Letters Are Buildings
The woman from the airline had walked Wren all the way to gate C14, checked something on her tablet, and said she’d be back in five minutes. That was at 1:40. At 1:52 the board above the desk changed, and C14 became a flight to Memphis.
Wren was twelve. She had flown once before, in the seat next to her mother.
She read the board again, and there it was, further down the list: her flight number, and beside it, E29.
The plastic pouch with her papers in it hung around her neck, but she had pushed it down inside her shirt at the first airport, because it was the kind of thing that made adults look at her the way people look at a lost dog. She left it there. She could read a letter and a number by herself.
She followed the signs to the train, got on, and rode two stops before she understood that the letters were going the wrong way. C. B. A. She got off at A, and A was the end of the line, and boarding closed at 2:35.
The clock over the platform said 2:11.
She asked a man behind a desk. He was on the phone, and he pointed with two fingers at something that turned out to be a hallway, a wall and a coffee stand, further from E than when she started. She stood in front of the coffee stand and her eyes got hot and she made herself stop.
The flight attendant was off duty, pulling a small black bag. She stopped because Wren was standing still in a place where nobody stands still.
“Are you meeting somebody?”
Wren pulled the pouch out of her shirt.
The woman didn’t take out a radio, or take her hand, or turn it into an event. She crouched down to the same height and gave her an explanation instead.
“Letters are buildings. Numbers are doors inside the building. You’re in A, you want E, and A is the end of the line, so from here the train only goes one way and it can’t take you anywhere wrong. A, B, C, D, E. You want the fourth stop. Count them out loud, it’s easier.”
“Four stops,” Wren said.
“Four. And when the doors open at E, go up, not down. Down is the parking garage.” She stood up. “I’m in D. I’ll ride with you that far.”
They counted out loud together. At D the woman got off, and Wren rode the last stop alone, and went up, not down, and reached E29 at 2:26 with the desk still open.
Two months later, flying to Denver, she stood under the board at Salt Lake City and didn’t look for her flight number first. She looked for the letter.