Hey guys! This is a fanfiction I'm co-writing with a friend. Sorry the first chapter is so short, I've had this weird case of writer's block for a few months now, which is why my other fanfictions haven't been updated in, like, ever. I'm gonna try to get new chapters for everything soon, but with school and all it might be hard. Fear not, there will be new chapters for everything! Eventually...
Disclaimer: I don't own OHC, nor any characters in it.
Mother dabbed at her eyes once more. "I just…I can't believe you're off to see the world. Leaving us behind…I should have known you'd want to spread your wings early and leave me before college…"
"Uhm, Mom…?" Spread my wings? What kind of nonsense was that? I squirmed as she pulled me into yet another giant bear hug. "I'm gonna miss my flight…Mo's already waiting for me at the gate…and I've yet to go through security…"
She released me, handing me my boarding pass and smiling tearfully. "Be good…study hard…send me letters! Or email me! Whichever one, just keep in touch!"
"Alright, Mom, alright." I chuckled, giving her one last hug before grabbing my carry-on and my backpack, rushing to stand in line at security. A young woman, an employee of the airline, stayed with me after Mom left, accompanying me through security until I got to my gate.
"Motoko!" I shouted, tackle-hugging her.
"Ooof!" She said, managing to keep her place in her book. "Hi, Katsuko."
"We're going to JAPAN! Can you believe it? Japan! And all its…Japan-y-ness!" I checked our tickets, verifying we had seats next to each other. Yes! They were! "See, we're sitting next to each other!" I bounced excitedly.
"I think we're in first class, too." She commented, peering at the seat aisle.
"Really?" I asked. "Awesome! I've never flown first class before!"
"Indeed. The first class part of the plane, the land of full meals and leg room." She joked.
"Thank goodness, too. I do love my legroom and full meals when I'm going to be stuck in a giant flying metal tube for sixteen hours." I said, rummaging through my backpack to make sure I brought my entertainment: iPod, books, DS, and other such items.
An employee at the desk came over the loudspeaker. "Passengers, we are about to board Flight 376, with service to Tokyo, Japan. At this time we wish to pre-board all passengers traveling with small children or those in wheelchairs."
I felt my heart beating just a tad faster. "We're really doing it, Mo. We're going to JAPAN. To LIVE THERE. For an entire SCHOOL YEAR."
Motoko opened her mouth to say something, but the woman came over the loudspeaker again. "We would now like to welcome aboard all our passengers flying business or first class."
We hurried to the podium, handing an airline employee our tickets to scan, then walked aboard the plane, stashing our carry-ons in the overhead bins and putting our backpacks under the seats in front of us.
I sat down in my window seat, and sighed. "I'm telling you, Mo, this is the way to travel." I said, wiggling to become a bit more comfortable in the cushioned first class seat.
"Oh, yes. I would travel this way MUCH more often were it not so expensive." Motoko rolled her eyes at me.
"Hey, hey, you pay the price if you want legroom. And an actual meal. And actual entertainment, other than a movie and a drink." I stretched my legs until they hit the seat in front of me (which still wasn't very much, but what could one expect on an airplane?). "You see? The poor suckers back there can't do that. Their legs ALREADY touch the seat in front of them."
"Eh. True."
Our conversation was at a minimum as the plane took off, since I preferred to stare out the window and watch America fade into the horizon and the deep blue of the Pacific Ocean run endlessly under our speeding plane. Motoko took to listening to music on her iPod, tapping her foot to the beat of the music and trying to drown out the hum of both the airplane engines and the idle chitchat of those on the plane.
After a while, I got bored of staring at endless blue, so I pulled out one of the many reading books I had packed in my backpack. Motoko read over my shoulder, an almost instinctional thing for us. Since our book interests aligned almost perfectly, any book I read she read, and any book she read I read. And sometimes, like now, we read them at the same time.
I must have fallen asleep sometime around Chapter 12, because the next thing I knew, Motoko was shaking me awake. It was pretty dark outside the window, and the plane's cabin was only brightly lit near those who wanted it to be.
"We're about to land in Tokyo!" she whispered hurriedly. We both pressed up against the window, seeking our first glimpse at the country we'd been waiting our entire life to visit. And now we were going to, and not just for a week or two. An entire SCHOOL YEAR.
My excitement levels were about as high as a little kid who was just told he could live at Disney World.