Amaretto

A short story first published on Wattpad in 2017

The air smelled like amaretto. Bittersweet.

“Here you are, ma’am,” said the flight attendant. She handed me my drink with a slight bow, so slight that it might rather be called a nod. After only a week in Japan, I found myself returning the nod automatically. That delicate modesty of Japanese culture was infectious. I was going to miss it something fierce; I could tell already.

I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder, three light pats followed by a rub that grew softer and faded away after a few seconds. This was my husband Cal reaching forward from the seat behind me. He told me once that the three pats meant “I love you,” but I suspect he made that up after the fact to explain a habit he’d already formed. Either way, it came to the same thing, I guess.

Five years we’d been married. This trip to Japan had been our “second honeymoon,” though we both hated the term. It sounded like something rich people would say. But then again, flying all the way to Japan just to relax for a week was definitely something rich people would do. Thank God for credit cards.

Now that the trip was coming to a close, I couldn’t keep my thoughts from drifting back to practical matters: all the debt we’d incurred, how much catching up I’d have to do at work, whether our daughter Judy would resent the fact that we’d gone to Japan without her… She was only four and easy enough to pacify for the time being, but what would she think in five years? Or ten years? This vacation wasn’t something we’d be able to repeat anytime soon.

I really hated leaving Judy behind with my mom, but Cal and I needed the time alone. We had to remind ourselves that we were together because we wanted to be, not just because we had a child to raise. Plus, I’d been wanting to visit Japan ever since I first discovered anime as a kid. I think Cal wanted to prove that being parents didn’t have to mean giving up on our childhood dreams. I didn’t really need proof, but hey, no complaints.

I felt Cal’s hand on my shoulder again. “Hey, Reina!” My name is Renata. Cal’s the only one that calls me Reina. He thinks it’s cute. I guess it is kind of cute. “Look out your window!” There was excitement and fear in his voice, but really, that’s nothing out of the ordinary for Cal. He’s always getting worked up over something or other.

We were descending rapidly now and getting pretty close to San Francisco, but I was surprised at how little greenery I was seeing. The nasty concrete gray that surrounded the Bay now extended south into the hills of the Peninsula, down past San Mateo and Palo Alto. “That’s not…” I began, but I couldn’t think of how to finish the thought.

I heard Cal shifting restlessly in his seat behind me. He knew something was majorly wrong. “Do you think it’s… Is that a different bay?”