Page 29 of I Hope This Email Finds You in Hell

Ten

My first thought is the roots from my nightmare. They’re real.

But it’s not the roots; instead, it’s a woman’s gnarled hand. Despite the ghastly appendage, her face is kind, creased with worry and lines of aging. “You’re not from here.”

Her voice doesn’t match the rest of her. It’s silky smooth with a maternal quality to it. A soothing pillow I wish to sink into.

She scoots into the empty window seat beside her and pats the spot she vacated. “Care to sit?”

“I should get back to my seat.” I glance down the aisle.

“So soon?” she asks. “Are you lost, dear?”

“Oh no.” My laugh comes out brittle. “I was just using the restroom. I’m in the next car.”

“No, I don’t mean lost on this train. I mean lost in life.”

The gentleness of her tone tugs at my heart. I reach for words to refute her, but there aren’t any. “A bit,” I confide. “But hey, that’s what your twenties are for, right?”

“So young,” she muses. “It’s been a long time since I was in my twenties.”

How long? I wonder. “It feels like I’ve been in them for a long time myself.”

She frowns. “Yes, I can tell. There’s a weariness in you seldom found in people your age. A hurt. It radiates from you. Do you tire from it?”

Breathing is suddenly an Olympic feat. Her simple observations have cut me to the bone. “Always,” I whisper, as if I’m admitting something else, something I’ve had thoughts of but distract myself from before I can dive too deep into any of them. I am so tired. Tired of the nightmares and the grief. Tired of barely being able to drive without triggering a panic attack. Tired of the gaps my old life had filled. A life with a clear future and friends and a partner and my parents alive and well. I’m exhausted. And if I ever take a real moment to acknowledge it, if I don’t drown out every waking moment with work and reality TV and scrolling social media for hours, then it will be more apparent than ever just how tired I truly am. So tired I won’t be able to go on.

“No one should carry that kind of grief,” the woman murmurs, eyes shining with empathy. They’re a light brown, darker around the rims—my mother’s eyes. My eyes. I’m startled by how much she looks like an older version of my mom. A version I will never get to see.

I didn’t realize that at some point I sank onto the seat next to her. From her purse, she pulls a handkerchief and hands it to me. My cheeks are soaked with tears that drip down my jaw. “You don’t deserve to feel like this. You know that, right?”

“No,” I contradict. “I deserve every bit of it all the time. I deserve to never feel happy again.”

“Oh, sweetie, that’s not true,” my mom coos. But she’s not my mom. Just looks like her.

Right?

“You deserve to forget about the pain and guilt and grief,” she says.

“I want to forget.”

“I could help you,” she offers, her kindness a welcome change from Luke’s gruff demeanor.

Luke. I should get back to him. Surely, wherever he went, he’s back by now. I need to—

“Would you like to be happy and light?” she asks, taking my hands in hers. They don’t look as veined as they did moments ago. They’re soft and warm. “Do you want to be free from the pain and suffering once and for all?”

“That would be nice.” My voice doesn’t sound like my own. It’s honeyed and haunted, like I drank too much to drown my sorrows, yet they still lurk at the bottom of the bottle.

Her thumb runs over the back of my hand. “Say yes and I can do it. I can make all the hurt disappear. It will be a little deal between us.”

Deal. Warning bells shoot through my head, ringing through the haze. I try to pull my hands out from under hers, but her grip is too tight and warm.

“You’ll never have to hurt again,” she promises. “Not from loss or lovers, art or anger. You will be blissfully happy for the rest of your days.”

“And how many of those will you graciously leave her with?”

The animosity in Luke’s voice is as stinging as a slap. A needed slap. It breaks through the fog of my mind and startles the woman enough for me to tug my hands away from hers. At the broken contact, a rush of clarity washes away the honeyed haze. Luke tugs me to my feet, wedging himself between the woman and me.