Broken Connections

I.

The cigarette stuck between my lips does almost nothing to calm my nerves. The habit is something I wasn't all that proud of, but with the lack of parental supervision over the past four years I had picked it up somewhere along the way. It had started just as a social thing, I only smoked while I was out drinking with friends, but the addiction quickly set in. I know my mom won't be happy with me when I get home, and I plan to quit soon, but I need something to help me get through this flight. In the past four years I have been on eleven flights, and yet I am still terrified of flying, at least ten of those last eleven I had been with him, he held my hand and comforted me the whole time, and now I had to think about the fact that I'm leaving for good, with no immediate plans to see him again. But I didn't want to think about that, I had cried enough in the last week about him, now I just need to calm my fucking mind and get over it, it's the only way I'll possibly make it through this flight. I sucked in another breath of smoke before blowing it into the abyss and butting out my leftover cigarette in the ash tray at the entrance of the airport.

As I walk through the sliding glass doors I hear a voice over the loud speaker.

"Last call for flight 277 to Toronto, please check in and go through security as soon as possible."

My flight, there's no turning back now, I'm going home and I'm never going to see Harry again, or at least not in the foreseeable future. I pull out my passport and boarding pass and head to the line for security, which is relatively short seeing as it's 3 am on a Wednesday, the only people in line are a few men and women dress in business attire, I assume on business trips, and me. Once through security I move on to gate 14, seeing that boarding has started already. I find my seat toward the back of the plane in between a younger looking girl, who I'm sure was on her way home from backpacking around Europe as her clothes were well worn and she looked as though she hadn't had a good long comfortable sleep in months, and an older man in a suit, who I'm guessing is one of the aforementioned business men on his way to Toronto for a business trip. I wonder if he had to pay for his own ticket or if his company was just too cheap to buy him a ticket in business class. Finally I feel comfortable enough to take the over the counter sleeping aid that Harry provided me for the flight so I could sleep through the flight, instead of worrying about falling out of the sky.

"Excuse me, miss? You just have to put your seat back into sitting position, with your tray up for take off, after that you'll be free to sleep."

The flight attendant looked at me with an annoyed look, I knew that those were the rules, I was just hoping that nobody would notice. The flight was almost empty, only about 150 people occupied the seats. I looked around as the plane started moving, the slow taxi to the runway felt like an eternity. As we speed up, getting ready for take off, I sucked in a deep breath. It was one of the tips for calming myself Harry always used to remind me of. Deep breath in, hold for five seconds, slow breath out and repeat. It hardly helped though, my knuckles were still white as I gripped the seat with all my might.

As soon as we were in the air I moved to a vacant row of seats to lay out and sleep the 8 hour flight away. It only took me a few moments until I was comfortable, and drifted off into a restless sleep.

---

'Oh my god, I'm so sorry! I wasn't watching where I was going! I've got to find my way around here so I don't have my nose stuck in my map. You're the third person I've walked into today! Literally walked into! I'm like a bumper car. I should shut up now.' I say awkwardly, I knew I should have taken the campus tour, but I just wanted to explore the city.

'It's okay love, everyone is a little lost on their first day. Can I help you find you way around?' The stranger says to me. I look up at him, and see the brightest green eyes, and long brown locks, and I mean his hair is almost longer than mine.