Chapter Five
MILES
PRESENT
“Give me five more!”
I groan as I throw five more jabs into the focus pads my trainer is holding, pushing focused breaths from my lungs before I fall forward and rest my hands on my knees, puffing out my breath. Letting it turn ragged and uneven as I hang my head.
“Good, man.” The trainer smacks me on my back. “You go hard, I like it.”
“Yeah,” I breathe. “Thanks.”
“You good?”
I pull my body up to stand straight. “Good, man.”
“Alright, I’ve got to get out of here, but I’ll see you next time you’re in town, yeah?” I nod. Whenever that will be.
I’m in California for the night, but tomorrow I’ll be heading to Italy for my baby sister’s wedding.
I still find it crazy that she moved away from home less than a year ago and now she’s getting married to probably the nicest guy I’ve ever met in a fairytale town in Italy. It sounds like something from a book or a movie—a rom-com that people would watch over and over just to feel good .
I hate the bitter taste on my tongue as I think about how content my sister is, how full her life now seems. It only highlights the emptiness I try to pretend isn’t present in my own.
I’ve tried to ignore it, the cold emptiness that lives somewhere inside of me, but I can't, no matter how hard I try. It’s a heaviness that weighs me down with every step I take, every day that passes.
It’s one of the reasons I love to exercise when I’m on layovers; it quiets my mind.
It also helps me feel like my two feet are back on solid ground.
After spending so many years in the air, sometimes I like to feel like I have something to ground me and a way to get my body moving, letting out all the pent-up energy I get from spending hours in the cockpit.
I grab my towel off the floor of the boxing ring and swipe it across my forehead, feeling the sweat slide across my skin. Tonight was a good session; it managed to keep my mind off everything I'm going to face when I land in Italy.
I squirt a spray of water into my mouth, trying to cool myself down from the inside before I jump out of the ring and grab my bag off the floor.
“I’ll see you next time,” I yell out as I swing my bag over my shoulder and walk out the door to the gym.
The air has a bite to it tonight. The breeze cools my hot skin and sets the sweat on my forehead in place, leaving me itching for a shower. Longing for the feeling of the water on my skin.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, my mom’s contact showing up as I turn it over in my hand.
I close my eyes for a beat, letting the phone ring.
I don’t know if I have the energy for any kind of conversation with my mom right now.
It feels like I never do these days, yet guilt has me pushing the green button. “Hey, Mom.”
“Hi, baby, I see you’re back in the country. You couldn’t end up in New York for the night?”
I sigh. Not a second to spare. “Sorry, this is where they needed me tonight.”
“Don’t act like you’re not high up enough that you can influence what flights you take, now that you’re a captain and all.
” I regret ever telling my mother that captains can bet on their flight paths.
After telling her I got the promotion to captain, all I’ve received are messages asking me to come home whenever I can, even more than I was getting as First Officer.
I try to ignore them for as long as possible before she starts calling instead.
But it’s true. In the years I’ve spent working for Everglades Airways, I’ve become one of the names that everyone knows, even before the offer of a promotion came up.
And now if I really wanted to, yeah, I probably could influence what flights I’m on.
Just like how I was able to swing it with my captain at the time to be on a flight to Italy tomorrow for Isla’s wedding.
But I don’t like to take advantage of the benefits I get.
I respect my company, I don’t want to abuse it.
“I’ll be seeing you guys next week at the wedding anyway,” I say, trying to steer the conversation away from myself.
“Yeah, in Italy. But it would be so nice to have you home every now and then.”
Home. It's a word that feels foreign to me nowadays.
I put my hand out for a cab as it drives up toward me.
My mom must hear me sigh as I slide into the back of the cab, because she carries on.
“We are so proud of you, honey. Everyone is always asking how you are, and we are so lucky to be able to talk up your successes. Keep doing what you’re doing, Miles.
My son, the international pilot,” she says wistfully and I have to physically stop my eyes from rolling.
To a listening ear, it sounds supportive, and she is supportive.
But it’s not because she wants me to be happy, it’s because it looks good for her as long as I keep succeeding.
“Thanks, Mom,” I say, not knowing what else there is to say.
The pressure that twists in my stomach every time my mother talks about my success pulls at my abdomen.
I hold the phone away from my ear to give my driver the address for the hotel I’m staying in tonight, giving myself a moment to breathe.
I don’t know why, but every time my parents talk to me about how happy they are about my career, I just feel…heavy. It’s all we ev er talk about. It’s never “How are you, Miles?” or “Are you happy?” It’s “Where did you go this week?” and “Why haven’t you come home in a while?” It’s exhausting.
And yeah, I am okay, my work is good and I’ve seen so much of the world, I consider myself so lucky for that.
But when people look at me, they just see the hotshot pilot, and at some point, I think I started to wonder if I am more than that, or if that is all I am good for.
For my success, for what I can offer, not for who I am.
After spending so long trying to live up to my family’s expectations, I think I took those expectations on myself.
I‘ve always expected the best of myself, always doing more and more, to prove that I am the success they always praise me for being. Always doing more, making more, progressing more. I don’t know anything else.
I’ve given up so much for this dream. My childhood, friends, enjoying my early twenties, and even a woman.
The woman who could've changed everything for me.
“Miles, honey?”
“Sorry, what?”
“I said, are you excited for the wedding?”
A smile breaks the corner of my mouth. “Yeah, I’m excited for Isla.” Even if my heart surges with jealousy every time I see the way her and Caio interact. In another life, that could’ve been me, it almost was me, but I did the one thing that ensured it could never be that way.
“You don’t think it’s a bit soon?”
This time, I do roll my eyes. “No, Mom, you met Caio, you know how wonderful he is. She couldn’t be in better hands than with him.”
It’s true, I don’t think I’ve met anyone who’s had Isla’s best interest at heart more than Caio, even myself.
From what I’ve gathered, that man has loved my sister since he laid eyes on her, but my parents are hesitant.
Even after everything that happened with Isla’s ex, even after they were so wrong about him.
She’s forgiven them, but I think some part of them still doesn’t want to admit they were wrong, that they didn’t know better in this case.
She just hums in response, confirming what I assumed, which is that she really doesn’t want to admit it.
“I’ve got to go, I’ve just arrived at my hotel.”
“Okay, honey,” she says hesitantly, probably jarred by my abruptness. “We’ll see you next week! I love you!” she chirps.
“Love you too,” and then I hang up the phone.
I tip my driver and slide out of the back of the cab, pushing open the hotel door with a grunt, my body already feeling the impact of my workout.
I love my parents, I truly do, and even though I feel the weight of their expectations, it’s nothing compared to what my sister felt.
I’m glad she finally found her place in the world, doing what she loves with the people that she loves.
I can’t wait to see her and May again, but most of all, I can’t wait to see my sister walking down the aisle in a white dress.
I press my keycard against the door and push it open, letting myself into my room and falling straight onto the plush mattress.
Hotels have become my home over the last few years; the beige walls and white linens are the most permanent things in my life.
The way I live my life doesn’t exactly leave much time for settling down, for a bed that I sleep in every night, and a place that I can call home.
Sometimes I wonder how long I can do it for, how long I want to spend by myself.
Don’t get me wrong, I love to fly, but it can be lonely, isolating.
And I don’t know at what point it’ll be too much.
At what point I’ll get tired of my own company.
Maybe if I’m having these thoughts, I’ve already passed that point.
But I don’t know if I could ever give it up, that feeling that soars through my veins when I’m 40,000 feet up in the sky.
Like I’m so far away from everything, like nothing matters.
It’s only me and the clouds. No matter how many times I sit in the pilot’s seat, that feeling never fades. Nothing even comes close to it .
Well, that’s not entirely true, something did. Four years ago, I felt the kind of rush that topped even my greatest days in the sky. All because I walked into that pub on that night.
I still haven’t wrapped my head around the fact that I’ll be seeing Marina in a mere couple of days.
I don’t think my brain will fully grasp the idea until she’s standing right in front of me.
There have been so many times I’ve wished I could just see her in the last four years, and now I'm going to.
I'm expecting her to ignore me, pretend I'm not even there, but this might be my one chance to tell her everything she doesn’t know and make things right. I can’t let the opportunity slip away, even if she tries to give me the cold shoulder.
I can’t stop thinking about her. About her smile and her laugh, and the way she made me feel like someone else.
Like just Miles, without any title attached.
About how it felt to be seen by her, in a way I don’t think anyone else has ever seen me before.
That feeling? It was like a drug; she was like my own personal addiction, and I wanted to overdose on her.
But I quit her instead, and I’ve been going through withdrawals ever since.
Never quite letting go of that lingering presence, that feeling as if I can still hear her warm laugh when I’m in a crowded room.
Or like I can see her messy curls as I’m walking through an airport, just to realize it’s someone else.
It’s the feeling that I get in times like now, when the silence of the hotel room sounds louder than an airplane engine that I could live without.
The times when there is nothing but loneliness hunched in the corners of the room, sneaking closer to me with every second that my eyes are shut against the light.
I can feel it, seeping into my bones with every night spent between those crisp white sheets.
But in a few days, I’ll be in Ruby Cove. I don’t know what's waiting for me there, but I know it won’t be quiet.