30. Alex
30
Alex
“ T his is the craziest thing I’ve ever done.” Gabby studies the information card from the pocket of the airline seat while the flight attendant goes over her spiel. This is the first time she’s been on a plane and her nerves are getting the best of her.
The last few weeks have been a whirlwind. It all started when Jax came barreling through my bedroom door around four o’clock in the morning, scaring Gabby and me half to death. I thought he was an intruder and took a swing. Fortunately for Jax, I was groggy when I took the swing and he missed out on sporting a black eye for a week. Unfortunately, my fist landed right in his shoulder. Specifically, the bad one with his war wound. There was a lot of shouting and before we knew it, the entire 3rd East crew was running into my bedroom.
Luckily, Gabby was wearing pajamas and I had my boxers on. While we’ve been sleeping together, we’re still not sleeping together. We’ve been sharing my bed ever since the night we spent visiting my family. It just felt right. Am I sporting the worst case of blue balls in modern history? Yes. Yes, I am. But I promised Gabby we’d take things slow and I’d let her take the lead. I love having her next to me and I plan to keep it that way.
Anyway, back to Jax interrupting my beauty sleep. After a few weeks of dead ends, he discovered an aunt of Gabby’s. It took about ten days to make contact with her, and after some initial shock, she agreed to talk with Gabby if she came to New York. Which brings us back to our current situation.
“You think this is crazier than leaving your hometown and driving a clunker of a car over a thousand miles to start a new life?”
“Stinky is not a clunker.” She splays her hand over her chest as if I just insulted the Queen of England.
“No, but I got you to take your mind off what we’re doing.” I give her a wink and settle into the too tight seat. “Damn, we should’ve flown first class.”
“Did you see how crazy expensive those tickets were?”
“Do you see how my muscular physique does not fit comfortably in this seat?” I retort. “How am I supposed to deal with this for the next sixish hours?”
“You can take a nap,” Gabby suggests.
“Are you going to let me sleep?”
“Probably not.” The airplane’s engine roars to life, and she pulls my hand into a death grip.
“Relax, the plane is just taxiing to the runway. We’re not taking off yet.” I dig into my pocket and hand her a piece of gum. “Here, chew on this. It can help with the air pressure when we take off.”
“Can we go over our plans once more? I need something to distract me from thinking about how this tin can is about to hurl us into space.” She pops the gum into her mouth.
“Now who’s being dramatic?” I roll my eyes, then start to go over our itinerary. We’re spending less than forty-eight hours total in New York. Neither of us could get much time off from work and the traveling alone eats up most of our time. “We’ll get into the hotel late tonight. I think it’s best to order room service because we’ll probably be exhausted, and with the time change, we’re going to lose three hours of sleep.”
“Deal. Although I can’t imagine I’ll be able to sleep tonight.” Her grip tightens on my hand as we begin our ascent.
“We’ll meet Lucia tomorrow morning at her house in the Bronx.” I project my voice over the sound of the engine. “How long we spend there will determine how much time we have left to explore the city.”
“I really hope we get to see Times Square. Mari and I always dreamed of visiting it. We wanted to see if it looked just like it does on TV. We also wanted to see the big tree at Rockefeller Center.”
“It’s a little too early to have the tree out just yet.”
“I know, but maybe we can at least see where it goes.”
“Sure,” I agree. I will take her wherever she wants.
The plane levels out at 35,000 feet and Gabby begins to relax in her seat.
“Wow!” She stretches over me to look out the window. “We’re in the clouds.”
“Yup. Do you want to switch seats with me?”
“Yes!” She excitedly nods. Gabby insisted on taking the middle seat. She was petrified that the window would pop out or something. I figured she’d enjoy the flight once the initial shock wore off, and it looks like my prediction is right.
“Do you think this is what Heaven looks like?” she asks dreamily while continuing to stare out the window.
“I’m not sure. But I certainly wouldn’t be upset with this view all the time.”
“Me neither.”
I turn in my seat and hook my arm around the top part of her chest, drawing her back to my front so she can continue gazing at the heavenly sky. “They’re okay, baby girl. I have no doubt they’re watching over you.”