Hope for the Hopeless

That flight was probably the worst flight I’ve ever gone through in my entire life. My legs were cramped up in my seat and the person was seated next to me snored like a foghorn. I wanted to stuff his face with pillows. And worse than that, I felt pretty sick the moment I got off the plane. My vision started to double a bit while I claimed my luggage at the terminal.

It was like one of those airport scenes in movies. Everyone was moving in slow motion, and it was too crowded—and everyone was bumping into each other out of hurrying. I walked through the ocean of unfamiliar faces and found my way near the exit. But I was taken back from my trance when some blonde haired dude crashed against me. His guitar case hit with my face. “Ow!” I winced. He turned towards me with his face looking quite pissed. His ocean-like blue eyes stared at me with annoyance.
“Watch it.” He said pompously with his Irish accent before walking away.

I shrugged him off and headed outside to hail a cab. Apparently, the transportation in London was more…well organized. It didn’t take long before I got in one. I remembered grandma leaving me Aunt Hazel’s address; I guess she figured that I was too much in a daze to even listen to her in the car. It was written in a small piece of paper that was tucked in my pocket. I opened it and almost choked on my own damn saliva.

“Notting Hill?!” I almost shrieked. The driver gave me a weird look before driving off to our destination.

Are they freaking kidding me?! The only Notting Hill I knew was that Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts movie. Everything just felt even more surreal as we drove past the old-looking buildings and bricked roads. I felt like I was about to puke, but managed to compose myself when the driver turned on the radio and The Smiths started to play.

And if a double decker bus
Crashes into us
to die by your side
is such a heavenly way to die

I sang quietly to the lyrics of “There’s A Light That Never Goes Out”, as I tried to calm my insides down. Good thing the driver was kind enough to not bombard me with their typical tourist questions. After a while, my eyes started feeling heavy and I sunk down on my seat. I figured we wouldn’t reach Notting Hill soon since there was traffic, so I drifted off into a light nap.

“Miss…” someone nudged me lightly. “Miss, we’re here.” The driver said a little louder and I woke up from my ‘light nap’.

“Oh, I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t…” I trailed off. He just smiled, said it was okay and didn’t even charge me for sleeping off in his cab.

I got off with my luggage and found Aunt Hazel’s home. It was a 3-storey apartment building with red brick walls that were filled vines. It was perfect. A minute later, Aunt Hazel emerged from the door with brightest smile on her face.

“Arya, ooh I’m so glad you’ve finally arrived! I was starting to get worried.” She said, enveloping me in a tight hug.

“Aunt Hazel, yeah I finally made it.” I replied, forcing out a little bit of enthusiasm. But it was useless, I was feeling dead-tired and the chilly weather wasn’t helping either.

She examined my face and her eyes quickly landed on the dark bags hiding, well not really, more like standing out from under my eyes. “Come on in, I’m pretty sure you’re drained from the trip.”

“I sure am.”

We got inside and Aunt Hazel showed me to my room. I was greeted by a literally red-haired girl who was sprawled across the couch. Her olive skin glowed as the sunlight hit her slender, but not skinny, physique. “Oh, this is—”

“I’m Casey!” she cut off Aunt Hazel while getting up from the couch. “You must be Arya Parker; it’s so nice to finally meet you!” Her long arms wrapped around me and pulled me into a hug. “I’m your new roommate.” She stated.

“Casey, I trust you to help Arya around.” Aunt Hazel said, nudging me closer to red-haired girl.
“No problem! We’re going to have a lot of fun.”