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(short story) Falling - classicdrogn - 08-28-2011
Falling
by CD, 2011
He awoke to confusion and shouting, a loud noise and jarring motion that threw him upright from where he'd tilted the airliner's seat back, staring around as the other passengers panicked. The prim-looking schoolmarm type who had the seat beside him was gripping the armrests with white knuckles. "Do you think it's an earthquake?" he joked, before noticing her eyes were wide and empty with shock.
The "Fasten Seat Belts" sign started flashing overhead and a voice came on the intercom to give pointless, unheard instructions. There was a... tearing noise, almost, mixed with the shriek of overstressed metal, and then the roof was gone and the wind tore them out of their seats, the bag jammed between his knees and the next seat no more help than her desperate grip.
There was a flash of the sun on paint as the tail passed between them, the disturbed air in its wake pulling their bodies together. Arms swinging wildly for any handhold to save them caught each other, and with the desperation of the dying they clung with terrified intensity. The random tumble evened out as their splayed legs caught the slipstream like the fletching on a badminton shuttlecock, and he opened his eyes again, wincing and squinting as the wind whipped into them.
He gasped. The sun was halfway above the horizon from this height, and the sea reflected it and the brilliantly-painted clouds as if it was a perfect disc of gold set in a band of bejeweled copper, floating in an endless dark sky. To either side the first, brightest stars peeked out where it faded to purple.
With the arm not trapped by hers he nudged the woman, the stranger who'd nodded when they were seated together but immediately become absorbed in her novel, accidentally dislodging the cord that had held her reading glasses when they tumbled through the air. The black wire frames and braided tether were lost immediately. Though there was no chance of making themselves heard over the wind even as they were practically nose to nose, he could see the questioning look in her eyes through fear-wrought tears.
Pointing with his chin and free arm, he directed her to the sunset, though the disk had become an oblong already as they descended. He could see her jaw drop, and felt her chest surge against his as she gasped, amazed as he had been at the sight. He grinned, the wind puffing out his cheeks ridiculously even as it tugged her sensible bun free of the painted chopsticks holding it up, ordinary brown hair turned into a halo of burnished bronze that fluttered wildly around them.
With the distraction, their flailing legs had been stilled and instinctively entwined. The dim corner of his mind that remembered a long ago weekend spent parachuting whispered that that probably meant they'd fall faster, but honestly at this point there was little difference. The increased resistance from the woman's hair flying loose did turn them around again, from headfirst to mostly upright, something welcome as the return of gravity after reaching terminal velocity had started to redden their faces.
The sunset was a backdrop, now, as he beheld the beautiful creature revealed before him. The wind and head-rush gifted her lips and cheeks with a rosy glow despite the earlier pallor of shock and lack of makeup, and the flapping collar of her sensible knit pant suit gave tantalizing flashes of a smooth neck and delicate collarbones. He could see her eyes running over his own face, and her head tilted down to his shoulders, both still clutched painfully tight in her hands. He wondered what she saw in him, with his half-zipped jogging jacket over a plain tee.
She turned further, to look over her own shoulder at the ocean surface, now close enough for the occasional white fleck of foam or wink of light from the nearly submerged sun to be visible. Her face swung back around, and with another glancing conversation the two came together in a kiss, one last act of defiance in an uncaring universe. He almost broke the kiss in surprise when after a moment her breath rushed into him, spicy with the lingering heat of the curry powder she'd added to their bland in-flight chicken, before she inhaled deeply in turn and tasted the mint of the gum he'd been chewing when he dozed off.
At least, they were not alone at
THE END
Notes from the Author
This was actually one of the first story ideas I ever had, somewhere around twenty years before I managed to write it – a short that condensed all the important points of the sappy romance novels the girls were so fond of (this being junior high, girls might not be icky but they certainly weren't interested in anything cool like robots, starships, or explosions) and that (in the form of Romeo & Juliet) we'd even been forced to endure as assigned reading – and so, finally, I managed to do. Boy meets girl, they suffer adversity, they share something wonderful that makes the adversity less horrible, recognise their attraction for each other, act on it, and die. Whether the story becomes a comedy or a tragedy at that point mainly depends on how long before they die and how satisfied they were with life to that point, so depending on the tone you read the last line with this one could be either – the characters could have been living terribly lonely lives and feel happy that they managed to find even a moment of happiness, or it could be a last bittersweet moment in two golden skeins cut tragically short.
- CD, January 30th 2011
Taken from the archives of stuff written while offline
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"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
- Sweno - 08-28-2011
a very neat perversion of the trope.
-Terry
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"so listen up boy, or pornography starring your mother will be the second worst thing to happen to you today"
TF2: Spy