Thinking Out Loud

Chapter 5

"Will you please stop panicking?! Our gates only just opened. Chill out!"
"I can't, I'm too paranoid," Joe said, his voice giving away that he wanted to run for their gate but Dianne's presence was keeping him back.
"Joe, we aren't going to miss our flight. Will you please walk with me, instead of walking ahead of me?" Joe dropped back sheepishly so that he was stood next to Dianne, trying his hardest to match his pace to hers.
"Thank you."

Within minutes, they got to their gate and joined the back of the queue of people waiting to board the plane. Not long after they had arrived, they'd shown their boarding passes and passports and had walked the length of a tunnel to the plane. They showed their boarding passes to a member of the cabin crew and were directed to their seats. They were flying to Australia and Joe had managed to upgrade their seats to business class; it was a long way and they both wanted to be prepared for the busy two weeks they were about to have. Being together, the couple had been given the two seats in the middle, locked away on either side from the rest of the plane. Joe left their hand luggage at the bottom end of his section and sat down in his seat, Dianne next to him.
"This plane is sick!" She whispered, the excitement of her first time in business class sparkling from her eyes.
"You like it then?" Joe asked with an eyebrow raised.
"Oh god yeh, it's so cool."
"You can make your seat into a bed."
"Shut up," Dianne said abruptly as her eyes widened in excitement.
Joe snorted. "Yeh, I'll show you how later."

"Right, so you put this bit down." Joe stood up and released a little bit at the end of the compartment, it was like a theatre seat, "that's for your feet. And then," he leaned over Dianne, "you press this button and..." his voice drifted away as Dianne's seat slowly began to form into a bed, reclining backwards until she was fully laid down. Joe smiled softly at the look of pure happiness in his girlfriends eyes as she stared up at him, her seat now fully back.
"Thank you." Joe leaned down further and pressed a kiss to Dianne's lips quickly before sitting back in his own seat, not yet made into a bed.

"Dianne," Joe whispered, gently shaking her shoulders, "Dianne, wake up."
"Uh."
"You need to wake up, we are about to start the descent and you need to be awake."
"Okay." Dianne opened her eyes slowly and was met with Joe's icy blue ones gazing at her. Seeing she was awake, Joe reached over her seat and pressed the button to bring it back up to a chair, not a bed. As the announcement that they were starting the descent rang through the cabin, Dianne clasped Joe's hand, stroking over the back of his palm with her thumb.
"Is your seatbelt on Di?" Joe asked, leaning over slightly to check.
"Yep."
"Good." Dianne smiled at his protective nature and kept her eyes focused on him as he tried to find a window to look out of for the descent.
"I can feel you staring," he said after a minute, "there are holes being burnt into the back of my head as we speak." Joe turned round and caught Dianne out, revelling in the blush that crept up her neck as her dimple deepened.

"Oh my god, it's hot!" Joe gasped as he stepped out of the airport.
"You baby, this is verging on cold for Australia," Dianne said as she walked beside him; the sudden blast of heat had not affected her. "It's a nice temperature actually but it's only 6 in the morning. It's going to get a whole lot hotter. This is a tad warmer than winter."
"It is quite nice, but if this is what your winters are like, I'm so jealous." Dianne grinned at him as he spoke.
"I live in the Uk now remember, I'm more acclimatised to the weather there than I am here! But this is still, what would you say? Chilly maybe?"
"Maybe, way in the future, it would be nice if we could share our time. Be here for a few months, and then the Uk for a few months?" Joe suggested.
"That would be great. But work; dance gets in the way of everything."
"Well, maybe when we've got a family of our own, or when we are pensioners-"
"No. I'm not spending hours upon hours cooped up in a metal tin that flys through the sky when I'm old. I want a break at some point in my busy life, thank you." 
"Okay," Joe laughed, "don't bite my head off!"
"You're annoying," Dianne moaned.
"I know, but you love it." Joe grinned as he kissed Dianne's cheek playfully. "Don't deny it."
"I love you, not sure about the annoying side that comes with it," she said with a sarcastic tone, rolling her eyes at the boyish grin on her boyfriends face.
"Well, unfortunately for you, I come as a meal deal. Nice me, annoying me, romantic me."
"Awwww," Dianne sighed as she ran a hand over her stomach. "That's reminded me how hungry I am." Bursting out laughing, Joe looked at Dianne to see a smile crack on her face.
"Do you ever not think about food?!"
"I wasn't until you started talking about a meal deal. I could really eat some of mums cooking right now."
"Well lucky for you, she's right there." Joe pointed over to a small, black-haired woman with a kind and friendly expression, Rina. Behind her, a taller man with greying hair, Mark. They had stayed back, watching their daughter interact with Joe, was something they both enjoyed doing. Being across the world, the only chance they got to see Dianne was over FaceTime and they could never really get a feel of how Joe was around her so watching them bicker like an old-married couple was something they didn't take for granted.
"They bicker like an old married couple," Mark chuckled as he took a step forward. "Come on, I want to see my girl."