Finding Her

“Hello and welcome to O’Hare International Airport. At this time, Northwest Airlines would like to begin boarding flight number 765 at gate C14. If you are seated in rows one through five, please approach the gate at this time. Thank you.” She glanced at her ticket one last time to assure herself that this was her flight and that she was seated in 5B.
“Here goes nothing,” she muttered to herself as she grabbed her coat and slung her purse around her shoulder. She walked up to the gate, with her Prada heals clacking on the tile floor, and took her place in line. As she stood there, she caught a glimpse of herself in a nearby glass window. Everything from the buttons on her designer black blazer to the hemline of her matching skirt was intact. Not even a strand of her long, light brown hair fell out of place from the tight pony she wore it in. However, her face looked as if it had aged ten years in one week. Although her make-up was impeccable, the lines around her mouth and on her forehead had deepened immensely along with the development of dark bags under her hazel eyes.
Repulsed by her appearance, she immediately diverted her attention to the tall and slightly robust man ahead of her. He had been staring at her for quite some time, probably, she thought, disgusted by her startling appearance. The man reminded her of something directly out of a classic John Wayne western, with his cowboy hat and boots, accompanied by a leather vest, blue jeans and a belt buckle the size of Texas.
He flashed her a smile, but instead of the expected off-white teeth, she was unpleasantly surprised by gaping holes and decayed gums. Dues to the odor of tobacco flooding out of his mouth, she concluded the damage had been done by chewing tobacco.
“Howdy,” he said, tipping his hat. She smiled back, but then quickly directed her attention toward the cell phone lying dormant in her purse, pretending as if it had begun vibrating. Removing the phone, she called her voicemail, validating her charade. As expected, there were no messages. Ordinarily, she was never one to engage in conversations with complete strangers; they were always awkward, brimming with odds and ends of pointless information and endless life stories. As interesting as his appearance suggested, she was not in the disposition to hears about the man’s life; hers was enigmatic enough as it was.
The line began to move expediently and in a short period of time, she was at the head. “Ma’am, may I see your ticket?” the flight attendant asked. She handed her the ticket. The flight attendant took it, scanned it and handed it back to her in one swift movement and said, “Thank you.” For a moment, she hesitated taking the ticket back. Starring at it, she did not know whether or not she had to strength or the capability to follow through with “it”. “Ma’am,” the flight attendant interrupted her thoughts.
“Yes,” she replied.
“Your ticket ma’am.”
This time, she snatched the ticket without thinking and walked through the gate.
Boarding the plane, she was struck by a thick wall of stale, recycled air. The pilot and his crew warmly greeted her, however, she avoided all eye contact with them. People, she felt, in general, were too difficult for her to deal with at the moment.
Walking down the aisle, she had begun to search for her seat. She looked above the seats where the aisle numbers were listed. She passed aisle one, two, three, four and finally came to aisle five. Looking down, to her surprise, she found the cowboy man seated next to her in the window seat. He smiled again, this time not revealing the decadence of his mouth, and said, “What are the chances.”
She half smiled back and muttered, “Obviously, they are not in my favor.” She couldn’t help but feel a certain animosity and disdain toward him, knowing it was going to be a very long flight.
She took her seat and placed her purse under the chair. For a moment, she thought she might take a nap, however, she couldn’t manage to get comfortable in the stiff seat. “So, where you headed?” the man asked, initiating conversation.
“Out east,” she replied.
“You goin’ there on business or something’?”
“Sure.” The shortness of her answers kept him quiet for a while, but he was persistent.
“You know what? I bet you’re nervous ‘bout flyin’. You know, sittin’ next to the window always helps. You wanna switch seats?” She looked at him and then the window. Suddenly, a twinge of her inner child surfaced and she felt giddy and excited. As a child, the window seat had always been her favorite. Watching the clouds mold into different shapes and viewing the microscopic building and cars had been fascinating to her.
She looked back at the man and, without hesitation, replied, “Sure.” As she rose from her seat, grabbing her coat and purse, he slid over into it. For a moment, she was somewhat bothered by the fact that he had not been courteous enough to move out into the aisle so she could take her seat comfortably. She had to squeeze her way between him and the seat to his front. Although it was some what awkward, she hadn’t minded it as much as she had expected. Intuitively, she knew he hadn’t done it intentionally to derive some sort of sick and twisted pleasure. He was, she guessed, 20 years older than her own 26, but there was also something about his voice and overall kind demeanor that signified his interest was pure curiosity. She took his seat and once again, without success, attempted to get comfortable.
“Good morning. This is your pilot speaking. We will commence lift-off in several minutes. It’s about 4:10 am here in Chicago. We are running according to schedule this morning. Therefore, the duration of our flight will be a little over 90 minutes. Now, if you would please direct your attention to the front of the plane…” She droned out the rest of the pilot’s soliloquy.
“So, you said you were headin’ out east. Where in particular?” the man started in again.
“Near New York,” she lied.
“What company you work for?”
“Excuse me?” she replied forgetting their earlier conversation.
“Oh, you just said you were goin’ on business before,” he said.
“Yes, I am. My job is a little hard to explain,” she lied again.
“Well what do you deal with? Writin’, engineerin’, …”
“Can I ask you a question?” she interrupted.
“Shoot.”
“Why is my life any of your business? Do I look like an open book?” she asked indignantly.
“I’m sorry, but I was just…”
“Look,” she interrupted again, massaging her right temple, “ I’m not trying to be rude or anything, but your ignorance to my indifference is starting to irritate me. If you don’t mind, I’d prefer it if you left me alone.”
Shocked by her bitter words, he nodded his head and turned toward the front of the plane. By the solemn expression on his face, she could tell that she had profoundly hurt him, but she was glad he would no longer be a nuisance.
Several minutes later, the plane began to lift off and as every second past, they elevated higher and higher. Soon, they were above the thick layer of white cumulus clouds. The sun was starting inch it’s way above the distant horizon. They look exactly like snow, she mused while intently staring out the window. As a child, she had enjoyed endless hours of building snow men and sledding during the winter months. Her parents had paid for expensive trips to the Swiss Alps every year, leaving her with the nanny while they hit the double diamond ski courses.
They also loved to through beautifully extravagant winter balls in their mansion, making them the envy of all their friends and enemies. She loved them; that was undeniable. However, she had loathed their worship of materialistic objects. They were always attempting to surpass every person they met by purchasing foreign cars and shopping at expensive boutiques.
She had always felt somewhat out of place as a child. Of course, now, she knew, they had had enough time to embed narcissism into her soul , but she had by no means been concerned with such frivolous affairs during her younger years. She could remember most of her childhood friend’s obsessions with constant spending. In contrast, she was always the one saving money. She had even insisted on getting a part-time job as a teenager at a nearby restaurant. That had enraged her parents.
Everybody knew she was different, but they could never quite articulate exactly what made her so foreign to them. Even she, herself, was unsure of what had prevented her from fitting into her parent’s society until a little under a week ago.
Continuing to stare at the mass of clouds, a distant memory began to permeate her thoughts. She was a little girl, no more than the age of 18 months. Dressed up in her winter gear, she was playing in the snow. Smiling and giggling, she tossed small piles of snow into the air, allowing individual flakes to fall back to the earth, brushing her rosy cheeks. A woman in a red pea coat with a green and blue striped hat and a matching scarf stood in front of her tossing snow into the air as well. She swirled in circles gracefully as the flakes fell back down on to her face. She was glowing with laughter and smiles. Although she could not make out her face, she could tell this woman was absolutely beautiful. She wanted to stay there, in that memory, for an eternity; something about her soothed and comforted her more than anything had in her life. However, the woman turned and began to run away and faded off into the distance. Her laughter became a faint echo and then nothing at all. There she was, all alone, in the middle of an endless stretch of the cold, white snow.
“Ma’am, would you like a drink?” a flight attendant asked, relieving her of the clouds’ trance.
“Uh…no, no thank you,” she replied in little more than a whisper.
“Do you think he would want one?” the flight attendant asked, indicating the man seated next to her. He was sleeping with his head resting on his left shoulder.
“I’m sure he’ll be fine. Don’t bother to wake him.” The flight attendant nodded and pushed the drink cart further down the aisle.
Watching him sleep, she remembered what she had said to him before. For a moment, she regretted acting inhumane toward him. However, the regret soon subsided and was replaced by confusion.
Who was that woman? It couldn’t be her, could it? However, she knew it was her. Was that a real memory or something I just made up? No it’s real, it has to be. How could she do this to me? She just left me with incomplete memories and emptiness. How could they lie to me about who they were for all those years? Why did I believe their lies. I knew something wasn’t right. Why couldn’t I figure it out? Had anybody else ever figured it out? Did she tell him about me or did she keep it a secret? Was it her only option? Is she really as beautiful as I imagined her? Does she even look like me? What will we talk about? Maybe she likes to write like I do. I wonder if she’ll be impressed by my job and achievements. God, why am I already seeking her approval? I’ve never even met the woman! I don’t even know what her economic status is. I wonder if she will she ask me for money once she finds out I’m wealthy? No, she wouldn’t do that. She would at least wait until the second time we meet for that if she even needs money. Maybe she won’t need it. Maybe she’s well-off. We could go shopping then. I wonder what her favorite…
Suddenly, her thoughts were interrupted by a violent quake. The airplane cabin begun to vibrate and shake rapidly from side to side. The plane took a severe nose dive and she had the odd sensation of her stomach jumping up into her throat. She clutched down on both arm rests, but on her left, she found the man’s hand. Fully awake, he looked over at her with an assurance in his eyes, trying to alleviate her obvious fear.
The plane leveled out and the shaking slowly came to a halt. She loosened the grip on his hand, leaving nail indentations in his skin.
“Sorry,” she said once she had regained her ability to speak.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said raising his hand for inspection. “It ain’t bleedin’ or nothin’. No damage done.”
“No, not just that. I was very rude to you before. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that. You deserve an explanation.”
“It’s okay. That isn’t necessary,” he replied.
“No, it is. I want to get it off my chest. I need to tell somebody about it before I implode,” she began slowly. “I’m…I’m traveling out east to meet my biological mother for the first time. I was adopted at the age of two and I’ve never even spoken to her before . She doesn’t even know I’m coming. I just recently found out about her a little under a week ago after my adoptive parents died in a car accident. I found the papers looking through their files. I just… I feel so stupid and naïve for not figuring it out sooner.” She paused for a moment, contemplating what to say next. “I guess I’m scared that she would be able to accept me or that she won’t want anything to do with me. I don’t think I can handle it if she turns me away.”
“She won’t,” he said, grabbing her left hand to comfort her.
“How do you know?” she asked, earnestly searching his eyes for an answer.
“This world has a funny way of makin’ everything work out just fine,” he said. “Have a little faith and things will be okay.” She knew he truly believed what he said was the absolute truth and that was enough to assuage her fears. How could a man she had been so ruthless to, she wondered, be the single solitary person to soothe her worries and heal her woes?
Inspecting him more closely, she noticed the lines around his mouth and on his forehead were cut deep and the dark bags under his hazel eyes were prominent. As they began to descend into the vibrant sunrise, she looked deeper into his eyes and saw herself.