading back to college

after Thanksgiving break, a premed student following the path that’s been placed before me.

Their good little girl.

I don’t know how to tell them that I’m dropping out. Maybe they’ll make it easy and will kick me out when I tell them; at

least then I won’t have to face the shame of living under their roof.

“You okay?” Oakley asks.

“Yeah,” I tell her. “Just a little restless.”

“We could go out to the observation car?” she suggests. “Look at the beautiful sights.” She points to the pitch blackness

out of the lower-bunk window.

“Sounds good,” I tell her, and we put on our shoes—she wears her slippers and I throw on the same sneakers I’ve worn for the entire trip—and make our way to the observation car.

“Hi!” Aya says, sitting with her legs crossed in one of the chairs.

Oakley glances at me, and I try not to make my face too obvious. Our dinner with Nanami was only a few hours ago, but it feels

like an eternity has passed since then.

It’s the first time we’ve seen Aya since we were instructed to lie to her.

Oakley checks the time on her phone. “Dude, it’s four a.m. What are you doing here?”

“I know what time it is,” Aya says, pointing to her bright pink watch. She holds the Percy Jackson book she’s reading out

for Oakley to see. “I made it to the fourth one, and my mom didn’t want to keep the light on for me to read so she told me

I could come out here.”

I can’t speak. If I do, I’ll tell Aya everything.

But I don’t have to say anything because Oakley takes charge.

“What part are you up to?” she asks as she sits next to Aya.

“They found out there’s an entrance to the labyrinth at camp!” Aya tells her, eyes lighting up.

Oakley gasps. “Just wait; it gets so good.”

“You said that yesterday!” she tells Oakley. “That’s why I’m reading it so fast, because I want to be able to talk about it

with you!”

Oakley was pissed about Nanami lying, but none of that anger was ever directed at Aya. Maybe the best thing we can do is show

her a good time while she’s not yet burdened by the truth.

Oakley turns to me, and I hope she’s thinking the same thing.

It’s apparently common train knowledge that if you book a ticket in coach, you can sleep on the dirty floor of the observation

car instead of in your seat, and some people are doing that now. They all seem to be deeply asleep—or they could be dead;

we can figure that out in the morning—so no one’s bothered by the noise of our conversation.

Oakley asks Aya to read to us, then pats the seat next to her so I can join the two of them.

I settle in, closing my eyes and getting into the story. Aya’s great at reading aloud, and when she stumbles over a word,

Oakley has her sound it out and then corrects her if she’s too far off. (“It’s ancient Greek, you get a pass here,” she tells

Aya a number of times.)

After a few minutes, Oakley reaches back and grabs my hand in the space between our chairs, rubbing her thumb against the

skin of my palm. This girl who made out with me and spooned me and laughed into my ear is here, helping an elementary schooler

sound out the big words in a book they both love.

And I can’t help but feel... things.

She’s so good with Aya; she’s kind when she wants to be and protective when she needs to be. She’s so much more than I could’ve known when I met her on Monday. (How was that only Monday ?)

“Are you even listening?” Aya asks.

I open my eyes and spring to attention. “What? Yes, of course,” I say, even though I have a sneaking suspicion that I’ve been

asleep for a while.

“Good,” she says, then continues reading.

Oakley must’ve fallen asleep too because she doesn’t stir as I half listen to Aya’s words.

A few chapters later, the conductor announces the next stop in North Dakota, bringing us closer to sunrise on day three of

this trip.

A trip that will end tomorrow, whether I want it to or not.

Two Months and Change into College

I hadn’t been to class in a week. In high school I would have stress dreams about showing up fifteen minutes late. I’d cry

into my pillow with relief when I realized I’d been asleep, that I still had hours before school started.

Not anymore.

That dream became real, and nothing happened. Professors kept lecturing; they continued administering tests and assigning

readings. School went on without me, and no one cared.

The only place I felt like going during the day was the greenhouse. If Randall suspected something was wrong, he didn’t show

it. He’d greet me with a kind smile and give me updates on the plants and what needed tending. I tried not to think too much

about how this was a position for student workers only. That if I stopped going to class entirely and someone figured it out,

I couldn’t keep coming here.

I spent most of my time with the Amorphophallus , though it looked no different than it had a few weeks earlier. Still, I watched over it as if the simple act of my observation

could make it flower.

Being in the greenhouse was a tactile experience; it was the only thing in my life that felt real. When Randall wasn’t looking, I whispered comforting words to the plant or touched it gently.

“Take all the time you need,” I told it. “I believe in you.”

They were words I could’ve stood to hear.

At that point, I was back to seeing Alden only at night, though it was by my choice, not his. The roles were reversed—he wanted

to spend time with me in the daylight, and I couldn’t handle it.

The autumn sun felt like a thousand surgical lamps that illuminated the parts of myself that I could no longer stand.

If I wasn’t with him, though, I had to be alone with my thoughts. So, going to his dorm felt like the path of least resistance,

like water carving and shaping millions of years’ worth of rock to form a canyon.

“Hi,” Alden said one night, legs splayed out on his bed.

“Hi,” I said. I could barely look him in the eyes anymore.

It was 1:54 in the morning, six minutes before the first of two repeating hours. We were about to enter Daylight Saving Time.

He had a deck of cards in his palm, though after a minute he put it down.

But I wanted him distracted, so I said, “Let’s play.”

He shuffled, and I closed my eyes to listen. I loved the crisp sounds of cards sliding past each other, swapping places and

then neatly realigning.

When the shuffling stopped, he laughed a little, breathing sharply out of his nose. “Are you awake?”

I opened my eyes, and Alden was smiling, his face soft. He only brought out his playing cards when he wanted to talk .

“Deal the cards,” I told him. I didn’t want to talk.

He dealt us each ten cards, which meant we were playing gin rummy. I’d never once beat him, which used to feel like a joke

between us but was now another reminder of the ways I couldn’t compare to him.

Alden’s watch beeped.

“Happy two a.m. number one,” he said.

“Happy two a.m. number one,” I repeated.

The cards lay untouched in front of us.

“Hey,” he said, an unfinished thought.

“You go first,” I told him quickly, motioning to the cards.

Our conversations used to flow smoothly, but since my haircut, that had changed.

“The person who didn’t deal goes first,” he said.

I pulled the ten of diamonds off the discard pile. I didn’t need a ten of diamonds, but I absorbed it into my hand. It felt

better to make an active choice rather than take my chances with the next random card off the top of the deck.

It was his turn, then, and he was beautiful, sitting there with his cards. My hair was now shorter than his, though it was

hardly a competition as he hadn’t gotten a haircut yet this semester. His bangs were long enough to tie back in a bun; he

probably would’ve let me braid them if I’d asked politely.

After about ten minutes, Alden said, “Gin,” and the game was over. We played three more rounds, and I lost them all.

“Good game.”

“It wasn’t.” I folded my arms over my stomach, and Alden sighed and leaned back against the chipped stucco of his dorm wall.

He nudged my leg with his foot and frowned. “Are you upset about something?”

Other than asking if I was only dating him because I envied his gender, this was the scariest thing he could’ve said.

Because it meant that he noticed me, and correctly at that.

“No,” I told him.