Wings in Alabama

Chapter 4

The next week flew by. It was filled with goodbyes, year book signings, and trash bags for lockers and binders. On Wednesday afternoon, right after sixth period, I was dragged away from school and to my mom's grey Subaru Toyota.

The day before we left, Mom clarified that I couldn't bring my cell phone on the trip. I couldn't believe this; she expected me to spend almost all of my summer with no phone? I wouldn't be able to bare the isolation from my social society, I didn't even know my best friend's number, let alone mine.

Even if I did, I couldn't use my mom's phone or anyone else's, also because I'd have to call her. I mean, come on, who honestly uses a cell phone to call people.

I ended up packing my IPad instead, along with other items I wasn't grounded from. We'd thrown our suit cases and bags into the back of Mom's car in the morning, to be ready after she got us out.

Three thirty-six, I could tell Mom was getting anxious. Her fingers did tap dances along the rim of the steering wheel and she got that twitch in her left eye that she always got when she was nervous. As Mom did her own thing, Emily was quoting random Potter-Puppet-Pals episodes, from Wizard Swears (such as "Dobby's Sock", which I rather liked) to "Happy Hogwarts Birthday". I belted out lyrics to all the songs on the radio that we listened to. Three forty-four, Emily was singing "The Mysterious Ticking Noise" on loop, my mom couldn't take it any more, and obviously blamed me and Em for it all.

"BE QUIET!!!!!"

Em and I immediately quieted down. A blanket of silence befell the car's interior, and I thought of a cricket chirping in silence. The memory almost made me giggle, but I knew better. I noticed that as soon as we had quieted down that Mom had stopped shaking and tapping and leaned back in her seat a little.

What seemed like hours of silence (which it wasn't, it was really, like, four minutes) gave us the time to see that Capitol Regions National Airport was coming into view. A few more silence hours (again, only, like, four minutes) and we were inside the airport's parking lot.

Our new issue was finding a parking spot. It took longer than I thought; every level was packed with cars. I took a breath to ask my mother something, but she silenced me with a twist of her hand. Her eyes were trained on the level in front of her, also packed with cars. Suddenly, Mom wrenched the wheel to the left, and I was slung up against my car door. When I picked myself up from the window, the car was settled nicely between two white lines.

Mom breathed a sigh of relief and slumped back in her chair. She folded her arms peacefully and closed her eyes. A few moments passed until I decided to speak. "Uh, Mom? Don't we have a plane to catch?"

She nodded slowly, her eyes still closed. She didn't even bother to turn her head my way.

"And what time is the flight?" I asked, hoping to trigger something.

"Four forty," she answered peacefully, then her eyes shot open. "Four forty! Get out, now girls!"

She didn't have to tell us twice. Emily and I jumped out the doors and grabbed our luggage from the trunk and ran to the door. We stopped about twice to give Mom some time to catch up, then ran some more. This is gonna take a while, I thought.

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I guess it didn't take that long, because we were sitting in the lobby and waiting for a plane that was only five minutes away. Emily had found Mom's phone and was searching random stuff on You-Tube, probably more Potter-Puppet-Pals.

"Attention passengers," spoke a clear voice from the intercom. "The 4:40 flight to Birmingham, Alabama is ready to board. Please form a straight line at the front desk in the East Wing."

I think the word straight has lost all value, because a lot of people were scampering to the line in a big hurry. Thankfully, I grabbed Em and Mom just in time to get squished between two rather large people. It was uncomfortable, but we weren't that far from the door. The line moved slowly, and finally we gave the flight attendant our tickets.

We ran onto the plane and immediately parked ourselves in the middle row. We shoved our carry-ons in the little compartment below the seats and quickly buckled ourselves in.

After the plane took off, I grabbed a pillow and wedged it between the back of my head and the seat. "Wake me when we get to Alabama, okay? Good."

And with that, I fell into a deep sleep.

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I was barefoot in the white jumpsuit again. I was still running, like I'd never jumped off the cliff. This time, none of the kids were in front of me. I was alone and on my own.

The black hearse sped on after me, and the cries of the mob grew ever louder. Suddenly, a sharp pain stabbed my shoulder blades. I cried out in pain and fell on my knees. I dared to look behind me and see what had caused the pain, but there was nothing.

I pushed myself off the ground and continued running, probably for my life. I gritted my teeth as the pain in my shoulder blades grew and gravel pushed into the soft underside of my feet. The cliff shortly came into view.

This time, I didn't hesitate, skid to a halt, or look behind me. I jumped straight into the air and free-fell down the edge of the cliff. I fell like a pencil with my head first and feet above me.

The nightmare froze once more, and I awoke to find Emily shaking my shoulders. "Get up, we're in Alabama," she yelled in my ear.

I shoved her away and looked around the plane. The passengers were getting their carry-on luggage and waiting in the aisles to get off the plane. A flight attendant with curly brown hair walked around to make sure everything was in order as another one directed for us to leave.

We were the last ones to go out, and we grabbed our luggage as soon as we saw it in Birmingahm's airport. After we'd just began to roll the suitcases, a woman with blond hair ran up to my mom and embraced her tightly, as if she was the last person she'd ever see. Mom hugged her back, then they started talking so rapidly that I couldn't understand them.

A man with dark brown hair took the bags from us and hugged Mom, giving the woman to come to Emily and I and hug us both. I guessed that these two people were aunt Kat and uncle Mike. I didn't have that much time to think before they herded us to a dark blue Honda Fit and started on a 1½ hour drive to Tuscaloosa.