Sidetracked

Penelope: Disappointments

- Bielefeld -

"Excuse me, please." Ardell says, lacking any semblance of conviction as he pushes his way past a few people gathering their luggage from the overhead racks. His hand never relinquishes Penelope's, even as her feet become entangled on the threshold of the restaurant, the tip of her boot gnarling up with the roughness and pissing her off royally. Jesus Christ, what's gotten into him? Tear up my fucking boot...

The gangway doors slide open with a heavy breath, and in what seems like a matter of seconds, Ardell and Penelope are in a gangway crowded with bustling people, inhales and exhales of all different cultures mingling together. In a moment of sudden clarity, Penelope rips her hand free of Ardell's and refuses to go another step. "What is going on, Ardell?" she spouts, her face furrowed in befuddled amazement and anger.

The train heaves to a rest, the brakes engaging with tired whispers, and before Penelope has realized it, Ardell has spun around to her and grabbed her gently by her shoulders, leaning close to her face, his features lit up with excitement and ideas. "You know what you said about disappearing? About running off and never being found?"

Penelope's eyes dart back and forth between his, her mind a pingpong match of different thoughts and confusion. There's something registering in her brain, but still she finds the strength to breathe the word "Yeah?"

"Let's do it." he says, his voice in a pitch she hasn't heard out of him before, somewhere between happiness and enlightenment, as if he's just thought of the answer to the world's most devious of problems, "Right now."

Penelope looks at him in utter shock. Her mind races in a thousand different directions. Say something. Gotta say something. "What do you mean--"

"I mean let's get off the bloody train and disappear." he interrupts, his face wide with an enticing gaze as he motions toward the door with a simple head tilt that speaks a million words.

"Us?"" Penelope can't believe what she's hearing, her head shaking involuntarily in response, " Together?"

Ardell counters her head shaking with an ambitious nod. "Yeah."

Penelope thinks fast. Quick. Think of something. Anything to keep him on this train. But why? Why don't I want him to get off? And why can't I go with him? Am I really so tethered to my life that I can't get off in Bielefeld. Bielefeld, Germany. German! That's it! "But you can't speak German!" she exclaims in an exasperated and almost too giddy retort.

Ardell doesn't miss a single beat. "I'll learn it." he says, his smile impermeable and his hair unkempt in just a way that makes Penelope catch herself from swooning a little.

Now's not the time for that, God damn it. She thinks for a brief moment, her mind a ravaged ocean whilst her body just stands there in front of him and her face just blankly stares at him. Come on, there's bound to be something else... Unless... Unless it's not actually that bad of an idea at all.

Ardell notices the awkward pause. As the doors to exit pull open with a wheeze and people all around them begin to step off of the train, he exhales through his nose and closes his eyes for a moment, as if he's composing himself to face the storm going on behind the set of eyes in front of him. He draws in a breath and gazes into them. "Look, Penelope. My whole life has been spent doing what everyone else expects of me, and it's never brought me even a fraction of the happiness I've found on this train. So what's stopping us? Why does it have to end? No one will ever find either of us in..." he pauses, his eyes shooting up to the corner in thought.

As if on cue, the conductor's voice comes across the speaker in German "Now arriving. Bielefeld."

Ardell indicates the speaker, his blue eyes crinkling into the lines of a smile. "Thank you. Bielefeld."