SHORTS: A Collection of Short Stories by PurplePassion16

The Interview

Gigi was rushing from TSA to get to her departure gate as fast as possible. This day already wasn't going as planned and she COULD NOT miss her flight. She was wearing a tailored business outfit with matching skirt and blazer and perfectly matched heels. She knew she looked the part for her interview, but right now, those heels were slowing her down, so she had no choice. She stopped mid-run, and took them off. She didn't like the idea of running barefoot on an airport floor, but she HAD to make this flight. So she booked it as fast as she reasonably could.

But just as her gate was within view, her suitcase lost a wheel. Frustrated, Gigi banged her high heels against her hardcover suitcase. One of the heels flew out of her hand and all of a sudden she heard a cry of pain. She turned around to see a man in a Hawaiian shirt holding his hand over his right eye and her heel on the ground in front of him.

"Oh my goodness!", Gigi exclaimed. "Sir, are you ok?"

The man glanced at her but just groaned and Gigi ran over to him.

"Sir, I'm so sorry! Can I get you some ice? Let me get you some ice." And with that, she rushed over to one of the gate agents at her departure gate.

The gate agent was a tall woman with a stern face, announcing over the intercom that this was the last call for the boarding of this flight.

"Ma'm," Gigi exclaimed, "I HAVE to get on this flight. But this man over here needs some ice for his injured eye. Can you help him?"

The gate agent raised an eyebrow at her, but then proceeded to call for first aid assistance over her personal radio. She nodded at Gigi and so Gigi quickly rushed back to the man to let him know assistance was coming. She picked up her heels and grabbed her suitcase.

"I wish I could stay," she said apologetically, "But I HAVE to make this flight. Please forgive me."

The man just nodded and waved her away as an employee with an ice pack and first aid kit came walking up to them. Gigi didn't waste any more time and rushed to get her ticket processed before the gate doors officially closed.

Gigi found her seat, put her carryon suitcase in the bin above her and sat down with a sigh of relief. Her seat was next to a window, so she opened it and stared out at nothing while her mind replayed all the things that had gone wrong the past couple of days.

First, there was the cancelation of her first flight two days ago. That forced her to buy a new plane ticket, and call the organization she was interviewing with to reschedule her interview. Then, because home was two hours away, she decided to rent a hotel. Somehow, her credit card had gotten a fraudulent charge on it and had to be canceled, leaving her no choice but to call her parents to book a room for her online. Then her parents had to drive to her the next day and bring her one of their credit cards to use until she could get a new one. They were more than happy to do it, but still, she felt bad. And then there was last night, when a bunch of college students across the hall decided to have a wild party, forcing other hotel residents to call the cops for a noise complaint. Gigi did not get much sleep.

And all of that led to this morning, when she slept past her alarm and rushed to the airport in an insane amount of traffic. The state college had won a football championship and the city was holding a parade. All the traffic had to be rerouted, and what should've been a 20 minute drive turned into and hour. Gigi had to drive around for 15 minutes to find parking, and just barely made it in time to catch the parking bus to the terminal. When the woman in front of her in the TSA line started arguing with the TSA officer about taking certain beauty products out of her bag, Gigi thought for sure that was the end of her chances. But thankfully another officer opened up a new lane and let her start the new line. And once she made it through security she knew she had to run with only minutes to spare. Luckily, it was a small airport, and she had flown out of there before with her family, so she remembered some of the layout. Thank goodness for that.