Last year our family got stuck in the airport for two weeks straight,
like in the movie The Terminal with Tom Hanks. In the beginning
we moved around in a haze, tired and jetlagged and wishing desperately
that we would be home in time for Thanksgiving.
But then my gay brother Paul
found a black-haired flight attendant with scars running up and down his arms,
and told him If you show me yours first I’ll show you mine.
The next night I woke up at 3 am and found Paul kissing those scars
with his mouth, counting them one by one
beneath the glowing neon lights of the fast food signs.
And we held a birthday party for a three-year-old girl with cancer
in the lobby, making do with two stubby candles found
in my mother’s purse and a package of instant chocolate mix
hastily purchased from a nearby gift shop.
At the beginning of the second week, we knew all the janitors’ names
by heart; the daily employees greeted us cheerfully at the counter,
and that was when I realized that sometimes being lost is a good thing,
akin to wandering around the darkened corridors of an airport terminal,
because at the end of the day, you always end up in someone’s arms
who will love you no matter how many scars line your wrists.