Welcome to Trainwrecks: Season 2 (2005-2006)! If you haven’t read Season 1, please start there! Trainwrecks is a free-to-read fiction serial that follows a group of six Seattle-adjacent friends from the year 2004 to the year 2015. Join Luna Cruz, Sebastian Velasquez, Dimitri and Victoria Hale, Duke Kingston, and Jasmine Nolan as they stumble their way from adolescence to adulthood, falling in love, making mistakes, overcoming their pasts, and staying together through it all.
For series introduction, character profiles, relationship charts, and general orientation, check out the Table of Contents!
Previous Episode | Table of Contents | Next Episode
“And then the guy’s boyfriend came home, and I had to climb out a second story window to avoid getting shot,” Dimitri concluded with an exhausted sigh. He sat next to Victoria at the kitchen island of his father’s townhouse, peeling an apple with a knife. “The nerve of some people, using me to get back at their partners. If I’d known he was taken, I never would have gone home with him.”
Victoria popped a grape into her mouth. She’d been depressed lately, as one who had lost her boyfriend and her best friend due to her own stupidity might expect to feel, and so Dimitri had taken to visiting as often as possible. It was better than going to Sebastian’s and fighting with Luna, anyway. The absolute nerve of her, telling him off like that when she didn’t even have her facts straight. “Have you ever thought about being in an actual relationship instead of having all these one-night stands?” Victoria asked, her voice flat and emotionless.
Dimitri made a face. “Why in the world would I do that?” He reached the bottom of the apple and admired the long, single peel that fell away from it, winding like a spiral staircase.
“I don’t know, because loving someone and being loved by them is nice?” She picked up the peel and carried it to the trash can.
“No offense, sis, but watching you limp around for the past month hasn’t exactly made me wild about the idea of being in love.” She glared at him. He smiled back. “Besides, who’d want to date me? I’m mental,” he said in a fake British accent, and made a circular motion around his temple with the peeling knife. No one in their right mind would want to be in a long-term relationship with him. He was too damaged, too tainted by all the hands that had touched him in the past, and he found sex repulsive seventy percent of the time. The only thing that kept him from going completely insane was acting like nothing mattered. “Anyway, you should cheer up before Dad gets home. Otherwise he’ll think you’re not excited about landing the in-person audition.”
Victoria had called him that morning with the news, but rather than sound ecstatic about her lifelong dream being one step closer to coming true, she’d merely sounded concerned. She looked like she wanted to say something but was interrupted by the front door opening. Dimitri turned in time to see his mother and father walk into the house, laughing at some private joke. He pointed the knife at them. “Ah-ha!”
His mother jumped and brought a hand to her chest. “Geez.”
“Where have you two been?” Dimitri yelled. “Do you have any idea what time it is? Victoria and I have been worried sick!”
His father frowned at his wristwatch. “It’s two o’clock in the afternoon…”
“Should we tell them?” Makoto asked.
Dimitri waved the knife back and forth between them as if trying to keep them away from him. “Tell us what?”
James sighed. “Alright, put the knife down and we’ll talk.”
A few minutes later, the four of them sat around the kitchen island with the fruit bowl between them. Dimitri noticed that everyone looked nervous—or irritated, in his mother’s case. He kept his scowl fixed in place, but he couldn’t stop shoving apple slices into his mouth. The tension in the air was almost breathable.
Finally, his father spoke. “Your mum and I have been seeing each other.”
“I knew it,” Dimitri cried around a mouthful of apple.
“We didn’t want to make a big deal out of it,” his mother said with a pointed look in his direction. “You guys have been affected enough by all our bullshit, so we tried to work things out in private.”
“I’m disappointed. Disgusted, even. My own parents, sneaking around like horny teenagers!”
“Dimitri…” Victoria muttered, but he ignored her, intent on being as theatrical as possible.
“What do you have to say for yourselves?”
James and Makoto looked at each other, then back at him. “We’ve decided to remarry,” his father said.
Victoria gasped sharply. Dimitri’s manufactured hysteria flew out the window.
“We both knew that we’d never really stopped loving each other,” Makoto said. “And after a few dates, we agreed it would be stupid of us to die in separate houses thirty minutes away from one another, so…” She looked Dimitri in the eye. “We’re getting married.”
Victoria burst into tears. She abandoned her chair, ran around the island, and flung herself into her mother’s arms.
But Dimitri stayed where he was. He couldn’t move. Memories flashed through his mind: his mother draping a blanket over his father’s shoulders after he fell asleep studying at the table, his dad showering his mother’s face with kisses until she shoved him away with a halfhearted complaint, the two of them holding Dimitri’s hands and picking him up as they walked so he could pretend he was on the moon, his mother and father singing Take On Me at the top of their lungs as they drove to the supermarket. Their laughter. Their love. Their joy. Things Dimitri had watched his mother’s illness snuff out like a fire, taking all the light and warmth in their lives with it.
How many nights had he spent at the Cruzes or his aunt’s house, crying himself to sleep over everything they’d lost? How many years had he spent staring out his bedroom window, waiting for his father to come home?
He’d given up after a while. Categorized his hopes as nothing but pointless objects that took up space in his heart and hurt every time he tripped over them. He’d thrown them away like garbage and forced himself to adapt to this life he’d never wanted to live.
And now?
Some long forgotten thing inside him began to swell. It made his chest hurt as it tried to claw its way out. He couldn’t breathe. His thoughts multiplied until they were nothing but a maelstrom of confusion and disbelief and—
He suddenly became aware that his parents were staring at him, waiting for a response. Three apple slices remained on his plate. Save for his sister’s sobs, the house was quiet, holding its breath. Dimitri lowered his head, his eyes landing on the faded injection site scars that dotted the insides of his arms.
“Oh,” he said with a distracted nod. “You’re getting married. Well, that changes everything.” His cheek twitched, reminding him to smile. “Congratulations. That’s… good news. Great news!” He recovered some of the cheerfulness that had been scattered by his rampant thoughts. “I’m sure you had a lot to figure out. Glad you, uh… did that.” He slid from the chair and backed away from the kitchen island, his smile plastered in place. “Why don’t you two discuss the details and we can all start planning a wedding, eh? But if you could just excuse me for a while…” He pointed behind him. “I’m going for a quick drive, probably be back in time for dinner. We should have dinner, right? To celebrate!” He laughed, hoping it didn’t sound as hysterical to them as it did to him. “Okay, I’ll see you guys later.”
And then he hurried out of the townhouse. The roar of his thoughts drowned out the ambient outdoor sounds. He was dangerously close to a panic attack. He had his hand on the car door when someone grabbed him. His father. “Dimitri, wait. Let’s talk.”
He shrugged him off. “We’ll talk later. I need a minute.”
James looked pained. “Please, son. I know this probably isn’t the way you wanted things to work out—”
“What do you mean?” His anxiety, coupled with that long-forgotten emotion that was fighting for freedom, warped into anger. “You think I’m upset about you and Mom? I’ve wanted you two back together since I was five years old! I waited fifteen years for this. What the hell took you so long, huh?”
James held his arms out in front of him as if Dimitri were a wild animal preparing to attack. He definitely felt like one. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s selfish of me to ask you to trust me, and it can’t be easy for you to trust your mum either. But as husband and wife, we will be each other’s top priorities. And as your parents, we’ll do everything we can to put you at ease so that you can live your own life.” He laid his hands on Dimitri’s shoulders. “You don’t have to worry about us anymore.”
Dimitri almost shrugged him off again, but he couldn’t. The part of him that wanted nothing more than to be comforted by his parents wouldn’t let him. Here was his father, telling him that everything was going to be alright now. That the thing he’d given up hoping for was happening at last. And he realized it wasn’t anxiety he was feeling, but—
Happiness. That’s what that mysterious emotion was called. He’d buried it such a long time ago that its name had rubbed off its gravestone.
“You guys are really serious?” he asked. His mother had come outside at some point and stood at the top of the steps leading up to the front door. When she nodded, Dimitri tried to respond, but all that came out was a sob.
Happy. He was happy. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt that way.
He didn’t fight James when he pulled him into a hug. Car keys still clenched in his hand, he wrapped his arms around his father, unable to do anything but cry. His emotions were a mess. His thoughts were a mess. He didn’t know what to do.
But maybe he didn’t need to do anything. That was what it meant to be free, right? He didn’t have to shield his mother from the world with his own body anymore. He didn’t have to keep an impossible promise to his dad, his childhood hero. He didn’t have to keep delaying his future because he didn’t know who would take care of his mom if he wasn’t around. He could just… live.
He’d already decided to give his father a chance, to build a new relationship atop the ruins of their old one. Trusting him to try and make things right was the next logical step. And his mother may have been sick for most of his childhood, but she wasn’t a helpless baby who couldn’t take care of herself. If she could trust James after everything, then Dimitri would have to trust her with her own happiness.
“If you hurt her, I’ll kill you,” he mumbled halfheartedly.
“I know.” James rubbed his back. “I know.”
He’d learn to trust them both. And live.
Author’s Note: Sebastian and Jasmine prayed for a miracle last week. Their prayer was heard.
Not going to lie, I was so scared until Dimitri managed to name that emotion TT_______TT
"He’d buried it such a long time ago that its name had rubbed off its gravestone."
WHAT A LINE!
The way I literally SCREAMED when James and Makoto said they were remarrying--
AAAAAAAAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
And Dimitri!! My boy!!! Hope and happiness exist and he can't deny it anymore!!!!! I want to give him 1,000 hugs 😭😭😭
I'd bet you all my shiny Pokémon that this wasn't the reunion Seb and Jazz were thinking of lol. Can't wait to see how everyone reacts to the news on Wednesday!!