Ossie's legs were shaking. He wanted to run to her and grab her hand and pull her home, all the way home, and lock the door, and never let her out of his sight again. He wanted to cry. He wanted to yell at her, the way his mother had yelled at him Wednesday night, you scared us, you scared everybody, don't you know what could have happened.
He didn't do any of that. He looked at Zoli, and Zoli looked at him, and Zoli gave the smallest shake of his head, and Ossie understood, because it was what he had learned on the bench. You don't pull her out of her world. You go into it.
They walked over slowly, crunching on the gravel, and climbed up onto the old platform, and sat down, one on each side of her, on the broken bench.
Aunt Yolie looked at them, and her face lit up.
"Zoltán," she said. "Oszkár. You are waiting too?"
"Yeah, néni," Zoli said. His voice wobbled, and steadied. "We're waiting too."
"It is late," she said, and frowned a little, looking down the empty track. "I think it is very late. The car should come by now. Pista said four o'clock, on the platform, he has something to ask me." She smoothed her dress over her knees. She looked young, suddenly, in the low gold light. Not young in the face. Young in the way she sat, upright and expectant and a little nervous, like a girl at a dance. "I think he has something important to ask me. He was so funny all week. He kept putting his hand in his pocket."
Ossie had to look away. He looked at the weeds and the rusted railing and the Twinkie wrapper blowing and blowing.
"He's coming," Zoli said. "He'll be here. He's just running late."
"You think so?"