Jet fuel.

It hung in the air, stale and almost forgotten, clinging to the tarmac like the last whiff of perfume after a long day’s work. So faint, lingering tauntingly, whispering to her of a past she wanted to chase to the ends of the earth. The smell of it was a home she could never go back to, and knowing that was like the dying of the sun, like the end of all good things. She wanted to cry, and cry, and throw her arms around her father’s waist, and beg the world to never, ever change.

But she couldn't, and it had, and that was all lost a lifetime ago. Her father, the pilot, her lifetime amongst the planes: her childhood, and her tears along with it. To her, the scent of jet-fuel was one of safety, and warmth, and happiness, and freedom; a scent few people ever became familiar with, but to her felt like the home she’d never otherwise had.

Everywhere she looked, a memory, a lost moment, a haunting. She expected at any moment to hear the booming roar of a tanker overhead, or the deafening scream of a jet, expected the dull clap of boots on the pavement, glimmering black regulation-shine winking with the sun. Once, she glanced up, expecting puffy white con-trails streamlined across a blue sky, and tasted ash in her mouth when she met instead the dead, flat grey the sky had become.

She spat on the ground, hatefully, clenching her jaw to deny the tears that threatened once again to well up.

This place was full of ghosts.

“Is it that smell? It’s giving me a headache too,” he said sympathetically, misjudging her thoughts completely, unable to understand.

She took a deep breath, looked around one last time, savoured the smell the way a convict might relish the taste of his last meal. She wanted to linger here forever...but that was a joke, and she knew it. There was nothing left here, and in truth, she’d already left it behind long ago.

“Yeah,” she replied softly, and refused to meet his questioning eyes. “Let’s go.”