Cutler 02 - Secrets of the Morning

NEW ADVENTURE, A NEW FRIEND
     
    We filed out of the plane slowly. When we entered the airport, Mrs. Levy spotted her son and daughter-in-law and waved at them. They came forward and hugged and kissed her. I stood back watching them for a moment, wishing that I had some family anxiously awaiting my arrival, too. How wonderful it must feel to arrive after a big trip and have people who love you waiting there to throw their arms around you and tell you how much they've missed you, I thought. Would ever have that?
    Once Mrs. Levy found her family, she forgot about me. I started after the crowd of passengers since we were all headed for the same place—the luggage carousels. But I was like a little girl at a circus for the first time. I couldn't stop looking at everything and everyone. On the walls there were large, colorful posters advertising New York shows. The kind of musicals I had only dreamt about seeing were loudly announced all around me. These stars and these shows, could they be only minutes away? Was I foolish to dream that someday I would be featured on one of these beautiful posters?
    I continued down the corridor gazing up at the huge sign advertising a perfume by Elizabeth Arden. The women in all the advertisements looked like movie stars with their glamorous clothing and jewels and beautiful, radiant faces. As I spun around, I heard a voice over the public address system announcing arrivals and departures.
    A family went by me speaking in a foreign language, the father complaining about something and the mother pulling her little wards by the hand as quickly as she could. Two sailors strolled past me and whistled and then laughed at my surprise. Farther down the corridor, I saw three teenage girls in a corner smoking cigarettes, none of them much older than I was, and all wearing sunglasses even though they were inside. They glared at me angrily when I stared, so I looked away quickly.
    Never had I seen so many people in the same place at once. And so many rich people! The men in soft dark suits and polished black and brown leather shoes, the women in elegant silk dresses and coats, their diamonds glittering on their ears and necks as they clicked down the corridors in their high heels.
    After a while I began to be afraid I'd gone in the wrong direction. I stopped and stared hard around me and realized that none of the other people from my plane were nearby. What if I got lost and the taxi driver who had come to fetch me left? Who would I call? Where would I go?
    I thought I saw Mrs. Levy hurrying down the corridor. My heart jumped for joy and then plunged when I realized it was just another elderly lady wearing similar clothing. I wandered to my left until I spotted a tall policeman standing by a newspaper booth.
    "Excuse me," I said. He peered down at me, over his open newspaper, his forehead creasing in tiny folds under his wavy brown hair.
    "And what can I do for you, young lady?"
    "I think I'm a little lost. I just got off the airplane and I'm supposed to go to the luggage carousel, but I started looking at posters and . . ."
    A light sprang into his blue eyes.
    "You're all by yourself?" he asked, folding his paper.
    "Yes, sir."
    "How old are you?" he asked, squinting with scrutiny.
    "I'm almost sixteen and a half."
    "Well, you're old enough to get about by yourself if you pay attention to directions. You're not very lost. Don't worry." He put his hand on my shoulder and turned me around and explained how to get to the luggage carousels.
    After he finished, he waved his right forefinger at me.
    "Now don't go looking at all the signs, you hear?"
    "I won't," I said and hurried off, his light laughter trailing behind me.
    By the time I got to the place where the baggage was the passengers were all squeezing and crowding around to get their bags. I found a small opening between a young soldier and an elderly man in a suit. Once the soldier saw me, he pushed to the right so I would have more room. He had dark brown eyes and a friendly smile. His shoulders looked so broad and firm under the snug uniform jacket. I saw the ribbons over his right breast pocket and couldn't help but stare.
    "This one's for marksmanship," he pointed proudly.
    I blushed. One thing Mrs. Levy had advised me on the plane was not to stare at people in New York and here I was doing it again and again.
    "Where are you from?" the young soldier asked. Above his other breast pocket was his last name, WILSON.
    "Virginia," I said.