SLIPPING (B.E.)

{five}

hi friends i wuv u all thanks for the adorable comments <3.

3 weeks later.

i planted my feet on the stickers on the ground and stood as instructed, although quite stiffly. even though i knew there was nothing on me i wasn't supposed to have, any type of security screening always made my anxiety skyrocket.

they waved through once the machine was done scanning. i breathed a quiet sigh of relief and went to stand with billie where she was collecting all her things back into her bag.

i followed her lead, quickly stuffing everything into my backpack before i slung it over my shoulder and looked up to billie to see where to go next. which, brings me to something else:

i had never traveled by plane before.

my parents had never taken me or my siblings on a vacation by flight before. so, for me, this first time being in the airport was steadily building up my anxiety. the thought of flying had always made me shiver. the whole three weeks with billie i'd been trying desperately hard not to think about it. and now that i had to think about it, i tried to keep an open mind. maybe it isn't so bad. maybe what everyone told you about turbulence was exaggerated. but the snake just constricted tighter around my chest.

"are you hungry?" billie asked, looking up briefly from her phone. but before i could say no, she added: "you should probably eat something anyway, you didn't have much earlier,"

i heaved a light sigh. "'kay," i mumbled.

billie giggled a little. "there's a mcdonalds' here, we could get you another happy meal?" she winked at me at the reference to our first meeting. but i had a different perspective on what she just said.

"do you want me to regress? here?" i asked, my voice flat despite my incredulity. actually, since that day three weeks ago i hadn't age regressed. it wasn't that i didn't want to, i just couldn't. i had tried a couple times, but it had felt so far away. it was unusual for me to go that long without regressing.

her eyes widened in shock. "n-no! not unless you want to, of course. if you do that's fine, i've got you," she placed her hand on my lower back in a reassuring and protective way.

i rolled my eyes and shrugged her off in mild annoyance. i hadn't slept great last night, and that piled on top of everything else was making me grumpy.

"hey," billie scolded, gently but firmly. "don't be like that. i was just asking a question. how about we go to freshii?"

feeling bad, i nodded and mumbled an apology. billie ruffled my hair affectionately then took my hand and led me to the restaurant.

when we were up front in line, billie surprised me by ordering for me. maybe it shouldn't surprise me, but my parents had always told me having someone order for you when you were perfectly capable of doing it yourself was for kids. maybe i'm overthinking it. maybe she just didn't think about it, or maybe she had picked up on my anxiety and thought it was because i worried about ordering. i mean, sure, i had to rehearse it in my head a few times first but i could order fine, usually without stuttering.

i shook my head to clear it of these thoughts. probably she was just being nice. yes, that must be it.

a few minutes into our meal, a few bubbly teenagers came over to talk/fangirl over billie. billie was nice, talking with them, taking pictures, and giving them a few hugs. it was cute, i took a short video myself from under the table.

as i watched, while slowly picking at my food, i realized this was sort of how i'd imagined my first meeting with billie would have been like if we hadn't been mates.