The seat next to Lottie Matthews was the last one left.
{{user}} had done a full scan of the cabin with the optimism of someone hoping for literally any other option and come up empty. She knew Lottie vaguely. Everyone knew Lottie vaguely. Quiet. Intense. On something, people said, though nobody said it to her face.
She sat down.
Lottie looked up from the window. Then back at the window.
"Hi," {{user}} said.
"Hi," Lottie said.
They didn't talk for twenty minutes.
Not awkwardly. It just didn't happen. Lottie had her head against the window watching the ground crew move around below with that particular quality of attention she had, and {{user}} had her headphones half in not really listening to anything.
Then Lottie said, out of nowhere — "My dad bought me new luggage for this trip."
{{user}} took her headphone out. "Sorry?"
"New luggage." Lottie nodded toward the overhead compartment. "Expensive. He researched it. Sent me three options and asked me to pick."
"That's..." {{user}} wasn't sure where this was going. "Nice of him?"
"It's his thing," Lottie said. Matter of factly. No bitterness exactly. Just observation. "When he doesn't know what to say he buys something." She paused. "I think he's been not knowing what to say for about sixteen years."
{{user}} looked at her.
"That's very specific," she said.
"I've had time to work it out," Lottie said. And then she smiled, a little wry, a little bright, the medicated version that was still genuinely warm underneath it. "The luggage is very good though. Very sturdy."
"High praise," {{user}} said.
"The highest," Lottie said seriously. And then laughed, a small surprised one, like it had caught her off guard.
"Mine does dinners," {{user}} said, after a moment.
Lottie turned to look at her properly.
"Dinners," she repeated.
"When something's wrong or he doesn't know how to deal with me he books a restaurant," {{user}} said. "Nice one. Cloth napkins. The whole thing." She paused. "I've eaten a lot of very good food during difficult conversations."
Lottie considered this. "That's actually worse than luggage."
"It really is," {{user}} said. "Because you have to sit there and eat the nice food and be grateful while he—" she stopped. "You know."
"Doesn't say the thing," Lottie said.
"Never says the thing," {{user}} confirmed.
Lottie nodded slowly. "Mine doesn't say the thing either." She looked back out the window. "I think he genuinely believes the luggage says it for him."
"Does it?"
Lottie thought about it.
"No," she said. "But it does have very good wheels."
{{user}} laughed. Lottie looked pleased about that, surprised and pleased, like she'd been aiming for it and hadn't quite expected to land it.
The plane started moving.
Lottie sat up slightly and watched the runway through the window with bright interested eyes, which was not the reaction {{user}} expected from someone who seemed like they'd rather be anywhere else.
"You like flying?" {{user}} asked.
"I like the bit where the ground disappears," Lottie said. "Everything looks better from far away."
"Especially home?" {{user}} said.
Lottie turned and looked at her. Something in her expression shifted, open and a little caught, like {{user}} had landed on something real.
"Especially home," she said quietly.
They were in the air when Lottie reached up to the overhead and pulled her jacket down and found, tucked in the pocket, a folded note.
She opened it. Read it. Her expression did several things in quick succession.
"What is it?" {{user}} asked.
Lottie held it up. It was a receipt. For the luggage. With a small note in the margin in neat handwriting.
Hope it serves you well. Proud of you.
Lottie looked at it for a moment. Then she folded it back up carefully and put it in her pocket and looked out the window.
"He wrote in the margin," she said quietly. "He's never—" she stopped. Cleared her throat. "The wheels really are excellent."