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Bzzt! Bing-bong! “Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, if you are flying on flight 1452 to San Francisco, we’re sorry to inform you that it has been delayed until 6:20 this evening due to technical errors. We apologize for any inconvenience.” K-chk!
’Inconvenience?’ Sam thinks, rubbing the bridge of his nose. That’s five hours from now, and they were already an hour delayed. He was supposed to be on a plane already, going back home to California and away from god-forsaken Detroit.
He sighs, sitting back in his chair at the gate. He’s been sitting there for two hours, waiting for his plane to board but it never actually happened, and now it seems it won’t until the evening.
Thank god he didn’t have to work tomorrow, he might have been screwed and the law firm he interns at doesn’t look too kindly on anyone who is late, absent, distracted, or tired on the job. It was hard enough getting it in the first place, and if he had lost it because of some dumb flight delay, he’d wanna pull all his hair out.
“Looks as if we have a long afternoon to get through,” a deep rumbly voice says from beside Sam. He looks up, spotting the dark-haired man who sat two chairs over about an hour and a half ago, when the plane should have originally been boarding.
“Yeah, we’re in it for the long haul now, I guess,” Sam answers, letting out a bitter chuckle. “San Francisco your last stop?”
“It is now,” the blue-eyed man says cooly, sending a cursory glance towards the gate desk. He sighs and folds his newspaper before placing it on the small rolling suitcase in front of him, turning to better face Sam. "At this rate, I’ll miss my connecting flight even though I had planned in a long layover.“
"Oh?” Sam says. “Where to?”
“Magaden.”
“And that's…”
“Eastern Russia.”
“Ah,” Sam nods, taking the information in. That’s a long, long way away. “Why there?”
“Business,” the man says. He’s dressed in a suit and tie, a trenchcoat thrown haphazardly over his shoulders. “But I suppose it’s not that big of a problem. I had scheduled in two days for sightseeing before my meetings begin.”
“That’s good,” Sam says. “I mean, or bad. Since you’ll miss out on sightseeing and enjoying the city.”
“I suppose so,” the man agrees. “Not that I haven’t been there already, but I had never had any time to thoroughly explore the previous times I have been to Magaden.”
Multiple trips to Russia? Sam is a little stunned. He hasn’t even been out of the country—not even to Canada—not to mention never been off of the continent. “Where else have you been?”
They sit like that for hours, the man telling tales of his travels and Sam listening with high interest. He could only imagine what it was like to travel the world and meet new people, learn new languages, and experience new cultures. The man indulges all of his questions, asking a few of his own—about Sam and his life, and by the end, he feels like they’ve known each other for longer than they really have. Like they’re friends.
Bzzt! Bing-bong! ”Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention. Flight 1452 to San Francisco is now boarding. We apologize for the delay.” K-chk!
Their eyes meet, blue to hazel. Sam smiles sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “I guess this is where we part, huh?”
“I guess so,” the man echoes, gathering up his stuff and standing. He must be flying first class as Sam is allowed to board the plane much after the man does.
The flight is long and full of ornery passengers. Sam tries to sleep but can’t because of this old woman has to stand up to go to the restroom every twenty minutes on the dot. He wonders a little about the man he talked to for hours before, trying not to dwell on the fact that after this flight, he’ll probably never see him again.
Sam’s walking away from the arrival gate towards the airport exit before he hears a voice calling after him. “Sir! Wait!”
He spins around and sees the blue-eyed man from earlier, sprinting towards him through the crowd with his rolling suitcase trailing behind him.
“I realized we haven’t exchanged names,” the man says, sticking out his hand. “Castiel Novak.”
“Sam Winchester." Sam takes it, receiving a firm squeeze of a friend and a confident shake of a businessman. When he pulls his hand away, there’s a folded piece of paper pressed into his palm. He squints down at it, making out Castiel’s name scrawled on the back of a business card with several numbers underneath it. A phone number.
"We should talk more,” Castiel says, turning a slight shade of pink. “So please call sometime.”
In turn, Sam blushes a little. A stranger—a stranger? No, a friend—that he met at an airport gate giving him his number? It’s a weird concept, like one of those miracle stories of the chances of two people meeting. Perhaps maybe it is…
“Of course.”