Expecting To Fly

By Afri'na Annie Coffman

“Just people.”
That was all she said.
It was all she needed to say.
A girl, a mere sixteen years of age, our girl, a million miles from home, she and her brother, alone in an unnerving helter-skelter world. A few short days ago, cozy and contented, back in their tiny town, they had little idea, or care, that such a place as this existed. Now, they may as well have been teleported out beyond the moon onto some alien planet ...
“We are people.” She retorts in answer to the old man’s bruising, racially charged interrogation. “Just people.”
As the saying goes, out of the mouths of babes sometimes come gems.
Brigit’s brother, never known as talkative, has made an instant connection with the man sitting across the table from them. But unexpectedly, with no more than a few hasty assumptions by the old man, that connection threatens to crumble and explode into hostility.
But her words turn the tide, and unite this odd trio. Two naïve teenagers and an irrelevant old street bum fuse into a formidable force. The three find themselves flying inescapably into a crazy-minded mission to help a broken city mend its ways.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Afri'na Annie Coffman
• Release date: Nov 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311432285

Book preview

PART ONE: HIGH HOPES

It was sixteen years ago. No matter, it may as well have been yesterday, even today, even a moment ago. The memory has remained crystal clear …

Birds

They left on a Tuesday.

They sat facing backwards. The two sat looking out the back window. Those two them kids sat soaking up the final glimpses of their past.

Those concluding images swirled in confounded emotions, at once warm and, at the same time, desperate. Later recollection of the dwindling moments contained both sweet serenity and excruciating heartbreak. Each revolution of the little train’s wheels frayed another tiny thread of nerve and sinew. They gaped in dumbstruck disbelief. The contentment and safety of home was mere centimeters, mere seconds, a paltry handful of heartbeats from being gone forever, forever … gone.

Them two kids watched as a slender pimply-faced youngster stood in the middle holding firmly onto the hands of his elders. The woman smiled her cheery smile and waved. The man was crying.

Oh, there were no tears visible. The eyes were bright and dry. He stood erect. He stared directly into the big boy’s blue eyes. His gaze flickered over onto her a couple of times. Then immediately it snapped back to stare deeply into the big boy’s blue eyes. The man looked strong, confident, reassuring. As he had forever been, the quiet man standing on the platform was their rock.

But the two of them knew. That well-taught, keen-eyed, observant pair was not easily fooled. They, and most especially the boy, had spent the entirety of their short lifetimes taking cues from this man. They grew up attuned to reading his expressions, his mood and his posture. They were well-taught by a grandmother who was surely among the very finest of observers (if I do say so myself). And so they could see it. Despite his façade of bravery they could see it easily really. There was the slightest slump to his shoulders. Almost imperceptibly each sturdy shoulder sagged and curled in toward the other. There was no doubt. Even though the tears were not yet flowing. The two of them knew it. The man was crying …

They sat pressed together. His left foot, ankle, thigh, hip, elbow and upper arm practically melded with her right foot, ankle, knee, thigh, hip, elbow, upper arm and shoulder. Being much taller, his knee protruded out past hers. His shoulder rose well above hers, sculpted and substantive, it threatened to bump onto the side of her face. They sat like that, the way little kids do, taking comfort, taking solace in the connection. They sat there, pressed together, the way they had so often sat as little kids.

They didn’t sit like that so much anymore. It wasn’t that they didn’t, as teenagers, still enjoy the comfort, the confidence, the reassurance, the opportunity to regroup in a safe place. No, it was more about how, as they grew older, some people looked queerly at them; it was about the social expectations; it was about the unspoken questions; it was about the obvious fact that they were not blood brother and sister; it was about how a few of Bloom’s more vocal individuals misunderstood the foundation of the odd little family. The truth was, that despite the absence of a biological connection, these two were as close a brother and sister as could be found anywhere.

Oh, thankfully, there were those who indeed did understand the connection … not the least of which were her best friends Mary and Ramona, also an old woman named Ocean who seemed to know and understand everything, as well there was a tough kid named Arnold whom you would never guess cared about such things. To boot, there was a certain young fellow named Austin Birofy. Three years ago Austin had been privy to an up-close, highly personalized and most memorable demonstration of the strength and devotion of the connection. But small towns, being what they are, well, a few gossips in the town had raised eyebrows, when, with muted voices, and with insufficient stimulation to occupy their minds and their time, well, they speculated on the nature of the relationship between the boy and girl.

But now, all those silly societal rules and conventions, all the scornful glances, all the whispered inferences and trifling conjecture meant nothing to them. In these life-changing, breath-robbing moments they sat pressed together, like little kids do …

The train had lurched when it started moving. It startled her. He liked it, of course. He thrived on any and all movement. Any hint of danger, anything inducing an increase in adrenaline was welcome in his world, anytime, anywhere. After the initial jolt the two-car solartrain moved smoothly, quietly. It glided along unobtrusively, silently slipping over the flat portion of track headed toward the incline. As the train built up speed its distance from the station began to grow alarmingly. The three left standing on the platform gradually shrank. Framed in the rear window they absorbed into a widening panorama. Facial features faded away. The familiar individual postures and stances of the trio of loved ones obscured into a blob of ambiguous human shapes, Already, their intimate auras and scents were consigned to memory. The big boy’s blue eyes squinted and strained but could no longer make out the colour or expression in his Gampa’s eyes.

The wind blew, strong and steady.

The wind blew from behind, a helpful tailwind. It boosted the speed. The wind hastened the arrival of the dreaded moment. With no fanfare and little sound the old-fashioned solartrain climbed up and rounded the bend to the right. This caused the town of Bloom to disappear behind the high hill known as the turtles.

And in that instant their childhood was left behind.

It Takes a Lot to Laugh It Takes a Train to Cry

They spent two rather glum weeks in the city before meeting Ariel. She helped the homesick pair to laugh again.

At first you may feel a little sick. It may feel creepy. Go with it, relax and don’t let your unease get the best of you. In no time you will feel like you are floating. You may think you are motionless, just hovering in one place. Believe me nothing could be further from the truth. You and your sweet little posteriors will have more giddy-up than ever before in your life. Well, for one of you anyway. She winked at Tucker. I have heard those stories about a gigantic pterodactyl plummeting out of a water tower.

She carefully explained all about the VacuumTubeTransporter, commonly known as the Vvvvt. Unless it’s busy you can ask for a small pod. They only hold four people and they run a little smoother when you decelerate at the other end. You can choose to sit facing forward or backwards. It doesn’t really matter though, you won’t see anything. Even where the tube is above ground and transparent to let some light in, the speed is so great that everything outside is just a blur. …

Ariel had a million stories, perhaps more. And by the time they left they were pretty sure they had heard all of them! This was one of their favourites…

So, there’s these guys show up and they want me to help them get across the Fence. What’s your name? I says to the first one. And he tells me. Ricky I think maybe it was. Ricky or Richie or something like that anyway. And your name? I says to the other one. And he tells me. Then I ask that guy who the third guy was. And he tells me. ‘Joe.’ he says. ‘His name is Joe.’ Well now, that first guy, that Ricky or whoever he was, well his eyes get as big as flying saucers. You’d swear he’d just seen a real-live ghost. She laughed; she laughed hard at the recollection of it; she shook all over and tears streamed down her cheeks. And that night, while the other two snored their brains out – Joe and the guy with the fuzzy hair they snored like they hadn’t slept in weeks – while they did that and while I pretended to be asleep, well, Richie, that one and his fraidy-cat ass, he high-tailed it out of town in the pitch dark. …

So here’s the papers you’ll need. She handed them to the girl. You best hold onto his for him Deary. You’ll get out in the GTACityState at the new International Uptown Union Station – the huge one up at Bloor, not the old downtown one. If you wind up down there they’ll probably throw you in the slammer for a while and then send you right back here. Anyway, just make sure you get out at the first stop in the GTA that’s all. Say as little as you can to the officials, just show them the papers and make sure they stamp them. Oh yes, give them this sealed envelope too; slip it to them quietly; try to not let anyone else see you give it to them; don’t open it yourselves. Once they open the envelope they’ll look up and glare at you; just gaze back confidently; give them your sweet smile – you do have the sweetest smile; don’t utter a word; just wait, be patient, be really patient and completely calm; once they get over glaring at you and glancing back and forth at each other you’ll get a little nod from one of them. You should be good to go. Now, after you get through Immigration get outside the station as quick as you can; don’t let anyone direct you to IQ; stay to the right but at the end, once you’re inside the high-ceilinged gallery, follow the crowd and make sure you go straight out the front doors; try to look like you’ve done this a hundred times before, like you’re a local just coming downtown from another part of the city; don’t show the papers again unless you absolutely have to. Now then, because you are such a darling pair of youngsters I’m going to give you a deal – just eighty-five bucks each!

~

The pod swayed when it started moving. It startled her. He liked it, of course. He thrived on any and all movement. Any hint of danger, anything inducing an increase in adrenaline was welcome in his world, anytime, anywhere. After the initial joggle the pod smoothly built up speed in an audible rush of wind pushing from behind. There was a final whoosh as the capsule merged from the run-on tube into the mainline slip-chute … then all went silent … all sense of movement ceased. They floated. Time dangled …

They swooshed into the deceleration tube. In the blink of an eye the trip was drawing to a close. The sound of wind returned. They could feel the little craft’s gradual loss of speed. Curiously, incongruously, later memory characterized the trip as both instantaneous and everlasting. In a long silky glide the pod floated in to the station.

Throughout the eeriness of the journey they had sat facing backwards, pressed together like little kids, a little nervous, a little edgy, a little tentative. But like always, like they had been taught to do, those two little souls glommed together. The two were as one, making themselves feel as big as they could; they were a formidable force. They had sat large together in a tiny, near-silent cross-continental earthbound rocket laughing at Ariel’s outlandish stories and corny jokes.

~

They sat on a bench in front of the station. Tucker, in a glassy-eyed daze, slowly took in the hiss and stink of the rushing traffic, the tiny patch of gunmetal grey sky between tops of tall buildings, the herd of scurrying faceless people, by and large clad in shades of grey on grey, the grimy lifeless buildings, the hard inflexible sidewalks and streets, the mostly leafless trees standing all in a line waiting for winter’s onslaught, the homeless old man with piercing blue eyes shivering on the street corner. Without taking his eyes off of this grim scene, the big boy-man tilted his head sideways toward Brigit and spoke.

And in that instant their adulthood flickered into view.

Explosion

It shook the