City Of Love

1

"Final boarding call for flight EK071 to Paris."

"Shit I'm gonna miss my flight, I've waited all my life to go to Paris, after all of the planning I went through, I'm gonna miss my flipping flight."

I sprinted through the airport apologising many times as I crashed into people and finally made it to gate 37. Thankfully they hadn't finished boarding. After showing my passport and boarding ticket to the flight attendant and I started walking towards the plane.

"Your seat will be on your left" the flight attendant said to me, even though I already knew. This was my second leg, and I wasn't really looking forward to it. I mean who in their right mind is happy sitting in those tiny chairs thousands of feet in the air for seven and a half hours. I started walking through first class to my seat Man I wish I could afford a seat up here I thought to myself as I glanced at the large luxurious white leather recliners with large T.V screens and plenty of legroom. Oh what I would do for a seat with leg room, instead I had to walk all the way to the back of the plane where the cheapest economy seats were. Suddenly I was lying on the ground. I looked up, my stuff was absolutely everywhere. All too typical of me to have tripped over my own two feet. I quickly gathered up all my belongings and kept my head down as I hurried to my seat.

I don't know why but I always tend to get quite nervous during take off. As I get sat, I did a quick check to make sure I picked up everything I dropped only to come to the realisation that I don't have my passport. Naturally, I started to panic.

"Excuse me, Miss, I'm going to have to ask you to put on your seatbelt as we are going to take off now."

"I'm sorry, but I can't seem to find my passport, I think I dropped it when I fell in the first class section."

"Okay Miss, I will do my best to find it after we are in the air, but at the moment I need you to put on your seatbelt."

"Oh, right, sorry," I said to the flight attendant as I fumbled to click my seatbelt together.

Takeoffs and landings are always the worst part. They make me feel so stressed. It was then that I felt the baby blue ribbon wrapped tightly around my knuckles. I slowly rubbed my thumb up and down the frayed edges letting the softness of the fabric calm me down. My sister had passed away when I was 14, she was 10, and she loved to travel. The ribbon was hers, and she loved flights, whenever we flew on the plane, she would use the ribbon to pull her hair back into a low ponytail.

5 Years ago

"Nikki, here, you can have it," Ella said passing me her ribbon.

"Ella, that's yours. I don't want to take your lucky ribbon from you, you love it too much." I pushed her hands away,

"But Nikki, I want you to have it because I'm not gonna be able to use it anymore. I'm too sick" she said with tears springing to her eyes. "I want you to use it, I know that I'm gonna die soon and I want you to have something to remember me by." she had started crying now which meant that I was crying too.

"Hey hey hey, Ella. I don't need anything to remember you by. You're my sister, I will NEVER forget you." I replied, now sobbing.

"Nikki. Please." she pleaded through her tears, holding out the ribbon, which looked so big in her now delicate fingers.

"Okay, Ella."

"Excuse me Miss, are you alright?" with concern etched over her face, the elderly woman seated next to me broke me out of the trance that I was in.

"Yes, thank you. I'm fine." I looked down at the tear-stained ribbon. I missed her so much.

I pulled my knot of headphones from my pocket, and after taking forever and a day to detangle the things, shuffled my playlist. As the low melody began to play in my ears, I sunk back into my seat. This is one time where I feel lucky for only standing at 5"4. As I listened to the different voices in the songs they made me wonder why people learn so much about celebrities. I've never done that. I listen to music for the music not so I can fall in love with some person I'll never get to meet. As one of the songs comes to an end, my heart-rate finally felt normal, and the seatbelt sign flickered off. I carefully released the latch on my seatbelt because I forgot to use the bathroom before getting onto the plane. The loud bang of drums in my ear as a song started reminded me that I still had my headphones on. I recognised the song immediately as being one of my favourite bands, Beyond Arizona, I wound my headphones around my phone after pausing the song and started to stand up.

"Could Nicole Grant please make herself known to a member of the flight crew, thank you. Once again, could Nicole Grant please make herself known to a member of the flight crew." One of the flight attendants said through the speakers.

What the hell have I done I thought to myself, why would they want to talk to me. A flight attendant swiftly made her way over to me after I had pressed the call button.

"Hello Miss how may I help you?"

"Hi... My name is Nicole Grant. Have I done something wrong?"

"No Miss Grant, not at all. But could you please come with me?" I nodded and warily stood up to follow the flight attendant. I wanted to ask where she is taking me but I'm too busy trying not to fall. Once we stopped walking, I looked around and noticed that we were in first class, great. I glanced to the guy in the seat next to him. I wonder if that's my passport he has in his hands, if only. I thought to myself.

"Excuse me but may I ask what I'm doing here?" you could hear the quiver in my voice, I really didn't like standing while flying.

"Sorr-" The flight attendant began, but she was interrupted.

"That would be because I asked for you to be here. You seemed to have dropped something..." The guy sitting down said as he waved MY passport around in his hands.

"Well, if you don't mind I will be taking that from your hands and be on my way; thank you," I stated as I leaned forward to relieve him of my passport only to be left disappointed.

"Ah ah ah. If you want your passport, you have to earn it." He said gesturing to the free seat beside him.