Future Writer Chapter 5 (8 pages)

Chapter 5

"I should tell someone that you're awake." I told her. "I'll be right back."

"Greg," I yelled out the door to the pilot.

"Yes?" he asked as he walked towards me.

"The navigator, she's awake."

"Move aside. I must see her," he told me.

He walked into the cabin and knelt down beside her. "Alexia?... How are you feeling?"

"I feel.. you know.. kind of, okay, but, I don't know, confused. What has happened? Where are we?"

"We were in a plane crash. We're about three hundred and twenty five miles south of Caracas. Everyone else on the plane is okay. How about you? Do you feel as though you can move? Does anything hurt?" the pilot asked in concern.

"I do have headache, but not too much."

"I'll get a pain killer from the first aid. You just sit tight."

The pilot came back with some tablets from the first aid kid and handed them to her. She swallowed them then leaned back in her chair. The pilot feels very relieved that she is okay because, for him, he feels the pressure of responsibility for the safety of his passenger and crew. I went to a chair forward in the compartment and was soon asleep.

When I awoke, the sun was high in the sky. Looking out the windows I could see that the others had set up a makeshift tent out of blankets that were draped across low hanging tree limbs.

I sat up and looked to the rear of the aircraft. The cabin was empty. I decided to have Clancy fill in the details of what I had happened then continue on with the story. I opened the ledger to where I had left off.

"Clancy, are you ready to write my future?" I muttered out loud.

Through Clancy, I wrote that Alexia and I would talk freely to the point that we would get to know each other on a personal level. She would be, in my perception, the perfect woman. After close to an hour, I stopped from my writing to the sound of the cabin door opening. It was Fred Clairfield and Bob Conners coming in to get rations for the others.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you," Bob said to me.

"That quite alright, I was already awake."

"We're serving rations if you're hungry."

"Sure, I'll be right out."

I went outside and found out why the others were outside. The cool breeze in the hot sun was very refreshing. Most of the people sat near the fire to keep the bugs away. They were being entertained by two playful monkeys jumping from limb to limb. The forest was so full of sounds that after a while you learn to ignore many of them. The rations were passed out to the group. Fortunately, the plane was stocked with enough food for a return trip as well. Rationed out, this gave the group an extra day's worth of food.

"I wonder if they're looking for us?" asked Tammy.

"I'm sure they are," answered the pilot.

"Can't we do something with the radio?" Marco asked the pilot.

"I'm afraid not. The batteries were wiped out when we hit the ground."

"What about flares?" suggests Millie, "Shouldn't there be flares on the plane?"

"Yes there are, but if we shoot them of now we won't have them when a rescue plane flies over."

Meanwhile Bob Conners and Ralph Glady are exploring near the regions of the plane. They came back with something that the group should concern themselves with. Ralph had in his hand a tree limb that was twice the size of the average thumb. The limb was recently broken.

"This had to be a very large animal to break this," mentioned Ralph.

"I think we should be a little more cautious about what noises we hear," added Bob.

"Are you sure you didn't break that on the way out?" suggested Frank Clairfield.

"I don't see how that could be. We walked to where this was and came straight back."

"OOHH!! OOHH!! AAHH!! AAHH!!" rang a sound through the jungle.

The noise startled many in the group. I walked back to the cabin to try and catch up with the events so far. When I walked inside, Alexia was there reading a romance novel.

"This is a good sign." I thought to myself.

I walked over to her while glancing at the title of the book, "You like to Read?" I asked her.

"Sometimes, yes," she responded.

"I enjoy writing," I told her.

"What do you write?"

"Fictional stories, you see, I like to play God with my characters. I can kill them, bring them back to life, and I can have them do all of the fun things that I can't do. For example; I can't safely goes on wild, life threatening, adventures with beautiful women from exotic places... So I have my characters do it for me."

"Have you ever been published?" she asked.

"No, but I've been close. I once had a contract with an agent but he was too shaky. He wanted too much up front money, which I didn't mind paying for providing he was going to give that much effort. I told him that a friend was coming to town and I asked if he could stop by to see the operation. At that point he started giving me a big run around about first time authors... so I just blew him off."

She shifted in her seat.

I continued, "Imagine, if you will, living in a world that is limited only by your imagination. My characters do. Imagine if you could go back in time, or just stop time, for that matter, imagine if you could read minds, or better yet, inject thoughts. You could say, Sam, that's me, I want you to find me to be the most attractive woman in the world, and BAM!...you're the most attractive woman in the world."

Alexia gave an almost embarrassed smile.

I continued, "Knowing why I write, you know?..  to do the fun things that life would not otherwise allow, what would you write about?"

"Me?" she asked.

"Yes," then I clarified, "If you could write about anything, in other words, you can create a world of your own, and I'm assuming that it would resemble this world, what would you change?... To make things... I mean what... Unless you like the world the way it is?"

Alexia looked confused.

"Okay," I continued, "would there be mystery, romance, and adventure?"

She answered in a shy, almost embarrassed, way, "Romance, adventure..."

"I can work with this," I thought to myself.

Before long we talked about a variety of issues, mainly her, which I didn't mind. The whole time that we talked, I grew to know her more and more.

Alexia is speaking, "....the major problem now with our young people is they're kind of, limited by our background, I don't know. In our country, is Muslim country. We're not... not that ah.. how you say... I'm having problem with language.. We're kind of fundamental like Iran or Arabic country, you know, but anyhow, their beliefs are sort of different and we are have kind of very strict traditions which, like, limit us, you know? We should, like, you know? I've been brought up with only one thought, my parents never told me to do something or not to do which is bad, which is good. The major thing is that the reputation of the family, you know? To, think not you,.. think about you.. You should think about your parents, about your brother and your sister. You tell about family you know? and all your relatives, generally, you know?"

"Is that common there?" I squeezed in.

"Ah.. Yea.. It is. You should think not about your actions, you should not think about yourself but about family."

For hours we talked. I thought it would never end, but then again, I didn't want it to end. Why Would I? She's pleasant to be with, interesting to listen to, very attractive in a mysterious way, and so far, I can't find any faults.

She loved to talk. It was almost as if she had a load to get off her mind. She told me that she was currently living in United States while schooling to be a full time aviator for a major U.S. airline. She came here as a recipient of a contest sponsored by the U.S. Information Agency in order to develop the economy of countries of the former Soviet Union.

She continues, "... that's the major problem for me. Even here I do feel it, I mean, Ah.. I can go awhile, just, just because even if my som.. while I .. I will do that, I.. I can't do that, I mean I do feel some.. some  kind of pressure, you know? from my tradition or something. I just can't change myself. In my country people often think about me.. how different I am. I'm a bit too serious.. that I'm looking like, you know? and um.. Guys here, like other international people, they call me anti-social ha, ha."

"Really?"

"Yea... "

"... and, in Corpus Christi I have some problems meeting people."

"What did you say?" I asked her.

"What?"

"Did you say Corpus Christi?"

"I am there on schooling for job, that's where I live."

"Really?"

"I'm sorry to interrupt, go on with what you were saying."

I thought to myself, "I can't believe this. Thousands of miles away I meet the ultimate woman, and she lives in the same town as me. YES!"

Alexia continued, "I don't know whether I'm talking about things which are, I don't know, interest to you."

"Everything is interesting to me," I chuckled.

"...So, I am here for limited time, for two years. I should do my MBA and get job or go back. Ah.. It's different here. Now I've got ... frankly, I've been through pretty hard times last semester. I wasn't studying at all. I was sitting and thinking 'Oh no I'm.... I'm now twenty eight, I was kind of little girl sitting and crying, I don't know what I'm doing here,'. That was... I mean, I'm from the city which has about two million, over two million population, you know? and here it's kind of small city. It was pretty tough."

I thought to myself, "Perhaps I could make her feel more welcome here."

"....Almost all I mea.. Even though I am kind of close age to teacher. I mean people here are twenty two, twenty three, they are too young. Not too much fun getting together, you know? So I don't know, I'm kind of a big bore here.

I don't see much to do here except study."

I began thinking, "I could show you many things to do."

"I do... I do... very much... I don't feel like there is big contact between instructors and students here. It is different in my country, I mean everything is different, I mean, it started, you know? the process itself, everything, I mean the attitude. Here I... I have a feeling that students are not interested in each other at all I mean..."

"Each other or ..."

"You come to class... we're kind of intellect, you know? We can talk to each other, all of us, I mean at least we, you know, three or four guys around you but other classes.. we don't know each other. We are not even saying hi, not, not because I'm foreign, you know? just, no one does, you know? I'm surprised. I mean, we're getting, not friends but, we're getting pretty close to each other I don't know, maybe second week of study we're kind of.. starting hanging out together. And the instructors here are also kind of... they are just telling the material, you know? What they are supposed to say and this, They don't want to teach. And the students don't want to learn."

I can't believe the secret I have within Clancy. This can't be happening.

Do I really have control over their future? I've always heard that each person has some control of the destiny, but this is in the literal sense. Wow!

I continued, "If an American were to go to your country, what sort of customs would he or she have difficulty with?...  suppose that the language was not a problem. What sort of things do they do there that would be difficult... Okay, suppose that I were going to your country."

"Speaking about life in general," she starts, "it is different in my country. You have heard that we have a weak economy right now, and we used to be big strong country, once. Now everyone kind of split, you know? and everything is not too good. For normal American guy in my country, likewise all the other countries were influenced by Soviet Union, they would seem not too much developed, I mean from the service point of view. The service is high over ours.  This is why all that stuff is not that good as here. Here in the United States, service is very high, I mean all this stuff... banking system, everything is for people although I don't think that it's all that much for people. It's about money, you know? I mean everything for people, and in my country it would be pretty tough from that point of view. you know? not that much service, not that much things available. I don't know. It's different like quality, food.. it doesn't mean that we have food shortage, but mmm... It's different... we buying our food very fresh, very good from market like your super... I mean markets like open markets like, you know? Farmer’s market. Enormous and very beautiful and food is fresh, not like you get here, although everything is kind of good here, and you can buy whatever you want, everything is kind of frozen, you know? not that tasty not... kind of artificial. That is probably good point in my country."

I thought to myself, "I could produce the fresh food that misses from her country. Perhaps she would feel an acceptance that she seems to not have here."

She continued... "But it's, I don't know, and traditions, they seem interesting to other people who come to my country because we are having, you know? this entrancy Bokahra Kamaton,  it's a.. you know, like Arabic countries, they have all that stuff, like oriental kind so we can see stuff there. It's kind of interesting but it's..  I know for sure that it would be interesting just for someone is really interested in culture, in oriental culture. Not for everyone. I don't know."

I just can't believe this. Clancy wrote me the most perfect, perfect, perfect woman. This is more than fantastic. I can't even think of a word to describe this feeling of new found power. I had Clancy write me the most perfect woman and here she is.

She continued, "... It is different. But what is really different is, you know, take my husband for example, he is..."

"What did you say?"

"What?"

"You're married?"

"Yes."