Аманда Хокинг: Flutter

Meanwhile, my life as a vampire was pretty damn awesome. There were missteps of getting the handle on walking, moving, breathing, eating… all the basic skills I had taken for granted before.

Learning was actually kind of fun, especially with Jack, Ezra, and Mae teaching me everything I needed to know. Overall, I felt better than I ever had before. Pain had been greatly diminished from the way I felt it before, but pleasure increased exponentially. On top of it all, I was completely and totally in love with Jack, and I had just started spending the rest of eternity with him. What could I possibly have to feel bad about?

When the plane started to take off, I thought I might throw up. My fingers were squeezing the arms of the seat so tightly that I was going to destroy them if I wasn’t careful, but I couldn’t help it. I had never been on a plane in before, and even though I had always wanted to go one, it scared the hell out me.

This amused Ezra endlessly. He chuckled warmly at my stricken expression as the engines came on, making all sorts of whirring and clicking noises that sounded exactly like death to me. I couldn’t help but look out the window at the dark night around us and imagine the plan crashing into the runway we were gliding on and bursting into flames.

“First time flier?” a woman across the aisle looked over at us.

“She’ll be fine,” Ezra cut her off shortly, but I was too busy being terrified to comment on his unusual rudeness. When he looked back over at me, he was smiling.

“You could say something comforting,” I suggested in a thin, anxious voice.

“Why? This is distracting you from thinking about other things going on around you,” Erza pointed out. “It’s less than a three hour flight to New York, and I’d like to wait for you to eat until the next flight.”

By “other things” he meant the other passengers, who were flooding the red-eye with the scent of their blood and the pounding of their hearts. While I had just eaten yesterday, which meant that I really wouldn’t need to eat for another five or six days, I wasn’t an expert on gauging my own hunger. I wasn’t even expert at walking across the room at this point, so managing a three-hour flight without eating anyone, that was kind of a feat.

“Mmm, sounds great,” I muttered tightly. Unfortunately, he had a point. My current level of fear made it almost impossible to notice my thirst.

“Really, you should be enjoying this,” Ezra continued with a wry smile. “There’s only a small window left where you’ll be able to feel fear like this.”

“Oh, yeah, this is totally awesome,” I agreed sarcastically.

“Let me give you a little tip.” He leaned in towards me, lowering his voice so it would be inaudible to anyone around us. “Even if the plane does crash, you’ll survive. You’re immortal now.”

So, it hadn’t dawned on me yet. I was a vampire, and I wasn’t going to die in a plane crash.

That is a very strange thought to have. To have absolute certainty that this wasn’t going to kill me.

Slowly, my fingers started to relax on the arm rest, and my heart wasn’t pounding in my chest anymore. Still, whenever we hit any patch of turbulence, I’d grip onto Ezra for dear life, but he’d just chuckle, and then I’d remember that this couldn’t hurt me.

I tried to enjoy the rest of the flight, but it was dark, and even with my improved vision, there wasn’t much to see out the window. Ezra had brought with some books on tracking and wildlife, and he was going over them, even though I’m sure he’d read them before. He had probably read every book on anything by now.

“Where are we going anyway?” I asked him quietly. Most of the other passengers were trying to get some sleep, and I didn’t want to wake them.

“New York City,” Ezra replied without looking up from his book. “And then to Finland.”

“Finland?” I raised my eyebrow, totally surprised by his answer. “Peter’s in Finland?”

“I believe so,” Ezra flipped a page. “Scandinavia and Russia have always been his favorite places to hide out, especially in winter. There’s hardly any daylight for months, and the temperatures are usually below freezing.”

“So we’re just going there because that’s where he usually goes?” I still couldn’t wrap my mind around Peter hanging out in Finland. That just didn’t sound… I don’t know. Exotic enough?

“No. Word has been spreading through some channels that Peter’s had a run-in in Finland. I don’t know exactly where he is, but I feel certain that he’s somewhere around there,” Ezra explained.

“A ‘run-in?’ What happened?” I pressed.

In all the hurry of leaving, I had neglected to find out where we were going, or even what we were going to save Peter from. Ezra had been very vague on the details, but he was positive that there was trouble.

That was enough for me, until we stuck on a flight for three hours with nothing to do.

Suddenly, that information all seemed more pertinent.

“I’m not entirely sure,” he said at length. “And I’d rather not speculate.”

“You’d rather not speculate?” I repeated, feeling a little perturbed. “I’m on a plane flying half-way across the world, much to the chagrin of my boyfriend, and not only do you not know where we’re going, but you’d rather not even speculate on why we’re going?”

“Finland is not half-way around the world,” Ezra corrected me, looking at me rather severely. “Jack will understand, and I can’t explain what I don’t know.”

“Fine.” I settled back down in my seat and crossed my arms over my chest. “I can’t speak Finnish.”

“You don’t need to. I can.” He flipped another page in his book, and I sighed.

“You’re gonna be a hoot to travel with if you’re gonna be like this whole time,” I muttered, and Ezra laughed to himself.

Eventually, I borrowed a couple books from Ezra so I had something to do on the flight.

After hours of doing next to nothing, I vowed to get as many magazines and books as I could when we landed at JFK.

That was my plan until we actually started de-boarding the plane, and Ezra grasped my hand tightly in his.

“There’s a three hour layover here, assuming everything leaves on time,” Ezra told me quietly as walked. “You can’t eat until we got on the plane, because they won’t let you on it if you seem like you’re drunk or high, which you are when you eat. So I need you to stay by me and never let go of my hand, no matter what. Is that clear?”

“Yeah but….” I was about to ask him why, but then we were stepping beyond the plane, and the smell hit me for the first time.

There hadn’t been that many people in the Minneapolis airport. In fact, I would go so far as to say there weren’t even that many people in Minneapolis. JFK terminal is a city unto itself, full of hot, sweaty people pressed up against each other. Even with it being as late as it was, everything was congested. And suddenly, my thirst appeared with a vengeance.

This was my very first time in New York City, but we were only here for a layover, and I was already going crazy with thirst. The next three hours were torture. Most of the time, I had to grip Ezra’s hand so tightly, I don’t know how I didn’t break a bone or something. In turn, he sat there patiently, talking to me about mundane things, like the Cary Grant movie he’d just watched with Mae.

To onlookers, I’m sure I looked totally insane. I sat there rigidly, my eyes locked on my shoes in front of me. I must’ve been incredibly pale, and my hand was desperately gripping Ezra’s. He was sitting next to me casually, a leg crossed over his knee, with a magazine open on his lamp and telling me all about Martha Stewart’s recommendations for making Halloween treats. I know he was just trying keep me calm and focused, because if I were to lunge at someone walking past, that would very, very bad.