Page 8 of Tilly in Technicolor
When the Keeper of Ketchup finally moves past our row, I straighten, ready to dig in. I open packet after packet, squeezing the contents onto my burger and fries.
I take a big bite, glad for something to do.
Eating sometimes feels like a hobby. Yes, I need food for nourishment, but, more than that, it’s fun. Eating holds my attention, calms my constantly spinning thoughts. I would try to sneak snacks during classes to stay focused, but teachers would always lose their shit over it. I might as well have been doing astriptease on top of my desk for how outraged they’d be over me having a tiny carrot stick.
The burger is pretty gross with a subtle sliminess that runs a real risk of making me gag, so I add one more packet of ketchup to the patty to try to get it down.
On my next bite, a wet, squelching sound precedes the feeling of something plopping on my chest. I squeeze my eyes shut, praying that what I think just happened didn’t just happen.
I force one eye open and, sure enough, there’s a fist-sized blob of ketchup trailing down my chest, leaving a vicious red smear across my white T-shirt.
I let out a Moira Rose–worthy shriek of horror, nearly upending my meal tray in the process. I feel Oliver jump beside me at the noise, and I turn toward the aisle as though I can hide the massacre of my shirt.
“Mother fuuuuuuhhhh,” I growl, grabbing the world’s thinnest napkin from my utensil pack and dunking it in my Sprite. That’s what adults do, right? Dip the edge of their napkin in a clear drink and go to town scrubbing at a stain? The problem is, the sheer amount of ketchup that landed on my chest turns the whole thing into a red puddle embedding itself farther into the fabric.
“Sonofabitch,” I say as the napkin dissolves in my hand. Getting desperate, I look at Oliver. He’s staring at me with wide-eyed horror, a look I’m far too accustomed with for only knowing him a few hours.
“Can I use your napkin?” I say, already reaching for it and opening the plastic packet with my teeth. I move to dunk the square inch of tissue that they’re trying to pass as a cleaning tool in my Sprite, but a bump of turbulence causes my arm to swing wildly forward and spill my cup (and my burger and one thousand ketchup packets and also somehow invade Oliver’s space and spill all his stuff, too) onto both of us.
“Oh, Christ!” Oliver bolts to standing, catching his knees on his tray and banging his head on the ceiling in the process. A dark wet drink mark is spreading across his shirt and crotch and I stare at it like I’m watching a train crash.
“Excuse me,” he says gruffly, bear-crawling over me to get out of the row. Once he’s untangled himself, he reaches back across me—accidentally punching me in the boob in the process and getting ketchup on his arm—to grab his backpack and pull it to him. He makes a mad dash to the bathroom a few rows back, the door rattling with the force of him slamming it shut.
I’m frozen for a moment, the pure chaos of the last minute looping through my skull like a swarm of aggressive gnats. Then, I groan, burrowing my face in my hands as the ketchup stain spreads like blood across my shirt, which, at this point, is virtually see-through and plastered to my body.
I consider trying to grab a change of clothes from my bag overhead, but I’d have to, yet again, unpack my ridiculous amount of underwear in a very public forum.
If this were a cartoon, the thought-bubble hovering over my head would be filled with bold punctuation and an aggressive use of the letterF.
A few minutes later, Oliver’s legs appear in my peripheral vision. I sneak a quick peek at his crotch—purely out of altruism to see how his wet spot was drying—and realize he’d changed into… a nearly identical all-black outfit? Maybe he really is a lovely-looking Lucifer.
I take a deep breath. This moment is important. We can either allow the madness to be common ground and laugh this off, or we can sit in stunned silence at how horribly freaking wrong everything has gone.
I glance up to his face, and he has a resigned look and tired eyes. I sigh, then stand, and he shuffles past me and plops into his seat.
Silence it is.
We both stare straight ahead for a while, then I catch Oliver glancing at his watch.
“Four hours and twenty-seven minutes left,” I whisper.
Oliver nods. “This might be the longest flight of my life.”
“Keep calm and carry on, right, mate?” I say with another weak attempt at a British accent.
His eyes close slowly, like he’s searching for strength, then he grabs his headphones, slips them on, and turns fully away from me.
Chapter 6It’s the Puke for Me
OLIVER
The end is near.
Not in the apocalyptic sense, despite how many times I’ve wished for it on this flight, but there’s only ninety minutes before landing. The worst has to be behind us.
“We must be getting close,” Tilly says, stretching her arms out in front of her and twisting her wrists side to side. “I can’t wait to get out of this seat,” she adds, squirming some more to emphasize her point. “Are you from London?”
“Surrey,” I answer, fiddling with my headphones. “I take it you’re from Cleveland?”
