if you want me to write a poem (about you) [e.c]

chapter 6

after

Eleanor stares out the tiny oval shaped window at the tarmac. Her hands are folded in her lap; the right has a white knuckled grip on the left like she's bracing against pain. She focuses on her breathing: in one two three four, out one two three four.

She can see people loading luggage onto the plane. It takes awhile, but eventually she spots her own suitcase, strips of bright floral print fabric wrapped around the handles gently swaying in the wind. It's only half packed, really, clothes just thrown in instead of folded neatly, because once Louis had said no all she had wanted was to get out.

Louis. No, she's not thinking about Louis. She slams the window cover down like punctuation on that decision, and the man in the seat next to her starts, looking at her in confusion. She tries to smile reassuringly, nothing to see here, but it comes out twisted, more of a grimace, and the man looks away quickly.

Eleanor shakes out her hands, then her hair. It wasn't anything, she tells herself sternly. He was drunk. I was drunk. It didn't mean anything.

She's repeated it so many times that it sounds like truth.

She checks the time. They should be taking off soon. This is confirmed when a flight attendant comes by and tells her to put the window cover back up for take off. She does so, avoiding the look the man next to her is giving her. She sits back and closes her eyes. One short flight and she'll be somewhere else, which is all she's ever really wanted for as long as she can remember.

The plane is starting to move, the pilot's voice crackling over the speaker first, then an attendant takes over. She keeps her eyes closed. The other times she was on a plane, she watched the ground slowly shrink away and eventually turn to clouds. This isn't like the other times.

I don't love him, she tells herself. She swallows and her ears pop. Her left hand is clinging to her right now. I don't love him.

It sounds like truth.

Eleanor Calder @EleanorCalder
Hello Italy.
5:13 AM - 4 Jul 14

Eleanor has kicked off her sandals so that she can press her toes into the cool cobblestones underneath the cafe table. There's a light breeze and a guy sitting across the table from her, talking about something she doesn't care about, construction or interior design or something. She'd met him earlier at a coffee shop, and his smile had made him kind of look like Louis.

He doesn't look like Louis now, the jaw and the accent and the everything wrong, and she wishes she'd never agreed to meet him for lunch.

There's a song playing over the speakers, faint on the wind but infinitely more interesting than this guy. It reminds Eleanor of Louis, the soft lilting melody and words she can't quite understand.

Two weeks in Italy have browned Eleanor's skin and lightened her heart more than she ever thought possible when she was on the plane, which had been not at all ever again. She thinks maybe she'll be all right eventually.

Jul 20, 13.03
Eleanor: Heard a song, it reminded me of you .xx

Eleanor fidgets with her phone, waiting for Louis to reply. The guy (why can't she remember his name? Paul? Pierre?) is still droning on, apparently not needing her to contribute her opinion of crenellation to the conversation. He barely even breaks off when the waitress brings them their drinks. Eleanor sips at her coffee and tries to get Paul/Pierre to talk about something interesting without much success.

Jul 20, 13.10
Louis: That's nice babe.

"What do you think?" Paul/Pierre asks, and Eleanor looks up at him in confusion, a smile teasing at her lips. The response is just so Louis. She misses him, she can admit that much to herself. Paul/Pierre's eyebrows furrow. "Are you okay?"