Vitro Read Online Free

little while longer. He knew the feeling all too well.
“Not too much daylight left,” he said. “You’ll have one hour on the ground, two at the max. Got it? No delays. This trip—well, being Skin Island and all, I’ll kind of be flying below the radar. Don’t want to broadcast it to the whole world. They’re touchy that way, these scientists.”
“What do you know about them?” she asked sharply.
“Not much.” Jim opened the passenger door. “You sure about this?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” She gripped the metal doorway and pulled herself into the cockpit, and he had to duck to avoid being slammed in the face by her backpack.
“You want to go to Skin Island.”
“If it’s so bad,” she leaned out of the doorway until her nose was inches from his, her turquoise eyes burning with a look that brought back an onslaught of memories, most of them involving their five-year-old selves running wild through the street markets, “why are you taking me there?”
Jim shut the door, making her sit back quickly to avoid getting caught in it. He grumbled to himself as he made one last walk around the plane, asking himself the same question. It came down to one, she was pretty and needed help and that was a powerful combination, and two, simply for old time’s sake. As he climbed into the pilot’s seat and jammed his ancient headset over his ears, a third reason occurred to him: I’m an idiot.
Well. It was done now, and he wasn’t one to go back on a promise. He checked to be sure Sophie’s seat belt was strapped over all the right places and securely fastened—he was paranoid about seat belts ever since a Japanese tourist kid had left his off and gotten his head knocked on the ceiling during landing, resulting in a concussion that had severely damaged Jim’s dad’s finances (such as they were) in the resulting insurance fiasco.
Then he went though the preflight procedures, checking the throttle, flaps, instruments, brakes, on and on the list went. He set the altimeter, then pulled the headset over his ears and pulled a scratched pair of aviators from under the seat and slid them over his eyes. The plane rumbled and vibrated around him, making his heart beat faster. There was nothing more exhilarating than flying. When he was fifteen, and his mom finally gave up on him and his dad and returned to the States, Jim spent more time above the ground than on it, covering hundreds of miles of open sea and sky, trying to lose himself in the vast blue-white atmosphere. On the ground, he only ever felt half himself, an empty body going through practiced motions while his soul lingered in the clouds. Every time he went up, it was like slipping back into his real skin, like coming up for air after being too long underwater. Easy and natural and right.
Like going home.
The cramped, weathered plane felt more like home than the house he and his dad lived in. He thought of his dad, whom he’d found that morning passed out on their dilapidated porch, surrounded by empty bottles. Jim had dragged him inside and left him on the couch. It was becoming an all-too-common routine each morning.
He pulled an extra headset from the pocket behind Sophie’s seat and dropped it in her lap. “Put that on.” She pulled it over her ears, adjusted the arm of the mic, and then gave him a dazzling smile. He sighed and pushed her backpack over so he could reach the throttle.
Jim revved the engine and the plane jerked into a taxi. The Cessna roared up to speed, fighting to leap into the air, but Jim waited until he was nearly out of pavement before pulling back on the yoke. The climb was steep and swift, just how he liked it. Back when he’d bothered to care, Jim’s dad had always criticized him for flying recklessly, but he himself was just as bad. He glanced at Sophie, wondering if she’d get sick from the rapid, rattling ascent, but she looked absorbed in her own thoughts as she stared out at the towering clouds rising around them like