Hearts in the Sky

Jenny Blake was already a sweaty, anxious mess when she made it onto the plane. Her eyes scanned the rows as she fumbled looking for her seat. The further to the back of the plane she went the more unpleasant the smell, and she realized how close she was to the bathroom. This was not turning out how she thought it was going to. “Go, be brave, have fun, be hopeful” they told her. She should have stayed at home.

It was Jenny’s second flight on the way to Toronto for the third and final interview at Milford Designs. A job that Amelia, her best friend, felt was the ‘perfect opportunity’ for her. Which is why Amelia submitted Jenny’s resume and portfolio without her consent.

Jenny was much more comfortable with the familiar. The things that she could count on. Friday night movies. Saturday morning brunch. The small-town drama. She couldn’t survive the unpredictable chaos of a big city. She was only entertaining the idea to appease Amelia.

While picking up her suitcase, a short woman approached her. She was bouncing a toddler on her hip and holding the hand of a young boy. The woman spoke timidly. “I hate to be a bother, but would you mind switching seats with me? Our tickets got messed up and placed me away from my boys.”

Jenny couldn’t deny any kindness to this woman. “No bother at all, I would be happy to switch.” And get away from the bathroom.

The woman smiled. “Thank you. My seat is 13B.”

Jenny helped the woman with her suitcases and made her way back up to the front of the plane. Hair began to fall loose from her messy bun, sticking to her face in the summer heat. Her cheeks were flushed, and she could feel her back covered in sweat. She was self- conscious of all the annoyed stares she was receiving as she made her away against the flow of passengers. She apologized and tried to quickly get out of the way. When she made it to row 13 she hoisted her suitcase up into the compartment and fanned herself off.

“Excuse me,” she said, having located her seat, right in between an elderly woman and a handsome man with familiar –

No.

Not him.

Anybody but him.

Jenny felt her heart skip a beat or two. It was almost like a vacuum started in the pit of her stomach, sucking up all her organs and her ability to function. Drew Saunders. The only boy she had ever loved. Until he shattered her heart.

Drew stood and made a motion for her to slide past. Jenny exhaled loudly and moved past him. As she did she could see him analyzing her. She sat down and pulled out her phone, ready to text Amelia with an SOS.

“Blake?” He questioned, shocked.

She flinched. “Jenny is fine.”

He grinned so wide it must have hurt his face. “It’s Drew,” He said, pointing at himself. He leaned back in his seat a little. Man was he tall. “This is crazy! How are you? What are you doing here?”

Her face continued to heat up. He was so close. And he was examining her like she was an insect. It was as if he didn’t remember that he broke her heart. Maybe she could go and ask that woman to switch back seats…

“I’m good. I’m just coming out this way for a few days and then heading home.” Less details the better. She wanted to escape, but her need for politeness overruled her desire to hide away. “And you?”

“My summer break just ended. I’m on my way back to U of T. In my second year of the medical program.”

“Med school? Impressive.” Handsome, popular, and smart? Jenny was doing all that she could not hyperventilate. She could feel the acid rising in her stomach.

“It wasn’t my plan at first, but I figured it out eventually. Where did you end up after graduation?”

This conversation needed to end. Anytime he spoke or she looked at him, all she could see was her ultimate humiliation. He was going to tell his friends he saw her. What would he say? ‘She was a mess, all flustered and ready to pass out at the sight of me’.

As Jenny opened her mouth, the pilot announced the flight was preparing for takeoff. She grabbed her headphones and lifted them up to put them in her ears. “I won’t be much company; I’m a bad flier.” She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, tried to calm her nerves and forget the lie she just told. Before he could respond she hit play on the podcast Amelia had downloaded for her, Seeking a Brave Heart. “To pump you up for the interview,” Amelia said. The flight was only 54 minutes long and the podcast was 45. She could handle it.

The memories kept ricocheting around in her head. The text that she had sent him, confessing her love, posted on every locker at school. Drew holding up a picture of the message to his buddies, laughing and running his hand threw his hair. Drew looking over in her direction and looking away. Drew throwing his arm over some pretty blondes’ shoulder. Realizing Drew had deleted her on all his socials. Jenny crying in the bathroom stall every day for a week. She couldn’t walk down the hallway without being reminded of her broken heart. There had been so many times that Jenny had wanted to reach out to him, but she didn’t want to risk further embarrassment.

The minutes ticked by as she was stuck in the endless loop of her memories. Lost in what could have been different. It was a dangerous way to think.

The voice from the podcast floated in as it neared its conclusion, indicating the flight would be ending shortly: “Remember, bravery is doing something that scares you, even when you don’t want to do it. I want you to take a deep breath in and push through that fear. You will be okay.”

Jenny felt a light tap on her arm. She pulled out her headphones and turned to the woman beside her. “I need to get by.” Jenny swallowed and quickly began to unbuckle and stand up, catching Drew’s attention and he did the same.

Not ready to sit back down, Jenny stood in the isle. She could feel her heart pounding harder the longer that Drew stared intently at her. “Go, be brave, have fun, be hopeful”. Jenny was not the type to be called brave, if that wasn’t clear enough by her desire to crawl out of her skin and hide forever. She took a deep breath.

Drew was smiling as he opened his mouth to speak.

“Why did you do it?” The smile fell from Drew’s face and Jenny realized that it had been her to speak. Mortified she quickly began to loosen her top knot, hoping her hair could help hide her inflamed cheeks.

“Do what?”

She wanted to say: nothing, forget it. But she swallowed her pride. She was already going to cry into her pillow tonight anyways. “Why did you print off that text message and share it with the whole school?”

He shook his head, his hair shifting slightly causing him to brush it away. “That was Josh.”

“Then why did you send it to him?” She could feel tears ready to prick her eyes. She had not been prepared to open pandoras box today. These memories were meant to be kept hidden and locked away at all times.

Drew’s face turned from confusion to sadness. “Jenny, you sent it to Josh.”

“No,” Jenny said firmly. “I sent it to you, and then the next day everyone saw it.”

“I promise you Jenny, you sent that text to Josh. He bragged about it for weeks.” Drew seemed annoyed as he recalled the memory. But then he paused and looked at her with wide eyes. “You meant to send it to me?”

“Yes,” she breathed. “Josh was a jerk, why would I ever send that to him?” But already she was realizing what had happened. Drew never got her message. He didn’t send it or post it. He didn’t break her heart. She felt a new wave of embarrassment. “But you stopped talking to me. You wouldn’t even look at me.”

“I thought you had just confessed your feelings to my best friend. I was getting out of the way.” The sadness in his eyes hurt her. She hated that she pulled the smile off his face.

Before Jenny could say another word, the woman returned. As Jenny sat down, she was painfully aware of the shift in Drew’s behaviour. He seemed stiff and closed off. An announcement came on that they were about to descend.

When this plane first took off, Jenny would have been so grateful for the silence. Now she found herself longing to see his smile again. She stared at him, seeing how much he had changed over the years. She thought back to the time she broke her leg and he carried her books from second to third period every day for a month. Jenny felt a shift in how her heart was beating, a distant familiarity to it.

Please don’t turn into a pining fool again, she thought to herself.

As the plane landed, Drew stood up to get his suitcase. He looked down at Jenny, the lazy smile returning to his face. “It was great to see you, Blake.”

Jenny forced herself to return his smile. “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”

The line started to move and room was created for Jenny to stand. She turned to get her suitcase from the overhead compartment but stopped when she felt Drew’s hand on her shoulder. Her body felt frozen and electrocuted all at the same time. Her heart failed her. Beat, stupid heart, beat.

“You know,” Drew said, leaning close so that his voice drowned out all the noise and chatter around them., “It’s a shame that the text didn’t make it to me. I had the biggest crush on you.” His smile grew before his hand slipped away and he walked off.

Jenny stood in shock, eyes wide and mouth slightly a gap. Time no longer existed as his words rang in her ears.

Her disbelief was interrupted by the complaint of the passenger behind her. Jenny quickly grabbed her suitcase from the bin and reached down to grab her purse. As she did, she saw a piece of paper with a phone number scribbled on it:

‘I promise this is the right number’.

She smiled, her cheeks turning pink as she looked at his retreating figure. He turned to smile at her one last time before he disembarked. She moved out of the way so people could get past her. With renewed hope, she opened her messages to Amelia.

Maybe moving to Toronto wouldn’t be such a bad idea after all.