Inferno

twenty | the leapforward

one year later....

Hungover with jet lag and a mid flight hookup gone wrong, I begrudgingly step out of the airport Starbucks to look for my colleague's Sedan in the pick-up spot. A glance towards my phone to give a once over to the necessary details provided by my company, in turn makes my eyes freeze on the date flashing in bold white letters. It's been a whole year of the earth rotating on its axis, of galaxies forming and dissolving, of stars falling and crashing, and of my life turning into a routine of reflecting on my real self from afar while I imitate a robot set on self destruction. I haven't dared looking back since, and have been fairly successful with pretending it was all a beautiful dream until now. The fact that I am short of a blow horn and a box of tissues to declare the anniversary of me leaving a piece of myself back in Spain, is enough to bring it all back like a hurricane. Not here, not right now, I remind myself whilst bitterly sucking on the sugarless iced matcha latte, struggling to keep it down and save the empty paper gift bag in my hands it's dignity.

Fortunately, I'm distracted with a call which I presume is from my colleague, who didn't have the decency to call me well in advance to say he's going to be late. Some project manager the folks over at Econ Sports have hired. "Hello?"

"Um, hi, I hope I have got the right number. You're the transfer employee from Arizona, right?"

Why, do I sound particularly distasteful about working with you? Bingo, you've got it right. "No, that's me. I'm waiting at terminal 2, there's a Starbucks near by. Those coffee giants who, for their life, can't serve you on time."

"I think I see you,"a rattle in his voice embarrasses me and somehow makes me proud of how berated I can make people feel. My mother wouldn't regret the training she put 19 years into, the last of which ended with the golden words 'I hope you're not swayed by any handsome sweet talkers in Canada. You've finally got a dignified job, try and keep it till our house warming party in June at least."
Our house is a little far fetched, coming from the self acclaimed head of the family, the control freak. Yet I nodded and ran for my sanity to catch the first flight out of Arizona, and away to tend to the wounds of a year long of passive aggressiveness. Seems a little too late to not let that colour dye me from top to toe. Not that I'm doing a fantastic job with my loose tank top and a Nike hoodie I've owned since fifteen. 

I'm about to call the guy again when a honk makes me squeal and almost spill the matcha on my already stained joggers. I assume it's the car, when the black Sedan pulls by on the side and out of the driver's seat, steps someone I never in the world could think would cross paths with me after I'm done dealing with Arizona for a long long while. "Harvey?"

"Leia Callahan, oh my god," he seems taken aback alright, seeming to process it until that quirky laughter erupts out of him, just the same from all those years back, making his shoulders shake while he comes over to pull me in a side hug. "What's it been, huh? Six, seven years?"

"Seven if you count that time you spent all those summers with Lily Trevon in the Galapagos at her beach house. Or under the bleachers even."

"Still as sharp as a knife. I am assured it's you in flesh and all that feistiness," he chuckles. "So you're the new head editor for Econ? I thought you'd gone into fiction, y'know writing novels, making millions and looking down at us simpletons."

"That's a myth, unfortunately, it's way more than a million dollars," cackling, we take the conversation up to his car, with him flaunting those pitcher arms while he lifts my bags without a groan or yelp in response. Everything's easily loaded in the trunk, except one of my duffel bags that I insist keeping with me, in my vicinity at all times no matter what. It's four in the evening, so I'm surprised when we're able to gear past the security check in minutes and are out on the roads of Vancouver, the sun blazing over the skyscrapers and sobering me up of the fuzziness.