Athens Airport, August 26th

At three o’clock in the morning, the Athens airport looks about the same as any given Athens street: littered with strays. Everyone is folded up on a bench or sprawled on the floor. People-puppy-piles rest on backpacks, friend curled into friend. This is the best time to travel, before the rush, before the slog, before the delays. This is when the mighty, they who power through the night and fly into the morning, stake their claim to destiny and a window seat.

I arrive with alcohol and espresso on my breath and the Med in my hair. I am sweating in a way that is blatantly unattractive but so is everyone else. The check-in booths aren’t open yet, so I sit in line behind a family from Pakistan and a couple from Texas. Rolling luggage makes a good chair for 13 minutes, and then the floor beckons. 

It seems I’m not the only one with travel troubles this early in the morning. Through the quiet airport, there are groans of site malfunctions, tickets unconfirmed, check-ins floundering. Before I found my seat in line, I’d waited for my turn at the information desk, to pay homage to the small, tan woman who clearly drew the short straw picking shifts. In front of me was a dark-skinned woman with meticulous eyeliner for 2:26 AM. She was flying Lufthansa to Frankfurt, but she couldn’t get her ticket to come up on the app.

“See, it says unconfirmed.” She showed the agent, who looked dutifully and nodded. “There’s no one at the desk, I don’t know what to do.”

“The desk will open at 3, and your flight doesn’t leave until six.” She was wonderfully reassuring. “I assure you, you will have plenty of time to make your flight.”

This quelled the woman as much as possible (which was not very much— no one is truly calm in an airport until their mid-40’s, and sometimes not even then), and she rolled her luggage to wait with the strays that had gathered along the far wall. 

I wasn’t sure if I should say good morning or good evening, or if I even remembered either phrase in my piecemeal Greek, so I nodded to the woman and approached the bench for judgement. 

“I’m flying KLM, booked through Delta, to Amsterdam.”

“Yes, the 5:45 flight.”

“Yes. But their app won’t let me download my boarding pass.”

“I understand. If you wait to the left, their check in opens at three. You can get your boarding pass there.”

“I can get my boarding pass there?”

“You can get your boarding pass there.”

“Even though the app won’t let me check in?”

“Even though the app will not let you check in, yes.”

“Oh. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“I figured that might be it. I remember my parents going to get boarding passes from real people at the check-in desks, it’s just that I’ve always checked in on my phone, and I was worried that if the app wasn’t working, I wouldn’t be able to give them my flight details and they wouldn’t be able to check me in, but you’re saying that they can check me in anyway. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“Ah. Thank you.”

I’m still sitting on the floor. It’s 2:47. The man in front of me saw someone behind the counter and got up in anticipation. The ignorance to assume anything at an airport would happen early. This is the Tantalus plane, where you are expected three hours early and your flight always leaves late, even when you think you can reach out the window and spin the turbines yourself. He’s sat back down now; realism brought him to his knees, like the rest of us. But he’s bought himself a fresh 13 minutes on his luggage. Optimism’s reward.

I wonder if the Lufthansa woman will make her flight. I hope she doesn’t have to make a connection at the Frankfurt airport— it is a most dreadful place. That was where I started my trip, a month ago almost to the hour. It was the only time since I left home that I felt the deep, terrifying sting of regret. That I might’ve spent three years savings on an adventure that I’d only half enjoy. It’s impossible to navigate, that airport. There’s a stretch of it that takes you ten minutes to walk. Just an endless, windowless corridor. I hope she doesn’t have a connection. I hope she makes her flight. 

The family from Pakistan is getting antsy. I’m glad the children aren’t too young, for their sake as much as mine. Toddlers shouldn’t exist at three in the morning. 

Apparently, the office doesn’t open until 3:15. Half of the Texan couple claims to have known this and also claims to have told their partner thirty minutes earlier. They fight, quietly. 

“Ok, fine. Let’s end the vacation like that,” says the other half, and the first half walks away. She’ll come back at 3:10 silently, and they’ll continue quietly until they reach their destination, at which point it will be like the fight never happened.

They’re setting up the counters now, it’s 3:01. The pack is watching for every move, waiting, waiting. The sun won’t rise until we do, and the luggage is uncomfortable.