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“—and in case any of you were wondering, yes our illegally seized ‘tax dollars’ are paying for the new rec centre. This is where I start telling you what you already know; get mad! Because—”
Dagny sighed and clicked off her podcast app. Normally she loved listening all day to the mysterious, anonymous school podcaster, ‘John Galt’ (and not just because his voice was totally swoon-worthy) but today she had bigger fish to fry. Besides, after her valiant campaigning against opening the rec centre had failed, she was too depressed to listen to more about it.
What she needed to do was stop hiding on the balcony and go downstairs, back into the prom hubbub. But though she’d styled her hair into a perfect blonde ballerina bun, and though her satin blue gown matched perfectly with her sapphire orbs, she couldn’t help but be uncertain. She could be her most beautiful self and she’d still be Dagny Train-butt, the laughing-stock of the cafeteria, the nerd who’d suggested ‘trains’ as the theme for prom and had campaigned successfully for them to hold the event in the Taggart Depot Station. Nobody had even cared that her family’s company had covered the transport costs.
“You know, they don’t crown the Prom Queen based on biggest wallflower,” said a familiar laughing voice from over her shoulder. Dagny relaxed immediately- it was Francisco, her best friend since they’d bonded over the liberal failings of trickle-down economics in kindergarten, and sort-of-ex. But they’d buried that drama a long time ago.
“Like I’d ever be Prom Queen. Especially with Lillian around,” the last part sounded more bitter than she meant it to; but she couldn’t help it. Lillian was Atlas High’s Queen Bee, with her tumbling red hair and smirking red lips, she ruled the school. She even had the hottest boy in town, she and Hank Rearden had been going steady ever since she’d publicly asked him out.
It had been just a day after he and Dagny had almost kissed in the oil field outside town, and part of Dagny felt like maybe Lillian had known, had wanted to take away her one shot at happiness.
“Oh, you didn’t hear? Lillian’s out of the running. She and Hank had a big fallout. Instead of a corsage he brought her some bracelet he made in shop class. She was not impressed.”
Dagny’s ears perked up. She turned to fully face Francisco, “What happened?!”
“She stormed off outside. Took the bracelet too. Said she was going to throw it into Lover’s Lake.”
Dagny didn’t wait to ask him anything else. She was already sprinting down the stairs, her kitten heels clacking awkwardly across the floor.
Outside the museum grounds were dark, just the shadows of empty trains sitting and waiting for tomorrow. Dagny looked around, and saw a shape moving inside one of the carriages. She hurried over and found the door open; and inside—
Was that crying?
Dagny frowned and followed the noise, and there she was
, Lillian standing with her back to her, her shoulders shaking. A sudden panic came over Dagny. What was she going to do now? All of her ideas had left her brain, just like a train exiting a tunnel.
Part of her wanted to run, but she fought the urge back. She was not the sort of woman to flee; not even from emotional conflict.
“Lillian?” she said instead, making her voice steely.
The taller girl turned, Dagny had to hold back a gasp. Even with her make-up running and her hair askew, Lillian was beautiful. And here in the familiar first class carriage, the smell of oil and metal and power sharp in the air, she was stunning.
There was no way Hank would ever choose Dagny when he had her.
“What do you want?” asked Lillian with a cruel twist on her perfect lips. She had immediately stopped crying. If it weren’t for the streaks in her mascara she might never have been anything but perfectly composed.
“I want—,” Dagny said, haltingly, “I want to trade. My necklace for your bracelet. The one Hank gave you.”
The necklace had been given to Dagny the year before by Eddie, her subordinate on Yearbook. But Eddie had wanted to ask her out and she’d had to decline; she’d seen how Francisco looked at him, and for all that she knew that homosexuality was a degenerate activity, she would never advocate for acting to constrain the actions of consenting individuals. She might as well vote democrat!
Besides, bros before hoes.
Lillian laughed, it was a delicate sound like glasses on a train jolting over a particularly rough patch of rails (not that Taggart Transcontinental had any rough patches). “Of course it’s about him. It always is with you.”
“What?” Dagny stepped back, there was a new look in Lillian’s eyes. Something dangerous and predatory, something—
Enticing.
"I'm not upset because of Hank's ugly bracelet. I'm upset because I need to go back in there and stand on his arm, and pretend to care about his metal."
Dagny wanted to tell her that Hank's metal was a marvel of modern engineering, but she couldn't find the words. “It’s a simple business proposition,” Dagny managed to choke out instead, “An exchange of goods, where we both—”
“I thought when I asked him out that I’d feel better about all of this. That maybe I could put you behind me. But it never works.”
Lillian was suddenly closer to Dagny, her breath smelling of the raspberry punch they’d been serving in reception. There was a strange energy between them, a charge to the air like the sparks which rattled off the rails on the evening express.
“Lillian, I—”
The kiss was sharp, adult, Lillian’s hand caught on the back of Dagny’s dress and in her hair. She was dimly aware that she’d stepped back again, into the wall, that Lillian was leaning down and pressing into her. That one of her shoes had fallen off, caught on the carpet as she pulled closer, as she pulled away. The taste of Lillian’s mouth wasn’t raspberry. Dagny couldn’t have named it.
And then it was over, and Lillian had pulled back. The absence left by her had a coldness to it which hadn’t been there before.
“There’s your trade,” she said with a smile, stalking from the carriage and back to the prom. Distantly, a Kidzbop remix of ‘Bad Guy’ by Billie Eilish echoed through the dark trains.
Dagny realised that Lillian had left the bracelet in her hand, and, catching her reflection in the dark window, that her hair was undone.
The bracelet was still warm from Lillian’s skin. She held it more tightly and didn’t think of Hank Rearden at all. One thing was for sure.
Monday morning would sure be weird!