Our hands touch. Everything is okay.
“I just had a dream,” he says.
“What about?” I say.
“I was standing down there”—he points to the tracks—“and there was a bright light and—”
“—and a train went through you!”
He looks at me. “How did you know?”
“I had the same dream.”
We look at each other. We look up the tracks. There is no sign of a train.
“Maybe we’re still dreaming,” he says. “Poke me.”
I poke him.
“Harder.”
I poke harder.
He squeals, “Ow!”
“Tickle me,” I say.
He tickles me, in my worst spot.
I howl.
“We’re not dreaming,” he says.
“Not anymore,” I say.
“Where are we?” he says.
We look around. Railroad tracks. Benches. Wooden posts prop up a roof that brims out over the concrete platform we stand on. A dim mist of light from the street behind.
“I think it’s the train station,” he says.
“What are we doing at the train station?” I say.
“How did we get here?” he says.
We stare at each other.
“Sleepwalk?” I say, not believing myself.
“Sleepwalk?” he says. “I don’t sleepwalk.”
“Me neither,” I say.
We stare into the darkness. Crickets shake their rattles.
“Well,” I say, “I guess we do now.”
We’re quiet some more. Thinking. Or trying to. How do you think about something you don’t understand?
“Lil?” he says.
“Huh?”
“In the dream?”
“Yeah?”
“Did you smell something?”
“Yeah.”
“What?”
“You say it.”
“Let’s both say it.”
“Pickles!”
More silence. A distant voice shouts but I can’t make out the word.
“Jake?”
“Huh?”
“Are you scared?”
“No.”
“Me neither.”
Silence. Night.
“Jake?”
“Huh?”
“When the train came?”
“Yeah?”
“Did you feel something?”
“What do you mean?”
“Feel. When the train came, did it feel like something?”
“Yeah. It felt like a train coming.”
“What else?”
“Huh?”
“What else? What else did it feel like?”
He looks at me. His eyes go wide. He smiles. “Home.”