The kitchen at the Skylark Bar & Grill in Terminal 3 closed at eleven, so Howard had to grab a bag of peanuts from a kiosk to have with his single malt, staring through the big picture window at the dark expanse of tarmac speckled with ghostly lights. Great machines lumbered, lifting off the earth, setting down gently as dead leaves. Sonic rumblings jittered the cutlery, a reminder of the distortion distance and scale can achieve, enormous tonnage and breakneck speeds rendered tranquil, remote. His flight to New York was pushed back again, this time by a whole hour.
+++++It stopped bothering him when the woman walked up and took a stool two places away. She looked tired. Half-heels that had seen better days, rumpled power suit, a run in one stocking, loose bun, a small valise dropped carelessly. Right away she tossed him a weary smile, the quirk of the eyebrows saying we’re in this together, aren’t we?
+++++Yes, Howard mused as he sipped his drink, sizing her up, they certainly were.
+++++The bar was a soft-lit island in a sea of fluorescence, surrounded by waiting areas and mounted TVs tuned to news and sports. Exhausted families, commuters, and employees trudged by, the occasional beep and whirr of a cart laden with baggage. Since the typical bustle had whittled down to the red-eye crowd and disgruntled souls contending with lost luggage and endless delays, the vast hall echoed with clacking footsteps, rolling suitcase wheels, snatches of conversation bouncing like whispers in church.
+++++The place stayed open late to accommodate stragglers, men and women in office wear desperate for a drink, a grounding influence in the unmoored, liminal zone of air travel. There was something soothing about that bland anonymity, Howard possessed of an uncanny familiarity when he’d sat, raising two fingers at the bartender, an aging fellow in apron and shirtsleeves with a wry squint and rosacea. Behind him a tiered army of liquor bottles glimmered, refracting scant movements of the customers on the far side.
+++++Once the squat glass of amber was deposited, things clicked into focus for Howard for the first time in weeks, maybe even months. The heat on the back of his neck and the hair-trigger reflexes had become second nature, but only now did an oppressive loneliness weigh heavily. He forced himself to sip slowly, glancing down at the leather briefcase by his left shoe every minute or two, as if reality were a fragile scrim requiring constant surveillance, a persistent, unscratchable itch. It was there, it was real. No one could take it from him now. Not the board, not the affiliates, not even the bomber jacket and sunglasses who had hopped from the town car three lengths behind his yellow cab upon arrival, dogged him through security, then spun like a frenzied weather vane when the herd of high-schoolers provided cover for a quick double-back. Watching from between the leaves of the potted weeping figs by the Lufthansa display had been a kick, with any luck the last thrill of its kind before Howard turned the page on a new chapter. A more sedate chapter, but liable to take the story anywhere, rather than the downwardly mobile path he’d been on, nowhere to end up but a landfill or beneath a concrete pillar in one of the new overpasses the mayor was touting as the first step in a total infrastructural overhaul.
+++++Howard understood the need for an overhaul, the chemistry of greed which had maintained an equilibrium for so long violently unbalanced by a simple logical equation: if we’re all in it together, why do we eat our wounded? His arm still ached from holding Stanley down two weeks ago while the fixers did their work, repairing trust through a simple act of destruction. He still couldn’t look at his fingernails the same way, keeping them trimmed short now. The screams had faded, but the nightmares of being snatched from his bed persisted. Only a collective delusion, a kind of hypnosis, could keep the unspoken truth from tearing free. One drizzly morning the decision was made.
+++++But it didn’t do to dwell on the past, the why and how of it all, the same reason a tightrope walker doesn’t look down. More immediate concerns pressed in, like this woman, rolling her slender neck, stray auburn locks swaying, checking her watch as the glass of red was poured and presented. The barman resumed his position under the TV, a rag draped over crossed arms, watching two wiry men in shorts exchange tennis volleys.
+++++Howard waited for another sidelong glance, but she stared straight ahead as she drank deeply, heaving a contented sigh as she replaced her glass with a slight clattering tremor. The ghost of a smirk seemed to suggest she knew his gaze was upon her, waiting for him to cross the border. He was happy to oblige.
+++++“Cheers,” Howard said, raising his tumbler, “to the miracle of air travel.”
+++++She turned slowly, a wistfulness imbuing her slouched posture, as if she’d seen everything, beyond the ability to be shocked or charmed. The maroon liquid sloshed as the glass rose. “Hallelujah,” she said drily, but the corners of her lips curled as she drank.
+++++The silence between them had the natural tranquility of close friends. She tapped out a Marlboro, slipped the pack back in her jacket pocket, asked him for a light. He provided. He commented idly on how they were talking about indoor smoking bans, she rolled her eyes and said, “Not yet, thank God.”
+++++Some time passed. They nursed their drinks. Howard had the feeling the ball was in his court, something crackling in the air.
+++++“Delays get you too?” he asked, half-angling towards her.
+++++She gave an exasperated shrug. “In more ways than one,” she said. “You just hit the nail on the head,” and chuckled jaggedly, covering her mouth as if she’d just cracked an off-color joke.
+++++Howard cocked his head. “What do you mean?”
+++++“I’m sorry, I’ve had a hell of a day.”
+++++“Hey, I asked.”
+++++She expelled air through puffed cheeks, dragged her napkin in a circle with one manicured nail. “Do you ever feel like your whole life is delayed?”
+++++Howard laced his fingers, considering, and the woman shook herself, murmuring, “I told myself I wouldn’t do this.”
+++++“Do what?”
+++++“Oh, you know. Talk the next person’s head off who showed me an ounce of decency. I bet it’s all you need, sitting here trying to relax. You’ve got your own problems.”
+++++“I wouldn’t mind a break from them at the moment, actually. Try me.” She appraised him hesitantly, chewing a thumbnail. “It’s almost like confession, isn’t it,” he continued, “talking to someone at an airport you’ll never see again?”
+++++She snorted through her nose. “I’m not usually like this,” she said, “you’ve caught me in a weird place.”
+++++He checked the briefcase. “I’m at a bit of a crossroads myself.”
+++++She brightened at that and moved to the seat beside him, neglecting her bag. “Oh yeah? Do tell.”
+++++“Just work stuff,” Howard shrugged. “Thinking of changing careers.”
+++++“You should, absolutely. So many things we’re supposed to want are actually prisons. You wake up one day fucking terrified, wondering what else you could have been doing all these years.”
+++++“Or terrified of what you have been doing,” he answered a little too quickly, clocking apprehension as she drew up. “I just mean thinking that maybe you’ve wasted your time.”
+++++“Right,” she said in a dreamy whisper, observing his hands on the glass, wrist hairs under the Rolex band, tracing his arm up to the powerful shoulder. She uncrossed her legs and faced him fully. “Do you think you’ve wasted your time?”
+++++He thought about it. “No. Everything I’ve done has led me here.”
+++++“That’s good, thinking positively. I wish that came easier for me.”
+++++The more Howard studied her face the more a peculiar sensation came over him, sneaky as the glow from the scotch but just as warm. Most of the relationships in his life had been fleeting, transactional, charades performed rotely until someone’s mask slipped, signaling the curtain call. Only once or twice, and not for ages, had that instant rapport carried things from the start, an external force to which he was all too eager to surrender. A thing of the past, surely, born from the naivety of youth. Or maybe not.
+++++“What’s your name?” he said, unaware that his hand had inched across the glossy countertop.
+++++She bit her lip with suppressed mirth. “Nella, Nella Vinton.”
+++++“I’m Keith Howard,” he said, reaching for a shake. Her grasp was light but firm, and their palms brushed as she withdrew, the subtlest application of pressure at the tips of his fingers.
+++++“Nice to meet you, Keith.”
+++++“You too, Nella.” He took a drink of scotch. “So why has this been such a hell of a day?”
+++++She ran her tongue along her inner cheek as if contemplating some final plunge. “Confession time, huh?”
+++++He upturned his palms. “Unburden yourself. Who am I going to tell?”
+++++“Alright,” she said carefully, “but this is a two-way street. I’ll go first, but you better not clam up on me afterwards.”
+++++“Scout’s honor.”
+++++“I left my husband this morning. I didn’t tell him I was going to do it, I hardly even thought about it, I just woke up and knew I needed out.”
+++++“Why?”
+++++She bobbed her head. “That’s the question. All day I’ve been making excuses. Money problems, bedroom problems, family problems. He has a temper, too. Takes things out on me. But I don’t think any of that matters. What matters is, I don’t love him anymore.”
+++++“Well, sounds like you’ve got it figured out. Most people never act on that kind of thing.”
+++++“Exactly, and I know why,” she stated. “It’s almost physically impossible to admit to yourself you’re on the wrong track when you’re in so deep. It takes a kind of, I don’t know… psychotic break to get free. I felt crazy doing it, like I wasn’t even me.”
+++++“How bad was his temper?”
+++++She hugged herself demurely, almost guiltily. “Bad. Sometimes.”
+++++“So you had to do it.”
+++++“I was suffocating, I just didn’t know it. And the worst thing? He won’t even worry, not for a few days at least.”
+++++Howard had to remind himself not to focus on her clavicle under the open collar, the glimpse of skin where the shirt was messily half-tucked into the skirt, the tip of her tongue dancing on her lips as her words came hesitantly, or tumbled out all at once. She evoked a heady cocktail of strength and vulnerability, and it was him, out of all the drinkers at all the airport lounges, she’d gravitated to. Maybe it was the novelty of a passing acquaintance, separate from the burden of real life, that made it heightened, a port in the storm. His hand moved closer.
+++++“Where are you headed?”
+++++“Annapolis, to stay with a friend. Take a break from everything, get back on my feet again.”
+++++“What about work?” He marveled at himself questioning her, overprotective, invested in the wellbeing of someone who ten minutes ago had only been a vague notion lurking in the recesses of his mind.
+++++“I quit,” she said sheepishly. “Office manager for a real estate firm, admin bullshit. Something else will come through.”
+++++“Lots of ways to pivot from that. Race car driver, professional psychic.”
+++++She grinned. “That’s the spirit. The point is, I’m done waiting for my life to start. If I see something I want,” she said pointedly, “I’m going to go for it. Consequences be damned.”
+++++“I admire that.”
+++++“And Keith, here’s the part where I swear you to secrecy. Can I trust you not to freak out?”
+++++“If you only knew,” he said, again incurring a puzzled frown, but rallied. “Tell me.”
+++++Nella leaned in. “I cleared out the bank accounts.”
+++++“Wow.”
+++++“I mean, he still has his own holdings, but right about now, actually, he’s probably getting home, taking a beer out of the fridge, no idea his life is about to collapse.”
+++++“I think he was a fool to let it get to that point.”
+++++“Do you? You don’t think I’m a monster?”
+++++He gave her a long look. “That’s not how I would describe you.”
+++++“How would you describe me?”
+++++Instead Howard just smiled, but the smile quivered and broke as he gazed out into the gloom. She was perfect. It was more than luck, it was provenance. But destiny fought an uphill battle in this world. The tabula rasa was a wonderful idea, and his heart broke at the impossibility of it, recalling the pop of Stanley’s finger joints, punctuated by breathless shrieks, the spiny ball in his throat when he thought about disappearing into the throngs of the Big Apple. How long would it take to sleep through the night again? To look in the mirror without a rising gorge?
+++++Beside him, Nella scoffed, tugging him back to reality. “I knew it,” she said.
+++++“What?”
+++++“You’re clamming up. You got everything from me and now you’re leaving me high and dry.”
+++++“Now that would be a crime. I wouldn’t dream of it.”
+++++She drained her glass, gestured for another round. The bartender pointed a question at Howard’s glass and he acquiesced. After the drinks were poured she said, softly, “So don’t leave me in suspense, Keith. Tell me what brings you here.”
+++++“Well, as I said, I’ve got business in New York.”
+++++“What kind of business?”
+++++Howard peered into his tumbler, into a wavering, discolored fragment of his own face. “Long story short, I decided our competitors were offering a better deal. So I made an executive decision, without giving notice, you might say.”
+++++“Mm, corporate espionage.”
+++++“Sort of. See, the people I work for–” he broke off and snorted, pursing his lips.
+++++“What?”
+++++“Can I trust you not to freak out?”
+++++Nella extended a pinky, allowing him to link his own.
+++++“The people I work for,” he continued, “are a legitimate business. All the paperwork, all the functions of a normal company. But everyone is owned by someone, right? IBM, Unilever, always someone higher up.”
+++++“Okay.”
+++++“The people who own us are a little different. Off the beaten track, you could say.”
+++++Nella breathed in, wide-eyed. “Oh, this is getting good. You’re a front for the mob?”
+++++Howard chuckled. “Not exactly. Well, I’m not sure. They don’t tell us much, we handle the logistics of liasoning with local political offices to make sure certain transitions and outcomes go smoothly.”
+++++Nella let out a soft whistle. “Spoken like a true outlaw.”
+++++He surveyed the bar nervously, a sudden awkward pause as they both recoiled, too far out on a limb and hearing that splintering crack.
+++++“I was joking,” Nella said in a small voice, “I’m not here to judge.”
+++++“I know, it’s okay. I just can’t believe it, listening to myself.”
+++++“But you’re getting out. We’re not so different.”
+++++“It is different,” he said sternly. “I don’t know how much good I’m doing helping out the other side, but after–” He grasped his drink with both hands.
+++++“After what?”
+++++“Something that happened two weeks ago. I got involved with a client, we started going to ball games, having a few beers Friday night. And things soured between him and my managers, so there was an incident.”
+++++“What kind of incident?”
+++++He shook his head. “All I know is I won’t ever do that kind of thing again. Something had to change, and this is the first step.”
+++++Nella reached out and placed her hand over his, surprising him. “Keith, I realize we barely know each other, but I feel something when I talk to you. You’re a good person.”
+++++He looked up at her, past her, his eyes popped, and he snatched his hand away, knocking the tumbler over and spilling a miniature lake of scotch.
+++++“Sorry, sorry, Jesus,” he muttered as the bartender sighed and came over with a rag.
+++++“What is it?” Nella asked, the fear he’d expected nowhere in evidence, instead an alert bedrock of concern, of trust.
+++++“Nothing, I thought I saw… someone, it doesn’t matter.”
+++++The man was just now passing the bar out on the thoroughfare, having pushed his sunglasses up on his forehead, bopping along to his walkman as he dragged a suitcase. Upon closer inspection it was a letterman jacket.
+++++Nella glanced back and forth, chewed her lip, seeming to come to a decision about him. “You’re going to think I’m a terrible cliché, but I need to tell you something.”
+++++“What’s that?” he said as his heart rate hovered back down to normal.
+++++“I think there’s a flaw in my personality that draws me to danger.”
+++++“You’re preaching to the choir.”
+++++“It’s strange because this never happens to me, but as soon as I saw you I knew we could be friends. That’s why I sat near you.”
+++++“I felt it too.”
+++++The PA system crackled over their heads and a harried voice announced that Delta flight 2208 to New York City would begin boarding momentarily.
+++++She maneuvered closer, her eyes dancing up and down his face, lids half-lowered. “Whatever happens next in our lives doesn’t matter, we’re both at a crossroads, meeting at the perfect time.” Her hand was back on top of his, conveying an electrical surge.
+++++“Yes,” was all he could manage.
+++++“I want to say more. You won’t think I’m terrible?”
+++++“No, I think you’re fantastic.”
+++++“I want you, Howard. Right now.”
+++++“Me too.”
+++++She released his hand, tugged her lapels, adjusted her collar. “Get the drinks,” she said. “I’m going to the men’s over there. Give it two minutes and follow me.” With that she was off, snatching up her bag and striding across the terminal with a walk that turned passing heads.
+++++“Thank God for late departures,” Howard muttered, fumbling in his wallet, slapping down bills. He almost left without the briefcase, a stab in his chest as he turned to heft it, struck by how unimportant it seemed now. What kind of idiot could go about their life concerned with documents, evidence, a payoff, when spontaneous human connection waited at every crosswalk, at any bar or subway car? What was money in the face of such a defiant repudiation of the tyranny of objects?
+++++It felt lighter as he traversed the sparse hall, head spinning with how lucky he was, certain that to ignore a sign like this from the universe amounted to a form of suicide. He didn’t look left or right, honing in on the swinging door with the simplistic stick figure, beside the other skirted decal indicating the female form, that heaven, that homecoming, that would be his, and color the rest of his existence with the awareness of the holy undercurrent fueling the world– love. Yes, goddamnit, it was love. Transient, temporary, but no less powerful. He’d never wanted anything so badly.
+++++He pushed through the door, heedless of other occupants, saw the stall at the end of the row ajar, and went to his salvation.
+++++Ten minutes later she emerged from the men’s room, incurring stray glances, a smirk or two, the clacking heels echoing off the arched ceiling. Boarding for flight 2208 was underway. The briefcase didn’t throw off her stride as she found the exit, enjoying the gust of air from the sliding doors, a near-empty bus trundling through the arc-sodium orange of the underpass. She reached the far side, entering the shelter of the cavernous parking lot, and set the briefcase down next to a man in a bomber jacket and dark sunglasses loitering by the stairwell.
+++++“You take off before the show?” he said offhandedly.
+++++“Didn’t need to spike his drink,” she told him. “We got along real well. I just took him to the bathroom. The janitor’ll find him.”
+++++He did a double take, the lenses obscuring whatever lurked beneath. “What are you, nuts?” He handed over the bulging envelope his instructions had described as an insurance package.
+++++“More fun this way,” she said, threw him a wink, and sauntered off into the night.

 

[Image Credit : Photo by Winston Tjia on Unsplash]