twisting (november 4, 2008).

More stuff, courtesy of a 20 year old Ashley.

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Carol sat nestled into the worn synthetic cushion of aisle seat 3B.  She flipped nonchalantly through August’s copy of Good Housekeeping, although it was already November.  Every so often, she would adjust her bifocals, intent on gaining better insight into ‘Homes, Gnomes, and Garden Décor.’ She sighed as the other passengers boarded around her.

Fifty-six years had been unkind to Carol’s body.  Her face was weathered from the sun, and her skin bore liver spots she could not remember having in her youth.  The lines beside her eyes tugged downward in a sad and deliberate sort of way, and when she smiled, her teeth were yellow from many years of coffee and tobacco.

 She hadn’t always been this way.  She married Sal when she was only nineteen.  Thirty-seven long years later, she was boarding a plane from Cincinnati headed towards Detroit, while Sal basked in the sun down in Boca Raton. She absentmindedly twirled her wedding band between sandy, worn fingers.

He arrived suddenly and without warning, like a hurricane of wit and charm.  His baseball cap was set high up above his brow, allowing the dim cabin lighting to dance across his twenty-something-year-old face.  Around his neck he was a worn silver piece in the shape of a cross, hanging haphazardly against his chest.  Though it was merely fifty-seven degrees outside, he was dressed in green canvas shorts and ancient black flipflops, with only a thin white t-shirt to shield his torso.  He glanced quickly around the snug interior of the tiny plane.

“I think I lucked out.  I’ve got the window seat,” he said finally, addressing Carol with a smile.

Carol leaned forward impulsively to move into the aisleway, but she was stopped by the cool wave of a hand.

“I’ve got it.  No need to move your pretty little feet,” he spoke brightly, surprising Carol with the lightness of his words.

Swiftly and with a grave Carol had never seen, he scooted over and past her, settling down into the faux-leather beside the window.

“Tell me about yourself,” he said, twisting his body to face her.  The smile he flashed was crooked and endearing, but the expression was honest and expectant.  Carol chuckled aloud, and she felt the deadness in her chest jumpstart to life.