The attendant smiles sweetly at Laura and sets her on the floor, then goes to speak with the oldest child in the car, a girl who looks to be about seven or eight.
“If something happens with the little girl I just dropped off, have someone come get me, okay?” she instructs.
“Well, why don’t you just stay here?” the girl asks.
“I have too many other things I need to do right now. They don’t staff the train nearly as well as they used to.”
“Fine,” the girl mumbles. The woman leaves the car. The girl walks over to Laura and crouches down.
“Hi, I’m Rachel. What’s your name?”
“Lowa,” Laura says. She fights back a grimace at the discovery that she’s become too young to even pronounce her name correctly.
“All right, Laura.” Rachel takes Laura’s hand and leads her over to a pile of toddler toys in one corner. “If you need something, let me know and I’ll get a grownup. Okay?” Laura nods silently. “Great.” With that, Rachel walks back to a bean bag in a corner and sits down, then picks up a book and reads.
Laura sits down and looks at the toddler toys. None of them look very interesting to her. But they’re all she has to occupy herself during the train ride.