Chapter
2
By Julie
We reached the
airport a half an hour later. I pulled into a parking space and turned off the
Jeep. Then I reached over and lightly shook Kevin.
"Hey,
wake up, cuz," I said. "We're here." Kevin lifted his head up
and rubbed his eyes.
"Is Nick
awake?" he asked sleepily.
"Not
yet," I told him. I reached back and gave Nick a light smack. "Wake
up, Frack!" I called to him.
"Shut up,
Frick," Nick whined, without even opening his eyes.
I wish I had some water with me right now so I
could get him back, I thought.
"Come on,
Nick. We're at the airport. Now, get going. We don't want to keep Jason
waiting," Kevin said firmly.
"Fine,
I'm up," Nick said, pulling himself to a sitting position. We all piled
out of the Jeep and grabbed our bags. I locked up the Jeep, and we headed into
the airport.
We weren't
taking a commercial flight to Denver, so we didn't have to worry about tickets
or checking out luggage. Instead, we were going in a private plane with a good
friend of Kevin's, Jason Warner. Jason and Kevin had known each other for
years, ever since they had worked together at Disney World. Jason had been one
of Kevin's fellow Ninja Turtles. His father was a pilot and owned his own
plane. Jason also knew how to fly the plane. He had kindly offered to fly us to
Denver, free of charge. That was wonderful for us, not only because it was
free, but because we wouldn't have to worry about any fans bothering us on a
regular airplane.
"So,
where are we meeting Jason and the other guys?" I asked Kevin, as we
walked through the large airport.
"There's
a small runway for private planes at the end of the building. We're meeting
everyone at one of the gates down there," Kevin replied.
We hurried to
the gate the very end of the building. It was nearly empty. I looked around and
immediately spotted AJ, Howie, and Jason sitting in some chairs together.
"Hey
guys!" I called, hurrying over to them.
"What
took so long?" AJ asked. Kevin and Nick both pointed to me.
"Hey!"
I exclaimed, but couldn't think of any good excuses to tell them.
AJ rolled his
eyes. "Well, we're all ready, so let's get going!" We all stood up
and grabbed our bags, and Jason led us outside to where his plane was parked on
the runway. It was not a big plane, but I was still impressed.
We all got on
the plane and took our seats. Jason and Kevin climbed into the cockpit.
"Hey, how
come you get to sit up there?" Nick asked Kevin.
"He's
like my co-pilot," Jason replied. "If anything goes wrong, he's here
to back me up." Nick's eyes widened.
"Hey,
don't worry, buddy, nothing's going to happen," I assured Nick, knowing he
hated flying.
"Yeah,"
Jason said. "I've flown this baby tons of times. I know what I'm
doing." Nick seemed to relax a bit. "Alright, we're ready to take
off," Jason said. "Fasten your seatbelts." We all put on our
belts.
A few minutes
later, we started down the runway, increasing speed. It was very bumpy. Then,
we took off. There was a lot of turbulence at first.
"Don't
worry, guys," Kevin called back to us. "It'll get smoother when we
get up higher. It's just shaking like this because it's a small plane." We
nodded. I didn't like all the shaking though. I was afraid enough of heights as
it is. All this bumping was starting to make me even more scared and nauseous
too.
A few minutes
later, we stopped going up, and the turbulence stopped. The flight became much
smoother, and my stomach relaxed some.
The flight was
supposed to last about four hours. I made sure I had packed plenty to do. I
grabbed a copy of Sports Illustrated and began to read it. Nick took out
his Gameboy. Howie pulled out a book, and AJ looked through another magazine.
The first three
and a half hours of the flight went okay. We all found ways to occupy ourselves
so we didn't get too bored. In fact, we were so occupied, that we never noticed
the storm clouds forming around us.
***