Feral Hearts Read online

  The chances of a flight going down from Dallas to Atlanta were about eleven million to one. That was fine for all those others, but if Jenna’s flight were the one to plummet, then she was in trouble. She had already read all the statistics for airline crashes and this one had a great record, probably due to the fire retardant materials, stronger seats, better training for attendants, and improved exits.

  Jenna had ruled out that there would be hijackers as a threat, but she still watched fellow passengers for strange behavior. As far as she was concerned, everyone acted in weird ways. No one paid attention to the crash directions, everyone was slow to turn off electronic devices, and the couple next to Jenna kissed.

  The blonde groaned.

  Jenna shifted further away in her seat, smashing herself against the window, wishing the couple would stop their play, faintly envious that the woman had such an attractive partner. Envy was said to be green. Green with envy. Jenna’s eyes were green but she didn’t look at other with envy, other than this one time, or did she? Is that what the saying meant? Because it didn’t mean people envied her green eyes. It must’ve meant that Jenna looked at others with envy, and she would have no matter what her eye color.

  She felt left out. That was why she envied people their relationships and happiness. She wanted to have the same.

  Jenna self-consciously brushed her shoulder length, plain brown hair away from her face, wishing she had the guts to lighten her hair, but she worried that the highlights would be the wrong shade, or too thick, too yellow, dry, or false-looking. There were way too many possibilities.

  Her hair might look fake. Maybe the highlights would number evenly. What if she hated them and it was impossible to revert to natural again? She knew she would measure her hair endlessly until it grew out. All she needed was another thing to measure and keep track of. Brown was a plain color, but not as without a personality as grey was lacking; grey was dull and faded, past it’s bloom. Brown was the color or rot and decomposition. However, it was also the shade for minks which were not only aggressive, but richly furred animals. Brown was an enigma.

  When the airplane was cruising, the Captain welcomed the passengers, and the seatbelt light was off, the blonde and her handsome man went to the bathroom to finish their activities, excusing themselves within a minute of one another.

  Jenna was both relieved and let down. She was glad to be free of the noises they made (because people might think Jenna was involved in the sexy activities), but she was also a little letdown.

  Jenna kind of wished to see how the couple interacted and what it was like to have a boyfriend to fool around with on an airplane. Outside of watching movies, Jenna hadn’t seen much dating-interaction and had zero experience of her own.

  When the man and woman returned from the little restroom, faces a little sweaty and flushed, Jenna made an effort to smile and be friendly. “Smooth flight, isn’t it?”

  “Very Smooth. Some bumps, though. Delightful bumps,” the blonde said. She almost purred.

  “Oh. I didn’t notice any,” Jenna said. Then she wanted to kick herself for saying something so silly when the man chuckled. No wonder she had so few first dates and no second dates.

  She counted the seats again. She used a wipe to clean her hands. She would’ve read a magazine, but she thought they were full of germs from filthy passengers who read them before her. She pulled out her book again but found herself counting words and then letters in words instead of reading the mystery. Social embarrassment was an anxiety trigger, her doctor warned her in her head.

  Jenna refused a drink on that flight, worried she would need the restroom and refusing to go in there after the couple had made the Mile High Club in the tiny cubical. When they landed and left the plane, Jenna saw the man and woman exchange business cards, promising to get in touch. They waved good bye to Jenna. When the man walked away, it was with a confident, smooth swagger. He was very attractive, and he knew it.

  Jenna was shocked. The couple was either playing as if they didn’t know one another to enhance their relationship, or they were strangers. Jenna suspected the latter was correct. She was very curious, so she followed the blonde into the ladies’ room.

  The woman, Connie or Bonnie or something like that, reapplied her lipstick in the airport bathroom where Jenna had followed her. As Jenna washed and rewashed her hands, carefully counting the scrubs on each hand and using a towelette to turn off the water, she watched Connie or Bonnie in the reflection of the mirror.

  “Blood Crave, by Delights make-up line,” the blonde said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I thought you were watching my lipstick. I love this color, don’t you? That’s the color. Blood Crave. I think it’s a new shade they’ve recently released. I bought it at the airport in Dallas.”

  Jenna nodded. “Oh. I’ll remember that.” She took the tube and looked it over, memorizing the brand, even though she had no reason to take note of it. She was being polite. Her psychologist, Doctor Ed, would’ve said she was “being social.”

  Even there in the Ladies’ room, she could hear his voice encouraging her to take a singles trip to Italy and to be social and enjoy herself. He thought it would open her up for more adventures and be good for her, but she doubted his advice just as she had doubted it a million times since she agreed to the trip.

  All she could think of was Cattabulous, who might be trapped in a bathroom without water for five hours or maybe seven, a night’s layover in Atlanta. Jenna washed her hands again since she had touched the lipstick, feeling it was full of germs.

  “The color might be good on you,” Connie or Bonnie said. She took back her tube of lipstick and looked at the man’s business card she had tucked into her bag. She rubbed her lips together and puckered as she looked in the mirror. “He was fun.”

  Jenna forced a smile again. “He was cute. I would go out with him.” Those were brave words for Jenna, and she knew she wasn’t the type that kind of man asked out for a date.

  “Eh. He was pretty hot.” Connie or Bonnie offered the business card to Jenna, who shook her head no, unsure why she was being offered the card anyway. Connie or Bonnie tossed the card into the trashcan and shrugged. “I have a boyfriend already who’s better looking and has a really good job and all.”

  Jenna nodded, pretending she understood. She didn’t understand at all. Even with Doctor Ed’s handy-dandy “words to use for camaraderie,” she couldn’t quite find the words to convey acceptance of cheating on a boyfriend, mainly because she never had one to cheat on. If she ever had one, she wouldn’t cheat. She’d appreciate having someone who cared and treated her well, not that Connie or Bonnie indicated a caring relationship back home.

  Bonnie/Connie walked away with a wave, her yellow dress vanishing around the corner. The bright yellow was dramatic and bold against all the somber colors around it. Yellow was a fake color, less dependable than others, and false.

  Jenna went her own way, cocooning herself as she walked down the busy, loud airport, ignoring chatter and exclamations to talk to herself calmly in her head. Focusing on where she was going, she counted steps, watched numbers on the gates change as she passed them, and hurried along, completely at her capacity for social interactions.

  That was her flight from Texas to Georgia. Georgia was the state of peaches, and while peach was a soft, sweet color, it didn’t have the outgoing, reliable feel that orange did, not that Jenna liked orange as a color. It was too bright and demanded way too much attention.

  In Georgia she held on to her carry-on bag and took a shuttle to her hotel room, where she made sure the room as clean and neat. She settled in with a room service burger and fries, counted the fries, and then turned on the television. She had another pillow brought up so there were three.

  The window was securely locked and she was on the fifth floor.

  Her room was 509 by choice.

  “No, room 306 won’t work. May I have room 307 instead?” she had asked politely when she che
cked in at the front desk. No. It wasn’t available. “May I have another, odd numbered room?” She refused 429. They agreed on 509.

  Doctor Ed had told her to just ask. He said that people in customer service heard much stranger requests than for odd numbered rooms. He said people usually asked for even numbered rooms. Statistically, people preferred even numbers and symmetry to odd numbers and asymmetrical elements.

  She also collected useless information, like statistics about plane crashes and phobias, dates, weather phenomena, and movies. She liked numerical data mostly, unless it was something even-numbered which was almost worse than no numbers at all. Leaflets three: let it be. That was for poison ivy and warned people that by watching for three leaves, they could know the plant was bad. Doctor Ed asked her why this didn’t mean that odd numbers were all bad, because poison ivy had three leaves in a cluster, but it didn’t work that way, she explained.

  For a doctor, he was not very clued in to how numbers worked.

  After counting the tiles in the bathroom and hiding one with a washcloth, she took a shower. After drying herself with a towel she turned the television off, leaving it at channel thirty-nine, and fell asleep, exhausted. She dreamed she was a dolphin. There were all kinds of statistics about the ocean, and as a dolphin, she ruminated about as many as possible.

  On Sunday she didn’t fly until after three o’clock, so Jenna called for room service, ate a good meal, showered again, and watched television. During the commercials, she took out Doctor Ed’s card and considered calling him and saying that she wasn’t going after all, and she didn’t mind being single.

  That was her deal with him. She agreed if she were to back out of making the trip, she would call and talk to him first, but it was Sunday. He might’ve been at church or with his family, and she couldn’t force herself to dial the number.

  Church made Jenna think of purple. Good color. It was a holy color, enlightened and positive.

  Jenna rolled the singles trip brochure in her hands a dozen more times, reading every word again. A fun and exciting (!) trip in Italy with other singles, all looking for companionship, friendship, and love. If nothing else, it would prove she could do this alone without having a breakdown. She could survive.

  And maybe she would find love.

  No, she wouldn’t. She knew the statistics were low for it.

  Jenna shook her head, knowing this was a waste of time. She had learned a few things, however. She learned that people like Connie or Bonnie found handsome men and enjoyed themselves and tossed them away like rubbish because they had a better deal on the side.

  She found herself at the airport with plenty of time to kill after going through security. At a boutique that was overpriced at least three times (and that was okay because it was three and not another amount), Jenna found the brand of lipstick she sought and purchased Blood Crave.

  “Do you want something else? We have this great fragrance half priced right now, and it’s really fantastic. It’s not too heavy…would you like to try it?” The clerk smiled brightly at Jenna. Jenna looked at the fragrance bottle. It was green.

  More envy.

  “No. Thank you.”

  “This eye cream is popular, not that you need it, but flights can be very dehydrating for the skin.”

  “I’ll drink water on my flight. Just the lipstick, please.”

  A sour look passed over the clerk’s face, but Jenna couldn’t imagine what she had done to cause the woman to be irritated. She had been polite and purchased the lipstick. Maybe the clerk was paid on commission.

  Jenna left the little shop, walked away, and found a restroom.

  In there, with bright lights all around, she carefully applied her new lip color, looked at herself in the mirror, puckered her lips, and promptly rubbed the lipstick away with a tissue. The color was much too optimistic for her situation when Jenna had no reason to think the trip would work out in a positive way.

  The lipstick left a red stain on her lips that somehow was attractive, and Jenna left it, thinking that she wasn’t ready for Blood Crave, but maybe just a hint of the color.

  Crave was a strong word anyway. Jenna didn’t think she had ever had a true craving, but only slight desires. She might enjoy and wish she could have some peppermint ice cream, or a steaming hot coffee in the morning, or a shower after a long, hot day outside, but she never craved any of that. None of it filled her mind or haunted her.

  That was silly.

  The tissue, smudged with red lipstick, caught her eye as it lay in the garbage can among white paper towels and tissues. Red was a strong, dependable color, sure of itself and brave. Maybe it was far beyond Jenna.

  Cattabulous had a red collar. The collar had little stones set into rivets on the fake leather. Seventeen of them, which was fine. She hoped her cat was eating well and wasn’t locked in the bathroom, but the image of the red collar in the while bathroom was all she could think of now.

  “Cattabulous?” Jenna cried out.

  “Are you okay, Hon?”

  Jenna saw the restroom in Atlanta swirl around her dizzily, refusing to coalesce, up and down, around to the side. Her back thumped a wall as a middle aged women carefully pushed her to a seat. Someone pressed a cool paper towel to her face, and Jenna slowly inhaled as ordered, letting the cool cloth refresh her.

  “Now just go on and sit right there for a little bit.” The woman pressed another cloth to Jenna’s hands. It felt cool and clean.

  “I’m sorry…I…” Jenna was embarrassed but still too woozy to try to get up and run into a stall, even though she wanted to.

  “Why, you nearly fainted. Have you eaten? Are you ill? We can call for medical help, Hon.”

  Jenna felt around and reached into her purse for a small bottle. The woman next to her helped her remove the cap on the little bottle and Jenna took a pill out gratefully. Jenna mouthed the pill, struggled to her feet, staggered over to the sink, cupped her hands under the motion-activated faucet, and swallowed the pill with the water cupped in her hands. The effects would be fast and she would feel better. “Nerves. I’m flying to Italy.”

  “Oh,” one of the women clucked, “that’s it, I’ll bet.”

  “What happened?”

  The women brushed Jenna’s hair back. “Poor thing. Sarah and I saw you go white as a sheet, Hon. Just relax and take a few minutes to let your medicine work. Rest and relax.”

  The other woman called out. “She’s just fine now. It was her nerves.”

  Women muttered and shuffled out the door.

  “Are you all alone? Bless your heart.”

  Jenna felt a wave of gratitude, but held the cloth tightly. “Yes. I’m alone.”

  “That can be a bit unnerving.”

  “I’m on a trip with singles…well, I will be as soon as we get there and meet up in Italy.”

  “That’s exciting. A singles trip! Why, you could meet just anyone at all and I’ll bet you have a wonderful time.”

  Jenna nodded. It did sound fun, in theory. “I’ve never flown but from Dallas to here. This will only be my second time on a plane.”

  “You’ll be fine,” the other woman said. Sarah. She had kind eyes and a motherly nature.

  Jenna felt her eyes fill with hot tears as she missed her own mother terribly. It was bad enough that Mom made her live alone (with Cattabulous) and work at a library where there were books combined on shelves with other books that were all sizes and shapes and colors (it took medication for her to even go to work). Mom said it made her more independent, but Jenna didn’t agree since it took pills to go to work, pills to live alone, pills to sleep, pills to wake, and pills for when the other pills didn’t work.

  Mom was allergic to Cattabulous, so Jenna couldn’t have her beloved cat and go back to live with Mom, which was probably why her mother had encouraged her to adopt a cat in the first place. No matter if Mom was unfair and wanted Jenna to be independent and find a boyfriend, get married, have children, and live a fantastic life. None of
it mattered. Jenna missed her mother and wished she were there to hug her and promise this entire adventure would all be okay.

  “Oh, Hon. Don’t cry,” the first woman said. Her name was Sharon.

  “I miss my mother and I miss home and my cat. Everything is different here, and I am just scared,” Jenna said and snapped her mouth shut as she realized she had blurted all that out aloud to strangers. Tears ran down her face.

  “Now, Honey, you can’t sit here and cry. You’ll have a wonderful time once you’re there and around young people and laughing with them. You’ll make friends. Right now, you’re tired because you probably didn’t sleep well for being nervous. Get some good sleep on your long flight and you’ll feel better,” said Sharon.

  Sarah nodded. “And have a cold drink. Just keep telling yourself how much fun this will be and when you get home, you’ll have some wonderful stories and pictures of you smiling from ear to ear with new friends to share with your mother.”

  “That’s true. She wants me to have fun. She paid a lot for this trip,” Jenna admitted.

  “See there? You want her to know how much you enjoyed this trip…so, that means you have to have the greatest time of your life. This should be a special trip, and it will be. So many people only dream of a trip to Italy. Why, you could even find love and romance.”

  Jenna looked into Sharon’s face and didn’t see deception. This was advice that her own mother had given her. Strangers agreed. That meant Jenna wasn’t too broken to find love on a single’s trip and wasn’t so hopeless that outsiders ran away from her.

  In a few minutes, Jenna felt better again as her pill took effect and the kind words cheered her spirits. She felt able to thank the sympathetic strangers whole heartedly, began to reapply her lipstick, and would soon head off to her check-in for her next flight.