The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight

It is “6:56 PM Eastern Standard Time, 11:56 PM Greenwich Mean Time” (5) and Hadley is trying to avoid thinking about her claustrophobia. Being on a plane is frightening, as are airports, and now she fears she will be late for her father’s wedding, which she doesn’t want to attend anyway. She purposely arranged to fly in after the rehearsal dinner so that she could avoid sitting in a room full of people who comprise her dad’s new life. Her mother encouraged her to go, despite the fact that Hadley has never met her dad’s fiancée, Charlotte. Missing her first flight means that Hadley will be cutting it close.

Hadley calls her father to update him on her flight. Hadley has already decided to hate Charlotte, despite Charlotte’s desire for Hadley to be a bridesmaid. Now, Charlotte tries to find an empty seat in the terminal, but there are people and suitcases everywhere, and she must remind herself to breathe as the walls seem to close in. A book falls out of her backpack, and a boy reaches for it, handing it back to her after glancing at the title. He is attractive, but Hadley is in no mood to talk.

When a woman refuses to watch Hadley’s bag for a minute, the boy offers to help, but she takes the bag with her when the woman insists that it is illegal to watch someone else’s bag. The boy’s hair is too long, and there are crumbs on his shirt, but he is very attractive and has a cute English accent. As Hadley maneuvers through the crowd, the wheels on her suitcase catch, and she drops her book and her sweatshirt. Suddenly, the boy is next to her, offering to help again. Hadley trusts her gut feeling that he is lonely and doesn’t want to be left behind, so she accepts his offer and they start walking.

Hadley is grateful for the boy’s company because the thought of the airplane makes her anxious. She recalls the first time she felt this panic, in a hotel bathroom on a ski trip with her dad last year. It was the first time they went on a vacation without her mom, and Hadley had a feeling that her father’s failure to return from a semester of teaching at Oxford was because he’d met another woman. By the time he had been away for six months, he felt like a stranger to her. From the hotel bathroom, Hadley heard the phone ring and her dad answer, greeting Charlotte and using British slang expressions. His adoption of British parlance was as upsetting as the fact that he had left her mom for this Charlotte, and Hadley’s resentment grew. The next day, an elevator that Hadley and her dad were in stopped abruptly, and she panicked. She punched all the buttons, unzipping her ski jacket. Her dad realized that she was having a panic attack and told her to close her eyes and think about the wide, blue sky, and soon, her breathing slowed, and the elevator started up again.

Now, Hadley reflects that imagining the sky won’t help her when she is in the plane. The boy asks where she is going, and she mentions dinner, so they find a deli. They realize that she will be in seat 18A while he will be in 18C, and when she sees his garment bag, she presumes that he is going to London for a wedding too. His half-nod is noncommittal, but Hadley assumes it means “yes.”

Hadley’s sandwich oozes with mayonnaise despite her request for none. Hoping she doesn’t look too picky, she disassembles her sandwich to scrape the mayo off each piece. The boy comments, and she explains her fear of mayonnaise, listing it as one of her top four, along with dentists, spiders, and ovens. She also quietly adds that she hates small spaces too. They talk and eat, and she thinks of the one boyfriend she had: the uncomplicated and dull Mitchell Kelly. She can hardly believe that she dated Mitchell when someone like this gorgeous guy was in the world. He tells her that his name is Oliver, and she introduces herself. He goes to Yale, and he jokes that he’s studying the fermentation process of mayonnaise. When a man bumps into Hadley, Oliver jokingly says that he is actually studying the congestion patterns at American airports. She laughs and confesses that she hates airports; Oliver loves them.

When Hadley tells Oliver what time the wedding is, he tells her that the timeline will be tight. She asks what time he needs to be somewhere, still thinking he’s going to a wedding, and he breaks eye contact and says that he is supposed to be at the church at two. Oliver gets a call and steps away, and Hadley notes his altered body language and posture while he talks. She thinks about Harrison Doyle, the local dentist whom her mother is dating, and reflects that the relationship is proof that her mother is moving on, just like her father. Her mom told Hadley that her dad wasn’t asking for much in hoping that Hadley would attend his wedding, but Hadley feels that all he ever does is ask for things without giving anything. On the way to the airport, Hadley and her mom had a huge fight because Hadley still didn’t want to go, and she blamed her mother for the potential that her plane might crash. She stomped away from the car without a goodbye. Now, Hadley feels guilty and calls her mom to apologize. She leaves a voicemail while Oliver returns to the table, his smile restored.

Hadley has boarded the plane and is in her seat, waiting for Oliver to arrive. He sits down next to her to wait for whomever has the middle seat between them. An older woman appears, and she offers to switch seats with Oliver, assuming that he and Hadley are a couple. As they settle in, the older woman asks how they met, and Oliver tells her that they met in an airport when he offered to help Hadley with her suitcase. Hadley adds that he has been carrying her suitcase ever since, whimsically implying that they have been together for a while, and the old woman is pleased by this chivalrous and romantic story. Hadley wishes that it were true. The older woman falls asleep, leaving them to talk undisturbed.

As they chat, Hadley tells Oliver that weddings are too showy, and that real love doesn’t need to be advertised; a person shows their love by being there and holding their partner’s hand. As the plane’s engines begin to roar, Oliver distracts Hadley with questions, asking about her favorite animal. She says that she prefers elephants because of an old stuffed elephant she had as a child. Whenever she was upset about something, she and her dad would go upstairs to consult the elephant for an answer. Hadley is grateful, aware that Oliver’s chatter is keeping her panic in check.