“So you’re not going to tell me the surprise?”
“Nope.”
“Not even a hint?”
“Nope.”
“God, what kind of scientist are you? At least tease me with a formula.”
Will starts laughing. “You are such a nerd.”
“Hey, don’t blame me. Dad created an actual formula for perfect cheese on toast when I got mad at him one too many times for forgetting to pick up the pizza. I have the equation up on the fridge.”
“Actually, he showed me that formula. It was ingenious. The bread-to-cheese ratio divided by time. He even had the width of the toast slice down to the millimeter.”
“See what I had to deal with all that time?”
Will turns to look at me, and the glow of the sunset brushes his face. He is summer gold, warmth and light. I halt midstep in surprise. I know Will. The feeling of familiarity like he has always been beside me, walking with me, talking with me, gazing at me. How long have I known him? Why can’t I remember? Nothing rational can explain the feeling that we have met before.
Will takes my hand as we cross another street, and he gently pulls me across an abandoned parking lot pockmarked and claimed by weeds. A chain-link fence at the far end stops our journey.
“Damn, I thought we would be able to get past these buildings,” Will says.
“This is what you wanted to show me?” I ask, looking around.
“No, look between the two buildings,” Will instructs.
I gaze out and see the edge of the river and the lowering sun reflecting off the water. The view is so narrow it’s hard to say that it’s beautiful. I don’t want to disappoint Will, so I continue to just stare out at the water as though it is something magnificent to behold.
A faint tremor livens the ground. I clutch the chain-link fence. The vibrations echo through the metal. The distant shriek of a whistle squirms into my ears. The train. I hear the train coming. I feel myself tense, ready to run. I can outrun it. I reach into my coat pocket and grip the bottle. I will not let it take me.
I turn quickly on my heels.
“Grace, please, just wait,” he says.
The ground is shaking. The rhythmic clank of the wheels against iron tracks. The steady blare of the horn. I have to leave now. The train cannot take me. I know I will not come back this time.
“Let me go, Will. I have to leave.”
“But you’re going to miss it.”
The low, haunting, rhythmic grind of metal against metal. The ringing bell and screaming whistle barrel into me. I hold my hands over my ears.
Will points and I follow his hand, glimpsing between the buildings, blocking the view of the river, the moving train. I lower my hands and grip the fence, pressing my forehead to the cold wire.
“It’s the five-ten freight train,” Will shouts into the noise.
I automatically begin to count the cars the way I used to do when I was so young. The sound of the passing train, an external heartbeat clear and proud, lulls me just like before. The whistle blows and the crisp, deep timbre echoes through my body, a beacon of truth and dignity. The ghost of what I have been hearing and living with in my mind is nothing like the reality of the strength that reverberates out from the passing cars. A final whistle blow and the last car disappears from sight. I close my eyes, relishing the fading rumble. Then silence.
Will cups the roundness of my shoulder. Light, but reassuring. I turn to him in gratefulness and surprise.
“You said you heard a train, so I started asking around,” Will says, still gazing out between the buildings as though watching the phantom train. “I don’t know how you could have heard it from down below in the lab, but maybe you have some extrasensory auditory powers.”
“All this time that I’ve been working at Genentium I’ve never heard it pass before,” I say. “I don’t understand how I could have missed it.”
“If you were down in the lab every night around this time, you wouldn’t know it existed. There’s only one train every week or so. It’s an old track. Most of the trains use the newer one on the other side of the city.”
“And you just happened to catch me at the diner just as this train was about to pass?”
“Well, I am a researcher, you know. I looked up the schedule, but catching you at the diner, that was luck. Or fate.”
“You sound like Dr. Mendelson.”
“Maybe there is a reason she’s a genius.”
“Funny.” I start to walk away.
“Wait, Grace. Can I have your phone for a second?”
“No.”
“Please, just for a second. I forgot mine at the lab.”
He is getting me to do all kinds of things tonight. I pull out my phone from my back pocket and hand it over. He quickly types something and then hands it back.
“That’s it? That’s all you had to do?”
“Yup. Now you have my number.”
I look down at my phone and see that I am calling someone. Will. “And you have my number,” I say.
“That’s how it works,” he says lightly, and turns to leave.
I turn around one last time and gaze down the narrow alley between the buildings that just a minute ago proved that I was not crazy.
All this time could I really have been hearing a real train when I thought I was imagining things? Can I rule this out as a possibility? I slip my hand into the sleeve of my other arm, dig my nails in hard. The pain feels
