The board says Tokyo but the clock says nothing helpful. 22:21 and Gate B has emptied out, rows of grey seats holding no one, the kind of quiet that only airports manage after a certain hour. Somewhere a cleaning cart squeaks past. Otherwise, silence with a hum underneath it, the building breathing through its vents.
Outside the glass, the apron is mostly dark. One aircraft tail catches a floodlight and holds it, the rest of the fuselage folded into shadow. No ground crew visible. No movement at all, actually, just that single wing of light doing its job for no one in particular. I keep looking at it instead of my phone.
There is a specific kind of tired that comes from transit, not sleep-deprivation exactly, more like the body forgetting what timezone to trust. My camera sits on my lap, unused. Some scenes don't need the shutter, they need witnessing, and I think this is one of them: the ceiling light too flat to be flattering, the vending machine glowing orange in the corner, the smell of instant coffee from a cup someone left on the armrest three seats down.
I think about all the versions of this exact chair, in all the airports, in all the years I've been doing this. Milano to São Paulo as a kid, half asleep on my father's coat. London years, budget flights, the smell of jet bridge carpet. Now Tbilisi, alone, headed somewhere I've never been before. Saudade for places I haven't left yet, which doesn't make sense, but neither does most of what a body feels at 22:21 in a foreign gate.
Tokyo will have its own light tomorrow. For now, this: the tail lit up out there like it's waiting for instructions, and me in here, doing the same.