“Before I got rejected from film school.” She says it fast, like she’s ripping off a bandage, but the next part—the next part comes out a whole lot softer. “For a film I was really proud of.”
Hugo isn’t sure what to say to this. He fumbles around for a question or a word of encouragement, but the silence stretches between them. Finally, he says, “What was it about?” which turns out to be the exact wrong question. To his surprise, her face immediately clouds over, and she unzips the case, carefully tucking the camera back inside.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” she says. “Clearly, it didn’t work.”
“But do you have any idea why—”
“It’s fine,” she says abruptly. “I still got into USC—just not the film program. So my plan is to put in for a transfer. That’s why I need to make another film.”
“When do you need it by?”
She twists her mouth up to one side. “Well, technically, you can’t apply till the end of sophomore year. But I figure it wouldn’t hurt to try before then, especially if I can make something good enough. Something too good for them to ignore.”
“Something like…Ida describing each of their four hundred and eighty-two meals on a train?”
This makes her smile. “Sometimes the best ideas come from the most unlikely sources.”
“Maybe you should be interviewing Roy, then,” he jokes.
Later, Ludovic arrives to make up their beds, and then they take turns standing in the hall so the other can change. Mae goes first, and when she returns to find Hugo in a gray T-shirt and pajama pants with rubber duckies on them, she can’t help smiling.
But it’s his turn to laugh a few minutes later, when he sees that hers are so similar. “Are those clouds or cotton balls?”
She looks indignant. “They’re sheep.”
“Right,” he says as he climbs up to the top bunk, barely managing to wedge himself into the coffinlike space. “Is that so you can count them if you have trouble sleeping?”
“Something like that,” she says, switching off the light.
For a while, they both lie there quietly in the dark. Every now and then, there are noises in the hall as other passengers make their way to the tiny loo. But Hugo can see how you might get used to sleeping like this; there’s something oddly soothing about the gentle rocking of the train. He does his best to keep his eyes from fluttering shut, thinking of all the things Alfie has compared his snoring to over the years: a buzz saw, a trumpet, an elephant, even—ironically—a train. The idea is to wait for Mae to doze off first so he won’t embarrass himself, but he can still hear her shifting around below.
He tries to turn on his side, but there’s not quite enough space. For some reason, he keeps thinking about the way Mae walked back over to Ida earlier, so full of purpose, and he’s surprised by how badly he wants to find out what will come of the interview.
“Is that why you’re here?” he asks, the words loud in the dark. Beneath him, he hears Mae stir in her own makeshift bed. “To make a film?”
“Maybe,” she says. “That’s part of it, anyway.”
Hugo stays very still, waiting for her to say more, and when she doesn’t, he asks, “What’s the other part?”
There’s a long pause, and then: “Do you ever feel like you need to shake things up? Or just step outside your life for a minute?”
“Yes,” he says, his heart thudding with recognition.
“I wanted it so badly: to get in to that film program. You have no idea. The worst part wasn’t even being rejected—it was the shock of it.” She laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “I thought I was a shoo-in.”
“Did you?” Hugo asks, unable to imagine being so sure about anything.
“Yup,” she says. “Want to know why?”
“Why?”
“Because I’m good. Maybe that’s a weird thing to say. But it’s just a fact. And I want the chance to get better.”
“You will,” he says, though he has no idea really. He’s never loved anything the way Mae loves making films, and he wishes he knew what it feels like to have that kind of passion for something. For anything.
Her voice rises up to him again. “What about you? Why are you here?”
“Because my girlfriend broke up with me,” he says with a wan smile.
“Right. But most people wouldn’t have come after something like that. Much less go through all the effort of finding a girl with the same name to take the ticket. I mean, what if I were a total psycho?”
He laughs. “The jury’s still out.”
“Really—why did you come?”
Hugo hesitates. Even in the cramped bunk, there’s something so pleasant about the motion of the train and the sound of her voice, and he’s reluctant to spoil it with talk of his knotty feelings about his future and his family and everything else. But he can sense her waiting below him, the silence lengthening.
“It’s a long story,” he says eventually, and he can almost feel her peering up at him through the dark.
“The good ones usually are.”
They talk late into the night. There’s something about the darkness that makes it easy, and when she checks the time and realizes it’s after two, it occurs to Mae that she’s already shared more with Hugo—whom she’s known for less than a day—than she ever did with Garrett.
She can’t help feeling as if she’s stepped out of her life as quickly and thoughtlessly as you might a pair of jeans; it seems impossible that she could be sharing a room with a boy she met less than twelve hours ago.
“It’s not that I don’t want to go to uni at all,” he’s saying, and she hears a dull thump as he knocks a fist gently against the ceiling of the train. “I’m not a bloody idiot. And I quite like studying, actually. I just don’t particularly want to go to that one.”
“So why are you going?”
“Because I’ve got a scholarship,” he says in a voice so miserable that it sounds like he’s telling her he has some sort of disease.
She can’t help laughing. “What am I missing here?”
“I didn’t get it because I’m clever,” he says. “Even though I am.”
“Okay,” Mae says, amused. “So, what? Was it a safety school or something?”
“No.”
“Sports scholarship?”
He snorts. “Definitely not.”
“Let me guess,” she says. “You have a hidden talent. You can play the piano with your toes. Or juggle knives. Or wait…are you in a marching band?”
“We don’t really have those at home.”
“Then, what?”
“It’s because of my family,” he says. “I’m a sextuplet.”
Mae lies perfectly still for a few seconds, not sure how to play this. Because she already knows, obviously. It’s basically the only thing that comes up when you google the name Hugo Wilkinson. And there’s no possible way he hasn’t guessed that she knows.
“Wow,” she says, testing the waters.
“Yeah,” he says, giving nothing away.
“That’s…amazing. Do you guys look alike?”
“A bit,” he says, which isn’t exactly true. Mae has seen dozens of photos online, and they look a lot alike. All six of the Wilkinson siblings are striking on their own—with their huge smiles and matching dimples—but as a group, there’s something almost dazzling about them. It’s easy to see why they’re minor celebrities in England.
Mae searches for an appropriate follow-up question. “How many brothers and sisters?”
“Five,” Hugo says, like she’s asked him what color the sky is. “We’re sextuplets. That means six.”
“I know. I meant how many of each.”
He laughs. “Oh. Sorry. Three brothers and two sisters.”
“Can you remember all their names?” she teases, and he laughs.
“Let’s see. George, Oscar, Poppy, Alfie, and…um…uh…”
This goes on for so long that Mae finally rolls her eyes. “Isla,” she says, and he leans down so his head is hanging over the side of the bed.
“I knew it.”
“Well, what do you expect? I had to make sure you were legit.”
“Fair enough,” he says, returning to his bunk. “I looked you up too.”
“Yeah, me and every other Margaret Campbell in the world.”
“What I’m curious about,” he says, “is how you managed to get yourself arrested for trespassing last spring.”
Mae’s mouth falls open. “You found that?”