Petunia
Petunia was getting used to the horrible plastic seating of the Rindburg Imperial Airport departure lounges. She’d flown more in the last three months than in her entire life to date, and if all the travelling was stressful, at least she was starting to get practiced at packing. The temptation to shop at the exorbitant stalls lining the concourse nearby was fading too.
Sat across from her, Phoebe looked less at ease. She was used to the travelling, but not to airports. This was the first time that her trip to a race hadn’t been on Soot’s back. The dragon was aboard an official charter transport plane, as was standard for dragons in the IL, but IL rules stipulated that only the vet team were allowed on that flight unless Tenebrae paid extra.
So, Phoebe was travelling with Petunia in the place that had been Adelie’s for the first five races. Misery drooped about the dragon rider’s shoulders as she thumbed listlessly at her phone. Occasionally she seemed to type out a message and then reconsider, rubbing a hand across her forehead or flopping her free arm against the seat not-quite-forcefully-enough to hurt.
The concourse was mercifully relatively quiet – it was a late Thursday morning and still too early in the year for summer to be drawing significant numbers of holidaymakers. Petunia glanced around, wondering if anyone would recognise Phoebe. Travelling with Adelie, they hadn’t had to worry about being recognised, but Phoebe’s face was increasingly visible across the city, from local newspapers to gossip magazines. Hopefully in the future, once the new sponsorship deals were actually formalised, they’d be able to afford to put Phoebe on the ICDA plane with Soot.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Hey, Petunia, what do you say to a friend you accidentally ghosted?” Phoebe’s question caught Petunia off-guard. She studied her friend’s face for a long moment, seeing in the hollows around her eyes an unfamiliar fear, different again from the desperation she’d showed when confronted about her mob entanglements at the last race.
Then Petunia thought about the question she’d actually asked. “How do you accidentally ghost someone?”
“I just meant, like, I forgot, I mean, I didn’t mean to-“ PhoebeSelen caught her own defensiveness. “I need to have a difficult conversation with someone and, uh, I kept being too busy with everything.”
Petunia frowned. “Can’t you just apologise? Honesty is the best policy, right?”
“I don’t know how to word it, though, Petunia. I can’t just be like ‘sorry I didn’t message you for two weeks, I was busy’.”
“Can’t you?” Petunia shrugged, a little awkwardly. “Isn’t that exactly what you need to say?”
Phoebe looked down at her phone and typed something. Her fingers started out sure and quick, then slowed, then ground to a halt. The dragon rider didn’t look up or speak again. Eventually, she dropped her phone into her lap and pressed both her hands to her eyes, tipping her head back to face the ceiling.
Petunia checked the clock. Still over half an hour until their posted boarding time.