Station 429

the night of hurt

the night of hurt

_________________________________________________________________________

Colleen had skipped a day before coming back to the station, just to mess with Foster. She was finding that it was fun to tease him, and he felt the same way about messing her. That extra day taken, though, turned out to be a day too long, as it had slowed her life down and given her too much time to think about her friends.

"Glad you finally decided to show up," Foster said to her. He was sitting down on the tracks, and he looked up to her with playful eyes.

But Colleen was not here for small talk. She was hurting, and angry about it too. It was the first time I had seen her like that, but the emotion radiated off of her like the sun. Foster thought it was so palpable that he could practically feel it in the air. "What do you do when you miss a dead person?" she asked, skipping all formalities.

Foster was left not knowing what to say. He didn't know how to handle this part of Colleen. He was familiar with the platonic side, the deep-ish side, the audacious side, but this side was a stranger to him.

"Well?" she demanded.

"I, um, I don't-" he stammered.

"Don't say you don't freaking know, Foster," she said. "Don't you dare say it."

"Hold on a second-"

"No! Don't tell me to hold on, or to calm down. Just say something worth while."

Foster ran a hand through his hair out of frustration, not knowing why she had brought this situation to him. He stood up to meet her fiery gaze, and to hopefully feel a bit less like he was being drilled into the ground. "What do you want me to say then, Colleen? Because I don't know what that fucking means." He tried to say it calmly, but it was obvious he was getting worked up.

"I don't know!" She slapped her hands against her thighs. "Just say something, anything but I don't know."

"What makes you think that I would know the answer to this question, anyway, Colleen? Because, if you haven't noticed, I came to a damn train station to try and work through my problems."

She narrowed her eyes, annoyed with how oblivious he was being. She felt like she was talking to a ten year old, because honestly, who could really not understand why Colleen would want to come to only Foster with this? "Because your father is just as dead as my best friends," she told him slowly, "and you must have missed him at some point in your life."

They were standing nearly toe to toe; they could feel each other's hot breath on their cheeks, but neither of them were paying much attention to it. Eventually, Colleen huffed out a breath and took a few steps towards the train with her hands tangled in her hair, breaking their staring contest.

The only sound coming from the tunnel was the scraping of gravel underneath Colleen's feet for a while. I have experienced a lot of silence after the shutdown, but I think this type of silence- one among friends- was much worse than anything I have ever heard before.

"I missed my dad for a whole twelve hours," Foster said, "and that was it."

Colleen stopped pacing when she heard that and looked up at him with tired eyes. "What the hell, Foster," she deadpanned, shoulders slumped. "Who misses their father- the one who brought them into this world, and is no longer a part of this world, mind you- for only twelve hours?"

"I do. And not for the overused reason of 'Oh my God my dad committed suicide left me alone, oh pity me. Who cares about my dad committing suicide when he left me'." Colleen wanted to laugh at that, but refused to let herself. "It's because of what he told me the day before he did it that I only remembered twelve hours after I found him."

They were nearly toe to toe again, but not out of spite. Colleen's fire had died out, which had led Foster to inch closer to her subconsciously. "What did he say?" she asked, quieter this time.

His voice was just as soft as he spoke. "He told me that one day I'll be dead, so I should stop over thinking and living in the past, but rather continue to move forward with my life."

"That's what he said."

He nodded. "Word for word. So my answer to your question, is you don't. You don't miss them."

Colleen only looked at him for a moment, wondering if he was serious. When she realized that he was, she saw him in a light she had not seen him in before. One that showed his soul as still broken yet walking around acting like it isn't, all the while trying to fix six other broken souls. But how can you heal someone while you're still hurt?

"Well," she finally said, meeting his eyes, "no offense to your father, but that is the shittiest advice I have ever heard." Foster raised his eyebrows. He did not expect that response, as he was used to people agreeing with him, so he did not have a good rebuttal to counter Colleen. "You don't just not miss dead people. That's like saying the person never existed, and that's taking the easy way out."

"And what does that mean?" the boy asked, starting to get a bit angry at her accusation toward him.

She opened her mouth, but no words came out, so she closed it. She was struggling to explain it at first, and wanted to make sure that whatever she said would really stick in Foster's head, so she took her time formulating her answer because she liked to make people think.

"Missing someone requires having an emotional attachment to the person," she finally said, "and if you claim to not miss that person, who is now dead, you're claiming to not have any emotions tied to that person. That's when you become a numb, emotionless void whenever someone mentions that person, acting as if they never existed. And to me, that's cheap, and the most disrespectful thing I have ever heard.

"So no, Foster, that's not what you do when you miss a dead person. You may be okay with being a numb robot, but I'm not. I'd rather continue on for the rest of my life hurting by recognizing my friends' existence and having it hurt like hell, than pretending they were never a part of my life."

Colleen crossed her arms and turned on her heel, and began walking back towards the entrance. Foster only watched her go, not knowing what was the better option- numbness or pain.

_________________________________________________________________________

dedicated to elisa (@beautyatwork) for her story screenwalks. i absolutely adore it and all the disney stuff is just amazing.

song is the nights by aviccii (felix jaehn remix).

whew this chapter was loaded. i hope you liked it though. if you did please comment and vote! it would mean a lot:)

-abby xx