Into the Light

Chapter 3

 

Shane and Julianna held hands as they prepared to leave the plane.

The flight attendant named Stacy appeared just before they exited.

“I’m sorry,” she said, extending a notepad, “but could you please sign this?”

Julianna’s jaw dropped and she gave the woman an incredulous stare.  Shane knew what she was thinking.  They’d been on the plane all those hours and the woman could have asked.  Instead, she’d waited until they were on their way out, and now held them up.  Shane also knew what the flight attendant had been thinking.  It would be unprofessional to ask for an autograph.  In the end, though, she just hadn’t been able to let it go without asking.  Shane thought that was sweet, especially since he was a minor celebrity at best.

He wrote a note, addressing it to Stacy and thanking her for a wonderful time.  He signed it ‘B.B. Fetters’ for ‘Baby Bro,’ the name by which the other members of Painted Ghost, and consequently many of their fans, referred to him.  Stacy smiled as he returned the notepad. 

Another flight attendant, emboldened, stepped forward with her own pad.  Shane signed for her as well, returned the pad, and took Julianna’s hand.

“Congratulations again,” the flight attendant said.

“Thank you,” Shane said.

“Enjoy Hawaii!” Stacy said.

Julianna didn’t complain aloud until they’d exited the gate.  Early on, they’d come to an understanding about the nature of his work, and she’d accepted that it sometimes meant dealing with fans at inopportune times.  “I cannot believe how inconsiderate some people are,” she said.

Shane left that comment alone, unsure whether she was referring to the flight attendants or to him.

“I need a cigarette,” she said as they made their way toward the main terminal.

He nodded.  She’d been better about it than he expected.

As they moved past a row of offices, Shane saw the girl and boy from the plane standing outside an office with a woman in the airline’s uniform.

The little girl ran toward them, hauling her brother by the hand.

“Hey!” the woman said, following.  “Get back here!”

“He’s not here,” the little girl announced, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.

Shane swallowed.  “Maybe he got held up in traffic or somethin’.”

“Excuse me, Sir,” the woman said.  “Do you know these children?”

“Met on the plane,” he answered as the little girl put her hand into his.

She nodded, holding out her hand.  “Come on, Cindy,” she said.

Cindy shook her head, tightening her hold on Shane’s hand.

“You need to stay with her,” Shane said, giving her hand a squeeze.  “So she can help you find your daddy.”

“Will you stay, too?” Cindy asked, looking up at him with wide, brown eyes.

He felt Julianna stiffen. “Shane,” she said in a tone of warning.

Shane didn’t want to make her angry.  Still, he couldn’t in good conscience walk away from that little girl and the little boy who had a death-grip on his pants leg.

It wasn’t so much that he had a way with children as that they had a way with him.  He liked children and they sensed that.

The airline woman spoke again.  “I think you should just let me take the children and–”

“No!” Cindy said.

Shane thought of the bags that would soon make their way around the carousel.  He knew better than to leave them in limbo.  There was no telling where they’d go.  Normally that might not be a problem but this was, after all, their honeymoon.  “Did ya’ll give people your suitcases?” he asked.

Cindy nodded.

“Someone is bringing them,” the woman said.

“Well, we gotta go get ours,” Shane told Cindy.  “But we’ll come right back.”  He felt Julianna stiffen.  “Okay?”

“We’ll come, too.”

“No,” he said.  “Your father might be worried if he can’t find you.  So you stay here and I’ll come back.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Cindy and her brother let go of Shane and allowed the woman to take them back to the office.

“I cannot believe you just did that,” Julianna growled.

“I’m sorry, Jul,” he said.

“No,” she said, “if really meant it when you said you were sorry, you wouldn’t do shit like this.”  She turned and flounced away, her train billowing behind her.

He didn’t blame her for being angry, but he wished it didn’t have to be that way.

They retrieved their luggage. 

“Do you want to just head to the hotel and I’ll meet you there?” Shane asked.

“No!” she said.  “I am not arriving at my honeymoon hotel alone.”

Shane called the limousine company he’d hired so they could let the driver know of the delay.  He went outside with Julianna while she smoked.

When she finished the first cigarette and prepared to light a second one, Shane spoke.

“Kids are prob’ly wonderin’ where we are.”

She rolled her eyes.  “There’s the door,” she said, pointing.

He went back inside alone, with the suitcases and carry-on bags.

The children sat dejectedly in chairs in the office.  Their faces brightened when they saw Shane.

“So what’s your name?” he asked the boy.

“Russ.”

“I’m Shane.”

“Thank you for coming back, Mr. Shane,” Cindy said.

Shane sat in the office and played computer games with the children under the watchful eyes of the airline representative while others at the airline tried to track down their father.  Finally they knew what happened.  He’d been in a car accident on the way to the airport, but wasn’t seriously injured and would be there soon.

An hour later, Shane relinquished Cindy and Russ to their rightful adult and called Julianna’s number.  She didn’t answer, though he knew her cell-phone was in her small, sequin-bedecked handbag.  He checked the place where he’d left her.  She wasn’t there.

He checked in with the driver, who hadn’t seen her, but at least that gave him the opportunity to rid himself of the luggage.  He returned to the terminal, in search of his wife.

Since she wouldn’t have been able to make it back through security and likely was too sore-footed to do much walking anyway, there were only so many places she could be.

He found her about a half-hour later, sitting in a bar’s cozy back booth with a tall, dark and handsome pilot.

He stood for a moment, watching her talk to the stranger, probably about her awful new husband.

In that moment, he heard the voice of his best friend, Bryan Black.  “She’s going to hurt you,” he said.  “I know that type, all right? How do I know?  Because I’m that type.  It’s all about the hunt.  What I don’t have is always more appealing.  The minute I get it, I start looking for something shinier.  Baby, I am telling you, marrying that woman would be the stupidest move you ever made.”

A voice in the back of Shane’s mind told him to just turn around and leave.

–

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