Your Flight Will Leave Soon Read online

  He was younger than her, Darcy thought at first blush, and he looked successful. New clothes, highlighted by an untucked pink button down, fine shoes but nothing pretentious. Timex, not Rolex. Definitely twenties. New bag meant he probably didn’t travel at all or he traveled so much that his old bag fell apart. His bag was too big for a typical carry on, but nothing fancy that hinted he traveled often.

  “Were you…talking to me?” Darcy asked him, though she didn’t trust her own voice, as her voice came out low in a noisy airport terminal. Like she had a frog in her throat. Gross. It didn’t sound so much like herself. But she was not herself. Not in this stressful situation. She had been standing in lines or sitting on an airplane and hadn’t had anything to drink since fifteen minutes into her flight out of Dallas to Denver.

  “Yes. I was,” Pink Shirt said, his attention turning to Darcy and he smiled a little, tight-lipped, friendly but not flirting. “Any chance you are Darcy Kluka?”

  Oh. She stopped, processing that he knew her name by some means. Darcy immediately figured she must know him, somehow and just couldn’t remember him. He must have been one of those people in her life who used to look very different when she knew him, or he was so much younger that she didn’t recognize him anymore. But that thinking didn’t make much sense.

  He didn’t look familiar at all, studying his face. He had a calm expression compared to the bewildered travelers darting about. Warm. Soft. Friendly without indifference or snobbiness. She got the overwhelming sense that he was totally harmless. Though she hadn’t seen him before in her life, she suddenly felt like she could trust him.

  Darcy didn’t know what to say. So she didn’t say anything at all, but stood there, watching him and debating and trying to figure out if her voice even worked.

  “Okay, so you’re not her. Sorry. I was hoping,” he said. He backed away from her just enough, not exactly a dog rolling over in submission, showing off its privates in total surrender, but Darcy about burst with curiosity and fear about him. A totally random guy at a place she’d never been knew her name. If he walked away, she would go crazy trying to figure him out. Because if he remembered her, she should remember him. She had forgotten people lately, blanking on names all of a sudden and she didn’t want to credit that to her age, but a temporary blip.

  At the same time, if this intriguing guy were a flashback from her serendipitous past, he could provide a solid distraction. Maybe he went to her high school, and he was traveling home on her flight. What a pleasant coincidence!

  Kinda short, actually for a guy. Vertically challenged. About perfect height for a girl, that space between not too tall to be considered leggy, but not so short as to have the dreaded shoe size six that’s hardly ever in stock. His eyes were kind. His hair was a little disheveled, probably from wearing a ball cap, an annoying feature of young men hanging onto teen years. His features were enticing enough and wouldn’t be painful to admire instead of being bored and alone at the airport. Maybe he would turn out to be funny and incredibly entertaining.

  If he’s weird, she could walk away. Big airport. Security was everywhere.

  “Hey, are you all right?” He asked, watching her.

  Darcy took his question as a diss. It was all in his tone. “How do you know my name?” Oops. She didn’t mean to blurt that out, but there it was. Darcy was not known for having perfect tact in social settings.

  He washed over with relief, “Awesome. You are Darcy. Good thing I found you,” he said.

  Wait. So he knew her name but didn’t know her from the past. Darcy felt confused and anxious all over. “Who are you?” Darcy asked, but her voice came out too weak for the situation. She hated how vulnerable she was when she needed to step up for herself. The notion he was looking for her but didn’t know her freaked her out. He didn’t look like he worked for the airlines. Or security.

  She told herself she had to think positively but felt at a loss for ideas. She had nowhere else to go. And who knew, he might help pass the time? Make her not feel alone? Seeing everyone else visiting, talking, enjoying themselves made her feel less alone than sitting at home wishing her apartment manager allowed her to have a Balinese cat, not that other breeds were not options, but the Balinese was her favorite.

  “Don’t worry. I don’t scratch or bite,” he said, giving a quick little wave like in junior high when guys are really unsure of themselves. “I’m Galen, by the way.” Or a germaphobe? Why didn’t he offer his hand? Mysophobia? Maybe that was why. He would fear whatever microbe her hands carried.

  Darcy offered a smile and extended her hand. How else could she know for sure? He ignored it. Definitely germaphobe. What was up with this guy? He was so different than anyone she had ever met. But then, she hadn’t traveled anywhere outside the country yet, so she thought of her own experiences as limited. “Nice to meet you, Galen. But how do you know me? I must say, it’s panicking me. A little.”

  She chided herself for being so forward with a stranger, but what choice did she have?

  “Oh. Sorry. So sorry. I have your ticket,” he explained and proceeded to ramble on, talking way too quickly, “You must have dropped this. I bet it fell out of your coat pocket. I’m sure it happens to everyone,” he said, holding up her boarding pass so she could see its bold typeface. He was odd, holding the pass in a way that he latched onto it. On accepting her pass with the tips of her fingers, more so by reaction rather than considering implications. She took it from him and studied it in disbelief. He was right.

  He said, as though offering her an excuse, “Not everyone likes technology.”

  She studied him, incredulous. Darcy immediately wished she had picked a digital boarding pass like Rebecca had so helpfully suggested. Darcy had considered the e-boarding pass but totally spaced out on researching how exactly you do that in detail in the hurry of things. Darcy was a habitual person. Rules. Checklists. Rebecca described Darcy as the girl who always ‘colored inside the lines.’ Darcy had reasoned, “It’s one extra thing you have to remember to do! What if my phone’s battery died? Or the device locked up and had to be reset?” Darcy remembered telling Rebecca that her boarding pass would never get lost.

  Yeah. Sure. If Rebecca could become a fly in the terminal, she would be laughing hysterically. Darcy considered herself semi-reasonable and slightly practical. A balancing act. Rebecca, when she got in the right frame of mind, would suggest Darcy had a stick crammed up her butt about certain things like keeping appointment times, driving the speed limit and food preparation.

  Paper ticket in hand, Darcy considering what this all meant. Was it fate? Fate that Rebecca spied her checking in and told her to go all Jetson’s, e-ticket and book an Uber to the airport, but whatever. Darcy opted for the shuttle because it was deemed more reliable. Those drivers had been transporting people to the airport for years without making the news about exposing one’s self to an unwilling passenger.

  Galen was smiling. Grinning, actually.

  “Thank you,” Darcy said and felt relieved that he found her pass and managed to find her, of all people at the crowded terminal.

  “My pleasure. I didn’t think I had a chance of finding you until I saw the gate. Dumb luck, I guess. Hope this marks a new beginning for you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Good luck, I guess. It was lucky that I found you,” he adjusted his black bag’s shoulder strap and said, “I feel lucky. This beats waiting in line for a new ticket in his mess,” he said, gesturing to the airlines counter, which had a short line that wasn’t moving at all.

  Darcy considered life without her boarding pass, which seemed kinda pointless considering her flight wouldn’t take off for what felt like years. The irony. Galen had just handed her a ticket to nowhere.

  But she got immediately curious about what else fate had in store, under pressure like a shaken soda can on a hot day–with this odd man she’d just met on what had to be the strangest circumstances she could imagine.

  Darcy said, �
��Oh, no kidding. This line never moves. At all. Everyone is overwhelmed.” She watched him a moment, unsure where this was all going, other than to kill time. “What were the odds you’d find me, right?”

  “Why don’t we sit? Get a drink? I could use one,” he offered.

  “I don’t really drink,” Darcy said and hoped he would believe that. She immediately thought back to the half bottle of wine she drank alone while watching a pathetic romantic comedy. It had been a disparaging night after she’d been stood up by a friend who was supposed to come through with concert tickets. The other half bottle was reserved for two nights later and shared with her neighbor, who was always looking for a wing-woman and always seemed in need of a bailout. Darcy didn’t want to finish an entire bottle solo, and she was very self-conscious about that.

  She’d had almost no breakfast, primarily because she got up late for her first flight, out of Dallas. On the plane, she had three bags of peanuts, but that was it. A drink could take the edge off, but she considered her circumstances and thought better of it.

  At worst, her story about this random dude she met at the airport might make for a great icebreaker. He couldn’t be like that guy she met when the company was testing new features in Swain. Total creep.

  “Me neither. A coffee then?”

  Darcy pulled off her white knit hat carefully, smoothed back her hair, tucked some deep brown locks behind her ears, her large hoop earrings swinging, watching his reaction and trying to figure him out. He was so curious and nothing like Tyler, nothing like any guy she had dated before.

  A quick peek at the board confirmed reality. All flights were delayed. The airline’s counter had earned a long line again. There were only two more flights on Frontier going to MSN for the day. The 12:39, which Darcy was ticketed for and a 5:20. Delta had one flight left later on that afternoon, and American had one also, around four. People were moving, some hurrying, some lethargic as though they could collapse face first onto that patterned blue carpet.

  She hated the thought of leaving the gate, on the chance they started boarding her flight. What if her letter was called? She’d miss her chance. Could they give away her seat if she wasn’t there?

  “It’s okay,” Galen said. “I thought, hey, there’s a coffee place down two gates down.”

  “Sure. Why not.”

  Two

  Galen

  Galen Brown had a pounding headache, and his water glass sat on the table, empty and out of reach. He had to get off the sofa where he’d been sleeping. He needed to heal. Still dark outside. His back was tacky from dried sweat to the sofa, and as hard as he and Addison had tried, his fitted bed sheet didn’t stay on the cushions all night. Craving a cigarette, he reminded himself of his promise to Kat. She would hound him; he probably had a text message from her waiting for him.

  What a way to begin a day with an important, potentially life-changing job interview. He had been working for months to get this opportunity. Not just anyone could even get an interview with Marcson Technology.

  A cigarette sounded good. One could not argue with Kat’s logic. At $8.37 per pack, they were not financially sound. Nor healthy. Especially in his current predicament. He considered they might help alleviate his headaches though that was debatable he decided it would be worth a shot. His body didn’t like deprivation of tobacco.

  He often told Kat, if he lit up at the bar where she worked, sitting on the patio, that ‘he liked starting small fires’ to which she would laugh, knowingly. Depending on Kat’s mood, the day of the week and the alignment of the stars, she might roll her eyes. Or just sigh and shake her head. She had told him once when she had been at a vulnerable moment, that she secretly adored that he smoked. She had gone into detail about how a plume of smoke leaving his olive lips while he had been looking away from her, toward the street, at night, it had been a seductive moment. Hot. That was the word she had used. Like a movie director. Or a rock star in a video. Galen appreciated her positive feelings, but he apparently didn’t react the right way, because she didn’t say much after.

  Smoking. It’s hot, or it’s not? Galen was confused. Quitting was no small task if he were to keep at it. The other problem was his weight. Friends of his who had successfully quit smoking gained weight from breathing it seemed, to which, Galen only half envied their achievement to have yet another, bigger, problem. One of those ‘congratulations, I’m sorry’ instances.

  His throat was raw, but his fear of waking his sister, her husband or worse yet, the twins, wasn’t a good idea. Still, his throat hurt and water would help cool the raw, scratchy feeling that would not subside. His pain meds were partially to blame, but he needed those if he wanted to move without wincing. Even turning over while he slept hurt enough to wake him. Luckily, he could sleep nearly anywhere.

  Sliding his leg a little at a time, caused his right knee to painfully stabbing his optimism. Minutes passed carelessly while he waited for the pain to recede.

  His crutches were out of reach. With no means of moving without some strain, even if minimal, on his injured right knee, moving sounded like torture, like his freshman year of college when he elected against better judgment, to rush a fraternity. It had been mother’s suggestion.

  He asked himself if he were trying to change too much, too suddenly. Four days ago, he decided he had to change everything in his life. At once.

  His first step was getting to his feet, then making his way to the kitchen for water, meds. Then, he could wait for the pain to become manageable.

  The color drained slowly from his hands, clutching sofa cushions as he flopped on his side and groaned, lips tightly clenched.

  He worried he had become a burden, to himself and the world.

  “Morning,” Addison said as though not speaking to any person directly. Her voice was cracking, her movement at him was swift, as though she were on high alert. Or just pissed to be awake this early. Her twin toddlers would sap all the energy she had to give when they woke up, and Galen knew without her saying so, that her real goal was to prevent her big brother from waking her cute little monsters.

  “You can’t get up on your own, so don’t try,” Addison said, keeping her scratchy voice down to a hoarse whisper. Her plaid pajamas draped loosely on her slender figure as though she had purchased the wrong size and just kept them anyway. She lifted and pulled from under his arms as Galen grunted and like a flopping fish on a boat deck with a hook through his lip, his effort was of little value.

  He’d forgotten to wake during the night for an in-between when his six o’clock dose had worn out its magic.

  “Tell me you won’t do this shit again,” Addison said to him, as they grunted in unison, her forcing him onto his feet. Her one hundred pound frame wasn’t built to lift her little brother; at more than a few ounces over two hundred, how many, Galen didn’t want to know.

  “Yes. I know. Thanks, mom,” Galen said.

  Addison stepped back as he supported himself on his own two feet and she watched as though she expected him to collapse. He breathed in deeply. “Can you walk at all?”

  “I’ve got to,” he said, knowing how much it would hurt. His left knee felt normal, and he could put the majority of his weight on it, but not all of it. He was told to stay off his injured right knee, which sounded easy enough in the doctor’s office four days earlier, feeling good on meds.

  “Marika wishes you well for today. She texted me,” Addison said.

  “What did you tell her?” He asked, strained.

  “The basics. Interview at ten. She’s got her chakra stones, an extra special seance on her calendar for you. Can’t hurt. She must really want your shit out of her place. What happened this time?”

  Galen grimaced while shifting his weight, using his crutch his sister handed to him off the floor not a moment too soon. He waited to steady himself. “Mom told me I’m a disgrace to the family, ever since I dropped out of college.” His pills sat on the counter, next to a full glass of water. An obstacle and a rewar
d; a destination and a new beginning. Taking those, in a half-hour, he would feel well enough to live.

  “I thought she told you that months ago.”

  “She did,” Galen said. “So this time I told her I would move away. She asked if that was a promise.”

  “You know, when you want to be, you can be quite the lady killer,” Addison said. “Maybe you should let your dazzling brown eyes do the talking more often.”

  “I thought they were soft and sensitive,” Galen said, grimacing.

  “Is that what Kat told you last night? You know, you can stay at her place. Mom might feel encouraged if you’re hooking up with a Thai ninja.”

  “Oh, shut up. I’m trying to walk again. You’re making fun of a cripple,” Galen said, unable to keep his balance. “And it’s Muay Thai.”

  “Whatever. You’ve got a martial arts welding bartender studying to be an engineer for a girlfriend. Between mom and me it’s the highlight of your accomplishments,” Addison said.

  Galen wailed in pain, trying to steady himself on his crutch in limited space between the sofa and the ottoman that Addison’s mother in law gave them as a hand me down.

  “Well, I can’t have you killing yourself. Let me help,” Addison said, squatting to use her quads to lift her brother. Without him saying another word, she was supporting some of his weight. “I rep more than you three times a week.”

  “Your compassion is touching,” Galen said. “You weren’t this mean to me last week.”

  “And I would love it if you would use your brain before doing childish shit with your friends. You are no good on my sofa. And mom’s pissed about your hospital bill.”

  “I said I would pay it,” Galen said. “She told me I needed to lose weight and get in shape. Quit being a fat oaf. How can I lose weight if I don’t do anything?”

  She helped him to the counter where he greedily took his medication. Addison refilled his water glass, knowing it would not stay full very long.