From Away

by David Carkeet

  The Vermonter was a “Train Going South.” He loved reading old schedules, with their headings “Trains Going East” and

  “Trains Going West.” He needed a “Train Going West.” He could go back home now that the finger of accusation pointed at Sarah. But what was home? It was a place where everyone gathered around in order to tell him what was wrong with him. It always puzzled him why people didn’t like him more. He liked himself just fine. Evidently the Denny that others saw from without had nothing to do with the Denny he saw from within. What did they see? He fixed his imagination on the arm-waving buffoon in Marvin’s French Fries. “God, what’s to like?” he said aloud.

  But how could he be any different? How to un-Denny Denny? As Homer, he had kept himself in control because every conversation had been a challenge. That was all he asked from life—that it be interesting. When he got home, how could he make his Chicago conversations interesting? By filling up his mind with something in addition to the conversation? Should he think about square roots? No, he should think about the immediate situation, the environment. . . . No, he should think about the people he was with. Their hair, their clothes, their eyes. . . . No, he needed to see inside them.

  No. He needed to see from inside them. He needed to see the world according to, say, Roscoe. That would be hard, and because it would be hard, it would be interesting.

  He reached for his cell phone and made the call.

  “Denny. I thought you might be dead.”

  “Hoped, you mean.”

  “Not at all,” said Roscoe. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because you can’t stand me.”

  “Denny, Denny, Denny.”

  Think, he said to himself. Think like Roscoe. “You’re waiting for me to say ‘Roscoe, Roscoe, Roscoe.’”

  “No, I—”

  “I’ll say it if you like, Roscoe. I won’t, if not.”

  “Well, no, Denny, it’s not necessary. Listen, I’m sure you’ve seen the latest from our noble competition, Model Railroader.”

  “I haven’t seen it, Roscoe. You’ll be surprised that I haven’t seen it.”

  “Well, yes, I am surprised. I’m afraid they beat us to it. They profiled Rod Stewart’s layout.”

  “Ah. You’re telling me this because I’ve suggested this celebrity profile for years. I understand. You’re also couching the news as if your magazine was on the verge of doing it—as if your competitor beat you by just an issue or two. I understand why you’re doing that, so as not to appear completely flat-footed. You want to minimize both your error and my foresight. I have no problem with any of that, Roscoe.”

  “Well, I don’t know if I’d put it in such a one-sided way, but . . . well, I guess you’re right, Denny. Listen, it’s funny that you called because I was just thinking about you this morning—”

  “You’re saying that even though you’ve been thinking about me for some time.”

  “Well—”

  “You don’t want to admit it because you don’t want to be taken for someone who depends on others. I understand that, Roscoe. It’s a normal kind of overcompensation rooted in your generalized fear. The very name of the magazine you founded, The Fearless Modeler, refers not to possible embarrassment grown men might feel for playing with toys, but rather to your own desire to be free of fear—fear of intimacy, of the future, of the unknown, and, ultimately, of death.”

  “My goodness, Denny. I . . . I’m certainly not prepared to get into all that right now, but I’ll concede that you’ve been on my mind for quite a few days. I thought of you when I read the freelance write-up I commissioned of Tom Blunt’s Super Chief. I saw Tom’s layout for myself when I was in Rochester. The idiot put the dining car in backwards! He actually had the first-class passengers walking through the kitchen!”

  “I understand. Because you had seen that horror show, when the write-up did not address it, you immediately thought, ‘Denny, for all his many faults, would never overlook such an error.’”

  “We seem to be in tune today, Denny. I won’t beat around the—”

  “You want to hire me back.”

  “Well, you certainly are on top of—”

  “But you don’t want to lose face, and how can you hire me back after firing me without losing face? You certainly don’t want to apologize, because you believe apologizing is a sign of weakness, and from what you’ve said about your father and your childhood I can see why you cling to such a ridiculous precept to project strength. I understand, Roscoe, and I accept.”

  Roscoe fell silent. “You’ve rather taken my breath away this morning, Denny. But I’m delighted you’re coming back. Go ahead. I know you want to crow. Feel free.”

  Denny imagined someone throwing his head back and cawing like a crow. It was a repulsive display. “I’ll report to work Monday,” he said quickly. He shut his phone, floored the accelerator, honked his horn, threw his head back, and cawed like a crow.

  Denny pulled into the Montpelier train station lot, killing Marge’s engine for the last time a few feet short of where he meant to park, but it was close enough. He wrote Warren Boren’s name on a piece of paper and wedged it between the valves of the French horn. Nick, the likely investigator, would certainly wonder how Marge’s car had gotten here and how Warren’s horn had ended up in it.

  As Denny walked to the depot, he heard a distant whistle. A B-flat, he was once told by a better. Inside, two women were talking over the ticket counter—the agent and a customer. He would have enough time to buy his ticket, though the women seemed determined to catch up on every piece of local news before that happened. They finally finished, and Denny stepped forward.

  “Hello again,” the ticket agent said. Denny recognized her as the woman who had greeted him and the other arriving passengers at the station when he had taken the train back from Connecticut. He was surprised she remembered him. “And where might you be off to this time?” she said.

  “Chicago.”

  “My, my. That’ll be different. Round trip?”

  “One way.”

  The woman raised her eyebrows. She seemed to want to say more, but she just quoted him the price. Denny paid in cash. As she handed him his change, she said, “Chicago.” It was a question.

  “That’s right.”

  She slid the ticket across the counter to him.

  “Big city.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “You couldn’t pick a place less like Vermont.”

  “I suppose not.”

  “To each his own.” Her tone implied he had lost his marbles. Sensing that the woman might perish on the spot unless she received an explanation, Denny gave her one:

  “I just want to get away from all the crime.”

  The woman laughed and laughed at that. She shook her finger at him and said, “The old Homer humor.”