Mister Weston

by Whitney G.

  GATE B30

  JAKE

  Dallas (DAL)

  STEPPING OFF THE PLANE in Dallas, I realized that Gillian had yet to respond to my last email. Not only that, but she hadn’t sent me a single message this week, and I wasn’t sure why I cared—or even noticed, but it made me upset for some reason.

  JAKE: Bathroom near the Hudson’s Bookstore. Terminal B.

  Jake: The board says your flight landed half an hour ago, Gillian.

  Jake: This arrangement works better when you actually answer.

  TEN MINUTES PASSED.

  JAKE: Have you somehow gotten lost in the airport?

  TWENTY MORE MINUTES passed, and she never answered, never showed up. Frustrated, I figured she was still upset about our last conversation and sent her an email instead.

  SUBJECT: OUR ARRANGEMENT...

  You’re making this more difficult than it needs to be, Gillian.

  —Jake

  SUBJECT: RE: OUR ARRANGEMENT...

  I’m not making anything more difficult than it needs to be. I’m done. I can’t deal with how you treat me anymore. (Also, I’m pretty sure those ellipses weren’t necessary in your subject heading.)

  —Gillian

  SUBJECT: RE: RE: OUR arrangement...

  Seeing as though I don’t treat you terribly, you need a better reason than that. Feel free to tell me in the bathroom near Hudson’s Bookstore. Terminal B. (I’m pretty sure you should never challenge me on grammar.)

  —Jake

  SUBJECT: RE: RE: RE: Our arrangement...

  You now treat me like a fuck-toy and a cum-bucket. You won’t even TALK to me about simple shit like the weather unless YOU feel like it.

  I. AM. DONE.

  —Gillian

  PS—This is exactly why I never wanted to fuck a pilot.

  SUBJECT: RE: RE: RE: Re: Our arrangement...

  You know seventeen letter words and twenty-one letter adjectives and you choose to use the words “fuck toy” and “cum bucket”? I don’t TALK to you because we agreed not to fucking TALK and unlike you, I would like to stick to the original rules.

  You are not done, you just want to play like you are, but I’m not chasing you again, Gillian.

  —Jake

  SUBJECT: RE: RE: RE: Re: Re: Our arrangement...

  I’m counting on it.

  —Gillian

  SUBJECT: RE: RE: RE: Re: Re: Re: Re: Our arrangement...

  I’m giving you five minutes to get to the bathroom, Gillian.

  —Jake

  SUBJECT: FAILED MESSAGE. Auto Response.

  The recipient has blocked all further communication from this email address.

  GILLIAN

  ~BLOG POST~

  PRESENT DAY

  FUCK HIM.

  COMMENTS DISABLED.

  GILLIAN

  ~BLOG POST~

  PRESENT DAY

  MY PHONE HAS TEN UNANSWERED text messages from him, far more than he’s ever sent, each one acting as if things will eventually return to normal, as if I’ll still meet him for sex.

  I hoped like hell I wouldn’t have to see him for at least a month, but as luck would have it, we shared a Monday night flight from New York to Milan, but I went the entire flight without so much as giving him a second glance. No matter the two times he attempted to confront me in the galley, or give me a look that made me want to screw him on the spot, I couldn’t do it. I called for a fellow flight attendant to come over so he would walk away.

  The ride on the hotel van held a tension so thick I wondered if anyone else could feel it. And when he came to my room later that night and knocked on the door, I only stared out of the peephole and waited for him to leave.

  As much as I desperately wanted to feel his hands on me again, as much as I needed to feel him inside of me again, I couldn’t let my feelings develop any further. I even called in sick today and am tempted to put him on my “no fly” list with the scheduling department. Very tempted...

  Write later,

  **Taylor G.**

  1 COMMENT POSTED:

  KayTROLL: 36 posts in three days?! Your life isn’t THAT interesting...

  GATE B31

  JAKE

  JFK (New York)

  A LINE OF CARS SLOWLY drove down Hampton Avenue in Brooklyn, honking their horns at me as I slowed my car in the right lane. A heavy rain was falling over the city, drenching every walking straggler in sight and damn near flooding the city drains.

  I looked outside my window at the address Jeff gave me for Gillian—a brick building that looked more like a haunted house experiment than an apartment, and shook my head.

  We hadn’t spoken since she blocked my email address, and the few times I’d seen her in passing, she’d done everything she could to avoid me. The more recent occasion, when I saw her boarding a tram in Atlanta International, she glared at me before rushing away. If it hadn’t been for the fact that I was needed for a quick turnaround flight, I would’ve gone after her.

  Braving the rain, I stepped out of the car and shut the door. I walked up the steps at the front of her unit and pressed the call button for unit four. The panel let out a loud, screeching sound, and then the entire thing fell to the ground.

  Jesus...

  I knocked on the warped wooden door, but as the winds blew by, it immediately gave way. I headed up the steps to the fourth floor and came face to face with two apartment doors, but when I saw the words “Two Broke Girls” artfully written in pink across the one on the right, I knocked on it a few times and waited.

  Two minutes passed.

  I knocked again, even louder this time.

  “I heard you!” Someone yelled. “I heard you!”

  The door swung open, but it wasn’t Gillian. It was a brunette in a bathrobe with huge red rollers in her hair.

  “Yes?” She crossed her arms. “It’s two in the morning, asshole. What the hell do you want?”

  “I’m looking for—” I paused. “I’m Jake.”

  “I know who you are.” She glared at me. “May I help you with something?”

  “Is Gillian here?”

  “I don’t know a Gillian.” She leaned against the frame. “I’m pretty sure you have the wrong address.”

  “I’m pretty sure I don’t. Is she here?”

  She shrugged. “I think she’s flying to Los Angeles right now.”

  “Her line says she returned from Los Angeles yesterday.”

  “Oh, well I guess you’re right,” she said. “Well, I guess she’s still out on a date. You know, those things you never take her on.”

  I rolled my eyes. “When will she be back?”

  “Tell him never.” Gillian whispered harshly from inside the apartment. “Never.”

  I peered through the crack in the door, seeing Gillian standing in the kitchen with her arms crossed. She was shaking her head and wiping her eyes with a Kleenex.

  “Never.” Her roommate repeated. “She’ll never be back, Jake. I’ll tell her you stopped by though. You can go now.”

  “Did you get my flowers?” I ignored her, knowing damn well Gillian could hear me right now.

  “She never got any flowers.” Her roommate stepped back. “Best of luck, Jake.” She slammed the door in my face before I could say anything else.

  I started to knock again, but since the walls were so thin, I heard Gillian begin to speak.

  “I hate him...” she said. “I fucking hate him.”

  “No, you don’t.” Her roommate countered. “But you don’t have to put up with him anymore.”

  “I won’t. He just...” She was crying. “I can’t handle no strings attached sex. I should’ve listened to you, Mer. I just—I thought he was starting to fall for me, too.”

  “Are you going to spend your next two days off crying about him?”

  “No.” Her tone was sharp. “I need to do the same thing I did to get over Ben. I need to go out and find someone else. Maybe not to sleep with, but...Just someone else.”

&nb
sp; My blood boiled at the thought of her being with “someone else” and I started to knock again, but I didn’t feel like wasting time. I twisted the doorknob and pushed the door open, walking right inside.

  “What the fuck?” Her roommate jumped up from the couch. “Don’t make me call the cops, Jake. You’re breaking and entering.”

  I ignored her and walked right over to Gillian, stopping dead in my tracks when she recoiled. She didn’t look up at me. She simply stared at the floor with her arms crossed, with her face beet red as tears fell down her face.

  “Gillian—”

  “No.” She cut me off, still not looking at me. “Say whatever you think you need to say and then leave. Now.”

  I sighed, looking over my shoulder to where her roommate was now watching us from the couch. I scanned the room, noticing that despite the drab exterior, they’d managed to make the inside look like it belonged in a completely different apartment. And in two of the corners, in front of massive stacks of piled envelopes, were eight of the flower bouquets I’d sent yesterday.

  “Say whatever you think you need to say,” Gillian said under her breath. “And then leave me alone, Jake.”

  “Okay.” I adjusted my watch. “I honestly think you’re the most insane and infuriating woman I’ve ever met. I knew from the moment you gave me a tour of my own goddamn apartment that you were a special brand of psycho.”

  “Okay, you know what?” She looked up and her eyes met mine. “Don’t say whatever you think you need to say. Just leave.”

  “I miss the way you fuck me.”

  “Oh, be still my beating heart.” She hissed. “How could I ever be okay with letting you go after hearing that?”

  “I figured I’d start with honesty.”

  “How about starting with transparency instead?” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Where do you go every three weeks? Why is that we can never meet up on those weekends? And why do you always take your phone calls in another room and change the subject when I ask about it?”

  “Gillian...”

  “Why is it that every time we’re on the verge of getting closer—every. single. time., you shut me out and act as if I can turn off my feelings as easily as you can?”

  I stepped back. I’d seen her angry before, seen her damn near on the edge of lividness, but the look on her face right now was beyond different from that. It was pain.

  “Those flowers don’t make up for you being an asshole, Jake.” Her voice cracked. “I don’t care how beautiful they are. And neither does this.” She opened a drawer and pulled out the watch I’d given to her and threw it to me.

  “You don’t have to give this back.”

  “I want to give it back,” she said harshly. “I want you to give it to a woman who can deal with you treating her heart like a goddamn yo-yo. So, like I said earlier...Say your final words and leave.”

  “I’m not leaving.”

  “Well, I will. Hurry up.”

  Her roommate noisily opened a huge bag of potato chips and sat up on the couch, watching us intently like we were her entertainment.

  I rolled my eyes at her and faced Gillian again. “Can I talk to you, in private, please?”

  “Right here is fine.”

  She pointed at the clock on the wall. “Five minutes.”

  “Fine.” I held back a groan. “I do miss the way you fuck me, and I miss the way I fuck you, too.” I stepped closer to her, crossing into the kitchen. “And if you weren’t crying right now, I might believe that you want me to leave you alone.” I closed the gap between us and wiped her tears away with my fingertips. Then I returned the watch to the drawer.

  “Don’t touch me...” she said, but she didn’t move back when I wiped another stream of tears away.

  “I don’t intend to hurt you, Gillian,” I said softly as she turned away. “And I think you should know by now that I do have feelings for you.”

  “You have one hell of a way of showing it.”

  “Gillian...” I grabbed her hands, entwining them with mine until she looked up at me again. “I don’t usually let people get close to me because they always disappoint me in the end. Always.”

  “What happened to ‘neither of us can predict the future?’ I believe it was you who said that.”

  “I’m not done talking.” I pressed a kiss against her lips. “The three-week thing is personal. It’s something I’ve never had to answer to anyone about, but...” I looked into her eyes. “We can discuss it later if you’d like. You think I’m fucking another woman when I can’t meet you those weekends?”

  She nodded, looking completely convinced.

  “Well, I’m not. It’s only been you since we met.” I let one of her hands go and ran my fingers through her hair. “As crazy as you drive me sometimes, I don’t want to lose what we have.”

  “Outside of great sex,” she said, her voice completely hoarse. “What do we have, Jake?”

  “Whatever it is, it’s a mess, but I like it.” I looked right into her eyes. “That said, I honestly don’t want us to argue anymore.”

  “Ha!” her roommate snorted, making both of us turn around, making us both realize she was still watching.”

  “Sorry,” she said, faking a cough. “My allergies are just awful this year.”

  I gave her a blank stare and turned around, refocusing on Gillian. “I don’t enjoy arguing with you and I’m s—” The word stalled on my lips. “I’m...”

  Her eyes lit up and her lips turned up into a small smile. “You’re what, Jake?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and before she could make a spectacle out of it, I continued. “For not treating you right. Yes, I will do better. If you let me.”

  “I think that’s as good as an apology as you’re going to get from him, Gil.” Her roommate spoke from the couch. “I would be okay with you giving him one more chance based on that, especially since you say the sex is so amazing.”

  Gillian cheeks turned red as she ignored that comment and looked up at me. “Is this the part where you whisk me into my bedroom and make love to me?”

  “No, this is the part where I ask you to come fly with me.”

  “When?”

  “Now. This morning.”

  Her smile faded. “I can’t.”

  “And why not? Is it the someone else?”

  “No.” She shook her head, and grabbed my hand, pulling me down a short hall and into her bedroom. She motioned for me to sit at her desk. “I’ll be right back.”

  She left and I looked around her room. With its bright yellow walls and Christmas lights strung atop the window, her cramped space was stuffed with boxes of shoes and racks of clothes on one side. Her mattress, propped up by egg-crates, was on the other side.

  The wall above her desk was covered in photos, college news-clippings, and handwritten notes. There was one particular phrase that was written repeatedly on multiple pinned post-its:

  Fuck you, NYC.

  Fuck you, NYT.

  And Fuck you, Kennedy.

  Ha! It rhymes...

  UNDERNEATH HER HANDWRITTEN notes were photos of herself. She was smiling in a college newspaper room, laughing at an airfield, and numerous shots of her in an airport.

  I picked up one of the airport pictures and noticed it was dated for six years ago. Her hair was twisted into a bun and she was dressed as a gate agent, not a flight attendant. Not only that, but she wasn’t dressed as an Elite Airways gate agent, she was wearing the red and white from Delta Airways in a few shots, and the blue and red from American Airways.

  Interesting...

  Before I could think about how she’d managed to get hired at three competing airlines within the same few years, I spotted two pictures of us on her wall. Confused, I pulled them down and saw that she’d snapped them while I was sleeping. With her eyes squinted and her black bra slightly exposing her breasts, she was smiling while resting against my chest.

  She suddenly returned to the bedroom and shut the door.

&
nbsp; “What is this?” I held up the pictures before she could say anything.

  “Nothing.” She blushed and walked over, trying to snatch them away from me but I moved them away and pulled her down into my lap so she was facing me.

  “Next time a warning would be nice,” I said.

  “You’d actually pose for pictures with me?”

  “No, but I’ll be sure to take your phone away next time we spend the night somewhere.” I ran my hands against her thighs. “Why can’t you come fly with me this morning?”

  “My family is coming into town for that proposal I told you about.”

  “So? You hate your family.”

  “Yeah, well...I need to meet them at the airport in a couple hours and come clean about everything.”

  “What’s everything?”

  “It’s a long story.

  “Give me the Cliff’s Notes.”

  She let out a breath. “They still think I have the same fancy job I had years ago and am doing something with my life. They think I still live on Lexington Avenue, and my mom and sisters are expecting to stay in that apartment, but you know.”

  “You were going to tell them all that as soon as they arrived here?”

  She nodded. “I made them reservations at a Hilton Hotel. They’ll have to pay for the rooms on their own, but I did try to make sure they wouldn’t have to stay here at my apartment.”