Unseen Messages(12)

Before I could argue, she snapped her fingers, looking over my shoulder. “Next.”

A man rudely bumped me, squeezing his considerable bulk between me and the desk, effectively shoving me away.

Bloody—

I bit my tongue.

I’d always had an issue with my temper. It’d gotten me into far too much strife. I’d made a personal promise the day I left England that I would rein it in. Working with timber and innocuous items helped calm me when others pissed me off (yet another reason why I loved my vocation).

I might’ve been able to control my outward reaction, but inside, all I wanted to do was shove the *’s head multiple times against the desk.

Don’t have time for that.

Kadavu was a short flight away. The storm was fading. I would find a way to get there tonight.

I grabbed my bag from the floor and stalked away to find a solution to my nightmare.





Chapter Five


...............................................

E S T E L L E

......

I’ve made mistakes, so many mistakes. I shut out those who told me to abandon lyrics. I avoided those who didn’t understand g-sharps and b-flats. I ignored those who didn’t realise my pronunciation came in the form of octaves and arpeggiated chords.

I’m a mistake. I’m my own person.

I made wrong choices. I made the only choices I could.

I died. I lived.

I didn’t listen. I listened.

Taken from the notepad of E.E.

...

HOLY MOTHER OF God.

Hadn’t I lived through enough drama on this trip? First, all the issues with security and boarding, and then, an attempted crash landing.

I couldn’t stop shaking.

I’d vomited in the stupid bag the air-hostesses provided for inflight sickness. I’d hugged my jacket full of belongings as if by some miracle I would survive with a pocket mirror and travel-sized toothpaste. And I hated how the fear of dying had shown me just how much of my life I’d wasted. How I’d pinned happiness on a future I couldn’t predict. How I let fear rule my decisions rather than doing what I quoted in my songs.

You’re alive.

Be grateful.

I was grateful.

Beyond grateful.

But despite my thankfulness, I couldn’t stop trembling at how close to death I’d come.

It was a minor storm. You weren’t anywhere near death.

I moved through immigration in a strange mind-space, unable to untangle the last hour of turbulence, terror, and finally, landing intact. I didn’t understand how strangely accepting I’d been in those final moments where I’d truly, deeply looked at who I was and was forced to stare at the one conclusion I’d been running from.

I found myself lacking.

It was odd to drift through the airport, still looking and sounding and moving like myself when something so irreversible had changed.

I thought I was dead.

You’re overdramatizing the situation.

Regardless, the thought of saying goodbye had forced my eyes wide open. I’d been slammed into my deepest, darkest secrets, and I didn’t like what I’d come face-to-face with.

In those horrifying moments of mortality, I introduced the ideal me to the real me.

And I didn’t like it.

I’m afraid.

Not just of failure and dying but of success and living.

Madeline had given me a dream career after a decade of meaningless labour. She’d given me something priceless after the death of my family. And all I could do was moan about crowds and cower in corners when people wanted to befriend and congratulate.

Who did that?

Who willingly choose a life of loneliness because she was too afraid to risk sharing herself with others?

Who am I?

I didn’t know.

Not anymore.

The girl I’d been when I boarded in America had died as truly as if we had crash-landed. I no longer wanted to be that Estelle. I wanted to be something more. Something better. Someone I could be proud of. If another life-or-death moment came along and made me score-card my life, I wanted to be happy not afflicted.

I wanted no regrets, and right now...I had millions of them.

Grabbing my suitcase as it appeared on the carousel (so much for having it go through to Sydney), I clutched my hotel and shuttle voucher and made my way outside. My suitcase creaked behind me. I needed a new one. The wheels on it had well and truly given up—I might as well cart it on sheer plastic for how useful they were.

The minute I get home, I’m going to reinvent myself.

Home.

The thought of sleeping in yet another hotel brought frustrated tears to my eyes. I’d begged at the checkin counter for a reprieve. I was happy to wait in the terminal for a possible departure. I was content to be patient. But the crew had been adamant that despite the fact the storm was passing, and other airlines would depart later tonight, they wouldn’t risk flying.

That was their final decision, and I had no way of getting home (unless I wanted to swim).

I need to sleep. I want this day to be over.

I hated the whiny voice inside, complaining of inconvenience and delays. Only moments ago, I’d admitted I didn’t like my desire to hide away and run from human contact.

Perhaps this was what the messages had been trying to say—not to avoid calamity but to walk right into it, so I could realise what was missing before it was too late.