A/N: THAT EPISODE, GUYS. I cannot even handle all the feels. Which is why I wrote this. It is a teaser for the larger story that I plan to write in the hiatus. It'll be a lot of fun, guys. I hope you enjoy this short first installment!
Altitude: Chapter One
Of all the random things Mindy Lahiri imagined herself doing on a Sunday evening, making out with Danny Castellano on an airplane definitely wasn't on the list. It wasn't something that had remotely occurred to her until it was happening. And then it was really happening. Like, nearly in plain view of the entire cabin happening. Mindy wasn't sure just how far things would have escalated if a flight attendant didn't find them, her unaffected sigh hinting that this wasn't exactly an unusual occurrence on flights as she muttered, "You guys need to go back to your seats."
Both of them murmured stilted apologies, Danny smiling slightly as Mindy stuck her chin to her chest. What had they gotten themselves into? They'd just written that apology email to Cliff, and now she could feel the heat from where Danny's hands had been on her waist, and the memory of his mouth against hers made her cheeks flush.
They returned to their seats, Danny stepping back to let her slip into the window seat. She pointedly looked out the window, hoping he would read the signs and give her a moment to work through what just happened. But Danny Castellano was not a man who read the signs.
"Mindy-"
"Can we please not have this conversation right now," she said, unable to look at him. Her mind was still all muddled, and she was afraid if she looked at him her mouth would find its way to his again, and things would get even more confused. She covered her mouth with her hand, propping her elbow on the windowsill.
"Okay," he said, voice uncertain.
Her phone buzzed, and she glanced down at the screen, her stomach plummeting when she saw it was a text from Cliff. She stared at the text, willing herself to feel some sort of definitive anything at the communication that would clue her into what the hell she was supposed to do next. The plan had been to get Cliff back. An unexpectedly heated make out session didn't necessarily change that plan. But maybe it did. Dammit, why was her life so confusing?
Danny looked at the phone and then her, his jaw tightening. He paused for a second before saying, "You're still going to try to get Cliff back, aren't you?"
"No," she said, although the word sounded false even to her ears. "I mean, I don't know. This is very…"
"You've got to be kidding me," Danny murmured, shaking his head.
"…confusing," Mindy finished, giving him a look. "This is very confusing for me, Danny."
"Well, I'm sorry for confusing you."
Mindy bristled at his tone and loudly went, "I didn't-" she felt the gaze of the passengers across the aisle on her, and she lowered her voice as she hissed, "I didn't ask you to kiss me, Danny. I mean, I was just trying to get some tonic water, and then you just…attacked me."
"Attacked you?" Danny returned, voice raising. "I attacked you?"
"Yes, you did," Mindy held, unable to back away from his challenging gaze.
"Yeah, well, if I remember correctly you attacked me right back."
Her cheeks flushed at the memory and she glanced over his shoulder, noticing a pair of teenagers a row back who were eagerly listening in on the conversation. They caught her gaze and quickly found something on their iPhones interesting.
"Look, let's just not talk about this right now. It's too close quarters."
"Whatever," he murmured, crossing his arms over his chest. He leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes. With his neck stretched back his Adam's apple became more pronounced, and Mindy had to actually remind herself to stop staring before she turned back and glanced out the window. They spent the remainder of the flight in silence.
While they waited for their luggage at JFK, it was an unstated challenge to see who would talk first. Both remarkably stubborn, they stood in complete silence for fifteen minutes before Danny finally said, "We can just forget it happened."
Mindy looked at him in surprise. "What?"
"We can forget it happened," Danny repeated, gaze trained on the revolving luggage belt. "It was, you know, the altitude or something. Made our heads all screwy."
"The altitude," Mindy repeated slowly. "Yeah, the altitude made our heads screwy. It made us act strange. Do things we would never do…without the altitude."
"Right," he said, finally glancing over at her. "If that's what you want. Is that…what you want?"
She swallowed hard, shoving her hands into the pockets on her sweatshirt. To be honest, she didn't know what she wanted anymore. As surprising as what happened on that plane was, something about it had felt almost inevitable. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't felt things gradually shift between her and Danny over the past few months. Something had been there even before her engagement, and then everything after.
Her luggage came around on the conveyor belt and Danny walked forward and got it for her. She took it from him with a soft thank you, watching him quietly as he went back and retrieved his own luggage. She could picture it then. The two of them together. She could picture them taking weekend trips and him harping that she over-packed as he hoisted her luggage into the trunk of the car. She could picture taking the subway into work together, and finding little moments in the doctor's lounge between cases. But she also saw what could come next.
"I can't do it," she murmured, catching Danny off guard. He glanced over at her and asked, "You can't do what?"
"I can't risk losing…," she trailed off, shaking her head. "You mean too much to me, Danny, and you know my track record. It always ends, and then things are never the same. And I can't do that to us. I can't-"
"Hey," he said, laying a hand on her shoulder. "Calm down."
"I'm sorry," she said, unsure who exactly she was apologizing to, Danny or herself. "I feel like a grade-A jerk right now."
"You're not a grade-A jerk," he murmured. "Come on, let's go grab some taxis."
She nodded, following him out of the terminal. After a moment she tentatively asked, "Are we okay, then?"
Danny took a deep breath and said, "Yeah, we're okay."
A/N: Feedback would be grand! For those of you concerned, this will be a MindyxDanny in the end. There's just some fun stuff that I think could happen beforehand now that there is this new fully realized dynamic to their relationship.
