The Belgian Adventure

6. The Beginning of the Journey

With the old Jordan back (and how!), time seemed to fly away as the day finally came for our departure to Belgium.

When you wait for something for as long as I did, you're bound to not believe that it will ever even happen one day.

That's exactly how it was when we locked up our house and, burdened with two suitcases and a bag each, went to find a taxi.

"This is surreal," I said aloud as we sat inside the cab after securing our luggage at the top.

"Uh-huh." Jordan agreed. He suddenly turned to me and asked, "Hey—did you pack my toothbrush?"

I rolled my eyes. Trust Jordan to worry about things like that. And why not? He doesn't know the 'A' of packing for a trip, and me, well, you could say I'm the master of the job.

Okay, not exactly, but fine!

"Yeah, worrywart. It's the first thing I put in your bag."

"Okay." He visibly relaxed.

I could just see him mentally checking out the list of things we'd need over our journey and stay. I chuckled to myself, and went back to staring out the window at the buildings and people passing by.

But not more than ten seconds later, he spoke again.

"Did you buy any gifts for the Grands?"

"Okay, that's a good question. But isn't that your department?" I accused.

"Since when?" He hit back at me.

"Well, alright. But I thought it was an unspoken agreement! Buying gifts for elders is a grown-up thing, not for teenagers, right?" I teased him indirectly. Jordan didn't like—nope, he absolutely hated­—to be called a grown-up.

He just raised his eyebrows at me and crossed his arms over his chest, by way of response.

"Ugghh! Fine!! I give in. Let's divide the load fifty-fifty then?"

"The load?" he asked, smirking.

I laughed. "We have to decide what kind of gift we'll buy for them. So, you buy for grandpa, and I'll do it for grandma. And we could easily take some time to spare for the airport mall once we're done with the check-in procedure."

"Okay, let's think till then."

I nodded.

I gazed at the trees darting past us and the aureate mountains rising in the distance, looking as beautiful as ever under the clear cloudless blue sky and radiant sun. I was still amazed at the fact that we were heading out of the city—and the country! —together, for the first time in so many years.

On reaching the airport, we went through the preliminary checks and tasks, and then, with about an hour and a half still to go before we boarded the plane, we went on to the mall inside the airport premises.

Splitting up there, we each went our own way. After browsing through various sections of women's wear, and giving my heart away to one or two spectacular dresses on display, I finally approached the payment counter half an hour later, with a beautiful red-blue scarf and a pair of dangler earrings for grandma, and a snow-white hoodie for myself. Yep, I couldn't resist after all.

Around twenty minutes later Jordan returned to our planned meeting place, a cafe in the mall, with—wait for it—absolutely nothing in his hands!?

I stared at him wide-eyed.

"What?" he said sheepishly, sliding back a chair to sit.

My mouth hung open. "After forty minutes and twenty-five seconds of searching, you couldn't find anything for grandpa?"

He rolled his eyes. "Of course, I did."

"What? Fresh Arizona airport air to gift?"

He laughed. "No, silly, I bought him a chocolate, since I couldn't decide on anything else," he shrugged and pulled out a Hershey's milk chocolate.

"And you couldn't find anything better even in that category?" I pointed out.

He grinned and shook his head. It was one of his favourites, after all.

I lay my head down between my arms on the table. "You're hopeless," I murmured.

After a cup of cappuccino, we both hurried to the boarding area so that we could board our flight in time.

As we took our seats (I got the window!), I noticed Jordan's eyes darting around the interior of the plane. He had started showing signs of nervousness as soon as he had laid eyes on the aircraft. No wonder the fifteen-hour flight to Brussels daunted him—it was on a similar flight like this one, albeit going in the reverse direction, that we had lost our parents.

For some strange reason, I had escaped the worst of the psychological trauma, but Jordan, who had tightly shut his eyes now and was taking deep breaths to calm himself, was evidently still trapped in it. I'd feared he had developed aviophobia, but he hadn't protested when the Grands sent us our plane tickets, and neither had he outright expressed anything like it yet. I couldn't help feeling a bit relieved.

"It'll be alright," I whispered, and taking his hand, squeezed it reassuringly.

He momentarily opened his eyes and gave me a watery smile as he held on tight. I never let go.

Finally, when the flight glided on the runway with me practically glued to the window, I was ready to jump out of my seat with excitement, even with the safety belt on!

"You wanna take a look?" I asked Jordan.

He opened one eye. "I don't know..."

"Come on, it's beautiful!" I insisted and leaned way back in my seat so he could bend over to look through the tiny window.

He obliged, though reluctantly. As we left the ground and ascended higher, he sucked in a breath. We watched the ascent together, mesmerised.

Soon the ground and the city below turned into a miniature colony of ants, until finally nothing but the clouds and a rainbow-like tint were visible under as well as all around us.

"That was gorgeous. Thanks, M," J said softly as he leaned back in his seat.

"I know, right!" I grinned. My stomach suddenly growled, and I smiled sheepishly. "Can we have dinner now?"

Jordan chuckled and stopped an attendant to ask when dinner would be served. There was still an hour to go, so he switched on his phone and pulled a pair of earbuds from his pockets, handing one to me. I gave him a quizzical glance. Ignoring me, he opened a streaming app and began to search for fantasy movies—my favourite! Sharing the earphones, we spent the next two hours watching Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief. J had managed to successfully distract me from my hunger, and as soon as the end credits started to roll, an attendant carrying a service trolley approached us with our meal.

Needless to say, I devoured it in less than ten minutes. Jordan found it funny, but I stuck my tongue out at him and dimmed the overhead lights before settling comfortably in my seat to try to watch the stars floating above the Atlantic Ocean outside.

That was when sleep overcame me, and I drifted away to golden corn fields and barley and wheat farms, flying over magnificent castles and shimmering rivers...