It’s only when the flight attendant hands me a menu, and both options—salmon or tortellini—make my stomach revolt, that I realize what I’m feeling isn’t just nerves. It isn’t even the renewed rearing of my hangover’s head; this is something else. My skin is hot and oversensitive. My head swims.
The food is wheeled into the cabin, the smell of salmon and potatoes and spinach so pungent and thick that I’m gasping, stretching on my seat to get closer to the thin stream of cool air. It’s not enough. I want to escape to the bathroom, but immediately know I won’t make it. Before I can wake Ansel, I’m frantically digging in the seat pocket in front of me for the airsickness bag, barely getting it open before bending over and violently hurling inside.
It doesn’t get any worse than this moment right here, I’m sure of it. My body is in charge, and no matter how much my brain tells it to be quiet, to throw up like a proper lady—fucking quietly—it won’t. I groan, feeling another wave hit me, and beside me Ansel comes awake with a jerk. He presses a hand to my back and his sharp “Oh, no!” brings my humiliation fully to the surface.
I really can’t let him see me like this.
I push to stand, tripping over him before he has time to get out of his seat and practically falling into the aisle. I’m getting looks from other passengers—looks of shock and pity and disgust—but they should just be glad I managed to hold on to my bag of vomit when I launched myself into the aisle. Even though I have to concentrate fully on walking as I trip down toward the bathroom, in my head I’m glaring back at them. Have they ever been sick on a plane full of five hundred people, including their new stranger-husband? No? Then they can shut the hell up.
One small mercy is the empty lavatory just a few rows up and I shove the door open, practically collapsing inside. I throw away the bag in the tiny garbage can and crumple to the floor, bending over the toilet. Cold air blows up into my face, and the deep blue liquid in the bowl is enough to make me retch again. I’m shivering with fever, involuntarily moaning with every exhale. Whatever bug I have came on like a train barreling down the track and hitting a building full speed.
There are moments in life where I wonder whether things can get worse. I’m on a plane, with my new husband, whose enthusiasm for this whole thing seems to be flagging, and it’s in this deep moment of self-pity that I register—with absolute horror—that I’ve also just started my period.
I look down at my white jeans and stifle a sob as I reach for some toilet paper, folding it and shoving it into my underwear. I push to stand and my hands are jerky and weak when I pull my hoodie off, tying it around my waist. I splash some water on my face, brush my teeth with my finger, and almost gag from it, my stomach rolling in warning.
This is a nightmare.
A quiet knock lands on the door, followed by Ansel’s voice. “Mia? Are you okay?”
I lean against the tiny counter as we hit a small batch of turbulence and the effect inside my body is magnified. I nearly pass out from the sensation of my stomach dropping in air. After a beat, I open the door a crack. “I’m okay.”
Of course I’m not okay. I’m horrified, and if I thought I could escape from the plane by crawling into this toilet, I might try.
He looks worried . . . and drugged. His eyelids are heavy, his blinks slow. I don’t know what he took to sleep, but he was only out for about an hour, and he weaves a little as if he might fall over. “Can I get you anything?” His accent is thicker with his drowsiness, his words harder to follow.
“Not unless you have a pharmacy in your carry-on.”
His brows pull together. “I have ibuprofen, I think.”
“No,” I say, closing my eyes for a beat. “I need . . . girl things.”
Ansel blinks slowly again, confusion making his brow furrow further. But then he seems to understand, eyes going wide. “Is that why you’re throwing up?”
I nearly laugh from the look on his face. The idea that I would suffer a period and throw up every month seems to horrify him on my behalf.
“No,” I tell him, feeling my arms start to shake from the effort it’s taking to stand. “Just a fabulous coincidence.”
“You don’t . . . have anything? In your purse?”
I let out what has to be the heaviest sigh known to man. “No,” I tell him. “I was a little . . . distracted.”
He nods, rubbing his face, and when his hand is gone he looks more awake, and resolute. “Stay here.”