Jim had loved Allison then and he would always love her. That was why he recognized her now, even though he had not laid eyes on her for nearly thirty years.
She was sitting there by herself in the train station with a large shopping bag at her feet and a leather-bound book in her lap. For some reason, Jim found that strange. But so many things about Allison’s situation were strange—everything really. Why had she disappeared all those years ago? And why had Jim not known that she was back—back from wherever she had been?
Although he would never have told his wife and two children, Jim still executed search engine queries for her name from time to time. She was his first real love, after all; and when she had stepped out of that restaurant, never to return, she had taken a part of him with her.
As he walked over to where she was sitting, a local politician began making a speech that was broadcast via the speakers overhead. The high-speed rail system was new for the city. Today was its inauguration day, in fact. The rail line was touted as an economic boon to this part of the Ohio rust belt.
He passed a newspaper vending machine that dispensed copies of the local paper: HIGH-SPEED RAIL OPENS TODAY DESPITE SECURITY CONCERNS the main headline said. There had apparently not been sufficient funds to install the sort of security systems that (supposedly) protected air travelers from terrorist attacks. But Jim was not concerned about his train ride to Pittsburg. There were plenty of more likely places for terrorists to strike; and right now Allison was the only thing on his mind, anyway.
“Allison!” Jim said, standing before her now. He gripped the handle of his briefcase with a sweaty palm. What would she say to him, after all these years? And would she still find him attractive? He was no longer the slender young man he had been all those years ago, in college. He had lost much of his hair; and he knew that the skin on his face had become baggy and fleshy.
He noted that she was still as beautiful as she had been—though she had undeniably aged since then. When she looked into his eyes, there was immediate recognition—and another emotion that he thought he recognized as—
Dread?
Why should she feel that way? Did she know that he had planned to propose to her that very night? He had had the ring tucked away in his jacket pocket. But then Allison had disappeared, and the ring had been sold for sixty cents on the dollar to a pawnshop.
“Jim,” she said. Her eyes fell to the book on her lap, and she immediately slammed it shut. She laid her hands across its cover. She pulled the shopping bag on the floor closer to her body. “Is that you? Is that really you?”
“It’s me, Allison. Yes, it’s me.” He wanted to hug her, touch her hand, something. But she did not seem inclined toward any form of intimacy—even intimacy of the platonic sort that passes between old friends.
She could not have forgotten how much more they had been to each other. Or could she?
And then she gazed down into her lap again. Her intentions were clear: She wanted him to go away. She wanted to pretend that he did not exist, and that the past did not exist.
“Where have you been?” he asked, dropping all pretense of making small talk. “What happened to you? We were having dinner at that little restaurant near campus. You were tipsy from the wine and you said you needed some air. You stepped out into the parking lot and I never saw you again.”
“Jim—”
“As far as I know, no one ever saw you again. The police grilled me. Then the FBI. And your family never forgave me. They believed that it was my fault, somehow. That I should have been there to save you from—whatever or whoever it was.” He glanced down into her shopping bag. It contained a plastic and metal device that was wrapped in masking tape. There was a button on the top of the device.
“Perhaps they were right,” he said.
“Jim,” she began again. “I did love you. You must know that. But I am no longer the person I was back then.”
He noticed something unusual about her voice—no, not her voice; but her speech. She was speaking awkwardly, as if she had to consciously choose each word. She also spoke with an odd inflection, as if—
As if she was speaking a foreign language. Of course that was crazy. Jim didn’t know where she had been for the past three decades; but Allison had been born and raised here in the Midwest.
“What did your FBI say about me, Jim?” she asked in that unfamiliar inflection of hers.
Since when is it my FBI? he wanted to ask. But he let the question slide.
**END OF PREVIEW**