I wrote this short story a couple few years ago while on an airplane flying down to Georgia. Apparently I wrote it in a fit of the crap happening with my family. It was just after Christmas and my parents refused to talk to me and me to them and had spent the Christmas holiday with my Resident Director’s family. They were great and nice, but I was damn aware that I wasn’t with MY family, and couldn’t be with them. Ironically, I was also on my way to visit Evan. Not Brack. So this had to be January of 2000. Diagnosing the mind of the protagonist could be a bit like diagnosing the mind of my developing mental illness.
The people in the airport terminal walked by with different airs. The Englishwoman–Angela knew that from the lightness of her accent–who met up with her family, with the grinning children, a boy and a girl, and her husband, who seemed as full of life as his wife. None of them were travelweary, as most of the airs in the terminal were. As relaxing as watching them would be, to Angela they weren’t interesting. Out from behind the pillar that she leaned on came an odd looking young man. It wasn’t so much that he was odd, really, it was his clothes. With him was a girl who Angela assumed to be the young man’s girlfriend (he had an arm wrapped around her at all times, lovingly caressing her back, even though they were in a very public place). The young woman’s clothing was snappy, stylish. Her odd boyfriend, in contrast, wore an overlarge black sweatshirt, matching overlarge sweatpants, untied sneakers, and a baseball cap.
As Angela stood by the pillar, the couple passed her at least four times. She was sure they must have found her immobile nature as odd as she found their fashion. Across the terminal, near the end of a ridiculously long ticketing line, a collie puppy chased a bit of paper, tugging at his leash. Angela smiled. She missed having a dog around.
Suddenly she was pushed forward from behind. She turned, regaining her balance, and found herself facing a man with shoulder length straggly hair, yet the top of his head was missing any straggles of any hair. Angela had never understood that style of haircut. At least the man had no beard. She realized that he was speaking. Apologizing, actually.
“Excuse me, ma’am. Sorry, sorry.” He was English too, but not with the lightness of the family from earlier. He picked up his dark gray briefcase, stark against his bright teal windpants. As he straightened, Angela was even more struck by the oddness of his dress: on his feet were a nice pair of leather boots, his shirt a wool sweater and over that a fleece vest. The pants seemed to want to jump out and maul you with their harsh hue.
Angela stepped away.
The man continued speaking, momentarily inspecting his bag. “Didn’t even see you there, my dear,” he said, his clothing atrocious but his accent charming. He pointed with his free right hand. “It’s the pillar you see,” he said.
Angela nodded. “No problem,” she said, realizing that this was the first time she’d spoken to another person since she’d replied “No” to the ticketing agent’s stringed together question of “Haveyouleftyourbagunattendedorallowedanyoneelsetocarryyourluggage?”
Good thing she’d heard the question before and she hadn’t had to ask him to repeat himself. She hated that. People were constantly, to her annoyance, asking her to repeat herself. She didn’t like doing that to anyone else. Yet at the same time, the man had spoken rather quickly.
The man who’d run into her had just repeated himself, she was sure of it. “I’m sorry?” Angela said.
“I said,” he said, “You sure you’re okay? I did bump you quite hard, you know.”
She brushed herself off as if to illustrate. “No, no. I’m fine. Really.”
“Well then,” he said, nodding. “Good day.” And he walked off into the crowd, his gray briefcase blinking–what?
Angela stared off at him as he disappeared into the mass of people. Blinking? She blinked. She must’ve imagined it. Paranoia gets you every time. Something beeped somewhere ahead of her, near where the Englishman had walked. Great, now beeping. All that would be too obvious for a bomb. She was sure blinking and beeping would earn at least a double take from the airport security guard.
She sighed and moved from her pillar. She’d stood there a good two hours and no one had said a word. Apparently she hadn’t looked as odd as she thought she had. Of course, she wasn’t actually meeting anyone, so that had to be the difference. If she had been waiting for someone, she was sure the security guards would’ve escorted her away after an hour, putting her to questioning as to why she’d loitered leaning on a pillar across from a gourmet candy kiosk for the better part of an hour. Good that they never came, it amounted closer to two hours.
Since waiting was not the case, they left her alone, aside from the Englishman who’d run into her. Angela adjusted her carry-on bag and walked toward her gate. Only pressing deadline was her flight in two hours. Her gate was an eight minute walk away–so even that wasn’t terribly pressing.
Her heavy metallic ring set off the metal detector–she’d forgotten to take it off. She smiled at the security guards. They’d seen her three times already. They must think she was really indecisive, walking back and forth to both ends of the terminal repeatedly. At least this time she seemed to have a purpose–clutched in her left hand was her Starbucks coffee. They seemed to appreciate the coffee’s importance with the advancing hour.
Ahead of her she saw a tall, powerfully built man with buzzed graying hair. For a moment, her stomach dropped, her breath clutching at her throat. Then her intellect took over and told her that her mother didn’t know she was here, much less her father, because only her mother showed any hint of interest in her activities, and that bit only to keep tabs on her. So that man couldn’t be her father, her emotions realized too, and her stomach climbed back to its proper place.
As she bent to pick up her bag, the buzzcut man collided with her. She saw stars, blinking and throwing her bag over her shoulder at the same time.
“You okay, miss?” he asked, his voice not alarming like her father’s. That soothed her.
“Fine,” she said, nodding and taking a step toward her gate.
“Sorry ’bout that,” he said, and then walked away, his own briefcase in hand. At least his wasn’t blinking and beeping.
Angela sat in a chair in front of the window at the gate, where she could see inside the cockpit of the plane. She wondered if the pilots or the flight crew could see her (she could see them anyway, and her mother had always said that if you can see them, they can see you). It seemed only fair.
She settled into her seat, stretching her legs out in front of her and resting her feet on the electric heater. Behind her she heard the English family she’d seen before. They must be on her flight, she realized. She didn’t understand why they’d want to go to the same place as her, but then again, she never really understood what other people thought. She hardly understood her own thoughts, and she was stuck with them all the time. Pity. They seemed to scramble all over the place.
The wife spoke to her for a bit–lovely, lovely accent. Angela realized she hadn’t blushed, that none of the shyness had crept forward and hooded her from behind, like it would have before. Is this what it feels like to be real? Angela asked herself.
Then, in the bottom of her stomach, the old feeling (old now, since it happened too often) returned, like she was about to be sick, only she knew she wasn’t. She felt the feeling buzz in her ears, pressing on the backs of her eyes, forcing her shoulders down. Angela ended the conversation and faced the window again, hunched down.
This wasn’t shyness–she was free of that now–but this new affliction seemed worse. Worse, sometimes, than what she’d experience at home. But the break had happened, and she was free, so they told her. They told her that she was brave, courageous. But Angela didn’t understand how she could be either of those things when the sick feeling pressed on her. She fought it off constantly, and sometimes she just wanted to stop fighting and give into it‚Äö√Ѭ∂
She couldn’t. She didn’t know any of these people; she was in a public place. Angela stopped slouching and sat up in her seat, waiting for her row to be called to board.
The feeling threatened her once more, as she boarded the plane, then a fragile old lady in a wheelchair ran over Angela’s heel, and began apologizing profusely.
“No problem,” Angela said. “No problem.”
In the plane Angela stowed her bag in the overhead bin above her seat, right over the wing of the jet. At least no one had run into her again, she seemed to have been running into people all day. She buckled herself in and idly listened to the flight attendant up front demonstrate the seat belt, oxygen masks, and explain about the flotation device located underneath their seats. Angela remembered the last amicable conversation she’d had with her father about that very same subject.
“What good are life jackets if we crashed, Dad?” she’d asked.
“They’re not really for you,” he’d said.
“What?” she’d asked.
“They’re for your body. You won’t survive an impact from a crash, even in water. It’d be like hitting concrete. They’re for the search crews to find your body. If you’re wearing a life jacket, then you’ll float to the top. That way, your family will have something to bury. Parachutes are too expensive. Life jackets make life easier for the living.”
“Charming, Dad,” Angela had said, ending the conversation. She played around with the cushion of the empty seat beside her. She’d have to pull really hard to get at the life jacket. No problem, she guessed, with adrenaline flowing. She didn’t bother to dwell on it. Most times, there wouldn’t be enough time to grab it.
There was a beeping behind her. Angela sat up and looked back quickly to see if the bald-headed-long-haired-man was on the plane with his suspicious briefcase. All Angela saw was a man with a cellphone. No danger yet.
The plane rose in the air and Angela eagerly watched the ground fall away underneath them. She loved that part. Once they reached cruising altitude, the ride got boring. She didn’t bother listening to the pilot talk about speed and time of arrival. Her arrival would be different from everyone else’s, but they’d all follow her anyway.
She listened again for the beeping, but didn’t hear any. The feeling settled down on her shoulders, so she didn’t bother getting out her bag till she knew she’d be interested. The flight attendant came down the aisle with drinks and snacks. The airline had some odd snack mix now instead of the nice peanuts. The feeling began to lift. Angela saw the oddly dressed young man with his baseball cap walk past her to the lavatories at the back. So he was following her too. She nearly giggled aloud. The feeling was gone. Time for her bag.
She stood in the aisle, opening the overhead bin. She unzipped her bag.
Then she was out the window–flying. And she was free, she was brave, and she’d done it, she’d broken the last bond and she hadn’t put on her life jacket, so they’d never find her body, her parents would have nothing left to bury.
Served them right. They never knew her anyway.
End.