Nora

It was early morning, and the sun had barely risen. Nora was sitting in the arrivals lounge at John Glenn International, waiting, having arrived early, just in case her sister’s flight came in ahead of time. The light was behind her lending a horizontal glow to the cavernous space before her. Nora had shed her coat, which now sat folded up beside her but not her sweater. She glanced up at the screens and then to her phone app again to make sure they agreed. They did. The plane from Algiers via Paris and New York was running fifteen minutes late, no, seventeen now.

It was quiet around her, mechanical noises and little more, not that busy so early in the morning and in a smaller international airport which wasn’t a very busy one compared to others she’d traveled through. Nora was feeling anxious. It’d been months since she seen her sister, or even talked to her. She was worried the abduction might mean she’d be greeting a sister who wasn’t the same as the one who’d she’d known, that the trauma Tasmin had suffered might have changed her.

She took in and then let out a breath to relax, then wondered if she should have brought Harold along to keep her company. Nora had not wanted him to distract her while she was welcoming back her older sister, though. Thinking about him did distract her for a few minutes. When Nora glanced up at the screen she saw Tasmin’s flight had just arrived and now it was only matter of minutes before she would disembark, go through customs, be allowed out through security.

She checked her phone again, scrolled down the news. There wasn’t anything that interesting going on. Endless government bickering and stuff. Nothing to actually distract her from the wait.

It wasn’t like this was the first time Nora had to wait for sister at this airport or another, she reminded herself. More so than anyone at the office except for maybe Dr. Burnes, The late Dr. Burnes. Ever since graduating college, Tasmin had gone one for excursions to other parts of the world, even after they joining Palantine and Co., or maybe because of that. Mostly it had been to Africa, as that was the continent Tasmin love the most. But Nora now wondered if that would turn her off going back at the earliest possible convenience as she had had over the last four years. Was it a little selfish for her to want her sister to be turned off travel for a good while, so they could truly reconnect, maybe?

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The minutes clicked by, their reunion edging close. Nora glanced around at the other people waiting what kind of reception they would give whoever was coming to them. For a moment she did think maybe she should have brought Harold along just for the company. There was another woman, silver-haired sitting to her right, a man and a young boy, a few others who had shown up in the last few minutes.

Then she spotted a figure sitting at one of the benches she hadn’t noticed a couple moments before. A tall man, dressed in a kind of crumpled dark green suit, a coat lying over the chair’s armrest. He seemed to be sitting quite comfortably, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Something about him-

Then he slowly turned in his direction, adjusted the hat he was wearing, kind of a fedora but smaller, and glanced back at her.

Nora felt herself take a sharp intake of breath as their gazes met. The man had sharp blue eyes, and a long sharp features, was somewhere in his middle age, lines on his face that spoke of experience, even deprivation. There certainly wasn’t much softness there.

He half-smiled at her, then winked.

Nora wrenched herself away from his gaze, tried to settle her stomach, which was now full of butterflies, but not the good kind.

It’s nothing, she told herself. You’re just in a mood.

She turned to look back. The man was gone, leaving an empty row as though he’d never been there in the first place.

What? That was something new, weird, unsettling.

He couldn’t have been a ghost, of that she was sure. Was her mind playing tricks on her, then?

Nora still felt ill at ease from the brief connection he made with her, So much so she had to stand up, and take a little walk around just to work off the increase in tension she felt.

And then, there Tasmin was coming through security with her leather travel bag on her shoulder, glancing around and finally spotting Nora. Nora waved her and for her sister to come over, even as she headed towards the crowd Tasmin was moving through.

Oh, thank God! She thought to herself. Her sister, in her khaki African gear did not at first glance look worse for wear.