Lucky Break by J. Minter

Mom,” I said, meeting her sad eyes. “I know you’re trying.”
    â€œDon’t apologize. But no mother likes to see her daughter fall into such a slump. Not when I could do something about it.”
    She scratched her head, then picked up her phone and typed a few thousand words in about a minute.
    â€œWhat would you say to a flight to Thailand to visit Feb tonight?” she asked.
    My eyes lit up. I’d never been to Asia.
    â€œMaybe the pace is too slow for you here,” shecontinued. “Maybe what you need is to keep busy. And we know Feb. She’ll put you right to work in one of those little rice shanties.”
    Her description was pretty funny, but actually, keeping busy with my bossy big sister did sound like it might take my mind off things.
    â€œAnyway,” Mom continued, “they’re staying at the Four Seasons, so it’s not like you’ll have to rough it
that
much. What do you think? Sound good?”
    I flung my arms around my mom and bobbed my head with more energy than I’d had in days.
    â€œSounds great!”

Chapter 11
NO, SERIOUSLY, I’M IN BANGKOK
    When I opened my eyes on Tuesday morning, I had no idea where I was. The room was dark and cold, and the bed was uncomfortably small. Everything around me was shaky, but I couldn’t figure out why. Was this what an earthquake felt like? Did they even
have
earthquakes in Manhattan?
    â€œThe captain has turned on the ‘fasten seat belt’ sign, indicating our initial descent into Bangkok.”
    When the seat belt sign illuminated over my first-class seat on the small Alitalia plane, all the painful details came flooding back to me. I wasn’t in Manhattan at all. I was on a plane to visit Feb in Thailand … because my mom was worried about my “slump” … because I was having a miserable time in Italy … because I’d just had my heart broken. Hmph, I would almost have preferred a minor earthquake.
    How did the rest of my family keep up with where inthe world they were, when, and why? Jaunting around three continents in under a week had totally thrown me for a loop. But this was typical for the rest of the Floods, just like a walk in Central Park was for me.
    On the bright side, at least my family was aware of my habits. They expected me to need a little extra hand-holding this week. After my mom had booked my plane ticket from Naples direct to Bangkok, I’d overheard her on the phone with Feb. The phrase “she’s in a fragile state” escaped her lips more than a few times.
    The plan was for Feb to pick me up at the airport and take me back to our adjoining rooms at the Four Seasons. I pushed through the throngs of people at baggage claim, thinking how glad I was going to be to see a familiar, sisterly face in the crowd. This place was crazy! I could barely breathe, let alone see over the heads of all the men in business suits, shouting into their phones, to find my luggage.
    I turned on my phone to see if Feb had left me a voice mail about where to find her, but instead, I found her text message.
    SOOO SORRY—DEBACLE AT THE RICE MARSH, COULDN’T GET OUT IN TIME TO MEET YOUR FLIGHT. A LONG-HAIRED MAN NAMED BENJY IS ON THE LOOKOUT FOR YOU. HE’LL TAKE YOU TO THE COMPOUND. I PROMISE TO MAKE THIS UP TO YOU SOON!
    I looked around the terminal nervously. No Feb to meet me, and now I was supposed to find some stranger in the midst of all these other strangers? This was certainly not very good for my fragile state!
    I crossed my arms and bit my lip and was just about to fire back a cranky text to Feb, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around to find a lanky Thai man with shoulder-length black hair and a ripped T-shirt that said
Peace Corps
, but that looked surprisingly cool and vintagey.
    â€œYou must be February’s sister,” he said, showing two deep dimples when he smiled.
    â€œHow’d you know?” I said. People