“Anyway, I can’t get you tonight. I’m buried here and not sure what time I’ll be done. Leo’s gonna pick you up.”
“Leo?” I blink, surprised at the sudden change of plans. “What, he drew the short straw?”
“He offered.”
I glance at my reflection in the train window and grimace. “Tell him I owe him.”
“You don’t owe anyone anything. We’re just glad to have you home.”
Home. That word hits me square in the chest. I chew on it for a moment, swallowing down the lump rising in my throat.
“Alright, I’ll text you when I’m close.”
“Do that. And Em?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t overthink everything the entire trip, okay? You don’t need to solve the meaning of life or think about every decision you’ve made up to this very moment. Just… try to rest.”
I force out a fake smile, as if he can see me through the phone. “I’ll try.”
“See you soon.”
He hangs up without another word and I am left staring out the window as the scenery blurs past, cold glass pressed to my forehead and thoughts swirling like storm clouds in my head.
Rest? As if that’s something I even remember how to do. I don’t think I’ve rested since before Mom died. Since the day of her passing, there has always been something for me to do, some demon for me to fight. Whether it was to plan her funeral, move to a new state, finish college, or paint new collections for art shows. I’ve been non-stop for the past decade, trying to fill the void that opened the day she died. Trying to keep my hands and mind busy so the grief would hurt a little less.
And now I’m moving back to the place I ran away from, with nothing but my unresolved grief and a broken heart, literally.
I look down at my phone and pull up our family text thread. For a moment, I get the urge to type “You know what, forget it. I’ll just stay and die in New York.” But after about five seconds of consideration, I reach the conclusion that may be too dramatic, even for me. Shaking my head, I exit out of the thread, lock my phone and look out the window again.
The train shudders, wheels screeching as we barrel past another nowhere town. Outside the window, gray dissolves to green, and suddenly it’s exclusively fields, trees, and old, crumbling barns. You know, the kind of picturesque countryside that people from the city slap on a Pinterest board and call “cottagecore” without realizing how much cow manure is actually involved.
Seven hours.
Seven hours of sitting still in the world's most uncomfortable chair with nothing but my thoughts.
Maybe I did make a mistake and should’ve just taken the hour and a half hour direct flight instead of this literal nightmare.
I jam my earbuds in and scroll through my playlists. Indie folk? Too sad. Pop? Too fake-happy. Alternative rock? Tempting, but I don’t want to scare the old lady even more. I land on some bluesy instrumental and let it hum in the background while digging the sketchbook out of my bag.
The cover is battered to hell—creases, coffee stains, torn up stickers and one rip that’s been patched with a strip of duct tape one too many times. It’s ugly and familiar, like an old hoodie you’ve had since high school that has seen better days, but still, you refuse to throw it away. My fingers skim the soft, worn leather, like muscle memory. Flipping through the pages, I find the next blank one and let the pencil loose in the empty space.
I start sketching without thinking. My hand moves on autopilot until pencil smudges against it, faint graphite streaking across my palm and pinky. Once the pencil stops moving, I glance down, expecting to see anything other than what is actually there.
It’s a hand. A familiar one. The tendons and knuckles sketched out with the kind of attention I don’t usually bother giving anything these days. There are shaded and detailed scars, faint, but deliberate, right where I knowhisare.
The realization of who they belong to punches the breath right out of me, and I immediately snap the book shut, hard enough to echo in the quiet train car.
Nope. Not doing that today.
I shove the pencil behind my ear and lean back against theseat, glaring out the window like it wasn’t my own subconscious that drew something I knew so well.
Those stupid scars. Those stupid hands.
My mind has betrayed me before in this same way, translating memories into an art piece. I haveconsciouslyfought nearly every day for months, maybe years if I’m being honest, to surpress the urge and force myself to draw or paintanythingelse.
It seems the train ride is resurfacing things I’ve fought so hard to forget.
