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» CHAPTER TWO «

All of a sudden Rebecca woke up, banging her head against Nick's chest. 'Holy shit, what the hell was that?!' she thought. She looked over at Kelly not even thinking about the fact that she was still leaning against Nick's chest. After a few moments she sat up straight. No one else was awake but she couldn't make herself stop worrying, she knew she felt something, turbulence, and it was scaring the crap out of her. A few seconds later she felt an even harder bounce, which woke a lot of passengers on the plane up, including Nick. As soon as Nick was awake he immediately looked over at Rebecca.

"Did you feel that?" he asked trying not to get nervous.

Rebecca nodded trying really hard not to start crying. She knew it might be nothing but she hated it. She woke Kelly up.

"Becky?" Kelly asked groggily, "Oh my gosh, Becky, what's wrong?" she asked worriedly once she really opened her eyes.

Before Rebecca could answer the plane took a huge jump. She looked around; everyone on the plane was looking worried. Then the captain's voice came over the intercom.

"We are flying over the Andes, there is just a bit of turbulence, nothing to worry about we should be arriving in Brasilia soon."

But the captain really didn't sound too sure. And it made Rebecca nervous.

'He wouldn't lie,' she told herself, 'he wouldn't, wouldn't, wouldn't...'

"I don't like this," Kelly said looking over at Rebecca.

Nick just sat there, this was horrible, if he hated one thing it was flying, especially over these damn freezing cold mountains. This was not happening. All of a sudden the plane started shuddering non-stop. People were screaming, babies were crying, and Rebecca was about to start hyperventilating. This was horrible; the plane was not just going through turbulence, the lights that the captain had turned on a few seconds earlier were flickering. Then the lights went out completely. Everyone was panicking and the captain had not said anything. Rebecca could feel it in the pit of her stomach; they were going to crash. And within minutes they did. Rebecca shut her eyes and grasped onto Kelly and Nick trying to block everything out, and then everything was blocked out for her, she couldn't feel a thing. A few hours later Rebecca's eyes opened, someone was next to her, trying to get her to wake up.

"Rebecca, get up, please..."

It was Nick. All of a sudden Rebecca's senses were all back and she started shivering and sobbing. Everything hurt and she was cold. She looked around. No one was moving. There were things thrown all over the place, but out of all 93 people on the plane she didn't see a single soul moving. Then she realized something.

"Kelly!" she cried.

She looked next to her, Kelly was there but she wasn't moving, there was blood coming out of a wound on her head. She quickly reached down and felt for a pulse. It was faint but it was there. She started crying harder. There was nothing she could do. She had no doubt they had crashed in the Andes. It wasn't too cold yet, but she already knew that there wouldn't be
people wandering around there, so there was no way they would be rescued soon. Then she realized that Nick was still next to her. She turned to him and the second he saw her looking, he knew she needed someone. He grabbed on to her holding her as close to him as he could. This was not good and he knew it, but they would need to try. They sat like that for a minute Rebecca sobbing into Nick's shoulder while he held onto her.

"Hey, Rebecca, it's okay, we're okay..." Nick said trying to help as much as he could.

"It's not okay, no one knows where we are, everyone's dead!"

But the second Rebecca said it, she started crying again. This was not really happening, she would wake up in a few minutes and they would be landing in Brazil.

Nick just shook his head, "People could still be alive, we can check at least. Not right now, but in a little."

Shaking her head Rebecca tried to stand up since the plane was still straight, but her legs wouldn't allow it, she fell back down into her seat.

"God Nick, I can not do this, I'm not that strong, and pretty soon its going to get cold, really cold."

"People will come looking, we just need to stay strong until then, and there's two of us, we can do this. We have to try."

'I can't do this!' Rebecca thought to herself, 'Kelly could've but I can't.' Nick decided that he really was going to have to take charge of this. He stood up trying to steady himself even though he felt really weak.

"Sit here, whatever, I can't deal with this by myself, but you don't seem to want to help me so fine, I'll find someone, not everyone can be... well, someone has to be alive..." Nick said, not being able to bring himself to saying they would be dead.

And so Nick walked over Rebecca while she sat there crying even harder although she found it hard to believe that was possible. Then she realized something, even if she didn't think she could be that strong she didn't want to sit there alone.

"No, Nick, I'll look with you, you're right, I'm sorry." she said trying to get herself up quick enough to catch up with him since he was already half way down the aisle looking around.

He turned back and looked at her, "Hey, don't try to run, not a good idea."

He came up to her and helped her get over Kelly who was still unconscious. They started going up and down the aisles when they heard the sound of a little kid crying.

"Oh god," Rebecca said aloud, "I was hoping for an adult, someone who would know what to do."

But she and Nick followed the sound to the baby. It was a little girl, she looked about 4 at the most and she was curled up in her mother's lap. Or at least Rebecca guessed it was her mother. The little girl looked up when Nick and Rebecca walked into the section she was sitting in with her mother and ran up to Rebecca. She was still crying but she looked happy to find someone. Rebecca doubted the little girl understood what was happening but she knew she couldn't let her know they were scared. She put a smile on her face.

"Hi, what's your name?" she asked the little girl, hoping she would be able to tell her.

"Elizabeth." the little girl said brightly.

Rebecca just looked at Nick. He turned his head so she couldn't see him crying but she had seen it in his eyes. He was as worried as she was. And this made it harder.

"Well, Elizabeth, I'm Rebecca and this is Nick, you're okay now that you're with us."

Elizabeth just nodded and looked up at Rebecca.

"My mommy though, she's not waking up. I want her to get up."

This time Nick noticed that Rebecca looked utterly terrified. She had no idea what to tell this little girl, so he spoke up as hard as it was for him to look at the little girl.

"You're mommy's taking a long nap sweetie, hopefully she'll get up soon."

He reached down and felt the mother's neck for a pulse. Rebecca looked at him hopefully. But he shook his head not letting either of the girls see as more tears fell down his face. Rebecca started crying and she couldn't hide it. She didn't mean to, but she couldn't help it this was all so horrible. As much as she didn't want to upset Elizabeth, she couldn't stop. Stopping his tears Nick walked over to Elizabeth and picked her up. Rebecca just turned away; her and Nick were going to have quite a time doing this. She knew she needed to be strong so she stopped the steady stream falling down her face.

"Hey Nick, why don't you let me and Elizabeth have some girl time and you can finish walking around the plane." she said not wanting Elizabeth to see all the people. "We'll go back to our seats and I'll cover up Kelly."

Nick nodded and gave Elizabeth to Rebecca who smiled at him as much as she could and then headed back to Kelly. Rebecca sat down in her seat and sat Elizabeth on her lap.

"Oh, you must be really cold you want me to get you a sweatshirt?" Rebecca asked.

She didn't know what else she could use so when Elizabeth nodded she took off her sweatshirt and put it on Elizabeth as she sat there shivering. She talked to Elizabeth for a little while longer and found out that she was 3 but her birthday was in 2 days. Finally Nick came back and he shook his head. But he also had brought a few blankets with him for Kelly since she was going to be a lot worse of then him and Rebecca. He looked at the sight before him. Rebecca was sitting there shivering and Elizabeth looked like she wanted to sleep. Kelly was still not awake but she seemed to be breathing.

"Becky, you can't sit there shivering, do you have another sweatshirt somewhere?"

She just shook her head and tried not to start crying all over again. Looking back down at Elizabeth she noticed that she had fallen asleep. She looked adorable in her big sweatshirt but Rebecca could barely think about anything, she felt like her arms
were going to fall off. All she had under the sweatshirt was a short sleeved blue T-shirt and it was way too lightweight. Nick immediately shrugged off his entire shirt because he had an undershirt under it and gave it to Rebecca.

She shook her head, "You'll be colder than me, put it back on."

"Rebecca I can handle it, you look like you're gonna turn blue in a few minutes. Just take it, I'll find something."

Crying, Rebecca took it from him. She quickly put it on.

"What are we going to do?" she asked him.

"I don't know, it doesn't seem that anyone else is alive. But there might be more blankets, or..." Nick trailed off he didn't want to say it. But he did anyway; "People have sweatshirts on..."

Shaking even more Rebecca looked away. She couldn't imagine taking something of a... dead person. It was like stealing. At least it felt like it.

"There aren't anymore blankets?" she asked.

Nick shook his head. "Tiny ones, they won't do us any good. Oh! I have a sweatshirt in my carryon bag. I can use that."

He got down his bag and put the sweatshirt on really quickly. He was still cold but this was better. Then something occurred to him. Food. There was nothing they had to eat.

"Rebecca, do you have any food with you?"

She shook her head. "Those airplane snacks, we can eat those. I'm not hungry yet but we can."

"Okay good. Now we are going to need more heat than this..."

"I can't think right now, Nick." Rebecca said staring into his eyes.

"I don't know what else we can do right now. I'll help more when I wake up. Oh wait do you want to sleep?"

Rebecca shook her head. ‘Don't say it Rebecca, he will think you're an idiot.’ Rebecca thought to herself. But she couldn't stop herself, she was cold...

"Nick, I don't know where I've heard it but I'm really cold and if you can find an empty row of seats or make one by moving some people a little we can..." she felt so stupid saying this but it would work and she was so cold, and she trusted Nick. She put it into two words, "Well, body heat."

Nick looked at her; she was really avoiding his gaze now. She was blushing too, although it could have been the cold but he doubted it.

Grasping her chin between his fingers he turned her face towards his, "Don't feel stupid around me Becka. I am tired, and cold and that will work. Hold on, I can move some people so we can lay down somewhere. Okay?"

She nodded still not looking in his eyes. Nick walked off, trying to find some people he could easily lift up and move although the thought scared him. Finally he found a few lightweight people and cleared about the space of 4 seats down the middle of the plane. He headed back to Rebecca and Elizabeth and found Rebecca grasping on tightly to Elizabeth, who was still asleep, trying to keep herself warm.

"Becka, come on, I found somewhere we can lay down. Bring Elizabeth too and we will come back to Kelly in a little when we wake up."

So Rebecca picked up Elizabeth still not looking Nick in the eyes and walked behind him. When they got to the seats he cleared Rebecca just sighed. This was the most uncomfortable thing she had ever done. Nick turned around and looked Rebecca in the eyes, she couldn't break the gaze and they both knew it he leaned in and kissed her lightly on the lips.

"It's okay, don't even worry about it anymore, we're just going to lay down okay?"

Rebecca nodded. Nick lay down on the four seats and then he motioned for Rebecca to lay on top of him. 'God...' Rebecca thought to herself. 'This is unbelievably embarrassing.'

"Becka, I know I don't even really know you but I can tell you are nervous so we don't have to do this, you know? It will keep us both warm but if you really are this uncomfortable with it, it's okay."

'You're being stupid Rebecca just do this.' she said to herself.

Aloud she said, "No you're right, it just feels weird... I mean... not that I don't trust you and everything but still..."

"It's okay, the fact that I'm this calm is unbelievable." he said, now sitting back up. "Would you be more comfortable if we just sat up and once you fall asleep either I can lay us down or I'll fall asleep like that too."

Rebecca nodded. She was so much smaller than Nick that when she sat down in his lap he could barely feel her and Elizabeth's weight and she could curl up against him easily. Trying to relax, Rebecca looked at Nick.

"I'm not going to break your legs am I?" she asked.

"Yeah right, I can barely feel you." Nick said smiling at her.

She loosened up and he could feel it.

"Becka...?"

"Hmmm...?" Rebecca asked half asleep.

"I think I'm falling in love with you..." Nick said quietly.

Rebecca just smiled and he wasn't sure she had even heard him. But, oh well, maybe he shouldn't have said it. Elizabeth was still asleep and after awhile Nick wrapped his arms around both of the girls and fell asleep.

chapter 3
REMEMBER to send feedback to the author, Zooey