Page 3 of Final Approach

My head spun from the change in pressure—I had seconds to get my own mask on.

Muscles burning, I reached with shaking hands for the chair arm to my left, my nails leaving gouges in the leather as I hauled my body into the seat, vaguely aware of the handcuffed beast of a man with his shaved head bowed in the aisle across from me.

The seatbelt barely closed as my bleeding fingers clumsily clasped the two squares of metal together. When they finally clicked, I pulled the air mask on and folded my body over my lap, head between my knees just before the jarring jolt of the collision resonated through every molecule of my being.

The raw screech of hot metal scraping along the jungle floor was the last parade of sound before everything went black.

8hours before takeoff …

“Are my tits getting bigger?”

My mirrored reflection stared back at me, emerald eyes crinkled into a frown as I palmed my breasts, weighing them with both hands. They felt bigger. Rounder, maybe. The size G bra I’d squeezed them into didn’t seem to be any tighter than usual, and yet …

Heavy breasts and heartburn—the current punishment for eating my feelings. More like the dosage change in my medication. Curse you, side effects.

“What? How should I know? Are you even listening, Marley?”

My cheeks heated to the surface of the sun as my friend’s incredulous voice came down the line.

“Yes, sorry.” I adjusted the phone between my shoulder and ear so I could continue to get dressed while Luisa chattered away. Grabbing the tight navy skirt lying at the foot of my bed, I stepped into it to pull it up over my dimpled thighs. “You were saying?”

“I was saying that Cheryl is really hoping you’ll come to her birthday party this year. You never come out, anymore.”

She emphasized “never” as if we hadn’t just seen each other on a wellness retreat in Costa Rica three months before. The wellness retreat where she discovered herself through questionable herbs and copious sex with the twenty-two-year-old yoga instructor, while I avoided everyone and everything for as long as she’d let me.

“I work a lot, Luisa.”

I gave up trying to dress myself with all the grace of a newborn giraffe, and set the phone to speaker mode on my bed. Zipping up the ridiculous uniform regulation skirt with a harder yank than I intended, I winced when the sharp metal teeth pinched my skin.

“And I’m not going to be able to make it anyway. I have a bachelor party flight that weekend.”

I pursed my lips for another reason entirely. Aileron was constantly inventing new ways to offer sub-par service to wealthy travelers and passing it off as luxury. Between playing pilot to a group of drunken, handsy men and visiting my mother half a world away … the bachelor party required less patience and more tips.

Reaching for the crisp white blouse hanging in my closet, I continued to dress as Luisa waited out my silence. We’d been casual friends for a number of years. Her chaotic energy was so like my twin, Charlie, it was what drew me to her in the first place, when she’d ambushed me at my first and only attempt at a spin class. We had so little in common, but I had few friends on this side of the world, and Luisa pushed me out of my comfort zone every now and again, while respecting my need for distance.

Apparently, today was the day she’d decided to break our unwritten rule.

The dusty mirror on top of my dresser reflected back puffy skin from disjointed sleep, and a thin layer of powder coating my cheeks and chin doing nothing to hide the exhaustion. Chestnut hair fell to my shoulders in loose waves, thanks to Brazil’s clinging humidity, lacking the zest it had thirty minutes ago when I’d curled it.

Two minutes of stagnant silence passed, broken only by my irritated huffs as I knotted my tie and tucked in my shirt. I abandoned the thin, sheer pantyhose laid out on the edge of the bed— much too hot for that nonsense today — and was about to speak when her soft admission broke through the stand-off.

“I wish we saw more of you, Marley. The world isn’t the cold place you think it is.”

I wish it wasn’t.

Regret, burning and bitter, singed my insides like errant wildfire. Drawing a deep breath all the way into my belly, I smothered the broil with a practiced shield of calm.

I was fun once, but it was so long ago I couldn’t even remember the person who laughed for the sake of it. Charlie would remember her, but she wasn’t here to come to my defense. I was on an entirely different continent.

Before I could muster the words, any words, to change the subject, Luisa did it for me.

“Maybe you’re pregnant?” she mused, a knowing smile in her tone. “That’s why your tits are bigger.”

A caustic laugh escaped my chest, choking me with its bite. “I can guarantee you I’m not pregnant.”

My infertility aside, pregnancy required sex with something other than silicone. My vibrator was so well worn from the lack of skin-to-skin human contact these days, I’d probably come on sight from the next decent man who touched me properly.

I’d have to find one first.