Page 45 of Leaving the Station

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 anAmorphophallustitanum, 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 onJeopardy!.”

“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.

“Let me show you a picture of the greenhouse,” I tell her instead of letting my brain follow that train of thought.

I turn on my phone for the first time in hours, then navigate through my photos, purposefully scrolling past ones I know will hurt me.

I wasn’t expecting to have service, but I do.

And a notification pops up at the top of my screen, with a name that stops me cold: Alden.

Six Weeks into College

TheAmorphophalluswasn’t growing much at all. It was stuck in the same tight ball of roots and soil that it had been for weeks.

Still, I tended to it like a helicopter parent, constantly checking to make sure it had enough water and light, that its growing conditions were perfect.

“You’re doing everything right,” Randall assured me. “We just have to wait and see whether this will be the year she decides to flower.”

As much as I loved hearing the wordsyou’re doing everything rightfrom an adult authority figure, it didn’t make me any less anxious.

In the meantime, I busied myself with the other plants in the greenhouse. I would brush my hand against theMimosa pudica,the sensitive plant that closed in on itself whenever anyone touched it. I’d futz with the pitcher plants and check in on what kind of bugs they’d trapped that day.

There were a few other student workers who came and went, but we didn’t talk much. They would drop their bags off in Randall’s office, sweep leaves, water plants without care, and leave.

I couldn’t imagine doing that. The fact that I had some impact on these living things was enough to motivate me to arrive early to my shift and stay late. I couldn’t do those tasks for myself—Icouldn’t even make it to class—but I could show up for the plants.

Randall made sure I was paid for the extra hours, but I would’ve worked them for free. When I stayed overtime, he would choose a plant at random and tell me more about it, and I soaked up the information like a sponge.

“Would you ever think about majoring in botany?” he asked me one evening in the greenhouse.

I was taken aback by the question. I couldn’t major in botany—I was going to be a doctor, and doctors didn’t need to know about plants.

So I gave a noncommittal answer and left the greenhouse quickly after that. When I checked my phone in the chilly evening air, there was a text from the Tees inviting me to a party.

To everyone’s surprise, including my own, I said yes. It was at someone’s place off-campus, a junior who was in the architecture program with Autumn.