Finding Family

When Dalton gets lost in the airport, he finds more than what he first thinks.

    Dalton’s eyes glistened with tears as he looked up at the sign looming above his head. The bold white font on the sign read ‘Terminal A - Baggage Claim.’ The letters seemed to look down at him, scolding him silently for staring at them in such a way. At that, Dalton’s gaze averted downward to his fidgeting hands, and the speckled tiles at his feet.

    “Where’s Momma..?” he whispered between pouting, pursed lips, and gave a humid sniff as mucus trailed its way to the openings of his nostrils. The airport around him ignored his quiet plea, as tall men and women in business suits passed him briskly, suitcases on wheels grinding after them as they walked,  and teenagers with frayed clothing hung across their bodies and headphones around their necks scuffled about to catch up with their companions, treating him as though he were a ‘Wet Floor’ sign. He regretted having watched the luggage on the baggage claim’s conveyer belt when he should have paid attention to his mother.

    “Dalton?”

    “Yes, Momma?” Dalton’s ears were on his mother, but his eyes were on the dark-colored suitcases that lounged on the conveyer belt, hypnotizing him as they drifted by, almost beckoning him to reach out and grab them. He felt his mother tap him on the shoulder gently, shaking him from his reverie, and motioned for him to follow her.

    “Stay with me, sweetie. I need you to help me look for Grandma.” Dalton turned from the baggage claim and skipped to keep up with his mother as her high heels pounded against the tile of the airport floor, her stride long and hasty. Dalton grabbed her gloved hand in almost an attempt to slow her pace, and watched as people began to hoist their luggage from the conveyer belt to the ground. He smiled as he knew he would soon be doing the same with Grandma’s luggage, when he and his mother caught up with her.

    “Momma, what is Grandma like?” he asked, eyes shifting focus to the people sitting in back-to-back rows in the terminal, waiting for baggage,  friends, and transportation.
    
    “Grandma is such a sweet, yet feisty woman,” came his mother’s reply, her pace unfaltering. “She took good care of Momma when Grandpa went away and she worked hard so we could have money. Then Momma got married to your Daddy and we moved here, and now we are letting Grandma visit.”

    “Why?” Dalton chirped, looking up to his mother just in time to see a smile spread across her face.
    
    “Well, Grandma hasn’t visited since you were born, and she really wants to see you.” Dalton’s eyes drifted thoughtfully to the tiles in front of him, watching them disappear as he and his mother trod along the terminal. What did Grandma look like, he thought, and would she be as sweet or feisty now as she was when his mother was young? Suddenly his mother came to a halt in front of numerous screens, etched with pixel letters depicting arrival flight times. His mother crouched in front of him and combed at his thick head of dark hair.
    
    “Stay here, sweetie, while I look for Grandma‘s flight number,” she said, grooming him for a second more before turning her attention to the screens. Dalton’s eyes followed his mother’s face as she stood, following her gaze to the screens and trying to make out anything that made sense to him. He could make out the letters and numbers on each board, but not many of them made any sense to him. I wish I could read better, he thought to himself, lips curling down. Then I could help Momma. Suddenly there came a gritty BEEP BEEP BEEP from behind him. He craned his neck to look over his shoulder, and saw numerous lights flash in rhythm with the noise. A gaping smile spread across his face. The conveyer belt was starting up again. He turned on his heels, dodging through people, idle luggage and scowls just in time to watch a fresh line of bags and briefcases begin to chug along the moving belt for people to claim.

    When the last bag disappeared back into the depths of the airport, Dalton turned about, satisfied, and looked around for his mother, only to find that her gloved hands and high heels were nowhere in sight.

    Dalton kept his hands close to his heart, allowing them to mindlessly fidget about as he meandered through the airport, leaning close to the baggage claims, occasionally hoisting his body up onto the tips of his toes in a desperate attempt to see over the tall people in front of him, hoping to somehow catch the top of his mother’s dark-haired head. He just couldn’t see her. Lowering his eyes back to the floor to rub his reddened eyes clean of tears before turning his attention for a moment to the flight monitors, he continued along, tempted to begin calling out for her, even in the middle of an airport. He was stopped dead in his tracks, however, as the side of his cheek was nestled firmly into the fabric of denim. He backed away to see an elderly man turn and look down at him, the softest of grunts escaping his nostrils. Out of sheer impulse, Dalton thinned his lips and sniffed humidly.

    “E-Excuse me…M-Mister?” he mumbled, lips trembling both with embarrassment and the post-shiver of forcing his tears away. “Have you seen my Momma…?”

    “Why aren’t you with her now?” came the man’s reply as he bent his hands into gripping one of the terminal’s seats, gently collapsing into it.

    “Well…I-I was walked away from her to watch the bags go by, and now…she’s gone.” Dalton looked straight into the man’s eyes as he found his own focus on the tiled floor beneath him - he seemed almost in sudden deep thought. Something in the old man’s eyes seemed extremely familiar to him. They reminded him of his mom. Digging one of his shoes into the airport’s floor, he chirped, “You know, you look like her.”
    
    Suddenly the man’s eyes went from thoughtful to alive with laughter as he chortled wearily, voice thick with perhaps the loosening of dentures, or slight insufficiency of teeth. He shook his head, as if thinking to himself.

    “I wouldn’t know your Momma unless she was my daughter, but I can assure you, I ain’t her,” he chuckled, his eyes dulling once again in thought as his laughter quickly faded. He leaned back in his seat, hooking the tip of his shoe beneath his rolling suitcase, and sighed. “At least your Momma ain’t gone like my family is…”

    “What do you mean?” asked Dalton, fumbling his way onto one of the seats next to the old man and clutching hold of the arm rests tightly. He looked back into his eyes and tilted his head - there was something off in his gaze, as though her were…sad about something.

    “Well, this ol’ man did some shameful stuff when he was younger,” he uttered, shrugging a bit and drumming his fingers against his own arm rests in a failure attempt to keep himself looking upbeat.

    “Like me?”

    “Not quite, son. I was older than you are, but I was still young. Had a beautiful wife and a daughter. Had a house on the countryside, cherry trees, and acres of green pasture that you could lie out on at night and watch the stars stare back at you. Even had more money than I knew what to do with.”

    “What’s so bad about that?” asked Dalton, his mind filled with fanciful landscapes of sheep herders and cowboys of the wild west as he rocked back and forth in his seat gently. “That sounds great!” The man swallowed and was silent for a moment, grey eyes ablaze with thought and the threatening of teardrops.
    
    “Well, I did something stupid one day,” said the old man, turning his left hand over to see the bottom of his wristwatch, fidgeting with the clasp as he spoke. “I took all that money that I didn’t know what to do with. I took it and I ran away. Ran away from the house, from those cherry trees, from the pastures, from my little baby girl…from my wife…from everything.”

    Dalton ceased his rocking and furrowed his brow, turning his head to the old man.

    “…Why?”

    “I wanted more. A house in the middle of nowhere was nice n’ all, but…I wanted to see the world, and I wanted to see the world alone.” The man’s eyes averted to his chest, his tone lowering a bit, muttering as though he were talking more to himself than to Dalton. “So I did…I took a plane to Vienna, then to Paris, then to everywhere else in the world I had wanted to go. Saw plenty of sights, met people that I shouldn’t have ever met, did things that I now regret, saw others that I forgot merely days afterward…I dishonored her…she’d hate me forever if she ever knew all of the things I’ve done to myself…I’m a disgrace to my baby…she wouldn’t ever want a father like me...”
    
    Dalton listened intently to the old man’s words, taking in what made sense to him and leaving what didn’t to the man’s own thoughts. He scrambled silently onto his knees in the chair as his elder fell silent and gently tugged on the cuff of his long-sleeved shirt.

    “Mister…?” The man merely blinked, smacked his lips together as he remained silent for a moment longer, then looked to the boy.

    “But you know what? I thought all of that would make me happy, being alone.”

    “Well…you’re alone now. Aren’t you happy being alone?” Dalton asked, releasing his shirt. The man shook his head after a moment more of pondering.

    “…No, son, I’m not happy. I thought that I would be, but I’m not…and now it’s too late. Now they’re both gone…”

    The man’s gaze returned to in front of him as he hunched in his seat, as if in defeat. Dalton readjusted his legs and frowned, returning his attention back to the flight monitor as he had before he ran into the old man. A line on the board caught his eye that read “VIENNA - 12:30 - C-D” in flashing white text. After examining the text for a moment, a thought came to him. He hopped down from his seat and found the cuff to the old man’s shirt again, tugging it with him as he walked toward the flight screens.

    “Hey, what are you doing?” he remarked in surprise, resisting the boy’s tug and trying to pull his shirt from his grasp.

    “We can help each other!” Dalton exclaimed, tugging even harder.

    “What do you mean?”

    “Your daughter and your wife are gone now, right?” The boy pointed eagerly at the flight monitors. “Maybe you can still find them. I’m looking for my Momma. If you help me look for her, then I promise to help you look for your family. We can help each other, and then you can be happy again!” The man’s eyes flickered with confusion, until he sighed.

    “Let go of me, son. It doesn’t work like--”

    “DALTON!!”

    Dalton’s head swerved in the direction of the voice to see his mother make an awkward run for him in her high heels, scooping him in her arms, tearing him from the old man’s shirt, and hugging him tightly. Dalton smiled and threw his arms around his mother’s neck before she held him out in front of her, a worried, stern look on her face.

    “Don’t you ever do that to Momma again. I thought I was going to have to call security to help me look for you!” Bringing her son close to her again, she turned her attention to the old man. “I hope he didn’t trouble you too much, sir, and I’m so sorry that he ended up getting lost and running into you.”

    “Not a problem, ma’am. He was well-behaved, and he‘s quite a smart boy. In fact--” The man stopped short as he noticed an older woman standing almost behind Dalton’s mother. The woman emerged as she found herself caught, and looked at him with a gaze that pierced into his soul. Dalton’s mother looked back and forth from the woman to the man, puzzled.

    “Mom, what’s wrong?” she asked the old woman, whose eyes only narrowed.

    “John,” she spoke to the old man, his eyes growing wide with shock as she said his name.

    “…Maybelle?”

    “It’s been nearly forty years. What are you doing in this part of town?” The old woman spoke with almost a monotone voice, caked with hidden remorse. The man seemed to want to run from the airport at any given opportunity, yet still he sat, locked in a visual standstill with this woman.

    “Same thing I’ve been doing for the past almost forty years, I guess - traveling.” Maybelle all but scoffed.

    “Good for you, then. You should be happy.”

    “Mom, what’s going on?” Dalton’s mother asked, placing a hand on her mother’s shoulder.

    “Dalton, meet your Grandpa. Sweetie, this is your father…now, let’s be on our way.” Maybelle’s gaze ripped from her ex-spouse’s as she prepared her ankles to turn her around so she could walk away.

    “Wait…” John called, causing her to stop. “I’m not happy…in fact, I never thought that I would be happy again, after leaving you and my only daughter. But,” his eyes swept to Dalton, the faintest of smiles appearing on his face, “this little guy wanted to help me find you both, and now I’ve found you…and now I want you back.” Maybelle’s face began to sour as he said this.

    “Why would I let you back into this family, after over 35 years - not a word, not a phone call…not even a goodbye.” Her voice shook as she spoke, not with rage, but with confusion. “Why?”

    “I’ve been a fool, Maybelle…I thought I knew what would make me happy. I thought that I was making the right decision. I was more wrong than I could ever be.” Maybelle’s face remained sour. “And now that all is said and done…I probably don’t even deserve you, or anyone else. You were always the one for me…and even if I were to remarry and make a new family, it wouldn’t be the same…” The woman kept her silence as the man spoke, only biting the inside of her lip as tears threatened to fall from the corners of her eyes. Finally, John hung his head. “I know…I guess it really is too late. I understand…I have no-one. I‘ve been a failure father, a failure husband…I‘m nothing now.”

    “Oh, quiet, you,” snapped Maybelle, blinking the tears from her eyes and looking to Dalton. “If nothing else, you have this little one. He’s your grandson, for Heaven’s sake.” She sighed and beckoned the man to stand, to which he obeyed, and - with a bit of reluctance - she gave him a sincere half-smile. “It’ll be hard to rebuild anything in this family in your current state, but…if you can be a good grandfather to Dalton…there might just be hope left in you yet.”

    “You…you really mean it?” John asked, baffled and filled with emotion.

    Dalton wiggled in his mother’s arms until she lowered him to the floor, where he scampered to his grandfather’s side, throwing his arms around his leg and hugging him. John ruffled his dark hair gingerly, eyes glistening as he smiled at Maybelle.

    “…Thank you.”

Author's Note

I plan to enter this short story into a regional writing contest sometime this year. With a little over 2,600 words, I hope to make something of it.
The plot was created by me, with the help of my beloved boyfriend.
I tend to enjoy taking fiction from a child's point-of-view, as they are the purest of beings that exist in this world, and their beliefs are unfiltered. For this reason, I hope to bring something truly sweet, pure, and heart-warming.