You know why I’m sending you there, right Lil?
The words my mother had last spoken to me replayed in my head, and not even the sound of pounding music could block out the pleading of her voice. Shutting my eyes couldn’t fade the image of the way her face fell when I stepped onto the train without a word. Her red swollen eyes already forming tears when I glanced out the window had almost made me jump off and apologize, but I couldn’t.
Summer was supposed to be a time of bliss. Where I could hang out with my friends; drink wine coolers; watch the sunrise and laze around. It was defiantly not supposed to be a time where I sat on a train for hours surrounded by people I didn’t know; and, most defiantly not a time where I was banished to farm in Kelowna, British Columbia.
The train was brought to a slow stop, letting a light breeze come on it, as passengers moved on and off. I was still left a prisoner on the warm, stuffy train and would be for another hour.
I wiped my sweaty palms on my jean shorts and shifted my weight from side to side trying to get comfortable. Every window on the train was closed. The conductor said something about so a passenger wouldn’t stick their head out a window. What idiot would do that? They would have to have no brains or be stupid enough to follow a dare from their friend. Or maybe they could have a death wish; again idiot.
My mother couldn’t handle me. That was her reason for sending me to live on a farm with my grandfather that summer. She was an idiot really; listening to the pile of lies that came out of my step father’s mouth. The catching me drinking part wasn’t a lie, but the rest was. I didn’t do drugs, I would never. Not after all the horror stories the teachers told in school.
I hated him. He was the worst thing that happened to my family. He was always there though, so that’s why my mother put up with him. She tried to pretend that he was my real dad; but I knew that she didn’t have a clue who was my father. I overheard her telling my Aunt Deb on the phone when I was… eight, maybe.
I wished that my mother would just dump him, save us all the trouble. He could twist around every word that I said, just to meet his needs. Every time my mother looked into my blue eyes and then his brown ones she always believed him. She had once muttered something about a ‘trusting look’ in them.
I rested my head against the buttery leather of the seat and turned the volume up on my iPod. An old lady came into the compartment and sat down across from me. She sniffed her nose in what I believe was disgust. She could probably see my black bra through the thin cotton of my blouse; or she could notice the ravels at the ends of my jean shorts; there from cutting them in haste that morning.
I looked down at my own shorts and tried to pull them down more so the back of my legs wouldn’t stick to the seat. Whoever invented short shorts obliviously did not have to sit on a plastic or leather seat anytime soon.
I picked at the red hair ribbon that was tied around my head, making sure that the bow underneath my sheath of hair was still in tack.
The lady across the way folded her newspaper back up and tucked it under her arm. She laid her head back on her leather seat, folded her hands in her lap and closed her eyes. I grinned to myself and moved my thumb over the white circle on my iPod trying to find a different song to block out the noise on the train.
Once satisfied from a song by James Blunt, I rested my head against the cool glass of the window, trying hard not to think about my mother. I still felt guilt for not saying good-bye to her, and for not saying I love you. She deserved it. That’s all I would have to keep telling myself, that way my guilt wouldn’t get to me.
The hour passed even slower then I had anticipated; all the tips of my purple nails were bitten off and my thumb nail had a piece of skin tore off it. The old lady across from me only stayed for a half an hour. I was thankful for that. I couldn’t stand her looking at me like I was some creature behind glass.
I waited and waited for the train to stop. As soon as I took my seat at nine o’ clock that morning I was waiting. When the conductor finally called out “Kelowna, British Columbia.”, though, I couldn’t move. I didn’t want to stay on the train but I didn’t want to leave. If I got off I couldn’t get back on until sometime in August, but if I didn’t get off I would have to sit on the train for another seven hours.
I switched my iPod off and shakily rose from my seat. I grabbed my coat and bag that was stuffed in the overhead compartment; slid open the compart-ment door and slowly made my way down the middle of the train. Only two other people where standing up at the head of the train; an old couple. The man trying to put his wife’s coat on her, but she pushed away his hands and stepped off the train. He sighed and muttered something before placing her coat on his arm.
I followed the couple outside into the hot muggy air and waited for the conductor to finish removing their bags. He turned towards me.
“Which ones are yours, miss?” He asked taking his cap off his head and wiping his sweaty brow.
I shielded my eyes from the sun and answered, “The two purple ones.”
He nodded his head and placed his cap back on it before looking in the train’s compartment for my belongings. I took the time to look around the station for my grandfather; he was normally late so I wasn’t surprised when I didn’t find him there.
The conductor placed my bags in front of me with a plop.
“Is that it?” He asked
“Yes, thanks,” I said.
He stepped back on the train and made the last call for new passengers. The train started off slow, but soon began to chug its way down the track. I watched until it turned the corner and then pulled my suitcases over to the wooden steps where I had waited with my mother one summer for my grandfather to come pick us up. I sat down cautiously on the splintery steps and pulled my knees up to my chin. My cell phone vibrated in my jean pocket. I stretched my legs out and took it out. I stared at the text message.
Hey! Don’t txt back I’m working. Call me 2night K.
How thoughtful. What was even the point of sending the message? I sighed and snapped my phone shut. I flicked it in my bag and then fished around the deep purse to retrieve my iPod. I slipped the earbuds in my ear, just as a dark figure blocked the sun. Pulling the music away from my ears I looked up.
*** <-- Might turn it into another chapter. Opinion please!
“Are you Lily?” He questioned. His black eyebrows were knitted and his hair was short and layered with a slight tousled look.
I stared into his sea blue eyes and gulped. “Yeah,” I answered, wondering who on the earth this black haired goddess could be.
His face broke out in a smile, making his red lips turn upwards. He removed what looked like a work glove from his left hand and tucked it under his armpit. He held his hand out to me and I took it, letting him pull me up.
“I’m Benjamin. I work for your grandfather,” He told me picking up my biggest suitcase with ease.
I smiled for a second then let my face fall. There was no way that my grandfather had anyone else working on his farm. He always told me that not another man would set foot on that farm until the day he died. It did explain how he knew my name though. Or maybe I just look like a Lily.
I picked up my other suitcase and followed him to his old Ford pickup truck; that had rust on it in more then one place. He slid my suitcase into the trunk next to a tire; I placed my other one next to it and walked around to passenger side of the beat up truck. The door creaked loudly when it opened and it closed with an unintended bang.
“Sorry, she needs to be greased,” Ben apologized sticking the key in the ignition, starting it up.
I nodded my head and smiled slightly clicking my seat belt in. I felt mute. I could barley utter five words to him. I hardly knew the guy and he had the power to make me nervous. Well that would be something to tell my friends back home, I met a guy and only after seeing him once I could barley talk. What a laugh they would have.
Ben clicked his seat belt and rolled down the window slowly, I guessed it was because the truck was so old. “So, how old are you?” He asked moving the knob on the stereo system. He fiddled with it while he awaited my respond.
I tucked a stray strand of hair behind my ear. “Seventeen, I’ll be eighteen in August,” I answered gazing at the side of his face. “What about you?”
“I’ll be twenty-one in November,” He announced, turning to glance at me for a second.
I smiled blushingly and looked out the window. He drove fast, even though the speed limit was thirty. The meadows whizzed by, and it almost looked like we were going in circles. The wind whipped at my hair, making it fly in front of my face. I moved some out of my eye view and snuck at look at him. His short hair moved with the wind too, but it stayed out of his eyes.
I had always wanted short hair like my friend Audrey. It would be manageable and it probably wouldn’t be in my face; but after a mushroom cut when I was six I vowed to never cut off my long hair again.
I sighed through my nose, tying my blond hair back with my ribbon so it wouldn’t keep getting caught in my mouth. We drove in silence for a long ten minutes, only the sound of the static from the radio and the window whipping in through the windows.
Ben fiddled with the knob again, then switched off the volume so the only sound was the wind. The his clear voice filled my ears.
“What university or college do you want to go to?” He inquired turning up a dirt road that I was very familiar with.
The first summer I had been to my grandfathers I made a best friend. He name was Rebecca and she could run faster then a cheetah, or so I thought when we ran down the dirt road, racing each other to open filed. I was six then. She had written to me every summer until we turned ten, then the letters stopped. It didn’t bother me. I had my friends in Ottawa and she had her friends there.
“McGill, in Montreal. What about you?”
God; was that all I could ask him? I sounded so lame and I knew it, but I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Ben turned the turned the windshield wiper on and rolled up his window with the other hand. Rain had begun to drop from the gray sky.
“Phoenix. The one in Vancouver. That’s the reason why I’m working for your grandfather, so I can save.”
Silence again. I stared out the slightly blurred windshield, waiting to see my grandfather’s house. The grand farmhouse came into view and instantly made me smile; I loved that house when I was younger. All the memories came flooding in my mind as Ben brought the truck to a stop.
He pulled the keys out and yanked open the rusted door. I opened my own and watched him grab my two bags from the trunk. Both of them were slightly damp from the sudden downpour. I followed him and side and smiled.
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