And if after this pause she thought of something new to say, he was going to have to wait a little longer.
Day Two
From the Passenger Records of Hiraya Sia
Raya
Raya awoke in a train car she did not remember entering. After she had stumbled into the Lotus, helping herself to the welcome drink she had skipped the first time and treating herself to a few more, the rest of her evening was a blur. She had fuzzy memories of visiting an opera house inside a thimble and a speakeasy that served distilled drunken thoughts in shot glasses with sugar and mint. The train car she woke up in was the last page of a book, which she guessed was the reason she had chosen it to fall asleep in. There were very few things that were more comfortable than a happy ending.
“Then,” said Poirot, “having placed my solution before you, I have the honor to retire from the case…”
The vaguest sense that she had dreamt about Q floated like a cloud in the back of her mind. She turned to her side. Q’s letter tumbled off her lap and onto an ellipsis. Its wax seal cracked open like half-parted lips, begging to speak. Q had stayed the night as she had asked, and it was not fair to ask him for anything more.
She broke the rest of the wax seal and pulled a sheet of the train’s official stationery from the envelope. A rough sketch of her face filled the page. She traced a finger over it, feeling the urgency ofevery line. Despite his rush, Q had been kind. Her eyes were brighter, her smile wider, than they were in real life. He had even smoothed her hair, tying it in place with the scarf he had gifted her. An embroidered butterfly, perched on the corner of the scarf, kept her penciled portrait company.
She turned the sketch over and read the note scribbled on its back.
Hiraya,
This is your face and your name. Let the blue tonic erase everything else, but please, keep these.
Your friend
or something stranger,
Q
Day Five or Fifteen
From the Passenger Records of Hiraya Sia
Raya
Keeping track of time mattered only when you ran out of it. Days on the Elsewhere Express, like the train’s stock of dark-roasted coffee and excess baggage tonic, were in endless supply. A new vial of the blue serum sat on Raya’s nightstand next to the calendar she had drawn on the train’s official stationery. Today was her fifth day on board as far as she could tell, but she could not find anyone who could confirm it.
Fragrant steam wafted up from her cup of oolong tea. Raya breathed it in and exhaled it slowly while watching passengers make their way down a cobweb bridge. Raya had avoided the Dragonfly until Dev had requested that they meet at the dining car to discuss his offer for her to join the maintenance crew.
“Good morning.” Dev strode up to her table balancing a tray of congee and an assortment of dumplings and sauces. He had changed faces, but Raya was getting good at recognizing people. Their eyesstayed the same. Dev’s eyes were playful and kind, no matter their color. Today they were the shade of buckwheat honey and smiled at Raya from the face of a man who was almost surely someone’s favorite uncle.
Raya smiled back at Dev, her first one that had felt real since she had moved into her compartment. “Good morning.”
Dev took a seat, his eyes on Raya’s tea. “Is that all you’re having?”
“I haven’t had much of an appetite lately.” The train’s menu was everything Lily had promised it would be, but Raya could not bring herself to eat more than a few bites of any dish.
“That’s a shame.” Dev arranged his condiments in a neat row. He nudged a little sauce bowl until it was straight. “The Dragonfly has the best congee.”
“I’ve heard.”
Dev took a sip of his tea. “So, have you thought about my offer to join maintenance, or do you need more time to think about it?” He dipped a shrimp dumpling into an angry-looking chili sauce.
“More time? Are you kidding me?” Lily had told Raya to take her time deciding which department to join and to try her hand at different jobs before making her choice. But Raya had made her decision on a glowing beach long before Dev had officially invited her to join him. “If I have to spend another day in my compartment staring up at the ceiling, I’ll go insane. When can I start?”
Dev laughed. “Most passengers enjoy having a little break before choosing a department. I didn’t realize that you were so bored. I would have asked you to join us sooner.”
Raya wished she were bored. The night Q leapt from the boarding car ran in a loop in her head. She paused and replayed it, rewatched it forward and back, scouring every second for anything she could have done differently.
Maybe if she had, Q would be sitting across from her at breakfast, smiling up from a cup of tea. Or did he prefer coffee? Raya hated that she didn’t know the little things about Q even if what she did know should have been more than enough.
