Page 142 of Love Unavoidable
“Because I think after that amount of time you will realize that life without Sadie isn’t so bad. That it’s kind of nice without her around.”
I backhand her in the stomach. She glares at me. I glare back. She doesn’t have to make a Sadie-less life sound so great.
“I don’t think that’s possible, Tenley,” Aaron says.
“Well, just try it. You might surprise yourself. Remember, don’t think about her, and no phone calls or visits. Okay? Hey, we gotta go. Our plane is here. Take care.” She disconnects the call.
“That was kind of cold,” I tell her.
“No, it wasn’t. Sadie, you broke up with this guy almost two months ago. You don’t need to continue coddling him. He needs to move on and he can’t do that if he is always thinking about you.”
It makes sense when she says it like that.
“Plus,” she continues. “Our plane just pulled up to the gate, look.” I turn to peek out the window, and sure enough a plane has parked and ground crew are scurrying around doing a-plane-has-landed things.
“Oh, thank god.” We pay our tab, collect our things, and head over to the gate counter, still needing to make certain we are on the standby list. Tenley gets in line and I take our bags and find a seat then watch idly as the passengers disembark in a steady stream.
The attendant at the counter announces that they will soon begin the boarding for our flight.
Finally!
I move to the edge of my seat, eager to get going. The line of passengers leaving the plane thins with a man in a cast and his daughter being the last to leave. He leans down and whispers something in her ear. His baseball cap is pulled low, so it’s hard to see his face. She smiles up at him, tells him to keep it real, and then offers him her fist to bump. He tries, and it’s cute, but still awkward because of the cast. The girl walks away but the guy gets in line behind Tenley at the counter, and I realize they aren’t related. Or if they are, they aren’t headed to the same place. I watch her as she goes, one of those girls who seems so smart and together that, even as a grown woman you want to be her when you grow up.
I shift my glance out toward the windows and watch another plane taxi to its gate. Tenley is up at the counter now, and another attendant has arrived, and the guy with the cast is on her other side. He must be cute because she keeps flipping her hair and turning her head in his direction. He seems to ignore her.
I check the time, thirty minutes until we are supposed to take off. The previous flight’s pilots and attendants leave the plane. I see one of the attendants go up to the counter, to her co-worker that is helping the guy in the cast and say something that makes them all laugh. I can just see the top of the guy’s cap beyond the crowd. Both Tenley, and the attendant helping her, turn to join the conversation and all four women surrounding the guy say “aww” in unison. His head dips in a way that makes me smile. Like maybe he’s shuffling his feet in an embarrassed kind of way.
Tenley turns from the counter with a wave and comes skipping back over. “We’ve got seats,” she says in a sing-song voice. “They aren’t together, but at least we will be on our way to San Soloman.”
“Ohmigod, Tenley, thank you! You are a miracle worker.”
“Don’t thank me, some insanely hot guy with a cast had all the attendants tripping over themselves to do good things, so all I had to do is mention that you were going to make-up with your boyfriend, and they suddenly found seats.”
“Well, that’s not exactly what I’m doing.”
“I know, but it worked didn’t it?”
“I saw you flirting with that guy. Insanely hot, huh?” I tease her.
“Beyond hot. And what you saw was metryingto flirt, he wasn’t interested. With a capital N-I.”
“Must be gay.”
“Must be, because, hello, have you seen me?”
“I have.” I smile. “Hubba Hubba.” I wiggle my eyebrows.
We both giggle in response.
She takes the seat beside me and we sigh together. Boarding for our flight begins, and it’s all I can do to wait my turn. The sooner I get on the plane, the sooner it takes off, the sooner we get to San Soloman and the sooner I see Ethan. They call our grouping and we get in line, behind dozens of other people. I can vaguely see the guy with the cast up ahead of us. Only because he’s tall and the cast color is bright.
Maybe we will run into him in San Soloman and Tenley can flirt with him more and he will fall in love with her and then she can move to San Soloman too. That is, if things work out with Ethan and I stay there. I wonder again if I should tell him I’m coming or just surprise him. I check my phone, it’s not like he’s texted me. Or called. Not since yesterday when I told him not to. God, was that just yesterday? It seems like so long ago.
We inch our way down the gangway towards the plane. “Do you think I should have told Ethan I was coming?” I ask Tenley.
“No, I think the surprise is the best part. He will be so happy to see you Sadie, this will be awesome. Don’t worry!”
“Okay.”
