Flight Risk

By KF Hassall

She was all I ever wanted from the moment I met her.
My little bird.
We had our future all planned out, until I stared down a fork in the road
and had to make a terrible choice.
Torn apart, I never stopped fighting to find a way to be together.
Now, years later she’s back, as beautiful as ever. Broken and haunted.
How do I tell her she is still the one?
How do I chase the shadows from her eyes?
How do I keep her from running again?
Or will she always be a flight risk?

• Language: English
• Publisher: KF Hassall
• Release date: Jan 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005972295

Book preview

Someone is pounding on the bathroom door. I can barely hear it over the heavy bass beat of electronic music. It vibrates the walls as I lean against the sink, staring at myself in the small mirror, not liking what I see.

Alina! Hurry up! You have less than five minutes before your final walk! one of the show’s stage assistants screams at me.

I have one more outfit change before I finish the finale of Christophe Alaine’s Las Vegas runway show. 

The heat is bothering me, making me lightheaded. It doesn’t help that I haven’t consumed anything but dandelion tea in two days. I was too fat to fit into one of my dresses for the show, so I fasted. Now I’m hot, faint, and crabby. But the dress fits.

The noise of the crowd and music causes my head to throb with the beat and the too-small, spiked heels pinch my toes, making every step punishing as they shoot daggers up my shins.

The makeup artists are going to yell at me for smudging their carefully applied shadows that cover the top part of my face, making it look like a mask, but even I can’t control my sweat glands.

I just need to get through one more strut down the outdoor runway that is covering the fountain outside the Trident Hotel and then this can all be over. Taking a deep breath, I bend over the sink, aligning my rolled-up dollar bill with the careful lines that I had tapped out onto my compact mirror, and inhale. Once. Twice.

Just one more walk. Then you can eat. But not too much.

I wait for the drug to hit, and hope it kicks in before I walk one more time. Checking my face for any residual powder, I brush my nose, toss the mirror aside, and rip the door to the bathroom open, almost walking into the attendant’s raised fist as she is about to beat on the door again.

Fuck! I’m ready. Jesus Christ! I snap at her. Can’t a bitch take a piss without someone chasing after her?

Her eyes narrow at me as she looks me over from the top of my head to the tips of my pinched toes. Hurry up. You need to get touched up. There’s sweat everywhere. Your eyes are all blown out. She reaches out and grabs me by the elbow, nails digging into my skin, and yanks me back to makeup. I struggle to keep up with her sneaker-clad power walk in my six-inch heels and do a half shuffle, half run, each step sending fissures of pain up the tops of my feet. 

Six people rush to me, dabbing, pulling, teasing, brushing, before I’m again dragged to wardrobe, which is basically a dressing room but lacks the privacy of one. Twenty people, at any given time, mill around changing, watching, talking into headsets. It’s the non-fashion industry eyes that bother me. Sponsors, board of director members, rich old men; none of them have any business being back here, yet they always are, watching, coveting with their greedy eyes. The dress I’m wearing is pulled off of me and I stand there in nothing but Satan’s shoes, while another set of hands grab the last dress and starts to shove me into it. 

I’m not a person. I am a hanger. 

Once the last zipper is pulled, I’m stuffed into the dress I couldn’t fit into two days ago. The boning digs into my diaphragm, preventing me from slouching. And breathing. 

I’m sent to the line of models waiting to go out. I’m the biggest name, the most sought after, therefore I get the last finale outfit.

Dirty looks and sneers are cast over shoulders as I stand, waiting for my turn. The drug slithers in, dripping down my throat, giving me that high I’m looking for, and I start to hyperfocus, plotting my strut, my turns.

My heart is pounding too fast, its thump, thump, thump rhythm exceeding the music’s tempo, and dark spots cloud my vision. Exhaustion rolls over me that even the cocaine can’t push back. 

Two more minutes and then it’s over. Work through it. Breathe through it. 

The line starts to move. I tap my fingers over and over, shaking out my wrists, blinking rapidly to stay focused and alert. I climb one step, two, three. The heat overwhelms me, my vision swims under the bright spotlights. I take short quick breaths through my mouth since one deep breath isn’t an option with this dress.

Then it’s my turn. I can’t see out into the crowd. I stomp along the clear plexiglass walkway that bridges across the large fountain. Stop. Turn. Turn. Walk. Stop. Turn. Turn. Walk. 

I get to the edge of the final turn and pause. My heart is pounding and I try to take a deep breath, but I can’t in my too-tight dress. Again my vision blurs, the black spots coming back, as an ominous cloud of darkness spills into my eyes like ink. I blink trying to get them to go away, but they only worsen. 

My legs start to sag, but I force myself to remain upright.

Breathe. Turn.

But I can’t. I can’t breathe, my legs give out, and I feel myself fall into a dream-like state. I’m not really in my body, but hovering over it, watching as if someone else. The water comes up to greet me, and I open my arms wide to embrace its coolness, feeling it wash over my skin like a baptism, a cleansing.

I lay like that, facedown, floating. I could almost swear I heard my name being called by him.

Am I dead? Is this heaven? Is he here with me? My love?

I close my eyes and let oblivion sweep me into its embrace.

There are people everywhere, shouting. I’m lying on my back, chills coating me as goosebumps spread along my skin. Why am I all wet?

Bright white light stabs into my eyes, blinding me, and I try to jerk my head away, but I can’t move it. I raise my