Love and Other Train Wrecks

by Leah Konen

  But there was something nice about it. That whole week and a half, I was just along for the ride. Kat made all the plans. Kat called all the shots.

  Since my dad left, since my mom’s anxiety took over, it had felt like all the responsibility rested on me. Lord knows my mom wasn’t the one deciding what we were going to have for dinner while trolling Sophie’s Instagram feed full of inverted-yoga-pose photos. I was the one expected to hold it all together.

  I wanted someone else to take charge, to say her way or the highway—and to truly mean it. I wanted an older sister. And even though she was only a week older than me, those were the roles we fell into, even if it was for such a short time. She made fun of me for reading too much. She gave me tips on properly plucking my eyebrows. She borrowed my jewelry without asking and didn’t apologize when I caught her.

  I’d never had a sister. Or a sibling, for that matter.

  It had always been my mom, my dad, and me.

  And I didn’t have one—not yet—but on that visit, I saw what could be.

  I saw what my dad saw in all of them. And though I hate to even think this way, though it makes me ill to think this way, I saw why he would choose them over us.

  It broke my heart. And I hated myself for how much I wanted to be a part of it.

  I open the message chain with my mom, but there’s nothing new, which means she’s probably opened the wine and will begin texting again in a little bit.

  And I have a crazy thought—what if I stay for more than a week? What if I never go back?

  What if Kat and I really get a chance to be sisters?

  Because as much as I want things to go back to the way they were, before my dad left us, as much as I want that with all my heart and more, it’s still hard to imagine being an only child ever again.

  NOAH

  4:51 P.M.

  I HEAR A SPLASH, AND I TURN BEHIND ME TO CHECK on Ammy.

  In the glow of the streetlights above, I can see that her right foot is completely submerged in a puddle. In the darkness, the slush looks almost dangerous. Murky and black. She must be freezing.

  “Serves me right for walking and texting,” she says bitterly.

  “God,” I say. “Are you okay?” I’m half talking about her foot and half talking about whatever conversation she was just involved in.

  But she just shakes it off and keeps walking. “I’m fine,” she says. “Carry on.”

  And so I do, walking forward, into the wind, head locked down.

  I’m not mad at her. Maybe she thinks I am because of the way I acted back at the diner.

  But I’m not—I have no reason to be mad at her. I’m mad at myself. I raise a hand in front of my face, shielding myself from the wind and the snow, which is still falling, only falling diagonally now. For a second, I close my eyes, and I see myself at the lake on that cliff, looking over, Rina down at the bottom, yelling at me to just . . .

  Jump.

  But every time my toes got so much as a foot from the edge, my palms started to sweat. I stepped back, my stomach doing somersaults.

  She didn’t know that I could hear her, down there talking with Cassie. She didn’t realize how much the sound echoed up to us.

  “He can’t do anything without freaking out about it. It’s chronic.”

  Cassie said something about it just being a cliff, about it not being a big deal.

  “I know,” Rina said. “And it shouldn’t be. But he’s like this with everything. No one wants to be with a guy who’s scared and worried about the whole entire world.”

  No one wants to be with a guy.

  Her words were piercing and shrill, like one of those high-pitched sounds that only dogs are supposed to hear. I stepped away from the ledge. Bryson hadn’t heard her, and he yelled at me to get out of the way before jumping in himself.

  How different would things have been if I’d just had the courage to jump?

  What would have happened if I hadn’t let her words get to me like they did?

  Where would I be if I hadn’t gone to that stupid party three days after we broke up?

  I take a deep breath, look around me. The sun has set, but there’s still a dusky blue hint to the sky near the horizon. Pretty soon, it will be completely dark. We have to get to the car rental place before then. I glance at Ammy, but she’s trudging along, avoiding my eyes.

  I wasn’t even trying to rebound. Honestly, I wasn’t.

  We were broken up, properly. There was none of that on-a-break stuff, the stuff Bryson was always pulling with Cassie because he claimed they weren’t “official.”

  We were indeed done. We’d had our fight at the lake. Then we’d had the fight at my house. It was over. We hadn’t spoken in three days. We’d gone from texting just about every hour, her telling me all the ins and outs of everything, from what she was watching on TV to family drama, which had been particularly difficult of late. It was a weird adjustment, being on my own for the first time in years. Bryson said I needed to come out with him, get my mind off of her. Bryson reminded me of every negative word Rina had ever said to me.

  His cousin Chloe was pretty. She was wearing a polka-dot halter dress and her hair was in a ponytail that sat on the top of her head, and she had something on her lips that made them perpetually shiny. She was smart, too. She was in college at Bard, studying political science. She had all these ideas on socialism that I hadn’t heard before.

  I had three beers, which was probably three beers too many, and pretty soon we were sitting close together on the couch in Bryson’s basement. Bryson and Daniel were busy messing with the Xbox.

  We kissed.

  And then we went back to the spare bedroom in Bryson’s basement, and we did more.

  It was so fast, and it was so meaningless, and as soon as it was over, all I felt was a punch to the stomch. Chloe, who was indeed smart, saw right through me. “You look miserable,” she said.

  “No,” I said. “Really.”

  And then: “I’m sorry.”

  She smiled weakly. “Bryson told me you just came out of a bad breakup.”

  She waited for me to say something, but I didn’t. All I could think was that that’s what two and a half years of me and Rina had turned into—“a bad breakup.” The thought made me feel even worse.

  “All right, I’m going to go now,” Chloe said, readjusting the top of her dress.

  I managed another apology as she walked out the door, leaving me alone.

  And I lay in that bed, and all I could think about was how much I’d messed it up. Rina would find out. Bryson would tell Cassie, and Cassie would tell her. And she’d never forgive me.

  I can’t get her back now, I thought. Over and over and over.

  It’s done.

  I had no idea just how much I wanted to fix everything with Rina until it was too late to do so. What was I going to do? Call her and tell her I’m sorry I broke up with her for a stupid reason three days before, and after hooking up with someone else, it’s now all of a sudden clear to me that we should be together?

  The sound of my name breaks my train of thought, and I turn around. Ammy is standing ten feet back, her purple wool coat and red knit cap and red bag illuminated by the streetlight, the only colors in a sea of white and dark sky. I have the weirdest desire to take her picture right now—Ammy in Winter in a Wool Coat at Sundown—and set it on the edge of my desk in the dorm, look at it every day.

  “Are you okay?” I ask, walking back to her, careful to avoid a chunk of ice on the side of the road. “What happened?”

  She shrugs. “I think so. It’s just that my feet are soaked and I can’t really feel my toes. Is that bad?”

  I walk closer and stare down at her feet. Her jeans are wet about five inches past her ankles, probably from where she stepped in that puddle when we first started walking.

  My heart beats a bit faster. My mom used to tell me all about how her sister got frostnip, gave me lecture after lecture when I started snowboarding.
/>   It’s unlikely, even though we’ve been out for hours. It takes longer than that. But I don’t like the look of her fully submerged foot.

  Plus—and this part is hard to just brush off—if anything did happen, it would be completely my fault. I couldn’t handle that.

  I cross my arms. “What do you mean? You literally can’t feel them?” I ask. “Or figuratively?”

  She purses her lips, thinking, her small mouth getting even smaller. “I don’t know. It’s hard to say. Is that bad?”

  Aunt Arden’s fingers still tingle from frostnip, even twenty years later. I don’t want to do that to Ammy, a girl who’d be well on her way to her destination if not for me. God. I double-check the distance on my phone.

  “We’re still a half mile out,” I say. “At our pace, it could take us another half hour, at least. Damn it.”

  She bounces from foot to foot. “I’m sure it’s fine,” she says. She starts walking again, taking the lead.

  I zoom out on the map a bit. “Wait a second, I’ve been here,” I say.

  She stops and turns, puts a hand on her hip. “On this desolate stretch of highway?” she asks.

  “No,” I say. I push my phone at her. “The Atwood. It’s an art museum. I went here once on a field trip in high school.”

  She just stares at me, nonplussed.

  Finally: “You do know that we’re not, like, in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, right?”

  “What?”

  “Never mind,” she says. “Why in the world would you want to go look at art right now? Have you lost your mind?”

  Her words are clipped, but it doesn’t matter. I step ever so slightly closer to her. “I’m worried about you,” I say. “My aunt got frostnip from skiing. It’s not as bad as frostbite, you don’t lose your fingers or toes or anything, but hers still tingle years later. I don’t know, I just couldn’t deal with it if something happened like that because of me. We should warm up.”

  She scoffs. “I mean, it’s not like you would know about it—if I did get frostnip or frostbite or whatever.”

  I shake my head at her. “That’s cynical.”

  She presses her lips together. I want her to smile again, like she did before. I want it so badly it’s strange. I want to tug her red knit cap down on her head and rest my hands on her cheeks. I want to leave them like that for a moment, until she looks at me and smiles. Until our eyes adjust to each other’s in the ever-growing dark. Until we’re the only light that we can see.

  Rina, I remind myself. I’m supposed to be thinking about Rina.

  “I guess I’m just in a cynical mood,” Ammy says finally, her voice rising slightly at the end.

  She’s angry, and for a second, I feel that fear of messing up. I remember this time I suggested to Rina that we go get Thai food. The way she yelled that she’d told me a hundred times that she hated Thai because she’d gotten food poisoning from it when she was ten. How she told me she couldn’t count on me to remember anything she said. I got in the car and drove away, but when I tried to call her, she didn’t answer. We didn’t talk for seven and a half hours, and I sat in my bedroom, worrying, wondering if the love of my life was going to cut me out over greasy noodles. Rina always wanted me to think less, to do things without overanalyzing the outcomes. But sometimes she made it really hard to live like that. If you messed up, she wasn’t having it.

  But Ammy doesn’t take it any further. Ammy just crosses her arms, waiting for me to say something else. It’s an instant relief.

  I point up ahead. “It looks like it’s just up there. Let’s go in, warm up. Who knows, maybe one of the docents can give us a ride? It’s not that far.”

  She stares at me, and hardly thinking, I step closer, rest my hands on her arms, and rub up and down quickly, trying to warm her up.

  Her eyes catch mine: alarmed, but not necessarily unhappy.

  I drop my arms and step back. “Come on. The place will warm you up much better than I can.” I force myself to laugh.

  She rolls her eyes, but there’s the smallest hint of a smile there, and she follows behind me anyway.

  AMMY

  5:01 P.M.

  THE GUY AT THE TICKET DESK LOOKS AT US LIKE WE’RE totally, 100 percent insane.

  I catch my reflection in the glimmering ultra-modern, ultra-reflective glass wall that separates the lobby from the coat check. I look a mess. My nose is red and my lips are chapped and errant hairs are stuck to my forehead like I pasted them there with the glue you used to use in kindergarten. My hat is even lopsided.

  I feel a mess, too. I wasn’t kidding when I said I couldn’t feel my toes. I really can’t.

  Maybe that’s why I didn’t object when Noah came up with this crazy idea. Because as much as I want to get to Hudson at a somewhat reasonable time, I honestly can’t imagine walking even another tenth of a mile in this weather, much less another half.

  In fact, the thought of going out there—after even thirty seconds in the warmth of this place—is hell.

  “Are you still open?” Noah asks.

  The guy, probably in his midtwenties, with thick nerdy glasses and slightly greasy hair that flops across his face, just laughs.

  “Is that a yes?” Noah asks.

  He must realize we’re serious, because he clears his throat, stands up straighter, and puts on a proper museum voice. “Yes, sir, we are open for forty-five more minutes. Two?” he asks.

  Noah surveys the admission board. “Two students,” he says. “Please.”

  The guy runs Noah’s card and prints us two tickets. He goes to hand us a map, but Noah is already off, into the next room.

  “Thanks,” I say, taking the map, which immediately warps in the snow still stuck to my gloves.

  I follow Noah, through one room and then the next, until he stops in front of one with a bench in the middle. It’s oversized, with black tufted leather and shiny chrome legs. It looks like freaking heaven right now.

  I stand my suitcase up against the bench and plop down next to Noah, who’s dropped his backpack, taken off his gloves, and is leaning back on his hands.

  I peel off my gloves and then kick off my shoes without even bothering to untie them, hardly able to take the coldness anymore, squirming out.

  Yes, I know that it’s totally ridiculous to change your nasty, winter-worn shoes in the middle of a freaking art museum, but there’s no one else in eyesight—no one but Noah, at least—oh, and also, at this point, I don’t care anymore.

  My socks, hot-pink ones with poodles on them that I borrowed from Kat last summer and never gave back, are wet. I peel them off, bundle them up, and stuff them in the front zipper of my suitcase.

  Noah watches me, an eyebrow raised. “What?” I ask.

  He shakes his head quickly, but there’s an odd look on his face, his eyes scrunched up, his lips pressed together. I can’t place it.

  “Nothing,” he says.

  I just shrug. “I know it’s gross, but honestly, you should change your socks, too. It will keep your feet warmer.”

  He kicks his feet out proudly. “My shoes are waterproof.”

  I look them over. An ankle-high pair of Keens. I’ve got a similar pair I wore when I used to go on hikes with my dad. Key phrase: used to. “You wore hiking shoes on a train ride? Were you planning on the train breaking down?”

  He laughs. “They’re more comfortable, really.”

  “Nerd,” I say, and I pull out another pair of socks, the warmest ones I have, Smartwool hiking socks my dad bought me the last Christmas before he left.

  “Let me see your feet,” Noah says as I start to pull them on.

  “Seriously?” I ask.

  “Come on,” he says.

  Reluctantly, I kick them out. They’re wet and gross, and my toenails aren’t painted, and it feels altogether too intimate.

  “Satisfied?” I ask.

  He reaches out and pinches my big toe. “Ouch,” I say, reflexively whipping my foot back. “What, do you have a foot fetish
or something?”

  He laughs. “No, but at least I don’t have to worry about maiming you for the rest of your life. You’re fine. If you can feel that, you’re totally fine. Especially with those warm socks.”

  “Great,” I say.

  “I really am sorry,” he says. “And I’m sorry I got upset in the diner.”

  I shrug, pulling the socks on and lacing up my shoes. I appreciate that he’s trying to be cool about everything, but to be honest, his frequent sorrys are starting to annoy me. “I don’t want sorrys,” I say. “I want a solution.”

  Noah just shrugs and looks down at his feet. “You said we were in this together,” he says. “Back in the diner. You said it wasn’t all my fault. I didn’t force you to come.”

  And he’s right. I did say that. He didn’t force me.

  But still—it’s hard not to think about what could have happened if I hadn’t agreed to go with him.

  And then I have a crazy thought:

  If I could do it over again, I would.

  I shake my head, trying to push it away, and look down at my feet, too. At those stupid Smartwool socks, the last present I got from my dad when we were still a family.

  I know we probably weren’t that happy at that point. But still. My grandma drove in, and we had a twenty-pound turkey for four people, and we watched It’s a Wonderful Life and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, in that order—always in that order.

  It wasn’t perfect, not by any means. There was still an easy-to-miss but hard-to-forget dent in the wall by the front door. I’d developed a habit of taking the shortest of breaths before walking into the kitchen, as if preparing. My stressed-out phone calls to Dara had gotten a little more frequent since my seventeenth birthday.

  But we were still a family then. Forget all the other bullshit. We had that. It was very much before.

  Noah is still looking dejected, so finally, I speak. “It’s okay. I know we are. And I know that I chose to come with you. It’s not your fault—I meant it when I said that. But I can’t help but think . . .” My voice drops for a second. “Well, what are we going to do?”