//------------------------------// // 9:57 PM - Departure // Story: Before Closing // by Rambling Writer //------------------------------// We were back in real time. It was depressing. We slowly walked down the train platform, neither of us wanting to say goodbye. Saying goodbye would make it final. So would the train leaving, but we could drag it out as long as possible. The platform was almost completely empty except for a few stragglers. Steam drifted from the locomotive, leaving mist that wreathed about the place and smothered the yellowing lamps that were the area’s only illumination in the night. The shadows danced along the cobblestones, like a cloudy sky in reverse. Water doesn’t have a smell, so I could just barely smell the little bit of smoke from the wood burning in the engine’s firebox. Pine. Pine always has that rich, unmistakeable aroma. I could only imagine what it smelled like in the cab. The station was quiet, the silence broken up alternately by night noises and sounds from the engine, small hisses and pops as water worked its way through the pipes. Above it all hung a clock, slowly ticking down the minutes until the train left. Of course, the only reason I noticed all that was because it kept my mind distracted. I didn’t want Aegis to just… leave. He wasn’t my soulmate or anything like that, not in the slightest. I could live with some time away from him, easy. Probably even a lot of time. But to just never see him again at all… That wasn’t fair. It’d leave a hole in my experiences. A small one, but it’d be there. Always. I glanced at Aegis, wondering what he was thinking. His face was inscrutable, but his head was a little bit lower than he usually carried it. Maybe. It might’ve been wishful thinking on my part, I’m still not sure. I opened my mouth to say something. I didn’t say something. I closed my mouth again and turned my eyes forward. We silently retrieved Aegis’s things from a locker and headed towards the train. I think there were a few times he wanted to say something to me, but couldn’t get it out. I could relate. And then we were in front of a passenger car. Aegis looked up, then looked at me. “S-so, uh, I guess this is goodbye,” he muttered. I rubbed a hoof against my other leg. “Yeah. See you.” He swallowed. “The harvest for you, that’ll, um, that’ll be coming up soon, right? Good luck with that.” My heart was beating faster. I looked off to one side for a few moments. “Yeah, that’ll start in, start in a week or so. Thanks. A-and good luck in college. I, I hope you do good.” “Do well. Good’s an adjective and modifies nouns. Well’s an adverb and modifies adjectives, verbs, and other adverbs.” “Well, at least your Equestrian grade will be good.” “Yeah.” “You grammar Neighzi.” Aegis twitched and laughed softly. “Heh. Yeah.” Our eyes met. I’ve heard you can see other ponies’ emotions in their eyes. Read them. Get an idea of what they’re thinking. Maybe if you know the other really well, I suppose. But right then, I couldn’t see anything like that. All I could see in Aegis’s eyes was Aegis’s eyes. Nothing more. They weren’t any particularly special color, either, just a plain, soft blue. All in all, there was nothing out of the ordinary in his eyes that I could see. Nothing especially attractive about them. So I don’t know what clicked right then. But something did. I reached out and hugged him. He gasped slightly, staggered a little in surprise, but quickly returned the favor, squeezing firmly. We held each other for a few seconds like that. When we broke, I felt short of breath. Before I could speak, he did. “I, I want to see you again,” he said quietly. He was talking very fast. “All this, all this stuff about, about not seeing each other again after tonight?” He shook his head. “It’s-” “It’s a load of road apples is what it is,” I said. I was also talking fast, same as him. “I want to see you, too.” He blinked. “Why didn’t you say something?” “I was worried you might not feel the same way! Why didn’t you say something?” “I was worried you might not feel the same way!” Part of me wanted to laugh. The rest of me said that would be a waste of time and I should keep talking. I kept talking. “We had a heart-to-heart under the moonlight! How could you be worried about that?” “I thought I’d never see you again! How could you be worried about that?” “But-” I groaned and waved my hooves. “Okay, let’s- let’s just forget about that, okay? You, look, what do you want to do about it?” The clock’s ticking seemed to have jumped a couple notches in volume. Aegis ran a hoof through his mane, messing it up and whipping his tail around as he thought. “I, I don’t- Do you know the schedule for that carnival?” “Uh, uh, yeah, yeah,” I said, nodding. “It’s yearly. Annual.” “Alright, so, so why don’t we come back here next year, alright? When the carnival comes again, y’know? Same date.” “Um, yeah, that, that’d be good. At the Marris wheel again?” “Yeah, yeah,” Aegis muttered. He kept shooting glances at the clock and his legs were twitching. “And if the carnival’s not here on that, on that particular date,” I continued, feeling a little out of breath from how fast I was talking, “we’ll just meet here, alright? Four o’clock, either way. PM.” “That, yeah, that sounds good,” said Aegis, nodding. “One year from today, Marris wheel or this station, four PM.” “Right.” “Okay, yeah, I, I can make that work. It’s, listen, it’ll be a long trip for me, but I, trust me, I’ll be there, okay?” “Okay, right.” I paused for half a moment. “You, you wanna exchange addresses, so we can write, or-” Aegis shook his head. “No, no, it, that, it wouldn’t work. It’s, I liked talking with you, and letters can’t do that, they can’t have that, that quick back-and-forth. They take too long. It’s-” “It’s depressing.” “Yeah.” Silence. “One year?” I asked. My voice was a lot slower, back to its normal pace. “One year.” “Sounds good.” “Right.” “Yeah.” More silence. We both jumped as the train’s whistle blew. I glanced at the clock. “Your train’s gonna leave.” “Yeah.” Aegis swallowed. “Bye.” “Bye.” He grinned a little. “See you later.” I grinned back. “You, too.” He nodded and disappeared into the train car. I turned around and left the station. I had a long trip back. I wasn’t sure how I felt. Excited. Nervous. Confident. Regretful. Elated. Depressed. Satisfied. Empty. All those things at once. It was like I’d jammed my emotions into a blender and hammered the “purée” button. Aegis was gone, there was no denying that. But it wouldn’t be forever, just a year. I could live with that. Besides, he was really confident he’d show up, so he would. Right? I couldn’t just let him down after tonight. Still, a year was an awful long time. What if I moved on and he didn’t? What if he moved on and I didn’t? Part of me said one of those two would happen. If not both of us moving on. But another part scoffed at that cynicism, saying that we’d find each other again, and while things may have changed, we’d still hit it off. So, no. I wasn’t sure how I felt. Not at all. But, one way or another, I’d be back in a year. Behind me, the whistle blew again, and I heard the click-clack of the train’s wheels as it pulled out of the station. I looked over my shoulder at the slowly accelerating train and its trail of steam. The windows on the cars were irregularly illuminated, most of them dark, some of them bright. I watched the train, silhouetted black against the dark blue of the night, as it rattled away, towards the edge of town, towards Manehattan. Then it went behind a hill and it was gone.