Hills covered in fields were passing by and she hadn't seen anything else for the last hour and a half. Yellow. Green. Yellow. Green. Sage's head was resting in her lap, heavy as a rock. Dawn had been close to dozing off when a loud voice distorted her half-sleep. A boy across the mid-aisle was talking loudly on his phone, yet not many people seemed to mind his obnoxiousness.
"Gone? What do you mean 'gone', like it just wasn't in the coffin or what? ... Dude ... Bet there's complete bloody mayhem at the school or what? ... But what if-- yeah, exactly! But do you really think that's possi-- ... I know! I wonder if it's happened other places too. I'll call Fr-- yeah, I'll call Freddy and let him know too, he'll go nuts for sure. ... Yeah ... Really? ... Okay ... Well, call me if you find out something more, I don't know when I'll be there, the train was r-- yeah, it was really late. ... All right ... Bye!" The boy hung up the phone returned to whatever was going on on his laptop. Very carefully, in order to avoid waking up Sage, Dawn pulled out her phone from her pocket to check the time. The train ride offered a max of 15 minutes left before arriving in Tonbridge for the first time in ages. Suddenly Dawn realized that she had not yet called her brother to inform him about the train's delay. She looked at the time again. The train was supposed to have arrived half an hour ago. Why hadn't he called her? She dialed his number and put the phone to her ear. One boop. Two boops. Three boops. Four boops. Five boops. And then a mechanic sounding female voice spoke:
"You have reached the phone of" - followed by a scratchy recording - "... Asbjørn..." - "The recipient is currently unavailable. Please leave a message after the tone. BLEEP." Dawn cleared her throat. She wasn't used to leaving him messages as he would usually pick up.
"Hey B. I, uhm... The train is late. So I won't be at the station before, like, y'know. I'll be there in 15 minutes, I think. Just... in case you were wondering why I wasn't there yet. Anyways, uhm, yeah. See you in a bit. Bye." Dawn hung up. She was making up several different scenarios in her head as to why her brother was not picking up the phone. Trying to shake it off, she stuffed the phone back in her pocket, accidentally waking up Sage. He let out a little whining sound and stared up at her with a concerned look on his face.
