Major League Screw Up

Chapter One

Earlier

“Come on Cady, we’re going to be less than forty-five minutes early if you don’t hurry your ass up,” Chantal called from across our shared apartment. It would have been impossible to miss her sarcasm. She knew how much I hated to be late to anything, much less the airport. You really had no idea how long security was going to take.

“I’m saying goodbye to Mr. Cakes,” I replied, glancing down at my huge tabby cat. He was lying belly up on my bed, purring loudly. I rubbed his belly and said goodbye, gaining enough static electricity to shock him when I touched his nose. He opened one eye and let out a short ‘mow’ before stretching out across my bed in contentment.

“He doesn’t care who’s here with him as long as he gets fed,” Chantal said, but she reached out and stroked him a few times under his chin. “And don’t worry, Drew will be here. He’s not going to forget.” She paused for a second, “Though I have no idea why he volunteered for this in the first place. Mr. Cakes hates him.”

It was true. I smirked and said “I know” and kissed Mr. Cakes’s belly before dragging my suitcase out of my room. Chantal’s two bags were already parked by the door. I turned back around, scanning the living room quickly.

“You’re not forgetting anything,” she told me. “We’ve gone through this four times already. Let’s go.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. Chantal had just reached for the doorknob when I heard the jingling of Mr. Cakes’s collar. He wound himself through my legs, looking up at me with big sad eyes. “Aww,” I said, dropping the handle of my suitcase to pick him up. He rubbed his head against my face, purring happily. “I knew you’d miss me.”

Chantal rolled her eyes, but couldn’t stop her small smile. “Seriously Cade, we gotta go.”

“I know,” I grinned. “But look at him.”

She chuckled. “Yes, he’s the greatest cat in the world. As you remind me every day. But you know what, it’s ten degrees outside and I am ready for Florida, so please… can we go? I swear he’ll be here when we get back.” Mr. Cakes meowed in agreement. I set him down on the recliner.

“Alright,” I said, kissing Mr. Cakes one more time. “Let’s go.”

Chantal was the calm and cool one as we weaved through late afternoon traffic. Every time we slowed below the speed limit, I visibly cringed, as if the plane was definitely going to leave without us. We got lucky locating a parking spot, but security checkpoints were going much slower than usual. By the time we finally got to the metal detectors, we had lost nearly all of the extra time we’d allotted for. Of course Chantal had to play coy with the security guard, who was definitely more than happy about the whine from his handheld metal detector that went off near her chest.

I rolled my eyes, interrupting their flirting. “Yes, she has them pierced. Can we go please?”

The guard seemed surprised to see me there. He nodded and I dragged Chantal behind me. We still had a long way to go to get to our gate.

“You’re a ruiner of fun, Cady. Lighten up,” she teased.

Chantal remained the epitome of calm the entire jog to our gate. She was, of course, constantly making fun of me, but that was just the way our friendship worked. We switched roles, however, the second we boarded the plane.

I let out a sigh of relief when we dropped into our seats. It was a tiny plane – only two seats on our side of the aisle – so that didn’t help much with my claustrophobia, but I willingly sacrificed my aisle seat so Chantal was comfortable. Chantal’s fear of flying was legendary. She had only flown three times prior to this trip. In high school, she went to Germany with her German class and vomited the entire ten hour flight. For her tenth birthday, her parents took her to Disneyland for her birthday and she had such a panic attack on the plane that she missed a whole day of Disneyland fun because her blood pressure wouldn’t decrease. And when she was just a baby, she had flown to visit some relatives in Texas and, according to her parents, did not stop screaming until the plane landed. I was not looking forward to this flight, even if it was only two and a half hours.

I held her hand in understanding and snagged a flight attendant as she passed. “We’re going to need a bit of liquor here,” I whispered, nodding at Chantal, who was getting paler by the second and biting down so hard on her bottom lip I was afraid it would start bleeding. The flight attendant nodded in sympathy and came back soon with a mini-bottle of rum and a can of Coke. Chantal skipped over the Coke altogether and slammed the bottle of rum, letting out a small sigh.

“What are the chances this plane will fall out of the sky?” she asked me for the millionth time.

“One in eleven million,” I recited. I’d looked up the information as soon as we decided on our trip. It had been Chantal’s idea originally that we should take a trip during the winter. Neither of us had ever had the time or money to do the whole Spring Break thing in college, but since graduation, we finally did. I was immediately in, but I knew that Chantal didn’t always think things through. We were going to have to fly and I was certain she hadn’t let her mind dwell on that. I’d looked up the statistic as soon as I could. I didn’t want her to back out because of transportation issues.

“That’s good,” she nodded, squeaking a little when the plane began taxiing towards the appropriate runway. Her grip on my hand tightened.

“We’ll be fine,” I assured her. “And soon we will be lying on the beach. Tanning and meeting gorgeous beachy men.”

Chantal laughed. “No, I’ll be tanning and meeting gorgeous beachy men. You’ll probably be hiding under an umbrella with a book.”

I chuckled at her perfect description of what I intended to do. I had packed one of my bags full of old paperbacks and my Irish heritage made tanning impossible. Chantal and I had very different ideas about what a relaxing vacation would be like.

After the pilot stated that we would be the next plane on the runway, I squeezed Chantal’s hand. “You know what the first thing I’m doing is when we get to the hotel?”

“Get eaten by a shark?”

“I’d more likely to be killed by a fallen coconut,” I told her.

Chantal burst out laughing, looking at me incredulously. “Are you serious?”

I nodded. I hadn’t stopped at just airplane crash statistics. I looked up statistics on basically all of Chantal’s phobias. “If you want to know anything about jellyfish, stingrays, or alligators, just let me know.”

She snickered, tightening her grip on my hand as the plane began accelerating. “No,” I said. “I am going to stand on the beach in my bikini because it’s going to be eighty-two degrees when we get there.”

The plane lifted off the ground with ease. Looking over at Chantal, I could see she was holding her breath. She didn’t release it until the plane leveled out a few moments later.

“Whoo,” she said quietly, sighing in relief. “I’m good.” She smiled her thanks at me before releasing my hand. I bent my fingers, wincing slightly.

During my first two years of college, I had been really jealous of everyone who could take off during Spring Break for some tropical trip. I spent my breaks working as much as I possibly could just to pay off room and board. I didn’t understand how everyone could afford the trips, so I hated everyone when they came back tan and reenergized for the last weeks of school. By my junior year, I’d accepted my fate. Besides, I’d hated college freshmen even when I was one, so I was okay with not spending an entire week watching people throw up. It was something Chantal and I considered when we looked for a place to go. We settled on Ft. Myers, Florida in early February hoping that we would miss most of the Spring Break crowd.

“I can’t wait to get into the water,” Chantal shared, pulling her mp3 player out of her purse. “Two hours and we’ll be complaining about how hot it is.”

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” Chantal groaned, shifting her sunglasses to the top of her head as she looked outside forlornly. Some time between getting off the plane and baggage claim, it had started to rain. And it wasn’t a typical late afternoon rain shower, but a full blown thunderstorm that had developed. Rain was coming down in sheets and watching others struggling with their luggage to cabs and awaiting vehicles was not giving either of us any incentive to move forward. “This really wasn’t what I had in mind.”

I sighed. “So much for sitting on the beach in my bikini.” I watched as our shuttle approached. “Ready?”

She glanced once more at the water pounding against the glass windows before us. She nodded slowly and ran as fast as her two over-packed bags would allow. I took my time, knowing there was no way to avoid the inevitable super soak I was sure to get. Rain or no rain, this was still a vacation. I didn’t plan to do anything in a hurry.

AN: This took forever to get up, I know. I couldn't figure out how to finish the chapter... so I just kinda left it, which is why it's so short. Baseball has renewed my spirit for writing this, so hopefully the rest will come faster. Let me know what you think. And thanks to Roman C Lee, follow the night light, PJC Macall, .roses, Annaface & Hoodlives for reviewing.