I don't know how America managed to get onto the plane for Brussels. Surely, I thought, it would take hours to unlace those bleached Nikes. Surely, there was something extraordinarily suspicious about wearing black knee-highs with tight shorts to match. Surely, a waistline maintained at chest height by a bulging belly and hostile fanny pack must have put off some alarm, detector, or TSA agent. By the time I made it to the gate, America had engaged yet another victim with his disengaging tale about his daughter's work in Europe. He was visiting her. He was proud of the person she's become. He was proud, and I am sure this pride is what led him to settle his Old Glory plaid shirt, thick-frame glasses, and tussled combover into seat 31F, now reclined.
I thought I would escape America by my going to visit Europe, but his thunderous falsetto rocked my world as much as his gnashing teeth and fat tongue churning a Planters' peanut concoction. He distracted me from thinking of her, so I closed my eyes, perchance to find Europe in a dream...
She purchased a window seat because she appreciated the freedom to admire the plane's course. And this allowed the sunlight to flood the grooves and crevices of her frail face. She was older, much older; her once sharp features weathered the wars, the Union, and the ages. Wine-colored blood poured through porcelain veins that hung down her neck like the branches of an ancient vineyard. Her argent hair intersected them at her stumps of shoulders. They were like coatracks that supported the hundreds of layers of cloth draped over her body. And as she sat content in the sun, she--
"DO YOU ALL HAVE ANY COKE?"
I forgot that America had a thing for interrupting people's dreams. His ringing voice roused me just in time to order a beverage and receive a package of peanuts.
"And what would you like to drink?" the stewardess asked the Belgian beside me.
"Water," he said.
"And me, too," his colleague retorted.
With dismay I examined the cool, caramel liquid in my cup. Then, raising it briskly in the direction of 31F, I made a toast to the identity I had just rediscovered.
I thought I would escape America by my going to visit Europe, but his thunderous falsetto rocked my world as much as his gnashing teeth and fat tongue churning a Planters' peanut concoction. He distracted me from thinking of her, so I closed my eyes, perchance to find Europe in a dream...
She purchased a window seat because she appreciated the freedom to admire the plane's course. And this allowed the sunlight to flood the grooves and crevices of her frail face. She was older, much older; her once sharp features weathered the wars, the Union, and the ages. Wine-colored blood poured through porcelain veins that hung down her neck like the branches of an ancient vineyard. Her argent hair intersected them at her stumps of shoulders. They were like coatracks that supported the hundreds of layers of cloth draped over her body. And as she sat content in the sun, she--
"DO YOU ALL HAVE ANY COKE?"
I forgot that America had a thing for interrupting people's dreams. His ringing voice roused me just in time to order a beverage and receive a package of peanuts.
"And what would you like to drink?" the stewardess asked the Belgian beside me.
"Water," he said.
"And me, too," his colleague retorted.
With dismay I examined the cool, caramel liquid in my cup. Then, raising it briskly in the direction of 31F, I made a toast to the identity I had just rediscovered.
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