To Perceive an Image

Eighteen: Images of Identity Theft

Maryanland, September 17, 2040, 7:00 AM

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, te- okay, that's enough. Fine, the tunnel wins.

I cannot hold my breath for that long, but I'll give myself credit for trying.

Screw asthma. Young Azail did this every day with no problem.

Views of mother nature surrounding houses and buildings removed my gaze from Flynn for the duration of our train ride. Never thought I would enjoy staring out the window at whatever my eyes could grasp this much. If my camera roll became a human and stood in front of me, it would yell vulgar words, asking me to stop taking pictures. But it's my phone, so I do what I want.

Something might be wrong with me. My short attention span never allows me to sit and stare at something for longer than a few minutes before feeling bored. How come my gaze never strayed away from the window?

Soon enough, a cramp shoots up my neck, and my eyes itch to see what Flynn's doing. See, I knew I'd get bored at some point. Craning my head to my left, I see the oh so serious sight of Flynn's 'I'm in deep thought' expression. I've developed a talent for knowing what every facial expression of his means. Furrowed eyebrows and heated glares sent toward whatever poor person or object standing within his vicinity meant do not disturb his running thoughts.

Bonus points if his hand touches his face, itching his cheek, index finger running along his mouth, or said finger resting on his chin. The list goes on, but it all comes down to one conclusion: thinking is in session. But, to his miserable luck, my patience will run out of juice if we don't see what's in that bag. Sure, I'll boil with curiosity if he says I'm not allowed to see private information, but that'll at least entertain me for a bit.

I whisper to not disturb the other passengers on the train, "hey, Flynn, shouldn't we look at those papers?"

Because of the concentrated glare in his eyes, I felt conflicted about disturbing him.

His eyes lift away from whatever phenomena caught his gaze before he turns his head to look at me. I know now's not the time, but the hand on his chin looks attractive. Okay, I'll stop. He nods his head, "Yeah, let's do it. I'm curious to see what we'll find. The first and last time I saw these papers was when my father put them where you saw. My 10-year-old self didn't know what they meant at that moment."

Nodding my head, I help him open his bag and organize each paper in a clean order on the table in front of us. Because we're cool, the assistant upgraded us to senior citizen seats. Kidding, I snuck us in here. They don't check, and our loose clothing makes us look like we are indeed senior citizens, so we won. But I told Flynn to keep his hat. Worst-case scenario, someone recognizes him, so we can prevent that by covering his face from onlookers. But damn him, he still looks handsome.

I stare at the papers laid before us with a tight-lipped smile served with a side of confusion.

Flynn, however, reads through each one and puts some of them back inside the backpack. I'll assume those don't provide any necessary information. The ones he holds near and dear go right into my hands, so he might as well make me his assistant. Deciding to do something other than stare at him, I skim through each paper for a few seconds. After my directions, many more get sent back into the backpack of doom. Now having a bit of an open table, I place the papers in my hands in another organized format. I bring forward three papers that caught my attention, all of which have pictures of khalto on them. All jokes halt in my mind when I notice something.

"Wait, you're reading the housing papers, correct?"

Halting his reading, he looks at me before nodding in affirmation. "Yeah, although I'm not getting much from them other than what I already knew. All of my family members' names are here. I remember these papers. I'm sure these were the ones we would get before we got banished because they mention my mother and father's former jobs and my school."