by Leah Konen
He sighs, leaning back on his elbows and staring at the ceiling. “Do you think you can go back out there if we warm up a bit? Do you think we can walk the rest of the way to the car rental place?”
I look around me at the all-white walls and sharp angles. It looks like a museum on TV, cold and modern. But the air, on the other hand, is warm. Radiators cranking with that kind of steamy heat you only really find in the Northeast. My dad kept going on about how nice the heating systems were up here, as if I cared at all. All that’s to say, it’s warm in here. Very warm. And it’s hard to imagine leaving this place in anything colder than a car that’s had the heat cranking for at least ten minutes.
I raise an eyebrow. “Do you?”
He kicks at my suitcase. “Maybe if you drop the Murakami.”
I laugh weakly, because I’m not really in the mood for jokes.
It’s silent for a minute between us. Finally, Noah lifts his hand up, pointing in front of us. “So, what do you think? Scale of one to ten?”
“Noah, I really don’t want to talk about art right now.”
“Come on,” he says, delivering a grin that I just know is at least partially forced. “We have to warm up a little bit, before we can even think about going out there again.”
I roll my eyes but decide to play along, hardly knowing what else to do. “It’s a Pollock, right?” I ask. I’m pretty sure. Bea is obsessed with him.
Noah breaks into a grin, which is at least partially genuine this time. He hops up, dashing over to the little white card on the big white wall. He turns back to me. “Of course it’s a Pollock,” he says. “Number 13, to be exact. Come look at it with me.”
“Seriously?” I ask, an eyebrow raised.
“Come on.” He gestures at me with an outstretched hand.
“Are you sure you haven’t seen Ferris Bueller?”
His eyebrows scrunch up, which tells me he hasn’t, but I stand up anyway, leaving our bags in the middle, only just now realizing how much my bones ache, from the cold, from the bitter disappointment, etc., etc. Noah is standing only about two feet away from the painting, so close, like he wants to absorb every brushstroke, crawl right in. I stand next to him.
“Really, what do you think?”
I cross my arms, suss it out. “I think if I got paid millions of dollars for splashing paint on a canvas, I’d be one happy girl.”
He laughs. “You think you could do it?”
I shrug. “Couldn’t anyone? I know he was the first to do it and all, but still.”
He points at the painting, hand moving from one corner to another like we’re surveying some kind of perfect natural landscape. “The colors. And the textures. And the way it’s chaotic but also harmonious. I definitely don’t think I could do it.”
I follow his hand, and—yeah—I guess he kind of has a point, but it still doesn’t make my heart sing. It still looks more like chaos than harmony to me.
And I don’t like chaos.
“Who wants to see chaos in art?” I ask. “Don’t we have enough of that already? Show me a beautiful landscape. Give me a Monet or a Van Gogh. Make me smile.”
He turns to me, smirks. “And yet you don’t necessarily read the happiest of books.”
“That’s different,” I say.
“How? Aren’t they both art?”
“Paintings are supposed to be pretty,” I argue. “They’re supposed to wow you. Books are supposed to remind you that life is hard for everyone. That other people have it even worse than you. I know you know that, because you love reading as much as I do.”
He smiles. “You know, I couldn’t get my ex to read a book besides The Hunger Games to save her life.”
I smirk right back. “I thought you liked The Hunger Games.”
He tilts his head a little bit to the side. “I do. But it’s not the same. No matter what argument I made however many hours ago. You know that.”
I feel a heat rise from the bottom of my toes all the way up to my face. And it’s not from the radiator this time.
“I do,” I say, not dropping his gaze.
His eyes don’t leave mine, and I want him to say something so badly—anything—just to break this up. Because I’m not sure what is about to happen, and I can’t stand it.
Then, finally: “Why won’t you tell me why you’re going where you’re going?”
And that does it. That splits the moment right in two.
“Because you’re a stranger.”
“Am I?” he asks. “Really?” His face looks hurt, like this is some kind of long bonding exercise instead of what it is, now that I’m thinking clearly again—two of us trapped out in the middle of nowhere just trying to get home.
I’m stuck, and I have no one to turn to. I can’t call my dad or Kat or Bea for help. The wedding starts in less than an hour. I can’t call my mom, because I already lied to her. I can’t even call Dara, who’s probably drinking Butterbeer as we speak. Or Simone, who I know for a fact is getting ready for her third date with Nora tonight.
And even if I could, how could they help me? There are no cabs; there are hardly even any cars on the road. Even if we could get a hotel room or something, how would we freaking get there?
All I have is this guy, a stranger. And he’s more concerned about talking about art than making an actual plan that gets us out of here.
I’m not just worried about making it to my dad’s in time for the wedding. I’m worried about making it anywhere at all.
Noah is still looking at me, obviously hurt. But I don’t have time to placate him. I don’t have time to stare at paintings and trade life stories and pretend that this is fun. I’m not going to woo a high school sweetheart back. I’m going for my family, for something that’s not supposed to be missed.
“Yeah,” I say, nodding and avoiding his eyes. “You are.”
NOAH
5:21 P.M.
IT’S WEIRD HOW MUCH HER WORDS HURT ME.
I know we’re strangers, of course we’re strangers, since we’ve only known each other a matter of hours. But quite frankly, it feels like we’re not.
Ammy heads back to the bench. She sits down and fiddles with the zippers of her suitcase, avoiding me.
I shift my feet. The room is wide and open, but it seems, all of a sudden, like it’s too small for both of us. “I’ll be right back,” I say, leaving her to watch my backpack.
She doesn’t even look up.
I head through the galleries toward the entrance. My mind turns as I walk. Why did she shut me down back there? Why did she call me a stranger?
Why do I care so much?
When I reach the lobby, the guy is messing around on his phone. I hesitate, halfway between one room and the other. I don’t know what to say. How to beg this guy for a ride without sounding like a lunatic.
I hear Rina’s voice in my head.
Don’t think so much. Just go.
No one wants to be with a guy who’s scared and worried about the whole entire world.
In an instant, it’s like I’m at the lake again, backing off of that ledge, watching Bryson run easily past, feeling the ache of sadness in my stomach at the casual way Rina could put me down.
At the way she wasn’t on my team at all.
I would never be here if I’d just jumped off that cliff.
Or if I hadn’t told Bryson what she said. If he hadn’t insisted I call her on it.
Or if I hadn’t exploded at her in our room on our last night at Lake George—detailing every negative thing she’d said or done to me over the course of our relationship.
I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t broken up with her over a jump off a cliff at a lake.
If I’d done it all differently, everything wouldn’t be such a train wreck.
But then again, I never would have met Ammy.
I shake my head. Why do I keep having weird thoughts like this? It’s not the point. Right now, I have to do something to fix this.
I take a deep bre
ath, push all my hesitations aside. Not because of Rina’s demanding. But because I know I need to.
“Excuse me,” I say, forcing some confidence into my voice as I walk up to the counter.
“Yes, sir,” the guy says. His eyes look less than enthused to be talking to me. They don’t match his voice at all.
I ease in slowly. “I was wondering if you could help me. Do you know if there are cab companies around here?” I ask.
I already know the answer, but it seems like the best way to start off the conversation.
He narrows his eyes, then shakes his head. “Not really. And I don’t think many people are out on the road in this weather.”
“Or Uber or Lyft or something?”
“This isn’t exactly New York City.” He scrunches up his mouth like he doesn’t like the taste of my questions. “You guys didn’t drive here?”
I shake my head solemnly. “We walked from the Hudson Bus Lines station. We missed the last bus. We’re only trying to get to Enterprise to rent a car, about a half a mile north, but we got worried that my friend was getting frostbite in her toes, so we decided to stop in here.”
What the hell? I think. Might as well lay it on thick.
“Oh shit,” the guy says, his smooth museum voice easily giving way to a less formal one. He sounds like he’s from the country, probably a little farther north than Hudson. In my experience, the farther you get away from the city, the thicker the accent becomes. “Are you okay?” he asks. “I mean, should I call the hospital or something?”
Crap. Too thick, I realize. Definitely too thick.
“No, she changed her socks, and I think she’s fine. It’s just that . . . well . . . we’re just a little worried about going out there and walking again, especially now that it’s dark out.”
The guy’s voice gets a tad gruffer, a tad defensive. “You want a ride, that’s what you’re asking?”
“Well . . .”
The guy sighs. “Look, I didn’t even drive here. As soon as we close, in about twenty minutes, I’m shutting down and walking home. I live across the parking lot. It’s half the reason I took this job, even though it pays just about nothing for someone with a degree—it comes with its own apartment.”
My face falls. Damn it. Crap. Blast. Shit. For the umpteenth time, shit shit shitty shit shit.
“Well, thanks, anyway,” I say, turning away. Feeling that same ache of failure, the one I felt when I walked off that cliff.
I head back toward the gallery, racking my brain for something to tell Ammy. Something that’s not, Hey, remember how you couldn’t feel your toes a minute ago? Get ready for that feeling again! We’re going right back out!
I stop for a minute, breathe deeply, and clench my fists together.
It’s hopeless. We’ll never get to the end of this trip.
Rina will definitely not take me back.
My fate is as doomed as those flowers, sitting soggy in the bottom of a trash can somewhere.
“Hold on,” I hear behind me.
I turn on my heel. “What?” I ask. I’m back to the counter in three big strides.
“I just don’t want to send you guys out into that,” he says. “You’re sure it’s only a half mile? You’re not under-exaggerating? Or, you know, whatever the real word for the opposite of overexaggerating is. . . .”
The thing is, overexaggerating isn’t even a proper word. It’s redundant. Exaggerating covers the sentiment on its own. Ammy would be internally laughing right along with me if she heard him say that.
But I don’t tell him that. I don’t think it would help my case. Our case.
I nod eagerly. “I promise. It’s really just a half mile.”
He takes a deep breath. “Go get your friend. And let me call my wife. She should be getting out of work soon.”
“Oh my God, are you serious?” I ask.
He nods, shooing me away with one hand as he pulls out his cell phone with the other. “Go, quickly, before I change my mind. I’m risking a night on the couch just to ask her this.”
I turn, bolting through the galleries back to Ammy. She’s sitting on the bench, reading her Murakami.
If I didn’t know all I did, if I hadn’t spent the last several hours with her, if I simply saw her like this, I’d think she was a girl, here for the afternoon, taking a break to read a book.
I’d think she was beautiful, sitting there like that, with her legs crossed at the ankles, with her head tilted down, bangs covering her eyes. With her hands delicately flipping each page.
I’d want to talk to her, that’s for sure.
I’d want to talk to her for a long time.
I take a step forward, clear my throat so she notices me.
She looks up immediately, closing the book without marking her page.
“This is going to sound crazy,” I say, “but I have good news.”
AMMY
5:34 P.M.
WE STAND OUTSIDE THE MUSEUM, IN THE BITTEREST cold, easily the coldest it’s been all day, staring at an empty, desolate parking lot. It’s dark out now, the only light coming from three sad streetlamps that only really serve to remind us that, yes, it is still snowing, the flakes glistening in the dim cones of light.
“You’re sure someone’s coming?” I ask again.
“I’m sure,” Noah says, rubbing his hands together to keep warm.
“You’re sure the guy didn’t just tell you that so we’d leave and he could close up the place early? He really looked like he didn’t want to be there, if you ask me.”
“I’m sure,” he says again.
I’m about to say that he was sure about a lot of things that didn’t quite pan out, but then he steps closer, wrapping me in a side hug, running his hand up and down along my arm like he did before. Except now I can feel the whole side of his body against mine. Now my heart is beating so loud I’m sure he can hear it through my wool coat.
“There,” he says, pointing across the parking lot as a boxy car pulls in and makes its way straight toward us, its headlights blinding against everything else.
Instantly, Noah drops his hand and takes a step away from me. Like the car shocked him out of whatever that was. Like it reminded him that this whole trip is just a pit stop on the way to our real lives.
And I hate to admit it, but I wish she’d given us just one more minute.
I wish his arm was still around mine.
The car turns, pulling up so it’s parallel to the curb where we’re standing.
I notice the red hair before I notice the put-out expression.
“Why am I not surprised that it’s you two?”
Shockingly—or not so shockingly, given that we are in a tiny-ass town whose name I don’t even know—it’s none other than the waitress from the Main Street Café.
Noah breaks into a grin. “Sorry to drag you out here . . . did you miss us?”
I smile, trying to be polite. “Thank you so much for doing this.”
The waitress’s sour look dissipates. “No problem,” she says matter-of-factly. “Now get in before you freeze your asses off.”
Noah takes the backseat and leaves me the front. I can’t decide if he’s being chivalrous or if he’s defying traditional gender roles by encouraging me to sit up front.
Her car is a forest-green old Mercedes with tan leather interior and a Jack Russell terrier bobblehead on the dash. She flips through the radio stations, settling on some kind of hip-hop.
Before I do anything else, I grab the bar beneath the seat and give it a tug, scooching it up as far as I can while still being somewhat comfortable.
“That enough space?” I ask Noah.
“You’re the best,” he says.
My heart flutters, and I curse myself for being so freaking cheesy about everything.
“Where are you guys going?” the waitress asks. “Bobby said it wouldn’t be more than five minutes?”
Noah leans forward, taking charge. “The Enterprise, just up the road?”
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“I know it,” she says, nodding. She turns the music up slightly louder and pulls slowly out of the museum parking lot. “I’m Selena, by the way.”
“I’m Ammy,” I say.
“Amy?” she asks.
“Like Sammy without the S. My parents are weird.”
Noah laughs from the backseat.
“This is Noah,” I say.
Selena nods, and she looks significantly less pissed off outside the restaurant, without the apron, with her hair let down. “So why in the world are you guys stuck out in the cold and bouncing from crappy diner to snobby museum?”
I turn to Noah, and he smiles sheepishly. Then I turn back to Selena. “It’s kind of a long story,” I say.
“Well, you’ve got a couple of minutes,” she says. “I’m all ears.”
We take turns recounting parts of the story, and she laughs, and she laughs, and then she laughs some more. But it’s not nervous, hysterical laughter like what came over me at the bus station. It’s just laughter—pure and simple—at the absurdity of it all. At us hopping off the train. At the guy with all the guns. At the just-missed train. Followed by the just-missed bus. At the fact that we huddled in her diner mainly to charge our phones. And the fact that we went to an art museum to avoid what probably wasn’t even remotely close to frostbite—or frostnip—or whatever.
She asks us how we know each other, and the honest answer gets her laughing even more.
“You guys seriously should have told me that when I waited on you,” she says. “It’s just like that movie.”
“What movie?” I ask.
“It Happened One Night,” she says. “With Dreamy McDreamFace and the actress with the big eyes.”
“Claudette Colbert,” I offer.
Selena laughs, raising her eyebrows. “The story would have brightened my whole mood, that’s for sure. And I definitely would have offered you a ride.”
I bite my lip. “Oh, well, we—”
“Didn’t want to ask me anything because I had my bitch face on?” she asks.
“No, I mean . . .” I scramble at the words.
She waves her hand, dismissing me. “It’s okay, really. You wouldn’t believe the creepy men who come in there, try and flirt with me—try and grab my ass if they’ve had one too many beers at the bar down the street. It grates on you. I have a degree in biology, and Bobby has one in art history. We’re doing our best to get by until I can save enough money for grad school and he can figure out what the heck to do with a degree in art history. People look at me, and they see a young redhead in a diner, and I swear, they assume I can barely read. One time, an older guy asked me—I’m not joking—if I knew how to subtract. That’s the main reason for the bitch face. Also, I was pretty sure that you guys weren’t going to tip.”