Colors...that is what he remembered most, the colors of people and airplanes, light splintering and reflecting itself through the great glass panes...the nearness of the noise of take-offs as jets thrust themselves against gravity and carved white smoke patterns across the blue air.
Strangers...that is what he remembered most, the looks on people's faces, climbing out of the coach section and hauling heavy luggage down from the compartments. The shuffle off the plane, balancing acts as one slowly moved towards the front. People sharing the same cockpit air for hours, now looking for chance to breathe in the outside.
People were no longer allowed to greet at gates, nobody was there except the airline gate agents to help you find your way. If you were at your final destination there might be an area just outside the TSA secure zone where loved ones could wait, trying to pick your face out of a crowd. Some held up signs...He would never have done that. He would never had needed to...her face was instantaneously recognizable...he could pick her out of a crowd. The tones of her skin, the slight color on her lips. The way she walked. He had memorized it, having seen it so many times.
Hardly in arrivals...mostly in departures.
But it made him want to travel even more, to come see her...to come find her. To arrive at her. Mostly to stay with her.
Feel the weight of her against him in an embrace. Feel the way she eclipsed all thoughts and concerns and made them disappear. Made worry go away. Made the cool of an evening change into a room with a fire. A room with her in it. An airport with her in it. He could still feel her in it. A world with her in it.
Smoothing the rough sewn pieces of their arrivals and departures.
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