"What are the odds, huh?" The man who knocked his case into mine says as he claims the other spot in the overhead compartment. "I always wondered how the airlines decided on zone numbers. You would think we would be in the same zone if we’re sharing a row, right?"
"It would make sense," I say, pulling out the laminated emergency landing card from the seat pocket in front of me.
"We won’tcrash," the man utters while getting comfortable in his seat.
I continue staring at the words on the emergency landing card, then glance over, watching as the man scrolls through his Twitter feed.If he is, in fact, around my age, I’m surprised he isn’t scanning Instagram or Snapchat. Twitter seemsold-schoolthese days.
"I wasn’t thinking we are going to crash," I inform him. "But, thank you for the reassurance."
He lifts his gaze from his phone and studies me for a moment. His eyes are the color of cinnamon but have speckles of gold shimmering from the sun glowing in through the window behind me. His hair is combed back, slicked without a strand out of place, and he has a small freckle in the center of his top lip. I didn’t look at him too closely after our minor crash encounter at the gate but seeing him clearer now, I can’t help but feel like he has a familiar look to him. Maybe he has one of those common-looking faces.
"You seem stressed out is all," he says, shrugging his shoulders.
"I am very stressed, but not because of flying."
The man holds his hand up as if to apologize. "Sorry, I didn’t mean to assume."
"No worries.”
He nods his head before refocusing his attention on Twitter.
"I didn’t think anyone still used Twitter," I utter in the same manner he spoke to me.
"We will never see each other again after this flight, so tell me why you’re stressed out. I’m not one of those people who can digest a statement as such, and pretend like it wasn’t said. I realize we don’t know each other, but sometimes a stranger is the best person to talk to, right?"
I place the emergency landing card down on my lap and fold my hands before looking back in his direction. "First, tell me why your hands were shaking when you arrived at the gate?" I counter.
"I had a bad night," he responds
"Going home or visiting?" I ask.
"Going home," he says. "You?"
I sigh and glance out the window for a long drawn out second before turning back. "As of twenty minutes ago, I’m going home."
The man seems perplexed by my statement, which is fine because I feel the same.
"What’s your name?" he asks me.
"Let’s not ..."
"Fair enough," he says. "You know ... you look like someone I once knew." That’s odd. Maybe we met once. I rarely forget people, but I can’t seem to think straight now, either.
My graduating class had seventy students, and they are all connected to me on Facebook, so I don’t know where we would have met or why we look familiar to each other. Maybe college, I guess.
"It’s the red hair. You know one redhead, and you think you know us all," I jest.
I lean my head back against the flat seat back, trying to find a comfortable position with my hair tied in a tight knot on the back of my head. It’s not happening with the small space I have to move around. I tug on my hair elastic and release my strands, making it so I can rest my head back and in the curve of the chair.
The man beside me shifts in his seat as if the act of dropping my hair over my shoulders makes him uncomfortable. "Your hair smells nice," he says.
Strangers don’t say this to each other, but judging by the surprised look on his face, I’m guessing he must have realized this too. I try to unfurl my eyebrows as I thank him in what comes out sounding more like a question than a response.
"Sorry, I—"
“It’s okay,” I tell him.
My nerves are becoming more prominent, and my stomach is twisting into its regular knot of stress. I want to sleep this flight away. I close my eyes and do my best to focus on clearing my mind. I need to have a clear mind before the plane lands. I can’t be the weak link in my family. They need me to be strong again ... somehow.
