Station 429

the night of indifference

the night of indifference

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Colleen could simply not stay away from the station the next night. She was plagued with what Kendall had said in response to her story. She expected Foster would be here- she figured he was here every night, which he pretty much was.

She found him sitting with his back against the train. She could hardly make him out in his all black ensemble, but made her way to the right once she got through the entrance. She sat down next to him, almost close enough for their shoulders to touch, and stretched her legs out like his.

She was lost in an ocean of her own thoughts and didn't know where to start. She didn't know what she wanted to say aloud and what she wanted to keep inside of her head. She was typically very selective when it came to what she spoke and what she kept inside. It wasn't anything personal to the people around her- it was just the way she conducted herself.

"It really is bullshit," Colleen decided to say after a moment.

"What is?" Foster asked.

"Suicide."

"I assume this relates to what Kendall said last night."

"Yeah. How did you guess?"

Foster shrugged. "How is it bullshit?"

"It's not in the way you're probably thinking," she said as she shifted to face him. "People commit suicide because their pain gets too much for them to handle, right?"

The boy nodded, his wavy hair falling in front of his eyes. "Right."

"And they think that suffering will just end once they're not on this earth anymore."

"That is also true." Foster was intrigued with the way she was describing something he's struggled to pinpoint for so long. He decided that he simply loved hearing her talk.

"Well, it's a terrible lie." There was a moment of silence as Foster looked and waited for her to finish her thought. "The suffering doesn't end. They throw it on the people they left behind."

Colleen went back to her original sitting position, clearly having said everything she was willing to say on the subject. "You sound angry," Foster observed.

"Not angry," she said immediately, but then paused as she tried to find the right words to say. "I feel rather indifferent at this moment, like I just spit out a random fact or piece of trivia. It feels like it shouldn't even apply to me."

"What do you mean?" Foster wasn't one to press, despite his relentless curiosity, but he couldn't catch himself quick enough this time.

Colleen didn't seem to mind, though. "Some days, it's like her suicide never even happened." She let out a breathy laugh right then, almost sounding bitter. "Until, of course, I get on my phone and see Hope's last text message to me was two months ago."

"Are you talking about the friend that committed suicide a month ago?" Foster asked. Colleen nodded. "What's the name of your other friend?"

"Naomi."

Foster didn't want to push the boundaries anymore. He knew someone could only take so much when talking about suicide. This kind of process is slow. Talking about a loved one's suicide, much less two, can take a long time to do. It depends on the person, but Foster could tell Colleen was more of a thinker and talked about her thoughts when they were more developed. So he let a brisk breeze fill in the small silence as he thought about Hope and Naomi.

He tried to imagine their faces, how they looked. Their smiles is what he really tried to imagine, of all things. For a moment, he thought about why in God's name would they have committed suicide and left Colleen Brigs all alone, broken and confused, to fend for herself.

Once the breeze calmed down, Colleen spoke. "What's up with Owen and Kendall?"

Foster looked down at her, shocked with the quick change in conversation, but he recovered quickly. "What do you mean?"

"Obviously they have something going on. So who likes who? Or are they already dating?"

"Oh. Owen has a crush on her, but nobody knows how Kendall feels."

Colleen raised her eyebrows. "How does no one know?"

"She's good at keeping her feelings hidden by her 'I don't give two shits' attitude."

"Now that I won't deny." Foster chuckled, which caused Colleen to smile slightly. She sighed and leaned her head back against the train. "This is hard, Foster."

He glanced down at her for a split second before returning his gaze to the ceiling. "You're telling me."

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dedicated to shiloah (@depths-) for writing the amazing story wrestling naked.

song is come undone by adam barnes.

just a heads up that most of these chapters are gonna be fairly short, like this one. that's just the way the story is panning out at this point.

thank you for reading you're amaaazing:)

-abby xx