Spencer hadn't packed enough layers.

To be fair to herself, she hadn't been thinking clearly when she booked the last-minute flight the previous night. It was, to say the least, a challenge to multitask when she was half-focused on the pending unexpected and expensive transaction and half-focused on trying not to trip over the empty bottle of Merlot she dropped on her dirty, thrifted rug five minutes prior. (She was grateful she drained the damn thing before tumbling over because that would have been a bitch to clean up.) Never mind the pile of snot-filled tissues thrown haphazardly around her apartment, courtesy of the broken heart she was currently nursing.

Introducing: Spencer, the mess playing dress up as a miracle.

It was hard to focus on, well, anything when it felt like the center of her chest had been gutted and replaced with a fifty-pound weight.

San Francisco International Airport came to her rescue, with refillable water dispensers present almost immediately upon her exit from the plane. While she wasn't nearly as embarrassed about crying her eyes out the entire flight since it wasn't a full bawl session and nobody paid a lick of attention to her, it also meant she was dehydrated by the time she reached her destination. Spencer couldn't refill her water bottle quickly enough, so after downing it with impressive speed, she went for round two.

By the time she slid the bottle into her backpack, she almost forgot how cold it was. (She didn't find airports to be generally cold, unlike how her sister insisted they were.) A cursory glance at the weather app on her phone reminded her that San Francisco was, in fact, not the same climate as Hawai'i. Who knew?

Spencer checked her phone. A new text message alerted her that her guide for the week was on her way. The message arrived about twenty minutes ago, so Spencer replied to let her know her flight had landed.

Since she wasn't sure how long she would need to wait, Spencer thought she would pull herself together as best as possible. Granted, there was a very, very large chance there was no salvaging any part of her appearance that night. Quite frankly, she shouldn't have cared. It was seventy-thirty at night and nobody looked their best at the airport. If someone looked even somewhat presentable, they were kind of an asshole. Who had the nerve to look well-put together at such a soulless place like an airport?

Not Spencer, clearly, if the reflection staring back at her was any indication. Her curls had deflated, her eyes were puffy, and her nose rubbed raw and red. The pimple patch stuck on the side of her chin was less than flattering given the accompanying person to whom it was attached. And that was some kind of... mustard, maybe, stuck on her collar. Spencer couldn't recall accepting the sad excuse of a meal provided by Hawaiian Airlines. Not that it mattered because her hoodie remembered it all too well. She could only imagine how strung out she must have looked to the flight attendant.

"Oh no. I'm so sorry!" A woman appeared next to her carrying a baby who had knocked over her travel-sized bottle of hair oil. "She was so fussy the whole flight."

"All good." Spencer smiled and slid the hair oil back into her clear pouch.

The woman rubbed her hand in circles on the baby's back. "It's freezing here, isn't it?"

Spencer's eyes drifted down at her diaper bag. Various baby items stuck out as if reached for in haste during the flight.

"Yeah, a little bit."

Her phone pinged with a new text notification. Spencer tried not to think about how before the last twenty-four hours happened, text messages from that person were few and far between. Life got in the way. People didn't just grow up; they grew apart, even when they didn't want to. It was nobody's fault, except that it was also everyone's fault. Life was inevitable, especially when they lived in separate cities, but it didn't mean they weren't making choices every single day.

"I have to go meet my friend," Spencer muttered. The other person and their child were already gone, so she quietly gathered all of her belongings and made her way outside.

Spencer should have packed a heavier coat, but she had no use for them in Hawai'i. The flimsy excuse of outerwear she sported barely protected against the cold air that swept over her as soon as she walked through the automatic doors, eyes scouring around in search of her friend. She wondered how much a person could change in five years. If the young woman who waved goodbye at the airport in Honolulu would be the same woman waiting for her in San Francisco. Would she still be recognizable? Would they brush past each other in haste, only to turn back around and laugh once they realized what had happened? Or would the differences manifest more internally? Perhaps San Francisco had changed her in ways that Spencer could have never predicted or understood.

Her heart raced in anticipation. Surrounded by strangers, in a city she had never stepped foot in before, it finally hit Spencer how out of her element she was. This wasn't like her. She didn't run away so irrationally to a brand-new city.  But it wasn't brand-new, was it? Did she not feel a sense of familiarity just knowing that someone who knew her better than almost anyone else in the world lived there?

"Spencer!"

She stopped. Combat boots squeaked as they spun around. Spencer. Spencer. Only one person said her name so delicately, so comfortingly. Time flew backward. Spencer moved forward. None of what she thought she knew when she stepped off that plane made sense.

When they were younger, Sakura and Spencer couldn't be separated. They were joined at the hips, in the mind, through their souls. Everything made sense because they were together through all the best and worst of times. Life happened, of course, and choices were made. When Sakura left Hawai'i five years ago, they weren't as close as they once were, but she had requested that Spencer be the one to drop her off at the airport. Spencer thought it was strange at first, thinking that Sakura had so many other friends at that point who could have taken her. But then she sat there idling at the airport curb, staring at the empty seat next to her, and realized how much she needed that. That door closed while many other open doors waited for them, even if they existed in different cities.

As they stood there staring at each other from a distance, almost reunited but not quite yet, not until they both moved, Spencer thought back to the day she said goodbye and how the emotions from it still lingered in that foreign air. She had never been more happy to see Sakura. No, not happy. Relieved. Completely and utterly relieved that they were finally back in each other's lives. Not that their presence and impact had ever left. But memories weren't the same as being there in person.

Spencer smiled and waved. After only a few minutes, she decided nothing looked as good as Sakura and San Francisco.