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Ashley still saw it sometimes. Saw her. Saw him. And her hand would unconsciously curl around a cigarette, even though they were no longer physically there.
It was a severe underestimation to say quitting had been easy, it hadn’t. There’d been plenty of times the buffet car had found her face first in the sink, hands trembling from withdrawals. But what had made it work when so many times it hadn’t, was Dinah. Well, not her Dinah. She was Ashley’s, but she was Dinah’s daughter, even if the kid herself didn’t know.
It had taken time, and a lot of arguing between her and Buffy, but the two had relatively quickly taken the trainlet in. After all, the kid was a few months old and the two would rather die before leaving it with her father.
At first, Ashley’s smoking took a spike. She’d never had the desire to want kids, never considered it. Buffy had brought it up once or twice, but it had never been in the plans. They were, however, very willing to be aunts. “Godparents,” Dinah had said, “Like if somethin’ ever happened to me or Grease.” At the time, Ashley had mumbled to the buffet car about that being an excuse for free babysitting.
But then, something did happen, something much quicker than anyone had expected. And the smoking car found her lips constantly on a cigarette, refusing to ever look at the trainlet’s eyes. His eyes. But then, on a day when she’d been left alone, Ashley had heard this horrible coughing noise. Tiny, desperate for clean air, and realised it was so smokey she could barely see. She’d nearly set the coaches’ shed on fire, dropping that cigarette.
Arguably. Ashley and Buffy had done a good job in raising Dinah. Redhead-Dinah, the two affectionately called her behind closed doors. A strawberry blonde twinge that reminded them of the hair of a certain caboose they’d once known. They didn’t care, anything but that horrible black.
They hadn’t scolded the dining car when at fifteen, she came with freshly dyed red hair. Not even when she added the streaks of blue. Yes, it did make her look more and more less like her mother, but maybe that was a good thing. Dinah was her own person, she didn’t need to replicate the friend they’d lost.
That being said, the two coaches had a habit of being over-procautious. The no-boyfriends rule had been set from the minute they’d taken her in. Anything to prevent history repeating itself. This rule, however, backfired very quickly in Dinah’s teen years when boys weren’t the only option. It was ironic, two lesbians forgetting wanting a girlfriend instead was an option.
They’d witnessed their fair share in break-ups and make-ups by the time the trainlet was adult. But the kids in this yard were nice, good, and didn't raise too much concern. That being said, they weren’t the biggest fan of the oil tanker, something about the way she smiled.
But the starlight had a very unfortunate habit of messing things up. Eventually came the diesel.
Steam engines? Fine. Another coach? Great. A freight truck? They’d live. An electric? Whatever.
But a diesel. Of course. A fucking diesel.
Of course, there was nothing arguably wrong with diesel engines, and it would be unreasonable to stereotype each one as bad. There most likely were good, nice enough diesels out there, not that either of them had met many. But at the same time, this was their daughter, her daughter, and the smoking car found she had every right to be apprehensive.
But Dinah was an adult now, and like it or not, her parents had no control over which trains she chose to date. And, after much convincing- and occasional arguing- from Buffy, the smoker had no choice but to sully her objections. She was just ‘scared’, and that was apparently ‘normal’, at least according to the occasional correspondence between herself and the observation car.
That was easy for Pearl to say, she and Rusty didn’t have any kids of their own. They were far too busy racing around the world- literally- to ever settle down. Ashley was quite sure the car certainly didn’t mind not having to ever deal with a drunk 16 year old throwing up and conveniently missing the sink completely.
Maybe that was harsh to say though, because the smoking car knew very well the couple had tried. Pearl had spent her twenties training so hard that she’d lost the ability for them to produce a trainlet by their own means, and no factory seemed willing to issue one on account of the constant travel. And even though Ashley had seen her friend less and less over the years, she’d never resent the first class carriage for not choosing to stay in one place.
In comparison, having a trainlet had come far too easy to the championship couple. One evening the dining car had mused over bringing up the subject of a child with her boyfriend over dinner, and within a month the two announced that they were expecting.
And now through some painfully ironic will of the Starlight Express, the smoking car had no other choice but to assist her partner in preparing their home for this dreaded upcoming visit.
Of course thier daughter had chosen a the incredibly option of the ‘meet the parents’ dinner (when this could have been a quick hi and bye next to the race track), which meant Ashley would be forced make polite conversation when she’d much rather derail herself. But still, she’d force herself to persevere for just one evening for the sake of Dinah’s happiness.
Just one evening, that should be easy enough.
The diesel looked like a cross between a killer bee and a paper shredded, dressed in a ghastly yellow uniform that was covered in oil stains, making it pretty clear she couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort to change between the track and thier shed. A great first impression. Her mullet, if you could even call it that, looked as though it had been cut with a pair of old kitchen scissors, black roots showing through the cheap looking yellow-blonde dye job.
The smoking car had the right mind to slam the shed door in the engine’s face and enjoy a quiet dinner, but the buffet car’s hand found hers before she could. Buffy gave her partners hand a small squeeze that said, ‘keep the peace’. And so Ashley put her best tight smile and stood by as Buffy ushered the couple through the door.
“So- um, yeah, these are my mums,” Dinah mumbled. Starlight was she seriously blushing?
The diesel said nothing, just gave a stiff nod at the couple, crossing her arms.
“Well, it’s nice to meet you ah-“ the buffets car began to trail.
“Greaseball” the diesel replied.
Ashley suddenly wondered if it was possible burn a hole through the wooden flooring.
Greaseball? Seriously. That couldn’t be right, surely. That was his name. The one who’d-
“Oh, where’d you uh- get a name like that, sugar?” Buffy asked, breaking the moment of nauseatingly stunned silence, chewing her lip slightly.
Greaseball shrugged, “Picked it after some old champion racer, not like he’s using it anymore.”
“It’s cool, isn’t it?” The dining car piped up, blushing with an all too familiar pride. She gave a glance to the smoking car, wondering why her mother’s face had gone blank.
Ashley could feel her hand trembling, fingers clasping tightly around a cigarette that wasn’t there as a numbness claimed her body. ‘Cool’? No it certainly wasn’t fucking cool, didn’t she know about what that monster had done?
But Dinah didn’t, no one really did. The story had spread around their old yard but never made the mainstream media, and it wasn’t as if she and Buffy had ever disclosed what had happened to their daughter. It had been easier, to pack up and leave and never ever verbally acknowledged the sheer horror that had remained ingrained in thier minds for years. But now it seemed thier secrecy had come to bite them in the arse in the form of a twenty something up-and-coming racer with awful hair.
The air of the dinner was filled by the dining cars oblivious chatter, the buffet cars questions and the diesel engine’s occasional mumbled response. Everything had seemed to be going fine, and the smoking car had somehow managed to keep her mouth shut.
Then it happened. Dinah had reached across the table to grab some salt, and her elbow nudged over the diesels glass. And that was when Ashley saw the engine dig her nails into the dining car’s thigh under the table in a way that made her feel sick. Without a word, not that she’d said anything the entire evening, the smoking car rose from her seat and walked out of the room.
She knew where she was going, in the back of the bathroom cupboard lay a packet of cigarettes she’d promised Buffy she’d thrown away. Ashley didn’t care now, didn’t care that she’d hadn’t smoked for years. She needed a smoke and she needed one now, rifling through the cupboard before heading straight for the shed’s front door.
The cigarette felt foreign in Ashley’s shaking hand as she lit up, tasting the long missed tobacco as she pressed it to her lips.
It was going to happen again, she knew it. History would repeat itself and she wouldn’t be able to stop it. One minute they’d be on the phone, a few shed’s away and by the time they got there she’d be face down on the kitchen floor, unmoving.
Ashley could feel herself choking slightly against the smoke entering her lungs, she didn’t care. All she could see was that dark bruise across the blonde dining cars face, the horrific crack on her forehead from where her head had hit the corner pf the kitchen counter. The rips in her dress, stained by boiling coffee that had blistered the skin of her upper arm beyond recognition. And that horrible sound, the baby crying from the living room, hungry, desperate for a mother who’s never be able to hold her again.
The smoking car washed the ash fall against the porch hardwood as she put it out, reaching into the packet and lighting up her second.
Maybe they could have tried harder, forced her to leave him for good, before a baby could ever come into the picture. Ignored her begging for her friends not to intervene, that constant belief that he ‘was better than last time, that he just ‘needed time’ , ‘needed her’.
“You really don’t like me, do you?”
Ashley looked up. The diesel looked back at her, hands shoved in her pockets, alone.
“Thought it was a bit strange a smoking car didn’t smoke.”
Greaseball skated over slowly, her movements bordering on cautious.
“Dee said you two’d probably be overprotective or something.”
Great, so Dinah had been telling the wretched diesel all about them, had she?
No, what was she thinking, of course she’d want to tell her supposed girlfriend about her family, that was a normal thing for a person to do.
“She’s been spilling all the family secrets then?” Ashley sighed, her fingers curling a little tighter around her cigarette.
The engine shrugged “Not really, nothing that probably isn’t public information or whatever,” She sat herself down next to the smoking car as if she were a landmine that could go off at any second, which wasn’t far from it in truth.
“You don’t like me especially. How much did she tell you about me?”
“Enough.” In truth the dining car had said beyond more than enough about Greaseball, about her racing strategy, about the training programme she stuck to without fail.
“Look, I know I’m from the scrapyard and you coaches get all narked about-“
“Scrapyard?” The smoker raised an eyebrow at the diesel. Dinah hadn’t mentioned anything about scrapyards, but Ashley knew trains that had been abandoned and got out carried the word like a brandish.
Greaseball blinked back at her, “Oh, right, so she didn’t tell you about that. Look, I’m not like-“
“I don’t care,” Ashley replied, voice holllow. Whether she did care or not wasn’t the point. It explained where the name came from, runts and faulty trains who’d been abandoned in the scrap weren’t ever commissioned names.
The smoking car put out her second cigarette, swallowing. Staring out into the yard in silence.
“Dinah isn’t ours.”
“What?”
“She wasn’t- Buffy and I- she was someone else’s before us.”
A look of processing crossed the diesel’s face for a moment. “You steal her then, or was she scrap and you just never told her.”
“No, we didn’t steal her.” Ashley replied, voice coming out calmer than she’d expected it to be. “Do you know, really, where your name comes from?”
“I mean yeah- like I told you, some old champion racer. Stole it from some old newspaper.” Greaseball paused, “Is she- his or something?”
His. Starlight that felt like a slap in the face. No, she was never his, she’d rather die.
Ashley didn’t cry, she wasn’t an emotional coach, not even when she was young. But she was shaking, violently. And then, finally, those awful words came out:
“He killed her.”
“What? What are you talking about, Dinah’s just-“
“Not that Dinah, my Dinah.”
Her Dinah. The blonde who’d skated back to the coaches shed, practically bursting with joy the first time she’d made up with him. Practically twirling as she spoke about how he wanted to be better for her. Fat chance.
“Oh.”
Greaseball said it like she didn’t quite understand, but understood just enough. “She doesn’t know, does she?”
The smoking car huffed shaking her head.