Page 27 of Leaving the Station
He nodded. “I can tell you care about the plants.”
Of course I cared about the plants; I cared for their well-being more than my own.
All I said was, “I do.”
“I’m teaching a botany lab next semester, if you wanted to take it,” he said as he shook out the tarp.
It was when he said that, when he mentioned a future academic season, that I knew once and for all that I wasn’t cut out for
college. That I didn’t have what it took to sit through another lecture or take another test.
If I could’ve taken that one lab, I would’ve. Spending time with plants and Randall for college credit seemed... not terrible.
But I couldn’t just take that class.
“That sounds nice,” I told him. “I don’t know if it’ll fit in my schedule, though.”
“No pressure.” He dusted himself off. “Just think about it.”
I nodded. Of course, I had thought about it, about what it would be like to be Zoe the botanist.
“I will,” I promised.
“Good,” he said. “I’ve really loved having you here.”
He left me in the conservatory, and I tried not to cry into the Amorphophallus .
I checked my phone then, and there was a message waiting for me. The only person who texted me with any regularity was Alden,
so I was about to swipe it away, but it wasn’t from him.
It was from Autumn.
Autumn: this is kind of random
but i was wondering if you were on campus ?
if you are I’d love to talk !
Wednesday, 12 p.m., Crossing into MT
I feel better after downing a bottle of water and stretching my legs somewhere in the westernmost part of North Dakota.
It took nearly eight hours to pass through the state, and in that time, everything has changed. I found out Oakley’s going
back to the Church. She found out I’m not going back to college. We made out.
The last one was the most revelatory.
After I cool off and head back to her sleeper car, Oakley and I finish our planning session for Aya’s party.
“I love that we’re doing this for her,” she says. “It’s like a grand gesture.”
“Except it’s not romantic,” I say.
“Grand gestures don’t have to be romantic.” She pulls a leg up to her chest. “I think it’s even more special that we’re doing
it for some random kid we just met.”
I kick my foot out so that my socked toe nudges her leg. “You’re some random kid I just met.”
We decide that we’re going to get off at the next smoke stop and run to the nearest convenience store. There, we’ll buy balloons
and streamers or, more realistically, whatever shitty party decorations we can find.
The conductor announces that we’ll have twenty minutes at the first stop in Montana, and that’ll have to be enough.
Oakley gets one bar of service as we approach the station, and she uses it to map our route to a place called “Chuck’s Party
Store and Smoke Shop.”
We sprint off the train the moment the doors open and run over to Chuck’s. A man—potentially Chuck—greets us, and we wave as we run past him to the “Kids’ Party” section. He doesn’t seem to find this bizarre. Maybe we aren’t the first people to plan a train party in Montana.
“Should we do the dog theme?” Oakley asks. She grabbed a basket by the door and is indiscriminately shoving things in there.
“I’ll do you one better,” I say as I hold up paper plates with pugs on them. “We’ll do the pug theme.”
“Big haul,” Chuck notes as we drop our basket off at the cash register.
“Yup,” Oakley says, tapping her foot.
He rings the items through with care and precision, taking his sweet, sweet time. He comments on each product as he bags it,
which is how I learn everything from the fact that some people like the taste of party streamers to how he’s picking his daughter
up from ballet after his shift.
I pass my debit card over, using what must be some of the last money I’d saved working in the greenhouse. At least it’ll be
put to good use now that it’s not going toward tuition.
“Thanks!” Oakley grabs the bag the second he finishes putting in the last item, and we run out of the store.
“We’re gonna be late!” I scream at Oakley. “WHY ARE WE ALWAYS CUTTING IT SO CLOSE?”
“I DON’T KNOW!” she shouts, sounding panicked as well.
The train’s going to leave without us and we’ll be stranded here in Montana with only Chuck and some party streamers to keep us company.
When we get back to the station, though, the train’s still there.
I glance at my phone. “But it’s been more than twenty minutes.”
Oakley shrugs like, Don’t question it , and we head to the nearest entrance.
One of the conductors is standing there, hand on her hip, shaking her head at us.
“I thought you didn’t wait for anyone,” Oakley says to her as we hop on.
The conductor motions to our bags. “Edward told me you were getting supplies for Aya’s birthday party.”
Oakley and I both nod as the doors close behind us and the train picks up speed. Leave it to Edward to be, like, twelve steps
ahead of the game.
“Well, I think that’s very nice,” the conductor says, pulling out her walkie-talkie. She looks down at her practical, Amtrak-approved
shoes. “I like talking to Aya about trains. She’s a good kid.”
I exchange a look with Oakley. “She is,” I say to the conductor. “She really is.”
Wednesday, 2 p.m., near Malta, MT
We’re back in Oakley’s sleeper car, taking inventory of all the supplies for Aya’s party. It feels even more important to
get it right now that we know that everyone on the train is into the idea.
And we’re the only ones who know the full truth: this will be her last birthday party before she learns that she’s never again going to live in the place she’s called home for the entirety of her short life.
I pull a stack of paper napkins out of the bag and add them to the “table decor” pile.
“You know how you were talking about how neither of us is the best spokesperson for our religion?” I ask Oakley, and she nods
as she rips a roll of streamers open with her teeth.
“And how you don’t seem to agree with a lot of the stuff you talk about in regard to Mormonism?”
“Yeah?”
“Then why are you going back?” I ask, and it comes out like a plea. “If you have these beliefs that so deeply contradict your
church’s then... why?”
“Community,” she says automatically. “I already told you.”
She’s looking down now, picking at a piece of lint on her sock.
I knew that’s what she was going to say. It’s what she told me before. And maybe that should be answer enough.
I haven’t found community anywhere. I barely had any friends in high school except for my Science Olympiad teammates, and
I gave up what little community I had in college to be with Alden.
“Community is literally the basis of Mormonism. Joseph Smith wanted to create a holy city on Earth; that was his main goal for a while. He was relentless about it. He wanted it to be walkable, he wanted everyone to live near each other, and to have room for farms and gardens within the grid.” She thinks for a moment, then adds, “He wanted people to live communally. And that didn’t stop with him.
When I got baptized, I pledged to bear others’ burdens and to mourn when they mourn.
There are parts of it that are beautiful. ”
It’s the closest she’s come to proselytizing, but what she described does sound beautiful.
“And there are bad parts, of course,” Oakley continues. “I know that’s what you’re thinking right now. But it’s not all bad.”
She picks at a perfectly groomed fingernail. “And it’s my home. My ward has always been my family. They’re so kind, and we’re
always there for each other. It’s just that the beliefs that guide them are sometimes not exactly what I personally believe.”
“But aren’t the beliefs the biggest part of it?” I ask, not able to let this go. “Those are what supposedly connect all of
you, aren’t they?”
“Do you follow each of the six hundred thirteen Jewish laws?” she snaps back. “There’s one that says not to engage in astrology,
but you know your sign. And do you pay a half-shekel temple tax? That’s one of the laws as well.”
I want to laugh, but I don’t. She knows too much, and she’s deadly serious. “No,” I tell her. “I don’t do most of that stuff.
But I’m still Jewish. I still feel Jewish.”
“There you go,” she says. “That’s how I feel about Mormonism.”
“But it’s different!” I nearly yell, anger bubbling to the surface.
“How?” she asks, unnervingly calm. “Because my religion is newer?”
“You know that’s not why.”
This is the first time in my entire life that I’ve felt happy being who I am, where I am. I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to escape.
But there’s a set end date: tomorrow when the train pulls into King Street Station in Seattle. And I can’t even tell Oakley
how I feel about all of this because she’s hell-bent on going back to Mormonism.
None of what has happened here means anything to her; it’s just a blip in her eternal life.