Kanna had a serious problem.

She’d just realized that she wasn’t going to be like her father. It had taken a single trip across the Pacific to let her in on such a valuable secret, but this was her second trip. That made it worse, since now it was clear. Before, she’d hoped in growing stronger, getting used to it. Now, she knew it wasn’t just hiding inside her somewhere.

“Blindingly obvious that I would never be him,” she whispered, to no one in particular. No one answered.

She was hiding in a bathroom stall at the ATL airport after being delayed again. Her carry-on bag hung on an untrustworthy hook sticking out the back of the door. She’d never been there before, all of it was strange and different. She longed to be familiar with the tiles beneath her feet, the hallways, the stores. She just wasn’t, and that drained her every second.

Her dad had crossed the Pacific over a thousand times, she believed. He’d called each trip a compliment, an award for being the top charmer of a smaller firm. Pipe fittings, brackets. Little things, useful ones. “Those tickets cost money,” he’d say to her. She’d understood; she’d smiled and nodded. She’d gazed in glory at his smiling visage, as she was taught to.

It never made flying better, for her. Every flight felt like timeless hell, frozen. She hated turbulence deeply. Planes also seemed a gambling den of vast risks: bacteria, noise pollution. The flights were at least sixteen hours long, each way. Each second on them passed like a toddler dragging concrete. It felt like living through pure pain.

She tried to cope. She jotted things down to distract herself, made a dream house inside her journal. Inside sat ideas, projects, perhaps ways she could escape her father’s life. Sometimes in rhymes, word blends, she expressed herself. Or tried. Words were just things, anyway; she could control them, play as long or hard as she wanted. She’d always liked words, and that had almost given her father hope. He’d been so good with them.

”What an issue: my dad was too good at everything.”

All it took was one mistake, from her; the air chilled at home and nothing had ever been right since. She’d scarred his faith in her by doing some trend, goofy kid stuff. She could barely remember what she’d done, even, or the reason WHY she’d done it. Something to impress friends, maybe, or she'd been trying try to make friends in the first place. She’d had few.

Her perfect dad hadn’t make her friends, since other dads in her neighborhood drank and cursed, watched TV. They worked more blue-collar jobs, lived blue-collar lives. Her dad had earned just enough money to stand out from the rest. That hadn’t been easy, though it seemed a silly complaint.

”Tragic, yeah.” Her bathroom-stall sarcasm went unnoticed.

After the prank gone wrong, teenage Kanna had stood there weeping, holding a bag of spray paint cans and Halloween masks. Something like that. Stupid, childish. She’d never felt more alone, with the police officers holding her by each arm. Never more ashamed.

Until now.

Buttocks going numb, one foot pressed against the loose-latch stall door, she knew she was done. Tears rolled quickly down her face, falling onto her bright white skirt. Her gut-sick terror of dying flames, or the concussive force of wind ripping the plane apart, or sinking into the sea. The tears placed finality on the shift inside her.

She’d only cried a few times in her life, just like him.

”Funny how that works,” she whispered, her voice cracking every few syllables.

She couldn’t go back home: she wasn’t strong enough to get on another plane. That left staying in the airport as the only option, for now. Deciding she was grounded for the time being, she tried to create a secondary plan to survive, for however long it took.

There were hotels around, she had cards with some liquid funds. Savings, too. Enough for now.

She just didn’t know how to walk, or talk, or live like he weren’t still watching her. Strangely, she felt glad he’d died. A jar of ashes wouldn’t be able to judge her like her dad could have, still alive.

The bathroom door opened and two girls burst in. For a moment, they chatted back and forth, then one left. Like fate, the remaining one pried open the door next to Kanna’s and went about humming and sitting down. Kanna tried not to freeze, breathing deep and slow. She was already such a wreck, she didn’t know how much more she could take.

Thankfully, the girl next to her simplified things in a way.

”Hey, neighbor, you don’t happen to have any change, do you? Or a spare tampon? That would be even better. Unexpected blessings, right?” Kanna’s body jerked up straight at the last words she spoke. Her dad used to say it all the time.

”Unexpected blessings, right?” He’d said it till it was stained onto her soul, scarred into her way of life; how she existed day to day. It was hope, maybe even understanding from somewhere beyond the ATL. Beyond her suffering in a bathroom stall.

Kanna wiped a few stray tears off her face with quick flicks of her wrist, then reached towards her bag. Thus, she moved past being frozen, finding life and light, even in the ordinary.

To Be Continued…