Agnes wasn't quite sure how long she had been asleep, but she figured it had been a while. Outside the window, the trees had given way to a snowy plain.
Quiet Boy had left the bench, but a glance across the aisle assured her he had not moved back to his own. She rubbed at her eyes tiredly before sitting up, shoving her coat off of her arms and into the floor. Loud Mouth was still asleep, so Agnes quietly shuffled past her, gripping the top of the seats to avoid falling.
She found Quiet Boy sitting in the seat in front of them, chatting softly with the Cheerful Girl. The two were eating handfuls of jelly beans.
"Hey." Quiet Boy waved at her when he saw her. "Did you sleep well?"
"I did; how long have I been asleep?" Agnes asked, squeezing onto the end of the seat next to Quiet Boy.
"Maybe 45 minutes? Hard to tell." He shrugged. He held his palm out to her. "Do you like black licorice?"
"I do, actually," She chirped, taking the jelly beans for him. "I always eat my brother's; he thinks it's yucky, but it's my favorite."
"What are you eating?" A groggy voice came from behind them and they turned around to see Loud Mouth standing on her tiptoes to peek over the back of the seat.
"Jelly beans," Cheerful Girl answered. "Do you like them?"
"Only the sweet ones: the spicy one makes my eyes water."
Cheerful Girl dutifully picked out the cinnamon jelly beans before handing Loud Mouth the jelly beans; Loud Mouth settled back into the seat behind them, pulling her feet up into the seat as she sat down. Cheerful Girl got up to go get more jelly beans.
"Do you think we're almost there? It feels like we've been on this train forever!" Agnes groaned to Quiet Boy.
"Maybe the train conductor will know."
Agnes stood up from her seat. "I'm gonna go find him. Be right back, OK?"
"My dad says you shouldn't cross moving train cars by yourself..." Quit Boy sounded unsure, but he also didn't make a move to stop her.
"I'll be extra careful, promise." She started towards the sliding door, but as she laid her hand on the brass handle to slide it to the side, it slid open for her. She yelped as she came face to face with the conductor (or face to stomach, as the conductor was quite a bit taller than her).
Her eyes traveled from the brass buttons on his blue suit to his face, on which there was a confused frown. She offered a smile. "Mr. Conductor! I was just coming to find you!"
"Young lady," He said, kneeling down to her height. "You shouldn't be moving across cars unattended."
"I just wanted to see if we were almost there," She said sheepishly.
"Regardless, you shouldn't endanger your personal safety. When I was your age on this train, I attempted myself and almost fell. It's slippery; you should only cross without help if it's an emergency." Much like when she first met him, he didn't quite smile, but something about his face seemed to soften. "Patience is a virtue, child."
"Yes, Mr. Conductor." Agnes nodded earnestly.
"Back to your seat, now." The conductor told her as he stood up and fully entered the train car. She scurried back to her seat as he picked up the microphone.
"Your attention please," The train conductor announced across the microphone. "In the past, we've had instances of lost tickets; because of this, we have begun the practice of checking tickets. We have reached the halfway mark of our trip, so if you will please, present your tickets."
The microphone clicked into place and there was a scramble to find the golden tickets. Agnes scrounged her jacket from the floor, pulling the ticket from her pocket. The train conductor walked down the aisle, giving each presented ticket a curt nod before moving on. He passed their seat without worry but stopped right behind them.
"And where is your ticket?"
Loud Mouth looked near tears. "It was in my pocket, but it's not there anymore."
"Are you saying you lost your ticket?"
Loud Mouth didn't respond. Agnes felt so horrible for her as she watched a tear fall down the girl's brown skin.
"Wait," Agnes said, pulling her own ticket out. "She can have mine, we can share it!"
The ticket was snatched from her hand as Loud Mouth tried to reach for it.
"These tickets," the train conductor hissed, "Are not transferable." He handed the ticket back to Agnes before turning back to Loud Mouth. "Young lady. You will simply have to come with me."
He took Loud Mouth's hand in his, and steered her gently to the sliding door. The door closed with a quiet schh. There was silence for a moment, before a voice chirped, "What do you think is going to happen to her?"
"She'll be OK." The girl with the yellow-tan skin had responded to Indian Howl Pendragon. "They'll figure it out."
Agnes distantly thought she was quite the sweetheart.
Agnes and Quiet Boy had taken up the seat behind Cheerful Girl again, but it was quiet without Loud Mouth.
"Do you want this coffee-flavored one for a green-apple-flavored one?" Quiet Boy asked quietly.
Agnes fished a green apple jelly bean from her hand, and a brown coffee-flavored one joined her pile. Outside of jelly bean trading, not much conversation took place.
Too busy watching the scenery out the window and too lost in her thoughts, she dropped one of her jelly beans; it rolled out of her hand, down her front, and bounced off of her leg into the seat, where it fell between the cushions.
"Dang," she said sadly, before shoving her hand between the cushions in hopes of finding it. While she had no intentions of eating it, her mother said that leaving candy lying around would draw in ants and she didn't want to draw in ants in a train.
"What are you doing?" Quiet Boy asked when Agnes stood up from her seat, running her fingers across the seat.
"I'm looking for the jelly bean I dropped, but I can't find it." She said. "I think the seat ate it."
Quiet Boy then stood as well, putting his tiny hand into between the cushions to help. Within a few seconds, he made a face of confusion. "I found something," he said. "But it's too big to be jelly bean."
He began to pull it out but abruptly stopped.
"What's wrong?" Agnes asked.
"It's paper, I don't want it to rip."
Agnes nodded in understanding and moved her hand towards his, her fingers coming under his hand to grasp the ball of paper. Together, they lifted a crumpled ball of golden paper.
"It looks like a ticket," Agnes said, watching as Quiet Boy straightened it out. As he did, the golden paper flattened out perfectly, revealing the letters I and T. Agnes gasped. "It is a ticket! It's the ticket she lost!"
"It must've fallen between the seats while she was sleeping." The Know It All Kid had apparently been watching them. "You need to take it to her."
"But how? The train conductor says I can't cross cars without help."
"Unless it's an emergency." Know It All finished. "This counts."
Agnes nodded. "You're right. I'll be back!"
With that, she began her walk towards the sliding door. It did not open this time when her fingers touched the brass handle, and there was no blue-suited conductor waiting for her behind the door. She stepped through that door, closed it, and then opened another door. Cold wind whipped around her and she found herself wishing had brought her coat. Instead, she simply tucked the ticket into the waistband of her pajama pants before facing what was in front of her.
Before her was an icy coupling, and it was about a foot-long jump. Both platforms on either car were icy, and she wasn't sure she could stick the landing. But she can see a shoe print in the light snow that hadn't been blown off by the wind and knows she must follow it to find the train conductor and Loud Mouth. She chooses one big jump will be safer than trying to balance on an icy, rickety coupling. So she braces herself, clenches her first, and jumps.
It feels like an eternity of being in the cold air, floating, waiting.
And then her feet slam into the icy metal platform on the other car. One foot slips out from beneath her and she slams into the door of the car. The door opened, catapulting her to the floor. She quickly crawls inside, slamming the door once she is safely inside. Her heart was racing; she pressed her hand to her chest and could feel her heart beating rapidly.
She pushed herself off the ground, however, because she still had to find the conductor. She went through another sliding door and found herself in the caboose of the train. She stepped out onto the back platform; though she had a mission, she couldn't help but linger for a moment to stare at the Northern Lights.
She wanted to cry at the beauty. Reds, greens, and yellows danced in the sky to music only they could hear. Agnes wished she could hear it too; it'd sound like that video she had heard of whale calls. Hauntingly beautiful, something that brings humans to a standstill in awe. And maybe she was imagining it, but were the lights making shapes of Christmas presents? She wanted to sit down right there, and never leave.
Something in her urged her to do just that because she felt as if life would never get better than this moment. And something in her told her that someone else, years ago, had stood here and thought the same thing.
She shook the feeling off, though, and turned away from the sky to face the ladder that led to the roof of the train. She was scared; but that's OK, according to her brother. Jackson told her that it was OK to be scared, as long as you didn't let the fear hold you back. So she squared her shoulders and wrapped her hands around the cold metal rungs.
She safely made it up the ladder where she was met with a roof covered in about 4 inches of thick snow. She stepped into it and immediately sunk in up to her ankle. She pushed forward, quite literally, and shuffled her way through the snow. She tried to keep her eyes on her feet instead of watching the cliff to her side. But even though she tried hard, her little legs didn't make it far. She was cold and now she was tired, and the snow was thick. Sitting down for a moment wouldn't hurt anything, surely.
She was startled from drifting off by a hand on her shoulder. She yelped and turned just a bit too fast. Before she knew it, she slipped and was sliding off the roof of the train. Screaming, she caught a rail on the edge of the roof.
A man with a ratty brown coat and a ratty brown newsboy cap reached out a hand for her. "Grab a hold, kid!"
"I can't!" She screamed. Her feet were flying in the air, she was over a cliff, and the rail was so cold on her bare hands. "I can't! I'm scared!"
"Don't be a coward!" The man yelled at her with a barkish laugh. "You made it this far, kid; you ain't no coward. Grab a hold."
She could barely see the man's face, snow blowing her eyes. She could see his hand, though; he was wearing red fingerless gloves. She was terrified, but she was going to let go either way, so she reached out desperately, and her fingers just barely brushed against his.
"Come on, kid! Wanna live or not?"
She tried again, this time her palm connected with the soft warmth of his glove and she was hauled back into the snow. She wildly looked around but was surrounded by the blinding white of the snow swirling in the wind. She was all alone.
But who, then, had saved her?
Doesn't really matter, she thought, does it? She began to walk again and she had only made it a couple more steps before she began to see... could that be a light?