Over the Wall by Chris Fabry

put labels on their food.
    When they arrived at the regional airport, Tim grabbed his suitcase and jumped out.
    Vera rolled her window down to say good-bye, but Tyson actually got out and pointed to the door Tim would enter and the counter inside where he’d check in.
    “Come on, Tyson. I want to beat the dinner rush at the Golden Corral,” Vera said.
    Tyson shook Tim’s hand. “Good knowin’ you. Have a nice life, buddy.”
    Tim walked inside and stood in line until it was his turn. He handed over his ticket, and the man asked if he wanted to check his baggage.
    “I checked it already,” Tim said. “I put some duct tape on the inside so it wouldn’t come open. I think it’ll be okay.”
    “No, son, checking means you give me your suitcase, and I put it on the plane for you. Do you want to check it or carry it on with you?”
    “Oh,” Tim said. “Well, does it cost any more to have you take it?”
    “No,” the man said, weighing the bag.
    “But how do I get it back when I get to Dallas?”
    “We’ll take care of that,” the man said. “Just go to baggage claim when you get there.”
    Baggage claim , Tim thought, trying to remember the words.
    The man put the bag on a conveyor belt behind him and asked Tim for some ID.
    Tim handed him his high school ID, and the man asked how old he was. It was right then that Tim wished he could have taken a bus.
    “Are you traveling with your parents?” the man said.
    “No, sir.”
    “Well, since you’re 15, you’re an unaccompanied minor. Are you okay making the connection in Houston? You have to change planes there.”
    Tim swallowed hard. “I guess I’m okay with it.”
    The man pointed out the security area and told Tim where he’d find his gate. They made him take off his shoes and walk through a metal detector, and it went off. Tim had forgotten to pack his pocketknife in his suitcase, the one his dad had given him.
    “You can’t take this on the plane,” a tall man said.
    “What do I do with it?”
    “You have to leave it here.”
    “How do I get it back?”
    “We could mail it to you.”
    Tim couldn’t think of the Maxwells’ address, and people behind him were giving him mean stares. “That’s okay. You can just throw it out.”
    A half hour before the plane was scheduled to leave, a lady at the gate got on a microphone and gave instructions for people not to crowd onto the plane, but it didn’t do any good because they pushed and got in line anyway. It was like a high school cafeteria.
    When Tim got to the door of the plane, the lady put his ticket through a machine, and he went down the Jetway. His seat was 15A, but he couldn’t figure out where the numbers were on the seats, and by the time he was a few rows back, he couldn’t count. He guessed and sat down. A few minutes later a guy said he was in his seat, and the flight attendant came and showed Tim row 15.
    Lifting off made his stomach lurch, but he was glad he was sitting next to the window because he liked seeing the ground rather than not seeing it. Tyson’s words came back, and he imagined the plane falling from the sky. If the plane went down, he wanted to land on Jeff’s house.
    /////
    The Dallas airport was laid out a lot better than the one in Houston. Instead of walking a mile or two to figure out where he was going, Tim found the baggage claim not very far away. He followed the other passengers—many of whom were wearing NASCAR hats and shirts—into a glass-enclosed area with big conveyor belts that ran around the room.
    As soon as he walked in, he saw a guy holding a big poster board over his head with Tim Carhardt written on it in big letters. Dale Maxwell didn’t look much like a race car driver standing in the middle of all these people, but Tim recognized his face even before reading the sign. He walked up to him.
    The man smiled, put the poster down, and held out his hand. “Tim, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Dale Maxwell.”
    “I know who you are,” Tim