A Journey 1

The tiny plane from Houston to Tucson is so small that there isn’t actually room for my carry-on bag in the overhead locker, and the very strange flight attendant, who has - dreads I think they are – but greying blonde, and tightly pinned up in a hairnet, so that it looks as if he has some kind of weird fungal growth on top of his head, or a cranial malformation, like they used to give actors on Star Trek in the nineteen seventies to make them look like aliens.

Anyway, he makes threatening announcements over the intercom as we board, about flinging bags that don’t fit off the plane, and rather alarmingly, their owners too - so I push mine in as far as it will go under the seat in front of me and hope he won’t notice. It’s fucking uncomfortable though. The woman next to me – a little old lady in a bright blue denim jacket – pulls down the seat-back table and proceeds to wipe it carefully, then she does the same to the handle on the window blind, then the window frame itself. I’ve heard stories of people who have an obsession with germs. How tiresome and time-consuming it must be to have a compulsion to clean clean clean like that.

We take off – and that’s always exciting in a small plane – it feels more like an adventure. Once we’re in the air I can relax a little about the bag crime I’m committing – he’s hardly going to throw me off mid-flight. There are still only about ten centimeters of legroom, but it’s not too bad.

I haven’t slept for twenty-four hours and so I drift off into my thoughts quite easily – it makes the time pass more quickly. Zachy didn’t want me to come – he was against the whole thing. We spent the day before in my car, driving through the countryside and he went on and on about it – he said
why go on a ten hour journey to get your heart broken – why not do it by phone or something, or maybe wait a bit – wait until after your birthday, perhaps once you’ve got used to living alone. And I said no, I had to know now. I couldn’t carry on in this limbo. Then I explained how it’s so impossible to talk from five thousand miles away, and so then he just hugged me and said he’d keep his fingers crossed. I’m so lucky to have him back in my life.

It isn’t a long flight – two and a half hours - and that soon slips past. We never seem to go all that high, so you can see the ground below the whole time – a fairytale desert landscape – empty and brown and hot-looking. It’s beautiful to look at and also brings back memories of the first time I came – how exciting and terrifying it was. I don’t think I’ll ever forget.

Soon we’re descending, and the woman takes her tissues out and starts to clean again – she must be nervous. Looking out of the window, it’s getting interesting now as Tucson is beginning – it’s such a strange city – low and brown – laid out below like that - sun baked dusty brown, with hardly any green. You can make out the little houses – so spaced out, so different, the sun glinting on the few skyscrapers downtown – god it looks hot. I’m still half-excited; it feels like such a long time since I saw him, although it was only a few months ago, and I am looking forward to it. This time it’s different though –because there is another reason for me coming– this time it might be the end.

There are two girls in the seats across the aisle from me and they begin to apply makeup, smiling to themselves every now and again– they must be doing the same thing as me.

We have to put our seats back into the upright position, and sit, listening and watching while the plane’s wheels hit the runway and there’s that horrible grinding sound, the hard braking of the engines and that ten second panic that we might not be able to stop. One of the girls across the way gives a little whoop as we touch down and I try to imagine who she’s meeting and if he feels the same way about her. Then I think about him too; he’ll be on the way to meet me, and I wonder what he’s thinking about, what words he’s rehearsing.

When the taxiing is over, the rush to be out of the door begins, the anxious shuffle down the aisle. Suddenly it’s slightly harder to swallow and my mouth feels dry. I try to talk myself into believing that it’s just going to be a nice fun time with someone I love, but it’s useless – it’s not going to be like that whatever happens, and I walk fast down the endless corridors of the arrivals building. I want to get it over and done with. Then at least I’ll know.