Why’d You Trick Me?

The butterflies in my stomach slowly start to subside as the airplane stabilizes in the sky. My hands loosen around the armrests and I let out a sigh of relief.

Why am I so nervous? I’ve been on a plane before, this is and should be no different.

An oddly familiar blond-haired man in the seat next to mine snaps me out of my thoughts.

“My name is Mathew.” He says, “What’s your name?” He is sitting comfortably under a cheap blue airplane blanket.

“My name is Kate.” I say, blushing with embarrassment for no reason at all.

“It’s nice to meet you, Kate,” the man eyes me suspiciously, but eventually smiles at me.

“It’s nice to meet you too,” I say politely.

Mathew asks me if this is my first time flying. I tell him no, explaining that I simply get nervous on planes. He nods understandingly.

“My bud from back home gave me this tip for when flying,” He says, “Tell the flight attendants you’re not feeling well, and then a few minutes later, casually ask for a good snack. The flight attendants will be so relieved that you aren’t going to be sick on the plane, they’ll give you whatever you want as long as you keep up the half-time sick act and say ‘thank you’ way too much.”

“That's,” I think for a second, and I look at him. “Very smart, actually.” I smile.

“Try it when the flight attendants come around with food and drinks.” He says, winking and going back to staring out the window.

“Alright.” I tell him, letting the conversation end there.

I sigh and lay my head back on the seat. I’m tired. I need sleep but my anxiety wont let me sleep.

I’m guessing it’ll be at least 15 more minutes before the flight attendants come through the plane with food or water, so I let my mind wander.

I start to feel the plane moving, my stomach flips and I close my eyes, trying to distract myself. I take a deep breath.

Mathew interrupts my racing thoughts, “Why are you on this plane right now? What is your final destination? Where are you going?”

I glance at my ticket: 5:15am flight from Florida, Orlando to New York City.

I look back up at Mathew and say, “I’m actually visiting my high school friends, we haven’t seen each other in a while and we wanted to get together.”

“Ah, interesting.” He responds, closing his eyes for a moment and reopening them, “I’m going to New York City just to visit, I’ve never been so I don’t know what to expect.”

I want to continue the conversation. It’s a nice distraction. “What do you do for a living?”

He goes silent and seems to be at a loss of words. I interrupt his thinking and say, “I’m sorry if I’m being nosy, I didn’t mean to-”

He cuts me off, “No no, you have nothing to worry about. I’m sorry, I don’t really know how to explain it.”

I raise an eyebrow, surprised that he can’t find a word to describe his own job to me. I assure him not to worry at all, and I change the subject. “Have you seen the newest episode of ‘Stranger Things’? I’m obsessed.”

Mathew looks confused, “What is ‘Stranger Things’? I don’t think I’ve watched that.”

My face slips into a surprised expression and he lets out a small laugh. “You’ve never seen it?!” I yell jokingly, “Well I guess I have a lot of explaining to do.”

Mathew patiently listens to me as I explain the entire plot of the 3 seasons of the show. He seems interested. We talk about the different characters, he asks questions about it and, before I know it, the plane is steadily flying in the air, my anxiety disintegrated.

He continues to ask questions about the show. I start to notice his prominent jawline and his deep brown eyes. His thick eyebrows, his long eyelashes, his flushed lips.

I try to ignore the small things I keep seeing. His blond hair that curls slightly at the tips, his nose that scrunches up when he smiles. A faint scar across the bottom of his cheek.

Do I have feelings for him? No. Nope. Absolutely not.

We haven’t even known each other for more than an hour!

Don’t be stupid, I tell myself. We are barely even friends.

The screen on the seat in front of me stops showing the world map with an airplane flying across, and goes to the home screen of Netflix. I smile and insist on watching the first episode of ‘Stranger Things’ together. Mathew agrees and leans in so that we can share my headphones. I play the first episode and lean back.

Mathew pays close attention to the show. When it finishes, he asks if I want to watch the next episode with him and I gladly accept the invitation.

After another episode, the flight attendants come around the plane offering food and drinks. Mathew looks at me and wiggles his eyebrows up and down, hinting to me that I should do what he said, pretend to be sick to get the food I want.

I can’t help but feel guilty, so I pathetically shake my head, telling him it’s not going to happen. He shrugs, giving me a small smirk as the flight attendant walks up with the cart.

“May I get you anything to eat or drink?” The flight attendant looks tired, she has deep bags under her eyes. She seems to be pretty happy and perfect though, obviously trying to keep the passengers on the plane calm and polite.

“I’d like a-” Mathew coughs a few times and raises an eyebrow at me, expecting me to play along. He coughs into his arm again, and continues. “Sorry, I don’t feel too well. I’d like water and a few cookies please.” Another cough.

I subtly smile and roll my eyes, observing the small airplane menu.

I eventually tell the flight attendant that I’d also like water and a few cookies. I smile at her and decide to just go for it. I add, “Oh, and if you could, please bring my friend here a vomit bag. I get squirmy around vomit and I want to make sure we’re prepared if anything happens.” Mathew coughs again and touches his throat, wincing and gagging ever so slightly at his fake pain and fake illness to prove our fake point.

The lady’s face goes pale and her eyes flick from me to Mathew. “Certainly,” She says, giving us our water and cookies and leaving for the vomit bag.

She comes back after a minute, handing me a pale yellow vomit bag. I thank her, trying to be as sincere as possible. I put it down on Mathew’s foldable food table/tray attached to the seat in front of him. I stand up and ask for directions to the bathrooms.

The flight attendant points to the nearest bathroom. “It’s the first door on your right, it’s impossible to miss it.”

I thank her again and make my way to the bathroom. I wait outside until the light above the door goes from red to green. The bright neon light shines like a miniature green traffic light and soon, a little girl comes out, happily skipping back to her seat.

I go inside and come out as fast as I can, I don’t want to accidentally keep anyone waiting. As I’m coming out, I see an old man waiting and I’m relieved that I rushed. I give him a smile and head back to my seat.

“Holy shit,” I gasp, noticing the meal that Mathew earned with his acting earlier. “It hasn't even been 10 minutes since I left, and look what you got!”

He smiles, gesturing towards my seat, inviting me enthusiastically to eat his well-earned food with him.

“I got us spaghetti, soup, diet Pepsi and a sandwich all for free! We’re not even in first class!” He exclaims.

I sit down eagerly, licking my lips and neatly placing a napkin on my lap. “Thank you so much.” I say.

He nods and begins to cut the sandwich in half. We feast for 15 minutes, talking and stuffing ourselves with food. We finish eating and I grab a napkin and wipe my mouth. The flight attendants come back over to our seats, making sure that Mathew is feeling alright. We thank them almost a million times.

“We will be landing soon so please put on your seatbelts,” Says the flight attendant, repeating it as she walks through the plane. I clip the seat belt around my waist. I fumble through my carry-on bag, looking for my book to distract myself during the landing. I can’t find it, but I desperately need a distraction. Mathew grabs my hand, squeezing it softly a few times. I give up on looking through my bag and I look up at him. I feel my stomach drop and I know we’re going to land soon. I feel the plane bumping onto the road and eventually, it comes to a stop. Mathew and I end up talking and letting the other passengers of the plane get off first, soon leaving us alone with the pilot and flight attendants. As we’re leaving, we are stopped at the main airplane door.

The police officer looks at me and Mathew and says in a deep voice, “I’m going to have to stop you for a moment and ask you a few questions.”

I look at Mathew, puzzled. He looks panicked. I whisper to him, “Do you know what this is about?” He doesn’t say anything.

I look back up at the police officer and he starts asking me and Mathew questions. “What are your names? When did you two meet? What is the reason that you are both heading to New York?”

“What’s going on?!” I can’t comprehend why Mathew and I are being questioned by the police. The police officer shows me a photo of a young blond-haired man. He informs me that the guy in the picture is a dangerous thief who is running from the police and is currently all over the news. I realize the man in the photo is Mathew.

——————————-

I’m shocked. I have a million questions. This must be why Mathew looked familiar when I first saw him, and why he couldn’t tell me what his job was. He doesn’t have a job, he’s a thief. Mathew soon realizes that he has no way off of the plane other than the door that is being blocked, so when the officer comes to arrest him, he sighs but doesn’t resist. The police officer searches Mathew, eventually finding a black wallet in his pocket. He opens the wallet to read the ID, and immediately hands it to me. It’s my wallet. I slip it into my backpack and take a step away from Mathew. I thought we had a connection.

“Goodbye, Mathew.” I murmur, stumbling out of the plane with the flight attendant as he gets escorted away by the officer.

As I’m leaving the airport with my luggage, I make a promise to myself that I won’t tell anyone about this. This was simply an unfortunate event and I don’t need to dwell in the past, I'll get over it. I think I saved myself from a lot of embarrassment by waiting until the last moment to ask for his number, because I would have been unknowingly asking a thief for his freaking phone number. I’m thankful that nothing bad happened but I still wish that Mathew could have been a normal non-thief. I agree with myself to put all of this behind me. It’s behind me, it’s in the past.

But I can’t help thinking to myself, Why’d you trick me, Mathew? I think I may have actually liked you.