Weight For Me
Deena and her son Noah Sampaio sat at gate 54 at the airport waiting for their flight to take off. It was an impetuous decision to make, but the second the ink was dry on her divorce papers with her ex, Mitchell, she sold the house and her car and packed their bags so that they could move to Virginia with her new boyfriend. Noah sat there crying to himself after arguing with his mother as to how unfair it was that he never got a chance to say goodbye to his friends or at the very least, have a goodbye party. ‘It's my turn to be happy’ his mother hissed in his face. ‘We're going to try it out, and if you don't like it, we'll move back home.’ It was all a lie, of course, just to shut him up and get him on the plane. She had no intention of leaving once they got to Virginia, and if Mitchell wanted to see Noah, then he would have to make an effort to fly nineteen hours from Hawaii to the east coast. She looked at the time on her watch just as the boarding assignments were being called out. ‘Time to rub the salt in the wound,’ Deena said in a low tone of voice so that Noah couldn’t hear her. She pressed the speed dial icon to Mitchell’s number for the very last time. ‘Hello?’ It sounded like Mitchell was in his car because she could hear his favorite CD of Bread playing in the background. ‘I'm just calling to let you know that your son and I are at the airport and we're about to board a flight to the mainland. I already have a job lined up, and I got Noah into a good school. I'll have him call you once we get to our destination.' She hung up after that and never gave him a chance to respond.
The announcement for first-class and platinum reward members had already been called out when the boarding agents began to next call out for the zone numbers. Deena had a smirk on her face while Noah refused to stop crying. ‘I won,’ she thought to herself, and the vision of Mitchell suffering through such emotional turmoil bought her a twisted sense of pleasure.
"NOAH! ‘NOAH!" Deena turned around and was flabbergasted to see Mitchell running into the terminal, how the hell did he get past the TSA much less be able to afford a ticket? Mitchell didn’t know it, but she also managed to clean out his bank account as well. Noah’s face lit up, and he screamed for his father and ran into his arms. "Noah, Noah, Noah!" Mitchell wore a million-dollar smile on his face as he held his son tight. Noah stepped back and looked at his father, "Daddy, don’t let mom take me to Virginia with her boyfriend! I don’t want to go! I want to stay with you! Please, Daddy, please!”
Deena yelled at Mitchell to let Noah go and leave, she even began to call for security, but Mitchell paid no mind to his ex-wife at all. He gazed intently into Noah’s eyes and said, "No matter what happens, Noah, you’re my son, and I’m your father, and that will never change. I’ll always, always love you, always."
Noah cried even more and begged his father to take him away from his mother, but Mitchell would not take his eyes away from his son. "When things get hard, just remember that I love you, okay?”
Mitchell stood up and looked at Deena with no sense of malice and told her, "Be good to yourself, Deena."
The last of the zone numbers were called out, and Mitchell turned around and walked out of the terminal. Noah was sad and tearful, but his heart wasn’t as broken as it was a minute ago because at least he got to see his Dad.
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The FUSOFE130 delivery truck features an innovative two-stage turbo charge, a low emissions diesel engine, and a dual-clutch automatic transmission. It’s a 13, 200-pound vehicle, with an estimated maximum payload of 5,225lbs. If you suddenly decide to cut the FUSOFE130 delivery truck off in the middle of the freeway where the speed limit is 60mph heading toward Makakilo, you are, in essence, expecting 18,425 pounds of pure forward momentum to come to a complete stop on a dime. Which it won’t.
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Mitchell Sampaio had his ex-wife on speaker phone while he maneuvered his 2015 Toyota Camry on the freeway passing the Waipahu off-ramp. With a curb weight of 3,240lbs to 3,480lbs, the red sedan took the broad curve just fronting the Waikele shopping center. Deena and Noah were at the airport gate, ready to board a flight to another state where a job was waiting for her, and a new school awaited their son. This was all very last minute, and rather than be upset, Mitchell did his best to keep his ex-wife on the phone, but it didn’t work. It was apparent that she’d only called to tell him the news and nothing more. The Ewa exit was coming up, and that would only serve to help him take the off-ramp, turn back around and get on the freeway in the opposite direction and head straight to the airport. Unfortunately, he was in the far left lane, but with a bit of skill, he managed to get into the next right path. All he had to do was get into the next one, and he would make an exit. However, Mitchell never saw that the FUSOFE130 delivery truck had also merged into the far right lane just a second before he did. At that point, Mitchell already had his phone on social media and went live, “Hey everybody, this is me, Mitchell Sampaio! My son's mother just called me and told me that they are at the gate at the airport and are about to board a plane and fly off to the mainland! She won’t even say where, and I’m just finding out about all of this right now. I know she’s blocked me from her account, but if any of you out there are her friends please share this with her so that somehow my son gets to see this, please?” He takes in a deep breath but is failing at composing himself, “Hey Noah...Noah, I love you, okay? No matter what you hear or what anyone tells you.….I love you, and I’ll never stop loving you. You’re my son Noah, and that won’t ever change...I’m turning around, and I’m gonna try and get.…”
The FUSOFE130 delivery truck hit Mitchell’s 2015 Toyota Camry sedan from behind at its full weight capacity. It shot the vehicle forward like a projectile as it went headfirst into the large steel post, which displayed the EXIT 5A sign to Ewa. Mitchell was killed on impact. The scene of the accident is horrendous, and it sets traffic back for hours.
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Off in the distance, a silhouette of Flight 184 lifted off from the airport and was now flying to Phoenix, Arizona, where it would meet a connecting flight to Virginia. Noah could see his old Date Street home and the beach where his father always took him to go swimming. He also managed to catch a fleeting glimpse of Grace’s Inn, where he ate french fries and Saimin like it was going out of style. The plane slowly makes it’s way past Diamond Head and banks off toward the west. Noah tried to catch one last glimpse of his island home, but he wasn’t able to see it anymore. He drew the shade down on his window and whispered to himself, ‘ I love you, Daddy.’
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