Chatterbox: Inkwell

Do any of you remember TAoSS? It was a story I wrote for a good long time last year, was completely head over heels for, and was extremely optimistic about my finishing it.

Needless to say, I abandoned it, something that I still feel truly awful about. I loved my characters, their problems, their friendships. However, I was deeply dissatisfied with my writing. It was sentimental, cliche, and dragged out certain things too long and moved other things too fast. I had written myself into a wall.

Well, it's back. Kind of. In any case, Adri and Jack and Alex and Theo are back— this time with distinct personalities, funnier jokes, and... wait for it... wait for it... an actual plot! 

Important Notice: This story contains characters that are part of the LGBTQ+ community. If you are uncomfortable with this in any way, then you are under no obligation to view my writing. I will respect your opinion on this matter if you choose to respect mine.

Another Important Notice: Dear former TAoSS readers, while it may be formed around the same characters, this is not the same story! You will notice changes, to the characters, their relationships, and... well, mostly everything.

And without further ado, I present to you: Red Sky Summer.

———

From the cabin of a potbellied airplane slipping through the midday sky, a pale, pout-faced girl stared at the feathery tendrils of cloud spread haphazard across the crisp blueness and wished that America didn’t exist.

She pressed her hand to the smooth metal wall of the cabin, letting her skin relax against its firmness in a quiet reassurance. The odds of being killed in a plane crash are one in 29.4 million. The odds of being killed in a plane crash are one in 29.4 million.

Those were comforting statistics. No matter how much she reasoned it out with herself, though, she couldn’t be rid of that small, creeping thought: the uncertainty of the unsolved “one”. Even as it nibbled at her composure, however much she bit her lip and gripped the handles of her seat, she hadn’t yet cried, and for that she was proud.

Papa returned from his short venture to the bathroom and settled back into his spot. “How are you doing, Adri, darling?”

She turned to him. The warped, grating, light of the cabin threw harsh lines across his face, making him look far older than he was.

“I’m fine,” Adri said. “How much longer?”

Papa checked his watch. “No more than two hours,” he said.

“Thanks.”

Further conversation was made difficult by Maman sleeping between them, the creases of her brows relaxing out of the perpetual furrow they had worked themselves into during the past few weeks. Adri examined her for a moment. Amidst the flurry of preparation and packing, it was odd to see her so still.

Adri lay back and rested her head on the sea green polyester of the seat. The plane was not quite silent, the steady hum of voices and crinkling of candy wrappers melding into the white noise inside her head. The rest of the plane ride passed in a fuzzy blur, and a dull stretch of time later, the passengers were beginning to get up, stretch their limbs, and continue with their lives.

“What time is it?” Adri asked, clambering to her feet.

“Two in the afternoon,” Maman informed her, standing up on her tiptoes to pull their orange carry-on down from the overhead bin. “But to us it feels like the middle of the night.”

Adri groaned.