It was close to 4 p.m. when I left the house the next day. Unfortunately, my mother hadn't warned me of the exact time of the flight, so once I had picked up the tickets, I headed back to the house, threw my clothes and other necessities into my suitcase in a whirlwind, grabbed my guitar, and went shooting down the road to the airport. My flight was going to leave in an hour and a half, and I still had to check through the much-dreaded security.
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Once I reached the airport, in retrospect, it wasn't that packed. This was extremely fortunate for me because I was on an extremely tight schedule. Checking through security was moderately simple, and once I took a seat in my designated terminal, I recieved a call from Joe.
"Hey, sis! You in the airport yet?" he asked cheerfully.
"Yeah, I'm waiting for the plane to arrive now," I replied, gazing out the window at numerous aircrafts shooting into the sky and ascending to the ground.
"Oh. When can I expect you?"
"Um, I'll be landing around ten, so probably tom-"
"No, you can make it here! We'll still be up."
"Are... Are you sure, Joe? I don't want to be a hassle or anything."
"No, it's totally cool! I have you're bed ready and everything when you get here."
"All right. I guess I'll see you then..." Hanging up, I looked up to see the large aircraft with Frontier Airlines printed formally on the side slowly approaching the terminal. I shoved my phone into my jeans and readied my boarding pass in hand.
"Watch it, girl," a man grunted, as he shoved past me quite rudely. I was about to retaliate with a sassy remark, but I realized I didn't want to get in a tussle with a middle-aged man. I took my seat by the window, luckily alone. My worst fear while flying was having a seat by a stranger. It took twenty minutes for all of the passengers to take their seats, and once that was done, I had to endure a tacky "airplane safety" video as the plane began to lurch forward toward the runway. I felt my head jerk backwards towards headrest and my body tilt backwards as the veins of the city beneath me grew to a miniscule size.
My flight mainly consisted of endless hours of music blasting in my ears, sipping on some watered-down soda, and just a little bit of shut-eye. I couldn't seem to get much, however, because of the anxiety that was slowly taking me over. I wondered what international rock-stars would think of me. What would the record label companies think of me?
As expected the plane landed around ten. My eyelids were already growing heavy, but I expected the night to last much longer than I would have planned. I dropped by Starbucks to grab a small cup of coffee to keep me running and found my way through the maze of people to the ground transportation terminal. As I hopped in one of the small cabs, I searched through my phone for Joe's address and dug through my purse for some cash to pay for the ride down.
Joe lived in a flat in downtown L.A., on a somewhat quiet street, as of now, however. I thanked the taxi driver and cautiously approached the porch. I tried to control my breathing and heart rate, but it was practically bouncing out of my chest. I felt as if I was going to cough it up. I took a couple of deep breaths and pressed my lips tightly together as I jabbed my thumb into the doorbell. I gripped the handle of my guitar case tighter, a hot sweat beginning to form on my palms. I heard footsteps from the inside, a throat clearing and then the door opening with a click. Then appeared my big brother, his wild curls tied back out of his face.
"Hey, Melanie!" I hugged him briefly, hoping he wouldn't notice how nervous I was. I was sure my eyes were wide as marbles, my vision throbbing in rythmn with my head.
