Page 49 of Trapped: Between Sky And Wind

“Sure, better we hitchhike,” I say mockingly. “The good Samaritan will drive us straight to the nearest police station.”

“We could continue to fight our way through the wilderness.”

“Which they’ll suspect we do.”

“I only meant if you’re too scared.”

I tilt my head and look at him. “No more than when you’re angry. Well, at least I can’t lose any limbs then.”

Bren jokingly grabs my neck and pulls me toward him before kissing me tenderly. I taste the heat of the day as salt on his lips, feel his cool fingers on my neck, and wrap my arms around him, pulling him to me. I would love to go back to Seattle to the suite with the huge picture window and stop time. Loving him and talking about our dreams like there’s no tomorrow.

Stop dreaming and wake up! I hear Ethan’s admonishing voice again. A life based on dreams is as unsteady as a house built on quicksand.

Oh, Ethan…the thought of him splits me in two. It’s much easier to be angry than accept my disappointment. I thought maybe his love for me would spare Bren, but either he doesn’t love me enough or he hates Bren too much.

I carefully detach myself from Bren, who immediately goes back to concentrating on the plan by watching the trains.

I don’t know what will happen next, when and under what circumstances I will see my brothers again. I have no doubt I will see them again one day, but I cannot estimate how much time will have passed. A year or ten? Will Bren and I be safe then? Where will we be living? Will we ever be safe again? Can I endure such a life or is it naive to believe we will permanently elude the police?

Will I ever face Jay, Liam, Avy, and Ethan in court?

“Hey, Lou, are you listening to me?” Bren’s voice snaps me out of my thoughts and I put my hands on my throbbing temples for a moment, overwhelmed by the thousand questions.

“Sorry!” I must look guilty. “I was thinking of my brothers.”

“I thought so.”

Sure, I haven’t talked about anything else all morning and Bren, in his inimitable way, put up with my rantings.

Now he points to a moving train that looks to be overflowing with goods. “I wanted to show you this kind of car. See the ones with the green containers?”

“Yes.” I spot the simple flat car shaped like a plank, the green container sticking out over the sides.

“Regardless of what we do or what happens, we must never jump on those with the green containers.”

“But the containers have a ladder on the side.”

“It’s an emergency ladder. The car itself has none. And you can’t get to the container roof from the emergency ladder nor do you have any other way of getting off. That means, you’re stuck for hours and might run out of luck when a tunnel comes and…well…” He just looks at me and that’s enough to picture the rest vividly.

At night, the freight yard is spooky. Everything appears more intense as if the gloom was compressing the impressions. I took the strongest painkiller Bren had and doubled it so I can run later.

Bren and I walk to the train tracks with our backpacks. We are now dressed all in black so as not to be spotted by security and move outside the large spotlights in the dark. I feel like a criminal. And it is a criminal act. Bren says train hopping is trespassing because the Canadian Pacific Railway is partially government-owned and also transports government goods. Oil and coal.

“Watch out for shunting trains,” Bren says under his breath. The brakes of an approaching train squeal in the distance, an eerie specter like in a chamber of horrors.

I merely nod. My heart is beating twice as fast as usual. I still can’t believe what we’re about to do. This is insane, life-threatening. The station is huge. There must be more than thirty platforms and the chance of being run over is high. Red lights from passing locomotives flash like emergency signals through the night, cars are pushed back and forth repeatedly without any discernible purpose. Abandoned railroad cars stand on side tracks, sometimes a chain of cars. It is difficult to estimate which train is ready and will soon depart or which has already been checked. I have absolutely no idea what’s going on.

I look around breathlessly and realize Grey has stopped and is drinking water from an old plastic container.

Bren walks ahead toward a train a few tracks further that appears to be assembled and ready to go.

“Grey, come on,” I call out under my breath. He comes running and I continue on when Bren yells, “Watch out, Lou!”

I stop instinctively, and at that moment, a couple of unlit cars silently roll by on the track right in front of me as if being pushed by a ghostly hand. I let out a gasp and run back to a parked boxcar, taking cover behind it with Grey. The engine passes, but it’s incredibly quiet and its lights are off.

Bren runs back and takes my hand tightly in his. “I told you to watch out for shunting trains,” he scolds, shaking his head.

Together, we hurry toward the freight train with no idea where the front or back is because it stretches on forever. Today, I counted trains with over three hundred cars, some of which took minutes to pass.

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