Such a Rush

He wasn’t standing with his hands on his hips anymore. He was standing with his hands on his head, like something had gone wrong. He put one hand down and then brought a dark shape to his lips—Mr. Hall’s radio. His voice came over the frequency Hall Aviation used. “Leah. Zeke can’t spell.”

“Affirmative,” I said into the mike. “He couldn’t spell for Alec’s ba

“Motherf—” Grayson clicked off his radio before he cussed over the public airwaves. But he was still talking animatedly to himself on the ground. He reared back with one hand like he would pitch the radio down the tarmac. Don’t throw the radio, Grayson.

I’d flown far enough that I couldn’t see him anymore when he came back over the frequency. “Leah and Alec, both of you come in and drop your ba

As I made the turn at the end of the airport, I could see Grayson again, looking across the tarmac at Mark. Mark was calling something through his cupped hands.

I concentrated on my flight again. Every flight might be my last, now that Hall Aviation and my job there were balanced so precariously. I circled the airport, dropped my ba

Even though the cockpit was hot with the unrelenting sun shining in, and the air was muggy with the scent of my sunscreen, my chest expanded and I finally felt like I could breathe as I flew over the ocean. The Atlantic lapped the Earth so close to my trailer. I could always feel it there, pulsing and cleansing two miles from me. But I rarely saw it now that I never flew. I caught a glimpse only if I got a ride somewhere and we happened to drive by it in the daytime. Now here it was, laid out for me farther than I could see in three directions. I couldn’t even make out its true color for all the sunshine glinting off every wave, like the whole expanse was made of molten gold.

When I’d reached a safe distance from the shore, I turned and flew parallel to the beach. Swimmers wouldn’t venture this far, so if I dropped the ba

I flew past the flophouse end of the beach first. Garishly painted high-rise hotels crowded each other here. The actual flophouses were across the beach road where I couldn’t see them, with no ocean view. I couldn’t make out details of individual people, but I knew from experience that these folks on the beach were the whores, the girls from trailer parks inland who could easily have been mistaken for whores, the tattooed exhibitionists, the privates in the military with their huge young families, way too many children for one man to support on such low pay. The vinegar scent of beer and cigarette smoke and occasionally marijuana wafted on the air here, even around the children, even at eight in the morning. The party for these people started early and went on all day since they could only afford a night or two in a hotel, and then they’d have to go back home. The few times I’d spent a day, this was where I’d been taken.

As I flew toward the nicer end of town, the folks on the sand thi

All the while, I looked out for other planes. The Army base sometimes sent Chinook helicopters skimming across the water and frightening the tourists. The Air Force base sent out F-16s. Occasionally a Coast Guard plane or helicopter would scoot past, on its way to save someone, or just cruising the beach like I was.

And then there were Alec and Grayson, flying in the same pattern as me. I heard Alec a

Grayson, Alec, and I knew the sequence by heart because Mr. Hall had drilled it into us. We flew out to the ocean and made a slow turn at a safe distance from the shore, always keeping other people in mind. We headed from the flophouse end of the beach to the ritzy end. Where the population thi

We flew back down the beach the way we’d come, even farther from the shore now to avoid a collision with each other. It seemed impossible, but we had no radar, nothing to tell us another plane was coming except our own eyes, and planes weren’t as visible head-on as they were from the side. Where the commercial section of the beach ended in a nature preserve and the crowds disappeared, we made another slow turn for the ritzy end again. That was the job, until we headed back to the airport for a break or lunch or a different ba

Each time I passed Alec’s plane, I thought about ways I could talk to him when we took a break around ten, excuses I could use to get into a conversation with him. I didn’t really believe that I could land a date with him like Grayson wanted. But as long as I looked like I was making an effort, I figured Grayson would have no cause to complain, and he would stay off my case until the business folded and he went away.

Every time I passed Grayson’s plane, I thought something completely different. Anger at him first. Then sympathy for the swirl of emotions he was obviously suffering through, all of them negative. In my experience, Grayson was wrong most of the time. But he felt very deeply, and I supposed that was why I’d always watched him. He said and did what I wanted to say and do but couldn’t because I knew my place or I knew better. My sympathy for him didn’t disappear just because he was using me.

Mostly their planes were too far away for me to see except as pinpoints in the sky. I concentrated on flying. I watched the few instruments for trouble. I listened to the engine, because a change in the pitch of its hum would be my first clue something had gone wrong with the plane or the ba

The truth was, this plane was not mine. It was tethered to the airport as surely as the pit bull was anchored to its trailer. But if I ever wanted to, just for a little while, braving dire consequences such as prison, I could head out over the Atlantic. Down to Florida. Up to New York. Wherever I wanted. I wasn’t going to do it, but the thought that I could made me smile.

Around ten, Alec a