You are awake before the sun. On purpose. I couldn't believe that part.
Everyone here is quiet and gray, dragging bags with little wheels, shuffling in a long line to take off their shoes. You take off your shoes for a stranger and don't even complain. You just do it. You're so good at waiting now. That's the thing I keep watching. You wait and wait and you barely look up.
But listen. There is a big window over there, and behind it the planes are lined up like sleeping whales, and one of them is going to lift the whole heavy thing of you into the sky. Into the actual sky. And nobody is pressing their face to the glass. Not one person. You bought a coffee and looked at your phone instead.
I used to think a plane was the most magic thing in the world. I used to think when I was big I would fly all the time and never stop staring out the window, and I would always pick the window seat, and I would watch the clouds from the top like a bird.
Did you pick the window seat?
Please tell me you picked the window seat.