Free Out of Order by Charles Benoit Page B

under and fell back asleep only to wake up twenty minutes later, his small portion of the six-yard sari reclaimed. He sat up, grabbed the end of the sari, his fist tightening around the soft fabric and the button, and yanked it free, rolling Rachel onto the floor. Without a light on he could only guess at the dirty look she gave him as she crawled back in bed.
    She didn’t mention the sari incident as they packed to leave in the pre-dawn light, but as he brushed his teeth he caught her admiring the elaborate gold-thread embroidery. Now on the train, he noticed her eyeing the simple lever that kept the train’s door shut.
    “Once it warms up a bit I’m going to open the door,” Rachel said. She glanced back at the half-empty car to see how many people it would upset. “In Canada they’d never let you stand in an open doorway. Too many rules, everybody afraid of a lawsuit. Here, you want to stand in the doorway of a moving train, knock yourself out.”
    “And how many people are killed falling off trains?” Jason was thumbing through Rachel’s guidebook, looking for restaurants in Ahmadabad. “Rules protect us from our own stupidity.”
    “Okay, Dad. I get it,” Rachel said in an exaggerated teen voice.
    “If you haven’t noticed, safety isn’t very high on the list here. It’d be smarter if you just stick to your toy trains.”
    “They’re not toys,” she said, this time in a voice that let Jason know she was done kidding. “They are scale trains. One inch to eighty-seven point one inches.”
    “HO scale,” Jason said. “I used to build plastic car models. When I was a kid.”
    Rachel sighed. “Here it comes. You’re going to make all sorts of smart-assed remarks about my hobby and I’m going to get pissed off and then you’re going to feel sorry and I’m going to have to forgive you so why don’t we just cut to the chase. I forgive you for being an insensitive jerk who thinks he has the right to belittle people just because they like things he doesn’t.”
    Jason smiled. “Well, we got that out of the way. But come on. Trains?”
    Rachel looked at him for a moment, trying to spot any hint of sarcasm in his expression. “It started with my grandfather. My dad’s dad. He worked for Canadian Rail as an engineer, worked the last steam lines in Ontario back in the fifties. Then he got hit in the face—some engine part flying off. Went blind in one eye.” Her finger came up involuntarily, touching her right cheek. “That was the last day he drove a train. A full-scale one anyway. He was hoping for a grandson who he could share his passion for trains but he ended up with me. I was ten when he died. Keep the trains going. That was the last thing he said to me. So I did.” She looked down at her hands.
    Jason swallowed hard and took a breath before speaking. “Wow.”
    “You like it?” Rachel said, her whole face brightening as she popped up in her seat. “I thought the bit about him dying was too much, but it seemed to fit. Usually I have him lose a leg in Manitoba but the eye was a nice touch.”
    Jason felt his face redden. “You made it all up?”
    “Always tell people what they want to hear. It makes them happy and it doesn’t cost you a thing.”
    “So there was no grandfather, no dying request?” His voice matched his waving hands, rising and dropping as he spoke.
    “Of course there was a grandfather, silly. He sold insurance. Lives in Florida now. He likes my trains, at least I think he does, but he thinks I’m kind of weird.” She looked at him and smiled. “Close your mouth before a fly lands in there.”
    “You…but…why….”
    “Why would I lie? Because the truth is never as interesting. Oh come on,” she said, giving his arm a playful punch, “like you never made up a story when you were flirting with someone you liked.”
    He drew in a breath to answer and held it, wondering what she had meant.
    “Other than the Freudian ‘trains into tunnels’ thing,” she