Hopelessly Seeking Happiness

Chapter 3: Que Onda, London

"Are you sure, these friends of yours are the real deal.?"

"Yes Franco, for the billionth time, Dan and Phil are real people, they are not some weird murderous fiends on the internet trying to cut off our skin to wear it and have sex with our corpses. If you don't believe me why don't you ask the millionths of subscribers they have." We were getting our luggage from the baggage claim; I was beyond jet-lagged and aggravated. I guess I was wrong about God being on our side because our flight had been delayed, the flight was 16 plus hours long, we had made a stop in Chicago, and we were flying coach with a baby whose ears kept popping causing it to cry the whole way. Just so you know, I'm not talking about an actual baby I'm talking about Steve, I told the idiot not to forget to buy the ibuprofen. And now Derek (who I call Franco for his eerie resemblance to Dave Franco) decided to grow paranoid and shoot all his paranoia unto me. How grand.

"You better be sure about this Jaz."

"I am, you freak, they were being nice enough to accompany us from the airport."

"Well why didn't they!"

"Because it's a fucking inconvenience for them they don't have a car, besides look at us we could pass for The Walking Dead rejects."

"Then why did they offer to accompany us, huh. If it such an inconvenience."

"Because they're nice guys, unlike you fucking ass butt."

"Girls, girls, you're both pretty, can we go get something to eat I'm starving!" Thank goodness for Evelyn.

"Yeah me too, that airplane food was nasty." Steve said struggling to keep up with our pace; he now had a headache due to his ears popping. It was amusing to me.

"I guess we can get some McDonald's, and we should get you some ibuprofen. Who the hell forgets to bring medicine, it's like the most important thing to pack in your carry-on!"

"Only God can judge me." He whinnied.

I took out my cell phone and pretended to be getting a call. "Hello, yeah, yeah okay I'll tell him, no, no, thank you, yeah, okay good bye. That was God he said 'Steve you're an idiot.'"

"Blasphemy " He yelled out and pointed at me, pretending to be offended.

"Your mom."

"Oh yeah, that bitch is blasphemy." Now normal people would be shocked to hear someone talk about their mother this way, but Steve's mother has no right to be called a mother, so in our little clan we got used to Steve's one shots toward his mom.

"Que Onda, London!" I might have scared a few British folk as I ran outside the airport and gave London a Hispanic style greeting. I took in my surroundings, every inch of them. I could see the city lights, shine all over the town, cascading beams of warmth into my heart. I tried exhaling all the American air -if such a thing is scientifically possible- and started inhaling all the London air. It went up my nose and filled up my lungs, it felt like smelling your favorite food. When you take in that scent and you could almost taste it; my food was London and the taste was victory and pride. I dreamt of traveling to Europe all the time, and I didn't care to what part of Europe I traveled to it could be France, Italy, Ireland, or Germany, all I want was to go and inhale the air, feel the air as it surrounded me with ecstasy. Ecstasy that came from the excitement of my spirit that emitted out of me in spams of triumph. Triumph that came from making a dream become reality, knowing that it took so much strength to muster up the courage and follow those dreams, knowing that even after set back and set back and set back, here it was your dream in the flesh, live and in color. It was standing right in front of your face yelling "Yoo-hoo! Here I am!" it was waving its arms around and dancing uncontrollably, flashing all sorts of colors, blue, red, green, pink, purple, trying to get your attention, trying to get you to notice it, so you could see how you, only you, gave it life. I gave my dream life, I made my dream a reality. It was no more just a speck of my imagination, it was here in front of me as sidewalks (or as the British say pavements), as streets, as buildings, as lights, as towers, as signs, as vehicles, as people, as air! The air I was breathing now, the air I had breathed in my town of Laredo, the air I would imagine breathing somewhere else, was here and I was here and I was inhaling it like I always dreamt I would. You take in air for oxygen and therefor you are alive. I was alive. At that moment as I took in the air -as a girl who knew nothing outside of Laredo- I sure felt royal. The proof that my dream had come true was the air I was breathing, the reason I was alive.