Windswept Page 2

  I don’t think it worked.

  When she looked away, I knew it was a lost cause, because at first glance, there were some immediate differences between us. Bluetooth earbuds were in her ears and she glanced at her phone often, whereas I didn’t even own a phone. From the bulkiness of her bag, I could tell there were schoolbooks hidden inside. I was a dropout.

  I could count on one hand how many people knew I existed, and it was fewer than four, one of them being a best friend who was barely ever around. And another who was like a half brother, but I rarely saw him either.

  The train came to a stop.

  I glanced over to see her leave. As the doors shut, I had already accepted that I would never see her again, but something happened that I wasn’t anticipating. I expected her to keep walking, never to think of me again—after all, I was just a stranger on a train.

  Instead, the girl stopped on the platform and turned back to look at me. It was the most unexpected thing, and in my nervousness, I gave her one last feeble attempt of a smile, so she knew I saw her. The train lurched forward, and I lost sight of her as the tunnel swallowed me.

  The lights flickered, and with a glance to her empty seat, I saw a hat lying there. Had it been there before? Was it hers? I couldn’t remember if she was wearing one when she sat down.

  I made a split-second decision. Besides, I had nothing else to do. Hell, I was riding the train because I had nothing else to do. It was either ride the subway more or roam the streets— decisions, decisions.

  The hat now gave me a reason to say something to her. It gave me a reason to see her again and, in that moment, I knew I wanted to see the stranger from the train. Even if just to learn her name.

  I grabbed the hat, closed my eyes, and when I opened them, I was standing on the subway platform the train had just departed from. People stood around, waiting for the next train to arrive. Of course, no one noticed me appear. They never did unless they happened not to be looking at their phones or staring at the empty space I suddenly came to inhabit. I pulled the strap of my bag over my head and across my chest, then started for the exit. My eyes scanned the crowd frantically as I moved, then I caught sight of the girl at the top of the escalator.

  I started after her, but with too many people in front of me, I had to wait my turn to go up the escalator. She got up to the street before I did, and then I had to fight through a group of school kids before I caught sight of her turning the corner. I quickened my pace to catch up.

  She took a left and started down a more residential street with trees lining the sidewalks. It was a nice neighborhood. Not expensive or fancy, but somewhere in between. I was about to call out to her when she turned up a set of steps and disappeared inside.

  I stopped, hat still in hand. It would be really weird now if I knocked on the door. Hey, I’m that stranger from the subway and I happen to know where you live now. Yeah, not creepy at all.

  I tucked the hat inside my bag, thinking maybe I’d come back later. Maybe leave it on her doorstep with a letter.

  No, that would be even weirder.

  So, without anything else to do, I drifted.

  A little before five thirty, I came back to the front of her house and leaned against one of the old oaks across the street. It was dusk, but the house was still relatively dark inside. There were lights on in the living room, but the top half was still dim and shadowy. I didn’t know what I was doing there, and I didn’t have any reasons other than the hat in my bag.

  A small car turned onto the street and parallel parked almost effortlessly in front of the house. A middle-aged man climbed out. He had to be her father. His hair was just as dark as hers, not yet showing signs of gray, but he wore glasses. He never gave me a glance as he walked inside.

  I knew I should have just left. I couldn’t stand outside her house forever and hope to “run into” her again. I glanced at her house one last time and saw a face peering out of the top window.

  It was her, and she was looking right at me.

  It was only for a moment, and then something distracted her attention behind her, and that’s when I made my break. I was gone before my heart took another beat and my stomach flipped. I never had to think about drifting anymore. It came without effort, as easily as breathing. I was gone long before she even turned around again, leaving but a slight breeze as any proof that I had ever been there.

  The park was deathly quiet when I appeared, and the old bench was cold as I sat down, placing my bag next to me on the seat. Minutes rolled on, and I tried to occupy my mind until I would be tired enough to go home and sleep.

  An evident breeze warned me I wasn’t alone, but I also didn’t have to worry. Just as I said, I could count on one hand how many people knew I existed, but there were only two who I still saw on occasion.

  “You look sad sitting there like that. You know that, right?” Jake’s Australian accent interrupted the silence, but I smiled anyway. He came around the front of the bench and shoved my bag aside to make room for himself. His hair was extremely messy, as usual, half of it pulled into a bun, and he wore a worn leather jacket. He smelled like expensive cigars.

  “I haven’t seen you since last month. Did you get lost in Japan?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Only for about a week.”

  I laughed because it was a joke. Drifters never got lost.

  “Do you have a house there now?” I glanced at him sideways. “Maybe I should check it out.”

  “I just got one yesterday actually,” he said, glancing at me, “but we both know you won’t be stopping in.”

  “Sure, I will.” My sarcasm was all too obvious, and I rolled my eyes.

  Jake’s smile disappeared. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m sitting, stupid. What does it look like?”

  “Reid.” Jake’s voice was on that serious line that he rarely used, and I knew he was going somewhere I didn’t want to. “I mean, what are you doing here? You can go anywhere in the world, and yet you choose to stay here. I don’t see the point.” He shook his head. “Sometimes I don’t understand you.”

  I stared out at the water and knew I needed to change the subject.

  “You coming this weekend?” I asked.

  Jake shot me a glare but answered, “You shouldn’t even go. You’re getting yourself in deeper every time you do. It’s not safe and you know it.”

  I waited, knowing the rest of his answer was coming.

  He finally said, “Yeah, I’ll be there, but just to see you get your ass kicked.”

  “You wish.”

  His smile disappeared again. “You know you have to stop soon, Reid. One of these times, I won’t be there to bail you out. They’ll find out about you soon enough.”

  He was in one of those moods and I hated it.

  “Well, until then, it’s the only thing I can do.”

  “No, it’s the only thing you will do.”

  I stood up in a rush and turned to face him. “Because it’s the only thing I know, Jake! I’m not like you. I don’t steal things that aren’t mine. You take advantage of too much.”

  “And you take advantage of nothing. We don’t have this ability just to do nothing with it. I don’t know about you, mate, but I want to actually live my life. You?” He gestured toward me. “You act like you don’t even have one.”

  “I’m living, too, just in a different way. Why can’t you just accept that I’m not the same as you?”

  Jake stood and I hated having to look up at him. “Oh yeah? Where are you living these days? The last time I saw you, you weren’t.”

  “I found a place.”

  “You found a place?” he mimicked. “Does it come with a loo?”

  I glared at him as best I could. “I get by just fine. I don’t need you to tell me what to do.”

  “Sometimes it seems I do.” His eyes searched me, and I felt exposed.

  I clenched my jaw and grabbed my bag, slinging it across my chest. “I’ll see you around.”
<
br />   I was about to drift when he caught hold of my arm. “Reid, I’ve told you before, you’re welcome to stay at my place. I mean it.”

  “Which one? I don’t fancy Paris as much as you do.”

  He smiled crookedly. “You know I have one here, too, and I always will.” He let go of my arm. “I’ll see you this weekend. Try not to get lost until then.”

  Jake disappeared before I did, and by then I realized I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t lie when I’d said I found a place, because I did. I just didn’t want to go there yet.

  So I just went wherever my mind took me.

  SAM

  NEW YORK, UNITED STATES

  THE FOG DISAPPEARED OVERNIGHT, AND THE morning came with the sun shining into my bedroom. My alarm clock went off five minutes earlier, but I still had plenty of time to get to school. I sat on the edge of my mattress and stared at the floor, trying to wake up.

  Last night’s dreams were still playing vividly in my head, and I wanted nothing more than for them to be gone. It was the third night in a row that I had strange dreams, but they were only strange because they had an unnervingly real feeling about them.

  My cell phone vibrated on my nightstand, and I reached over to see who it was. Nella, my best and basically only friend, from school had texted me. We used to be neighbors, but it was different now that there was more distance between us. In more ways than one.

  I opened her text.

  Meet me at the café after school? It’s been forever.

  I quickly texted her back and told her yes. I rarely did anything after school, not to mention outside of school, but Nella was the one person I never minded hanging out with. We were both similar in our introverted ways, and I was pretty sure that was the reason we were friends.

  Since I was still good on time, I pulled my laptop from under the bed. It was Dad’s old Apple laptop, so it took a little while for it to come to life. After checking my usual social media and glancing at gossip, I opened FaceTime and clicked on the only contact I ever called—my older brother, Logan.

  He answered after just two rings, his face filling the screen. I hadn’t seen him in person since the summer, but he hadn’t changed much, though it seemed like he needed to shave.

  “Hey, Sam.” He smiled and ran his hand through his hair like he had just gotten up, which he probably had. The rest of his room was dimly lit behind him, and I saw his messy bed in the corner.

  “Hey, sorry I missed your last call,” I told him.

  “That’s what happens when you become a senior. It’s even worse when you’re in college, trust me.” He grinned. “How’s that going, by the way? School, I mean, is it as horrible as always?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t use the word horrible, but close enough. Will you be here for Thanksgiving?”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to make it,” he said, pulling on a T-shirt. “If not, it’ll be Christmas for sure.”

  “Well, I think plane tickets are kinda cheap right now.”

  Logan smiled and shook his head. “Getting there isn’t a problem, Sam, don’t worry.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “What are you going to do, walk? You are off school that week, right?”

  “Don’t worry about it, I’ll get there. It just depends if I get bombarded with homework the week before.”

  I sighed. “Okay.”

  Logan stared at me through the screen. “Are you doing all right?”

  In that moment, I thought about being open and telling him about my weird dreams and images of a cliff that I couldn’t get rid of. That I woke feeling unrested and had been experiencing weird flashes of places I’d never been to. That I saw a boy disappear on a sidewalk. But no, I couldn’t tell him those things.

  It was probably just school stress, or something.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied.

  School dragged by. The air was still brisk and seemed to be getting colder by the hour. Once the school day was over and my bag was full of schoolbooks and homework, I started walking the two blocks to the small café where I would meet Nella. There was a bite to the air, and I could almost make out the fog from my breath. It was the coldest day yet since the leaves had started to change colors, and the season was ending too soon.

  I missed my hat. I was angry that I’d forgotten it on the train.

  After I had walked another block, the small café finally came into view. It sat on the corner of a three-way intersection next to a park, and it always seemed to be overlooked, sitting between a popular Starbucks and a Panera Bread. I didn’t know how the café stayed open, but it was a nice getaway to those who, like me, appreciated silence.

  Nella, already seated at the table near the front window, waved when she caught sight of me. A younger couple sat at the other table near the opposite wall. Otherwise, it was empty. I walked across the worn wooden floors and sat down across from Nella.

  “We have to do something this weekend, Sam,” she announced. “It’s been forever since we’ve hung out.”

  “Since school started, which was only about a month ago.” I smiled and finished with, “And hello to you, too.”

  She glared levelly at me. Her dark hair was pulled back into a simple ponytail, and she was wearing her glasses, as usual. She looked cute with them on, not to mention smart, but she hated to be reminded of them. Her poor eyesight was the bane of her existence.

  “I need to do something besides school,” she said. “Can’t you agree just this once?”

  “When has there been a chance for me to not agree? We both know we never do anything anyway.”

  She finally broke out a smile. “That’s why we’re friends— we’re both boring people, and both perfectly fine with that.”

  “So why the sudden change in mood?” I asked, taking off my jacket.

  She shrugged her shoulders and sat back in her chair. “I just feel like doing something. I need to get out once in a while.”

  The barista made her way over from the counter with our drinks and smiled brightly at us. “It’s good to see you girls again. You haven’t been here in a while.”

  Nella smiled back. “We’ve been super busy with school. You guys aren’t going under because of us, are you? Because I really think I would die if I had to start going to Starbucks.” Her eyes widened with fright, and I laughed.

  She chuckled and shook her head. Her blonde hair was thrown up into a messy knot and it bobbed along with it. “No, we’re doing just fine. Let me know if you need anything else.”

  Once she walked away, Nella shook her head at my cup. “I still don’t understand how you can live without coffee.”

  I cupped my hands around the mug and smelled the delicious chocolate and whipped cream. “Because coffee is disgusting, and I’m not going to argue that point again.”

  “Fine,” she answered tiredly. “But seriously, Sam, we’re doing something this weekend. Is Friday night good for you?”

  “Friday? But—” I tried quickly to think of an excuse, but I came up with nothing that would satisfy her. Homework couldn’t be one, because I would have all weekend to do it. And because she asked three days in advance, Nella knew for a fact that I didn’t have prior plans. The only image that came to mind was my unfinished puzzle and multiple episodes of an anime to watch, and that wouldn’t be a good enough excuse for Nella to back down.

  She smiled at me over her mug. “I thought so. I’ll pick you up at nine, and you better be ready.”

  “Nine? Where are we going at nine o’clock at night?”

  Who goes out at nine at night? Actually, a lot of people, but none of them being me. That was an hour before I was usually in bed.

  I could just imagine it now: Nella and me getting lost somewhere in East Harlem with no way home. It would be raining and cold, and our phones would be dead.

  But she was right—going out could be fun, once in a while.

  I smirked. “Fine. Nine it is.”

  By the time Nella and I parted ways from the c
afé, it was nearly rush hour. The crowds were already thick as I made my way down the steps into the subway. I hated crowds, but sometimes there was no way around it in the city. I was tempted to shove my earbuds in to drown out the noise with actual music, but the train was already slowing down and I was short on time. People jostled their way in and out of the doors, and I just barely got through before they slid shut.

  I glanced around for an empty seat, but they all seemed to be taken. Some people were already standing, hanging on to the handrails above and the bars in the middle of the car, but I didn’t really feel like standing.

  I started down the aisle, desperately searching for an empty place I could cram into. My eyes trailed toward the back, where I spotted two empty seats along the wall. I made my way back, watching my feet so I wouldn’t trip over anything and being especially mindful that my backpack didn’t hit anyone, but when I looked up again, only one seat was left.

  The guy from yesterday sat in the other.

  I stopped moving and just stared at him, my heart giving me a little kick. He was wearing the same jacket and hoodie, but today his hood was down, showing his dark hair, messy like the day was too windy for it. Should I sit next to him? Our encounter from yesterday had been on my mind throughout the day, but I had been almost certain I would never see him again. The chances of that happening were close to none, and yet here he was.

  I tried to make myself breathe and then continued toward the empty seat casually. He glanced at me as I sat down but said nothing, looking away before I knew it. He looked awkward sitting there; he was stiff as a board and just stared straight ahead. I stared straight ahead, too. My heart beat too fast and I felt heat rise to my face.

  Why does it always have to be so hot on the train?