Lily's POV
I'd forgotten how much I hated airports. It wasn't the flying I hated, as much as the amount of people that you had to come into contact with. For a person who had tried most of her life to avoid people, running away from any opportunity to be in a relationship, living life on the run, airports were a nightmare turned reality. And that moment when you go to enter Departures? That was the worst part. I'd come to realize over the years that there were only ever 3 types of people at an airport.
First you had people that associated the airport with sadness: leaving a loved one; more often than not, couples sharing one last tender kiss; children waving their parents goodbye as they set off on their own into the world; older faces saying farewell to their children and grandchildren, knowing it would be months, maybe years, before they would see each other again.
Then you had the people for who the airport was a joyous occasion: along-lost reunion with a friend of years gone by; the wife who's husband is back from that long trip away; families setting off or arriving on holiday somewhere near and exciting.
And then they was the category I fell into to. I hadn't really found the right word to describe "us" yet. I guess the closest thing to a definition might be "The Inbetweeners". The ones that went through Departures without so much as a glance behind them. There was no point, nobody had come to see you off, no-one to wave goodbye to at the last minute before they left your sight.
We were also the ones that had nobody to greet us with a big welcome sign once through Arrivals. We came and went through airports, without anybody really looking our way, wondering what our reasons for travelling were, without a second thought to the fact that our journey was just as important as theirs.
True, most "Inbetweeners" were businessmen, and they themselves were a category in their own right. But somehow they seemed to be able to look as though they belonged, that it was their job. And thus, were able to detach themselves from all that was involved when travelling, something I envied them.
Personally, I had to distract myself from my thoughts during the whole procedure. I had been on countless trains, buses, coaches, taxis, in my life, yet somehow flying made me forget what I was running from. It made me forget my anxieties and worries, something I had learnt was very dangerous, and it had been learnt the hard way.
Hence why I found myself sitting alone at a table in Starbucks, with my head in a book. Reading and books had always played a big part in my life. It was through books that I had first been able to escape my life that I had now left behind. I had been able to travel the world through the pages of a book and see different ways of life through the words of my favourite authors. As I got older, and started to write for myself, I was able to plan my own future, with nothing stopping me from imagining only the best way of life.
I very rarely read a romance story, it was too close to home for my taste. But I had found a copy of Lauren Willig's The Secret History of the Pink Carnation in a charity store from the last town I had left, and had been unable to put it down. The heroine was such a lovable character, someone I could sympathize with and I allowed myself in the luxury of imagining myself in her shoes, being swept off my feet by a 18th century British gentleman who loved me for who I was.
There were parts so funny, I struggled to contain my laughter. One particular passage made me giggle so hard, I didn't even realize I had made a sound until I noticed people glaring. Oops! I dropped my heads downwards, immersing myself in the story once more, pushing the annoying strand of hair that fell in front of my face away.
Suddenly, I had a strange sensation of being watched. All at once, my senses were on high alert, like they always were when I was on the move, coming out of my hiding places. I looked up to see a tall, gorgeous man looking my way. His features looked familiar somehow, the way his jawline was chiselled into perfection, his lips clearly defined against his mouth, the way he towered above everybody else, and the British accent he spoke with when paying for his coffee.
It was if he had just stepped out of my book. My British gentleman. I felt my eyes widen in surprise, as if I had never realised such people existed.
Then, before I could smile at him, he turned away, pulling his cap down over his face, as if he wanted to avoid attention. I felt the smile drain off my face.
Who was he? And more importantly, did he know who I was?
