n a Sunday
afternoon flight
from Tampa to
Chicago, I settled into my window seat. The flight was hours late, the cabin stiflingly full. You made your way down the aisle, stowed your duffle in crowded overhead, and wedged into the middle seat between me and a man on the aisle. Deep in my book, I hardly looked up except to note that you wore a deep blue winter jacket, which seemed out of place even though the local weather was much cooler than usual.
You boarded with a woman who took the same middle seat in the row behind us, and it crossed my mind that it was unfortunate that you were not sitting together. In the dog-eat-dog world of commercial travel, them’s the breaks.
The flight eventually took off, and I read and dozed, waking to request a ginger ale and pretzels, noticing you asked for water, no ice, which you drank quickly, and a cookie that sat uneaten on your beige tray table.