Through the train’s half-open window, the sun splashes over my arms and up onto my face. I turn to take in the scenery: baby-blue sky, cotton-puff clouds, and leafy green trees. We take a bend and pass under an old stone bridge, and then the seaside rolls into view. Turquoise waves lap at a pebbled beach. The setting is happy, the hues are vibrant, and the music bright and cheerful. I look down at my lap, my hands folded neatly, one perfectly peach-colored fist over the other. I lift my right to examine the flawless tone, and I gasp. One thumb and three fingers. Three fat nail-lacking fingers. I turn to the glass of the window finding my reflection easily, but, again, I’m startled. As expected, they’re my features: white-blond hair, pale blue eyes, even my new pink top, but all of it, every last detail a cartoon. And I’ve never felt better, more lively, more invigorated — or more animated. I am, after all, a drawing.

Sunlight dapples over the waves with a sparkle that snaps. I hear the click and the clack of the happy train that, as if sensing my approval, blows its high whistle.

I stand and look about. No one else is in the passenger coach with me. I walk forward, pulling open the door to the forward car. No one in the next coach, either. I push my way through this empty passenger coach, and then another. At the front of the third, I can see into the engine — the bright blue engine. I see Jacob, his cartoon image anyway, busy at the controls — too busy at his engineering duties to notice me.

The train slows, and a station comes into view. Once the train glides to a screeching, hissing stop, my no-cap knees descend with two easy glides to the spotless platform. From this gleaming, vine-covered depot, I watch as the fussy blue engine pulls away with a Peep! Peep! The coaches clatter past. Annie’s name painted in script on the side of the first coach, followed by Clarabel. The third coach is painted a sunny yellow, but I’m alarmed to note it has no name painted on its side. I run with stiff legs to keep pace with the train, but it quickly passes me. Then on the back in a loopy cursive, there it is — Julia. Onto the gated back end of the train steps Jacob. He waves as the train pulls into a tunnel and disappears behind a final puff of steam.