“Passengers with the name Davis-Hodges, please report to the gate podium. There’s been a change to your seat assignment.”
Lainey sat up straighter. “Why is it that when you hear your name on a loudspeaker it always feels like you’re being called to the principal’s office?”
Elliot closed the laptop and wrestled their wonky-wheeled roller bags out from under their legs. “No idea. I was an officeaide in high school, so getting called to the principal’s office usually meant he was ordering us Subway sandwiches for lunch.”
“How did I marry such a nerd?”
Their bags knocked into their heels when the two of them bellied up to the podium.
“Is this Elaine?” the gate agent asked. She was a tall, older-looking woman with dark toned skin and dark hair tucked into a neat twist. She was smiling at Lainey. A lot.
Too much.
“Who’s asking?” Lainey answered defensively.
“Yes.” Elliot jumped in. “This is my wife.”
“Elliot tells me you’re on your honeymoon?” Lainey bit back a wicked smile. This was a scheme Lainey pulled pretty much every time they left central Wisconsin. Booked-up hotel in Chicago? Full flight out of the Minneapolis–St. Paul airport? Hour-long wait time at a Green Bay Outback Steakhouse? She hinted at a honeymoon gone wrong, and everyone from hotel maître d’s to chain restaurant waitstaff were overjoyed to swoop in and save their night.
“Yes.” Lainey tipped her head onto Elliot’s shoulder. “We’re honeymooners. Young and in love. We met on a roller coaster!” She stopped speaking at Elliot’s gentle shove at her hips.
“I’m going to upgrade you two to first class. I wouldn’t normally do this just for a honeymoon, but—” The woman’s lip quivered. Lainey’s stomach tensed. Her attempts to yell into Elliot’s brain via telepathy,Why is her lip quivering?!were met with silence. Moisture filled the woman’s eyes. “But when he told me about your condition, it became clear this wasn’t an ordinary honeymoon.”
Lainey turned slowly, the way a dying woman might, she supposed, to stare down her very sweet, very dumb husband. “Hetold you about my condition?” Lainey asked through a gritted smile.
“To think you both got married anyway. With all those odds stacked against you. It’s so special.” She wiped her eye with her navy sleeve as the printer beside her chugged out two new boarding passes. “I want you two toreallyenjoy your trip.” The gate agent handed Lainey a pair of tickets the way one might offer a treat to a dachshund they were about to euthanize.
They were silent all the way back to their seats, and then…
“What the hell, man?”
Elliot nodded violently. “Too far?”
“Way too far! Am I supposed to be dying?”
His knee shook so hard he knocked over one of their bags. “Honestly, I have no idea. I blacked out when I was talking to her. You know I’m not good at ethical gray areas. One step to the dark side, and I completely lose my bearings.”
“How about we leave the small-time scheming to me, and you just stand there and look pretty?” She pressed her hand on the top of his knee, stilling it.
Elliot’s head swiveled around the gate area, attempting nonchalance and failing miserably. “She’s still watching us. And crying. I knew I couldn’t do this. I have to come clean,” he announced.
“Absolutely not. You’re going to get us bumped from this flight. That feeling in your stomach is your lesson. Just kiss my forehead and watchGladiatorwith me,” Lainey instructed, hooking her arm through his elbow. He pressed his mouth to her temple and reset the laptop, nuzzling into her as Russell Crowe continued to drip with sweat. They made it another ten minutes, until the anxiety radiating off his body was too much to bear.
She closed her eyes and exhaled out her dreams of a transatlantic flight in pampered luxury. Elliot’s guilt would have ruined it anyhow. Hell, her own guilt might’ve.
“Would it make you feel better if we spent the next two hours searching for a worthy pair of people to trade tickets with?” she asked. His shoulders instantly relaxed.
So for the rest of their layover, they didn’t watchGladiatoror fantasize about their first-class meal. Instead, they wandered from row to row like a pair of eavesdropping Willy Wonkas until they met an older couple from Maryland, Dot and Gene, who were traveling to Paris for their fiftieth anniversary. They’d had children young, gotten married young, and had never been on a plane before today. “I’m finally taking Dot around the world, just like I promised her I would at our wedding,” he said. They couldn’t have found a worthier pair.
They watched Dot and Gene board with the first-class passengers and then settled back into their seats.
Lainey stared down at her new seat assignment. “They better take full advantage of first class. Really honor our sacrifice.”
“I’m sure they’ll get champagne drunk in our honor.” They called another boarding group over the crackly speaker. “You know what I just realized?” Elliot asked, burying his mouth into her hair. “You, Elaine Davis-Hodges, are officially no longer a resident of Wisconsin. Are you ready to go somewhere new?”
She turned her head so they were nose to nose.
“With you? More thanready.”
