Trip to Lima.

ABULIA- THE NOVEL
DOTY RAN DOWN THE STAIRS. SHE DIDN’T WANT HER DADDY TO SEE HER LIKE THIS. MASCARA COMBINED WITH A TEARDROP THRUSTING INK DOWN TOWARD HER NOSTRIL. SHE KNEW KEVIN WOULD NOT SURVIVE IF SHE TOLD HER DAD THE TRUTH. AND SHE DIDN’T WANT IT TO COME TO THIS. THE ONLY WAY OUT OF THE SITUATION WAS WAY OUT. SHE WOULDN’T WRITE AND SHE WOULDN’T CALL. EVERYBODY WOULD WONDER WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED. AND IT WASN’T BECAUSE SHE WANTED EVERYONE TO FEEL SORRY FOR HER. SHE JUST DIDN’T KNOW WHAT THE HELL ELSE TO DO.
“maybe i can escape to ecuador. Or macchu picchu. maybe meet a holy man who can instruct me. I’m not looking for the answers here.”
She wanted to go somewhere where her dollars could stretch. So she didn’t have to bring a suitcase, she could get what she needed there. She took the sock out of her drawer, the one with green and blue stripes where she kept her tip money.
“what am i going to tell my boss?”
She thought out loud to herself. Then halted. She grabbed the money and ran out the door. It seemed like the farther she got from the house the faster she ran. She had never flown like this before, not even in dreams. For a split second she thought about trying out for the olympics.
“There’s no way they sprint this fast,” she thought, “maybe this time I could win something.” The fog zapped her eyes opened wide as she ducked down double skipping down the subway steps. She didn’t pay for a ticket but lept over the red traingular doors and down more stairs into the open arms of the subway. Once in, those doors could not close fast enough. And when they opened 22 minutes later, she sprinted up staircases out of breath but determined.
“They’re never going to see me again, nor I them.” For about 5 seconds she felt alright, before her gastrocnemius muscle began to ache. She glided into a walk and silently leaped over the double doors where her nonexistent ticket was supposed to open them for her. One more flight of stairs and she would be at the airport.
By the time she got to the first terminal she was limping. She did not want to go anywhere domestic and kept right on. She found aero peru, and waited in line at the counter.
“how much for a one way ticket to Lima?”
“Leaving today?”
“Yes, next flight.”
She’d never flown this way. Every time she vacationed in the past was a rehearsed affair. Hours online searching for the best faire for air tickets and hotels. Everything weeks in advance. She knew the price for her desperation would be steep.
“920 dollars.”
She didn’t care. She put the money in cash on the counter and grabbed her ticket. She passed a homeless man sitting on a chair, dozed off. Taking out her phone and placing it next to the man, she thought,
“i won’t be needing this.”
Then she made her way into security. She stoically parted with her shoes and walked on through the line quicker then all the people with luggage to put through the x ray machine. The security guard wanded her down and she made it through in record time.
Her flight was on time, and she boarded. After 2 melatonin she was out cold.
“Even dreams we don’t remember still affect us.” She awoke to the voice of what sounded like a Doctor. He sat in the seat in back of her. She peered through a crack in the seat so she could catch a glance of his face. She wondered what he was talking about.
“How do they affect us?” A woman sitting next to him asked.
“The subconscious remembers everything. Even things we think can’t be heard are heard. And the unseen seen. A smile out of the corner of one’s eye, a frown from the nurse in the operating room.”
Doty opened the window. It was not light outside, but getting there. She was anxious with the anticipation of landing somewhere new, but it wasn’t the same excitement she had known before upon embarking to foreigh lands. She wasn’t “getting off” on ecstatic emotions, so much as logically trying to engage her mind in what best to do next.