R&D

Chapter 17

The next day Roshi and her family went to the airport to prepare for the long 24 hour flight to India. 24 hour one-way. And that was just the flight time. The travel time was way worse.

They got onto the first flight which was a quick 2 hour flight to San Francisco. She turned her phone back on when she landed and saw the WhatsApp message from Dev.

First flight okay?

Yes baby

He sent her a kissing smiley in return.

Roshi decided her paranoia about her parents reading her texts was too far so she stopped being overly cautious about what she texted Dev. Also her parents weren't tech savvy so there was no way they could've figured out how to do that in the first place.

Once in San Fran, Roshi and her family had to switch to the international terminal and then from there was the long haul of waiting for 6 hours before their midnight flight. They killed some time by going to an airport restaurant for dinner but still had a long time before the actual boarding started. Plus with the time difference it was actually one hour later for her so she was already feeling sleepy.

Roshi found an empty area that was within sight of her gate so she went and sat there. She did a video chat with Dev using the airport WIFI.

Are you awake, she asked. It's 10pm on a Sunday night and the next day is my first official day of summer vacation, of course I'm awake, he said. Roshi rolled her eyes. Plus you think I'm going to sleep before your flight takes off, he asked. She smiled.

She yawned. I'm so tired, I wanna sleep, she said as she laid against the window and closed her eyes. If I was there you might be tired, but you definitely wouldn't want to sleep, he said. She opened her eyes. Dev, she said embarrassed as she drew out his name. He laughed.

She continued to talk with Dev for an hour when she saw boarding was starting. I need to go, she said. Okay, have a safe flight, send me a message from Hong Kong, he said. I will, she said. I'm going to miss you so much, he said.

It's just two months, she said, and you're going to be busy with your internship, the time will go by super fast. Her parents were now waving at her to come back to the gate. I love you, she said. I love you, he said. She waved as she hung up.

Roshi and her family boarded the flight and she fell asleep before the plane even took off. Roshi woke up sometime later to see the entire cabin was asleep. She turned her TV on to look at the route map. She saw they hadn't reached Hawaii yet and had been flying for about 3 hours. She stood up and went to the restroom.

She then walked up and down the aisles to stretch her legs. There were a few people awake here and there, but 90% of the cabin was asleep. She saw how some people were watching Rated R TV shows and Movies. She was wondering how that kind of content was allowed on a plane when a kid could easily see it from their seat.

In the back of the plane there was a staircase leading to the 2nd floor where the first class cabins were. There were no stewardesses around so Roshi started walking up the stairs out of curiosity. She got to the top and peered over the edge. A first class attendant saw her and asked her to return to her seat. She sheepishly went.

She got back to her seat and turned on her phone, out of habit. She was about to put it away when she noticed the flight had a dedicated WIFI channel. She was able to connect to it and when she opened the browser page it showed her that she could pay for WIFI, of course, or she could get 1 hour of free WIFI.

She didn't know the flight had free WIFI. The time in Utah was 4am so Dev was definitely asleep. She decided to wait until he'd be awake and use her free WIFI then. She put a movie on her TV and fell asleep halfway through.