Our Uber driver parked in the departures lane at Lambert and popped his trunk. I got out and stared for a second at all the space. “Where’s your luggage?”
Uncle Morty yanked out his computer bag and a carry-on and eyed my large roller bag. “This is it. Where do you think we’re going? Antarctica? You got a parka in there?”
I hauled out my bag and I’m not going to lie, I might’ve popped out a hernia. “We’re going for three weeks. This is three weeks’ worth of clothes.”
“Greece has washers.”
“I’m not using ‘em. This is a vacation,” I said, hooking my carry-on over my shoulder.
“Well, I ain’t carrying that shit,” said Uncle Morty. “You pack it, you deal with it.”
I rolled my eyes. “I never thought you’d deal with my bag, but you might want to tone it down after we find Nikki.”
He stopped his grumpy march to the airport door and turned around. “Huh?”
“Men typically offer to help to be polite. Nikki likes polite.”
“Gimme that.” Uncle Morty came back and whipped my roller bag away from me.
I waved to the Uber driver and he rolled down the passenger window. “Good luck!”
“Thanks.”
“You smell great by the way!”
“Tell your friends,” I said, laughing.
He gave me a thumbs-up and drove off, leaving me to follow Uncle Morty into the airport. I slapped on a floppy hat and sunglasses and put my head down.
Nobody noticed me and I’ve never been so grateful, but it didn’t last. Uncle Morty was standing at a kiosk, passport in hand, which should’ve been easy, but it was us, so it wasn’t. There were two gate agents with him and two more on the way. Our reservation must’ve been flagged. I pictured a skunk emoticon next to our names and I couldn’t blame them.
“Mr. Van der Hoof, we just need to make sure there’s no issue with your flight today,” said the lead gate agent.
“There ain’t no issue,” said Uncle Morty. “Does it seem like there’s an issue?”
“No, but on your last flight, there was—”
“That wasn’t you. What the fuck do you care?”
“There’s no need for that kind of language, Mr. Van der Hoof,” she said, looking dangerously like she might call security. Attention was the last thing we needed.
I rushed up and said, “Good morning. What’s the problem?”
“Oh,” said the gate agent with visible relief. “It’s you. Thank goodness.”
And then she did it. She sniffed me.
“That’s the issue!” bellowed Uncle Morty. “Don’t be smelling my niece. That’s just freaking rude.”
Another agent ran over and got in between them. “I’m sorry, sir. We’ve been instructed to make sure—”
“Now you’re sure!”
I grabbed Uncle Morty’s arm. “They’re sure. They’re sure.” I glared at the agent. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “I didn’t want to have to do this.”
“Me, either,” said the original agent. “But after the last time…”
“I get it,” I said, turning and giving Uncle Morty the stink eye. “Don’t you have something to say to these nice people who are going to let us get on a plane to go see Nikki?”
“Get outta my way,” he said. “I got a plane to catch.”
“That’s not it,” I said.
“Gimme an upgrade.”
I groaned. “For God’s sake, apologize for losing your temper and it wouldn’t hurt to tell them who actually stunk last time.”
“Why would I do that?” he asked, genuinely puzzled. “They’re causing the problem.”
“You caused the original problem.”
“Huh?” the female gate agent asked.
“Tell them,” I said.
Uncle Morty got shifty eyed. “It depends on your point of view. We could’ve flown to Greece. People being snowflakes and fancy ass pain in my—”
“It’s not a POV problem. Tell them.”
He grumbled and groused.
“Do it.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Do you want me to get on that plane?” I asked.
Uncle Morty said through gritted teeth, “I’m sorry for yelling and cursing and being an ass.”
“Thank you, sir,” said the male gate agent.
“And?” I said.
“Do I have to?” Uncle Morty asked.
I glared and he said, “It was me that stunk last time, not Mercy. She smelled like roses. I smelled like dumpster fire. It was me.”
The gate agents gaped at us.
“You?” said the female. “But we were told and it was on the news.”
“The news was friggin’ wrong,” said Uncle Morty. “Imagine that.”
The male was doubtful. “That was widely reported and the pictures were very persuasive.”
Uncle Morty pointed at me. “Look at her and look at me. Who do you think made babies cry and a lady barf up her burrito?”
“I see your point,” he said. “May I ask what was going on?”
“No.” Uncle Morty pushed past him and practically punched the big red start button on the check-in kiosk.
I pulled the agents aside and whispered, “There was a breakup. He was in a bad way.”
“Oh,” they said in unison. “Good luck.”
“I hope I won’t need it,” I said with a smile.
I did need it. I needed it bad. As soon as Uncle Morty put my passport in the scanner, the screen went red and security ran up, encircling us.
“What the holy hell?” asked Uncle Morty. “If this is about the stink, I apologized. What do you want from me?”
One of the guards spoke into his walkie and then looked at me. “Miss Carolina Watts?”
“Er…yeah,” I said.
“Take off the hat and glasses.”
I sighed and did as I was told. People were looking and they definitely knew who I was and not because I was DBD’s cover girl or that I solved a few murders or had a now infamous bikini shot taken in Honduras. It was because I supposedly smelled.
“It’s her,” said the guard. “Should I cuff her?”
“Cuff me?” I asked.
“Hell, no,” said Uncle Morty.
“Not necessary,” squawked the walkie. “Bring her in.”
“What about her companion?”
“He’s clear.”
The guards took my suitcase, carry-on, and purse. Then they took me by the arms and pulled me away from Uncle Morty.
“Hey! What are you doing?” Uncle Morty yelled. “Let her alone. We’re going to Greece.”
“Feel free to check in, sir,” said the guard. “Miss Watts isn’t going anywhere.”
“What’s going on?” I asked. “What did I do?”
“You’ve been flagged.”
“As what?”
“A terrorist.”
That’s right. I, Mercy Watts, was on the No Fly List, flagged as a flipping terrorist, and I got all that comes with it. Yanked into the bowels of Lambert Airport, I got searched, strip searched, and then searched again. I got x-rayed, body scanned, bomb sniffed, and they literally took apart my shoes. Those were my new Bob’s and I’d just gotten them broken in.
There was a moment when I thought they might just cut my cast off to see what was inside. Hint: it’s an arm. A supervisor put a halt to that when I said I would sue them, since I had a spiral fracture that was almost healed and that they ought to have known that, if they bothered to google me at all.
So instead, they decided to x-ray my arm three more times from different angles. I’m so gonna get bone cancer.
Then they searched my luggage and bomb sniffed it and scanned it and then repeated the process before taking every single thing I packed out and examining it. I’m pretty sure my thongs did not need three dudes to take a closer look. I half expected them to sniff them and I know I packed ten pairs. I counted. Homeland Security owes me four pairs of Victoria’s Secret lacy thongs. I don’t want to think about where my poor panties are spending their time now.
“Are we done?” I asked. “I can still make the flight.”
“No,” said nondescript Homeland Security guy.
I checked the clock. “Pretty sure I can.”
“You aren’t allowed to leave the country.”
“What in the world is going on? I’m not a terrorist. You know who I am. It’s crazy.”
“You’re on the list.”
“Take me off.”
“I can’t,” he said.
“Why not?”
“I didn’t put you on. It’s not up to me.”
I took a thong out of his hands and put it in my suitcase. “Who did then?”
“I’m not at liberty to say.”
“Then what am I supposed to do?” I asked.
“You don’t have to do anything.”
“Hello. I have to get off the No Fly List.”
“Good luck with that,” he said. “You’re free to go.”
I started repacking my suitcase. “What do I do?”
“You can submit a form to the Department of Homeland Security. The Traveler Redress Inquiry Program.”
“A form?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Then they’ll tell me why I’m on the list?” I asked.
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean ‘maybe’? How can they not tell me?”
“They don’t have to.”
“Why not?”
“Because they don’t.” With that, he turned around and left me with a sunglass-wearing guard, who absolutely refused to speak, period.
I threw away my Bob’s, put on a pair of beach sandals, and had the exit pointed at. I went out into a maze of halls, passing other hapless travelers with various issues and managed to get pointed at multiple times. There was some video taken and plenty of pictures. I figured I was on YouTube at that very moment, now known as a smelly terrorist, but that didn’t compare to having to face Uncle Morty. If he got on the plane without me, it would be a miracle and miracles were in short supply.
I got turned around a number of times and it took an extra five minutes to get back out into the regular airport and to my dismay Uncle Morty was waiting, red-faced, sweating, and livid.
“Hurry the fuck up!” he bellowed. “We can still make it through security.”
“We can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I’m still on the No Fly List,” I said.
“Why? What’d you do?” he asked.
“Nothing. I don’t know what’s going on.”
Uncle Morty began muttering obscenities and walking in a circle, flailing his arms and sweating more and more.
“You’ll have to go without me,” I said. “Apparently, all I can do is fill out a form.”
“A form? What fucking form?”
“I don’t know. Some form.”
He pointed at me. “You!”
“Yeah?”
“Stay here.”
“No problem. The only place I can go is home,” I said.
That made him redder and he marched off yelling for Homeland Security and I’d be lucky if they didn’t arrest him for sheer belligerence.
I pushed my suitcase over to the wall and pulled out my phone. I’d have to tell my parents. Chuck. They couldn’t hear it on the news. Gaskets would be blown and somehow that would be my fault.
Who to call first? Maybe Aunt Tenne. Sweetheart that she was, she might be willing to tell Mom and calm her down. Maybe Chuck. He was generally rational.
As I scanned through my contacts considering my options, there was a cough behind me. I ignored it. Somebody wanted a better shot. Not happy to oblige for your Instagram post, dude. Beat it. I’ve peoples’ days to ruin.
More coughing and it was a particular kind of coughing. I can’t say exactly how I knew who was behind me, but I did, on the third cough. There was no way to avoid it. I turned around and there, standing in the terminal, wearing black suits and exceedingly boring haircuts were two FBI agents, the rookies, Gordon and Gansa.
“Ah crap!”
They smiled, identical in their blandness, and Gansa gave me a finger wave. I flipped him off.
“Don’t be like that,” said Gordon. He was the taller of the duo by a half inch. I’d known them for months and I still had a hard time telling them apart, other than the height. Gansa was slightly blonder, but it wasn’t super noticeable.
“I’ll be however I want,” I said.
“We’re here to help you,” said Gansa.
“Doubtful.”
Gordon smiled. “We heard you had a little trouble getting on your plane.”
“Oh, really?” I asked. “You heard it?”
“We did.”
“Could it be that you put me on the No Fly List because you’re totally douchebags?”
The rookies almost had expressions. I think they were surprised, but whether it was about being called douchebags or me figuring it out, I couldn’t say.
“We want to talk to you,” said Gordon.
“The feeling is not mutual.”
“It’s important.”
“I’m sure you think it is.” I grabbed my suitcase and started pushing it in the direction that Uncle Morty stomped off in.
They rushed after me, protesting.
“It is important,” said Gansa.
“You want to hear what we have to say,” said Gordon.
“That’s where you’re wrong.” I broke into a jog. I don’t know where I was going. Away was my only goal.
They came after me and Gordon hissed, “We can get you off the list.”
“Piss off. I’m not that into going to Greece anyway.”
“You won’t fly anywhere ever,” said Gansa.
That is a problem. Nope. Don’t care.
I continued to wheel away and tried to use my phone with my bad hand.
“It’s about Kansas,” said Gordon.
“You mean the task force I got you on?” I asked. “No good deed goes unpunished.”
“We have to talk to you.”
“But I don’t have to talk to you.”
“We’ll arrest you.”
“Screw you,” I said, heading for the women’s bathroom. That might be safe.
Gansa grabbed my arm. “Trust me. You want to hear this.”
“Trust me. I don’t,” I said.
“It’s to do with your family,” said Gansa.
I got in his face and he backed up, bumping into a mom and her stroller. Still a rookie. “You mean about how your bosses screwed my parents over and then cut ties with my dad? Bite me.”
Gansa got a little less bland. “I’m not going to lie. That sucks. Not our idea.”
“Really not,” said Gordon. “We don’t want to hurt your parents.”
“But I’m fair game?” I asked.
“You’re not.”
“You put me on the No Fly List,” I said. “What is wrong with you?”
The rookies got in front of me. “We couldn’t get you to answer the phone. You’re avoiding us,” said Gordon.
“I wonder why?” I tried to dart past them and they grabbed me.
“We need your help,” said Gansa.
“And this is how you get it?”
“We’re desperate.”
I rolled my eyes. “The FBI is desperate for my help. Give me a break.”
Gordon and Gansa shuffled their feet and avoided eye contact.
“Wait a minute. Is this you two? Like just you two?”
“Well…there’s a situation and our superiors—”
“Hey!” Uncle Morty yelled across the terminal and then he did what I didn’t think he could do. He ran, coming at us like a bull in Pamplona. The rookies jumped out of the way and Uncle Morty chased Gansa around but being that Uncle Morty was about sixty pounds overweight, the rookie was never in any real danger of being caught.
Uncle Morty finally stopped and bent over, gasping, “They…put…you…”
“I know. I know,” I said.
“On…the…list.”
“I told you that I know.”
Gordon hazarded coming close and said, “Mr. Van der Hoof, we only want Mercy to come with us and get some information.”
Uncle Morty’s hand shot out and he yanked Gordon down to his level by his innocuous striped tie. “You’ll take her off the list?”
Gordon gagged out, “Yeah, sure.”
Uncle Morty straightened up and put his hands on top of his head, revealing the tremendous sweat stains under his arms. “You bastards. You got some nerve.”
“We couldn’t get her any other way and this is important,” said Gansa.
“So important they sent rookies?”
More shuffling of feet.
“Goddammit.” Uncle Morty pointed at them. “I want her off the list.”
They put their hands up.
“We just need a little help,” said Gordon. “It’s a case connected with the Kansas situation.”
Uncle Morty eyed them. “What about your superiors?”
“You see, they don’t think this is a case, but we think if we can just get a little more—”
Uncle Morty put up his hand. “Shut up. I don’t give a fuck.”
“But this is big. It could—”
“I don’t care.” He looked at me. “Go with them, Mercy.”
“They screwed over my mother,” I said. “Have you forgotten that?”
“Not these two dipsticks. Get off the list. I’m going to get a refund.”
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “They’re blackmailing us.”
Uncle Morty pulled me close. “Blackmail ‘em back.”
“What?”
He took my suitcase and carry-on. “I’ll expect an update by the end of the day. Beat it, losers.”
I’m pretty sure “losers” was referring to the rookies, but I was the loser that day. No doubt about that.