Out Of The Sky

My bad day started with a two-hour sit in the airport lounge. 

Perhaps if Oh had remembered her passport, and my brother hadn't had his license revoked two weeks earlier, I would have made my flight in time and my mum wouldn't have had to come and buy us all new tickets as well as save my brother from being arrested.

"You children can be so stupid sometimes," she scolded us as we took our suitcases to luggage. A man loaded it onto a cart and we began back toward the lounge to wait out two hours for the next flight. "I told you near fifty times to remember your passports, even you, Ophelia. And don't even get me started on Harris--"

"Okay, mom, I get it," Harris groaned from behind us. I glanced over my shoulder at him, with his sandy Bieber-esque hair falling down over his eager blue eyes. For a twenty-one year old, he was sure looking young. Younger than me, even. The fours years between us was really just a number. Harris, being a childish traveler with no job, and then me, a girl fresh out of school and ready for university after my three week's break. 

Harris was a tall, skinny, yet toned lad. He had a fresh, teenage face and could never tie down to a single girl. In the past year he had been with several girls for a maximum of two weeks at a time before he moved on and a slew of ragged, teary phone messages and nighttime drive-bys to diss my mother came in from his previous perky, too-nice-to-handle girlfriend. He was a heartbreaker, and he certainly accepted it. The thing was, he always promised my mum he would change for the better, find a girl who he could fall for. But he never did.

I was used to it; my mom wasn't. 

"You know I was only doing the right thing, mum," he called after her. "Right, T?" I ran a hand through my messy platinum hair, rolling my eyes. 

"No, not at all, actually," I said sharply, looking back at him. "You told me you retook your driver's test!" He held his large hands up in defense. 

"Okay, okay," he agreed, "fine. It won't happen again. Promise." To help himself further, he came into speed with mum and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She smiled slightly at him and nodded. 

We got to the airport lounge with an hour and forty-five minutes to spare, and mum decided we could handle everything after that point. She gave me a quick kiss on the forehead, a light hug, and said a well-thought-out, openly painful, "Goodbye, Thalia. I'll see you in a week," before turning around and walking away. 

"Love you too, mum," I muttered under my breath before being attacked by a hug. Harris' spindly arms clenched around my frame tightly, slowly releasing all the air in my lungs. I managed to wrench him off of me, and he quickly attacked Oh. She looked to me for help, but I sat down on the rickety lounge bench and watched instead. After she had slipped free from him, the two sat on either side of me and we began talking about everything and anything to pass two hours by. 

---

"Well, this is it," Harris said, nodding toward the terminal. "My baby sister is off for a week." he gave me a quick hug and began backpedalling away from me. "I love you, T! Expect big hugs when you get back because I'm that kind of brother!" he turned around and I did as well, walking away to show a pretty young woman my ticket and passport. Oh and I eventually boarded the plane and took our seats. 

Considering my mum was herself, she wanted to give us the best experience possible by booking us a secluded, almost private flight on a smaller sized plane. The second we boarded, I noticed a curtained area in the back. I figured they were holding something of importance back there. 

The airplane seats were comfortable enough that I could fall asleep, but only until we had began lifting off after a good forty-five minutes. That was when Oh shook me awake and told me to buckle up. We took off and a perky flight attendant came past with her cart. 

I took a bottle of water and a small bag of chips to snack on, and Oh took the same. 

"Cheers for a long and boring flight to Florida," I said, clinking water bottles with Oh. She nodded and took a large gulp from the plastic container.