Chapter 1: Penerbangan Tengah Malam dan Pandangan Pertama
The cabin lights were dimmed to a soft amber glow, catching the polished walnut paneling and making the whole space feel like the inside of some expensive cigar box. Zacky had the window seat, which he always booked on night flights—something about watching the world shrink beneath him helped his brain slow down. The moon hung fat and silver outside, casting pale light across the empty seat beside him.
He'd been looking forward to the solitude. Three days of meetings in Jakarta had left him hollowed out, and the four-hour flight to Bali was supposed to be a buffer between the corporate version of himself and the version that could actually breathe. He'd already loosened his tie, ordered a whiskey, and was halfway through mentally cataloging everything he needed to delegate when the curtain at the front of the cabin rustled.
The flight attendant appeared first, her professional smile stretched a little too wide, the kind that preceded something unusual. She was guiding someone. A woman. And the woman was—
Zacky's whiskey glass stopped halfway to his mouth.
She moved down the aisle like she was navigating a narrow hallway in a house she'd never visited before, her body angled slightly to avoid clipping the seats on either side. She wasn't tall, but she didn't need to be. The proportions were almost architectural, a series of impossible curves stacked on top of each other in a way that seemed to defy basic physics. Her hair was dark and loose, falling past her shoulders in waves that looked like they'd been arranged by someone who understood exactly how light worked. Her face was the kind that made you forget what you were about to say, even if you weren't about to say anything.
And her chest. Dear God, her chest.
The dress she wore was some kind of dark green silk that pooled and clung in all the right places, but it was fighting a losing battle against the sheer volume beneath it. Each breast was roughly the size of Zacky's head, maybe larger, and they pushed forward with such density that the fabric had given up any pretense of subtlety. A deep V plunged between them, and Zacky could see, with a kind of dumbstruck clarity, that her navel was almost entirely obscured from this angle. Like, the bottom of the V was still riding high, and her stomach was... somewhere behind all that.
He forced himself to look at the window. The moon. Right. The moon was there. Very interesting.
"Excuse me."
Her voice was lower than he expected, a little raspy, like she'd been laughing too hard earlier or maybe crying. He turned back. She was standing beside his row now, looking at the seat next to him with a flicker of something—annoyance, resignation, he couldn't tell. The flight attendant was already backing away, mouthing an apology to Zacky that he didn't understand.
"Looks like we're neighbors," the woman said. She didn't sound thrilled about it.
Zacky stood up—instinct, mostly, but also because he needed a second to arrange his face into something that didn't look like he'd just been hit over the head with a mallet. "Yeah. Looks like it."
She maneuvered into the seat with a practiced efficiency, settling her bag beneath the seat in front of her and adjusting the pillow behind her back. Up close, he could see the details he'd missed from across the cabin. Her skin was a warm brown, glowing softly under the amber lights, and there was a small scar just above her left eyebrow, thin and pale. Her lips were full and bare, no gloss, and her eyes—dark, almost black—were watching him with a wariness that suggested she'd been through this exact scenario a hundred times before.
"The flight attendant said there was a seating issue," she said, buckling her belt. "Apparently someone double-booked the seat I was supposed to have." She shrugged, and the motion did something to her chest that Zacky actively chose not to think about. "So. Here I am."
"Here you are."
Silence. The plane hummed around them, engines a low constant drone. Zacky sat back down, suddenly very aware of how close their armrests were. She smelled like something clean and faintly floral, not perfume exactly, more like soap and skin.
"I'm Zacky," he said, because the silence was starting to feel like a living thing.
She glanced at him, and for a moment he thought she wasn't going to respond. Then: "Abbi."
Just that. No handshake, no follow-up. She turned to look out the window, but he caught her reflection in the glass—she was studying him, too, in that way people do when they think you can't see.
"Business or pleasure?" he asked.
"Pleasure." A pause. "I'm meeting some friends. They've been bugging me to come out for months." She didn't elaborate, but something in her tone suggested the friends weren't the whole story.
"Bali's good for that," Zacky said. "Forgetting what you're supposed to be doing."
Abbi turned back to him, one eyebrow raised. "Is that why you're going?"
"Work, actually. But I've got a few days on the back end." He swirled the whiskey in his glass. "I own a resort in Ubud. Small place, twenty villas. Mostly just a place for me to decompress when the city gets too loud."
"Must be nice." Her voice was flat, but he caught the edge of something underneath. Curiosity, maybe. Or judgment. Hard to tell.
"It has its moments."
The flight attendant came by with drinks, and Abbi ordered a glass of white wine. She took a sip slowly, her eyes half-closed, and Zacky found himself watching the way her throat moved as she swallowed. He looked away. Focused on his whiskey. This wasn't high school.
"So what do you do?" he asked. "When you're not being double-booked on flights."
Abbi laughed—a short, surprised sound that didn't quite reach her eyes. "You really want to know?"
"I asked, didn't I?"
She considered him for a long moment. Then she set her wine down and turned in her seat, angling her body toward him. The movement brought her closer, and Zacky caught himself holding his breath.
"I'm a model," she said. "Well. Sort of. I started in plus-size, then moved into some niche stuff." She gestured vaguely at her own chest. "As you can probably guess, I do a lot of work for companies that specialize in... larger proportions."
Zacky kept his face neutral. "That's a thing?"
"It's a thing." Abbi's mouth twisted, not quite a smile. "There's a whole industry for it. Bras, lingerie, swimwear. I've been doing it since I was nineteen. Before that, I was just a girl from Ohio with a backache and a lot of unwanted attention."
"How'd you get into it?"
"Someone found me at a mall." She rolled her eyes. "Sounds like a bad Lifetime movie, I know. But it happened. Some scout was shopping and saw me trying on a shirt that didn't fit, and next thing I know I'm in a studio getting measured for custom garments at six in the morning."
Zacky tried to imagine a nineteen-year-old version of her, overwhelmed and probably terrified, standing in a room full of strangers with measuring tape. "That must have been weird."
"Weird is one word." Abbi took another sip of wine. "I dropped out of college. My mom cried. My dad didn't speak to me for six months." She shrugged, but the motion was tighter this time. "They came around eventually. Once the money started coming in."
"Your parents?"
"Everyone." She looked out the window again, and the moonlight caught the edge of her profile, sharp and lovely. "When you're from a small town and you suddenly have more cash than your parents make in a year, people find ways to be supportive."
There was a bitterness there, old and worn smooth from being handled too many times. Zacky recognized it—the particular flavor of resentment that came from being valued for the wrong reasons. He'd felt it himself, in different ways. Everyone who'd ever built something from nothing knew that taste.
"I get that," he said.
Abbi glanced at him, skeptical. "You get it?"
"I started my first company when I was twenty-three. Took me six years to make it profitable." He leaned back, stretching his legs as much as the cramped cabin allowed. "My family thought I was throwing my life away. Then the checks started clearing and suddenly I was a genius."
"What kind of company?"
"Logistics. Software for supply chain management." He waved a hand. "Boring stuff. But it paid for the resort, and now I don't have to think about shipping containers unless I want to."
"That's it?" Abbi's eyebrow arched again. "You just stopped?"
"Not exactly. I still own it. I just don't run the day-to-day anymore." He finished his whiskey, setting the glass on the small tray table. "I got tired of being the guy everyone needed at three in the morning. When your phone rings at that hour, it's never good news."
"What's it like? Being the guy who doesn't have to answer anymore?"
"Quiet." He smiled, and for the first time all night, it felt genuine. "Mostly quiet. Sometimes lonely. But I've got a good staff, good friends. It's enough."
Abbi nodded slowly, and something in her expression softened. "That sounds nice. The quiet part."
"Is that not something you get?"
She laughed again, but this time it was real—warm and full, the kind of laugh that made you want to hear more of it. "God, no. I'm constantly surrounded by people. Photographers, stylists, agents, fans." She said the last word with a grimace. "I can't go to the grocery store without someone recognizing me. Last week I had to leave a restaurant through the kitchen because a group of guys wouldn't stop staring."
"That bad?"
"Worse." She turned toward him, and the movement brought her chest perilously close to his arm. Zacky held very still. "Do you have any idea what it's like to be known for your body? Not your face, not your personality, not anything you actually did. Just... this." She gestured at herself. "I'm a walking billboard for something I didn't even choose. I just grew this way."
"Must be exhausting."
"It is." She slumped back in her seat, suddenly looking tired. "I'm thirty-one. I've been doing this for twelve years. And I still can't walk into a room without people's eyes dropping to my chest first. Women hate me before they meet me. Men assume I'm either stupid or desperate." She took a long drink of wine. "I'm neither."
Zacky didn't know what to say to that. He couldn't pretend to understand what her life was like—the constant scrutiny, the reduction of a person to a single physical attribute. But he could recognize the loneliness underneath it, the same loneliness he'd felt in his own quieter moments. The feeling of being seen but not known.
"I'm sorry," he said. "That sucks."
Abbi blinked at him. Then she laughed, shorter this time but not unkind. "That's the most honest response I've gotten in a while."
"It's true."
"I know." She looked at him differently now, some of the wariness fading from her eyes. "Most people either try to compliment me, which is just them trying to get in my pants, or they try to pretend they don't notice, which is worse because it means they're actively lying." She tilted her head. "You didn't do either."
"I almost did," Zacky admitted. "The compliment thing. But I figured you'd see right through it."
"Smart man."
"I try."
The plane hit a pocket of turbulence, the cabin shuddering briefly before smoothing out again. Abbi's wine sloshed against the side of her glass, and she grabbed the armrest on instinct. Her hand brushed Zacky's, and she didn't pull away immediately.
"Sorry," she said, but she didn't move.
"Don't be."
They sat like that for a moment, the contact lingering, before Abbi finally withdrew her hand. She cleared her throat, looking out the window at the clouds.
"So what's in Bali?" she asked. "Really. Not the business stuff. The other part."
Zacky considered the question. The truth was complicated—he didn't fully understand it himself. The resort was an excuse, sometimes. A place to hide. But there was more to it than that.
"I'm looking for something," he said. "I'm not sure what."
"That's vague."
"I know." He smiled. "But it's the best I can do."
Abbi studied him for a long moment, and he got the feeling she was seeing something he hadn't meant to show. "When I was twenty-six," she said slowly, "I took a month off. No bookings, no photoshoots, no nothing. I went to a cabin in Vermont and just... sat there. For thirty days. I didn't realize how much I needed it until it was over."
"What did you find?"
"Nothing." She shrugged. "But I stopped looking for a while. That was the point."
Zacky nodded. He thought about the empty villa he kept at the resort, the one he never rented out, the one with the garden view and the outdoor shower and the hammock he'd never lain in. He thought about all the times he'd gone there determined to relax and ended up working anyway.
"I don't know how to stop," he said.
"Me neither." Abbi's voice was quiet. "But I'm trying."
The seatbelt sign pinged on, and the captain's voice came over the intercom—something about beginning descent, arriving in Bali in twenty minutes. Zacky felt a strange pang at the sound, like waking up from a dream before you'd finished it.
"Twenty minutes," Abbi said, echoing his thoughts.
"Yeah."
She was quiet for a moment, fiddling with the hem of her dress. Then: "You know what I realized? We never actually talked about why I'm really going to Bali."
"You said you're meeting friends."
"I said that, yeah." She grimaced. "The truth is, I'm running away. From a relationship that ended badly. From a career I'm not sure I want anymore. From an apartment that's too full of memories." She looked at him, and her eyes were bright, almost challenging. "I'm going to Bali because I don't know where else to go."
Zacky absorbed this. "That sounds familiar."
"Does it?"
"I sold my apartment in Singapore last year. Didn't buy a new one." He shrugged. "I stay in hotels. Or the resort. I haven't had a home address in nine months."
Abbi raised her eyebrows. "You're homeless?"
"I like to think of it as untethered."
"That's a nicer word for it."
"Yeah."He laughed. "It is."
The plane banked, and through the window, Zacky could see the lights of Denpasar spreading beneath them like a net of stars. The cabin crew began moving through the aisles, collecting glasses and preparing for landing. The spell of the conversation was breaking, reality seeping back in.
"Can I ask you something?" Abbi said."Sure."
"When you looked at me earlier—when I first sat down—what did you see?"
It was a dangerous question. The honest answer was a catalog of physical attributes that would make him sound like every other man she'd complained about. But there was a vulnerability in her voice that made him want to answer honestly.
"I saw someone who'd been looked at too many times in the wrong way," he said. "And I wanted to know what was underneath all that."
Abbi's expression flickered—surprise, then something softer. "That's a good answer."
"It's the truth."
"I believe you." She reached into her bag and pulled out her phone. "We should exchange numbers. Before we get off the plane and disappear into whatever's waiting for us."
Zacky started to say yes—had the sentence half-formed in his mouth—when the plane dipped hard, a sudden lurch that sent loose items sliding off tray tables. The pilot's voice came back on, calm but clipped, explaining that they'd hit a rough patch of air and would be landing a few minutes late. Abbi's phone slipped from her fingers, skidding beneath the seat in front of her.
"Shit," she muttered, bending to retrieve it. The motion did something to her chest that Zacky had to look away from.
By the time she straightened up, the flight attendants were moving through the cabin, instructing everyone to put away electronics and secure their belongings. The landing was chaotic—a series of jerks and bumps that had people gripping their armrests and laughing nervously. Zacky and Abbi didn't speak again until the plane finally settled onto the runway, rolling to a stop with a gentle sigh.
"Welcome to Bali," the captain said.
The cabin erupted into the usual chaos of disembarkation—people standing before the seatbelt sign was off, reaching for overhead bins, blocking the aisles. Zacky stood and grabbed his bag, then stepped back to let Abbi out of her seat. She was close enough that he could smell her again, that clean soap scent, and he felt a pang of something he couldn't name.
"Thanks," she said, sliding into the aisle.
"For what?"
"Listening." She looked up at him, and her smile was small but real. "Most people don't."
"I do."
"I know." She started moving with the crowd, flowing toward the exit. Then she stopped. "Zacky."
"Yeah?"
"I never got your number."
He reached for his pocket—and realized his phone was in his bag, and his bag was under the seat where he'd just been. The crowd was pushing forward, impatient, and Abbi was being carried along by the current of bodies, her face getting farther away every second.
"It's fine," she called back. "I'll find you."
Then she was gone, swallowed by the stream of passengers, and Zacky was standing alone in a row of empty seats as the cabin slowly emptied around him.
He sat back down, suddenly exhausted. He pulled his phone from his bag and stared at the screen. No new contacts. No messages. Just the time, 11:47 PM, and a single notification from his resort manager about a leak in one of the villas.
He'd met someone interesting. Someone who was more than just a body in a seat, more than just a set of impossible proportions. And somehow, in the chaos of landing, he'd let her walk away.
He should have gotten her number. He should have—what? Run after her? Tackled her in the jet bridge? It wasn't like there was a rush. He could find her. Bali was small, and she'd said she was meeting friends. Maybe he'd see her again.
But that was the thing about chance encounters. They were only chance. And the odds of running into her again, on an island of four million people, seemed impossible.
Zacky stood up, grabbed his bag, and walked off the plane. The terminal was hot and crowded, filled with the sounds of people reuniting, luggage being collected, the distant hum of a hundred conversations in dozens of languages. He moved through it all on autopilot, his mind still back on the plane, still in that amber-lit cabin, still watching Abbi get carried away by the current.
Outside, the air was thick with humidity and the smell of tropical flowers. The sky was black, no stars visible through the haze of city lights, and somewhere in the distance, thunder rumbled. A storm was coming.
He called for a car and stood at the curb, waiting. The first raindrops hit the pavement just as his ride pulled up—fat, heavy drops that promised a downpour. He slid into the backseat and gave the driver the address of the resort.
"Long flight?" the driver asked, glancing in the rearview mirror.
"Long enough," Zacky said.
He watched the rain streak across the window as they wound through the streets of Denpasar, heading toward the hills of Ubud. The city bled into suburbs, then into jungle, the road narrowing and curling through darkness. He thought about Abbi's voice, the way she'd said "I'll find you." He thought about the way she'd looked at him when he told the truth.
He thought about how, for the first time in years, he actually wanted someone to find him.
The rain turned into a monsoon, sheets of water pounding the roof of the car, reducing visibility to almost nothing. The driver slowed, muttering something in Indonesian that Zacky didn't catch. They were still an hour from the resort, and at this pace, it might take two.
Zacky closed his eyes and let the sound of the rain fill his head. He didn't know if he'd ever see her again. He didn't know if she wanted to be seen. But something had shifted tonight, something small and quiet, like a seed cracking open in dry soil.
He was going to find her.
Even if he had to search every villa, every beach, every hidden corner of this island. He was going to find her, and this time, he wasn't going to let her walk away.
The car pushed on through the storm, headlights cutting weak cones through the downpour, and Zacky watched the road ahead, waiting for whatever came next.