Such a Rush

Finally I moved to my mother’s room. At first I just stood there in the dark space, unbearably hot because I’d had her door closed to save on air-conditioning since she left. I was afraid to touch anything. But she was gone, and I was leaving. I dragged her clothes out of her closet and her dresser. I started to put those in garbage bags to give away too. But she might show up at the airport and demand them back. She would be very angry that I’d given them away. I kept them in the garbage bags. I would store them in the cellar at the airport. There they would remind me of her only when I took a box of files down for storage, or I sought shelter there with Grayson.

I got so absorbed in the chore that I didn’t realize how much time had passed until a knock sounded on the aluminum door. The knocking wasn’t hard enough to make a noise like a gunshot and alarm me, but it did follow the beat of Molly’s favorite rock song.

I opened the door wide. Molly balanced there on top of the shaky cement-block staircase. In her face I saw relief that I was okay. Love for me. Anger and betrayal and loss and hurt. We had a lot to talk through and a lot of apologies to make to each other.

“I have never thought of you as my charity case,” she said.

“Okay.”

“I didn’t want to be friends with you just because you were an edgy girl with the guts to steal my boyfriend, either.”

“Okay.”

“But I can see why you would think that,” she wailed. “How did we get to this place where we had to be tough all the time and never said how much we loved each other?”

“Shhh.” I wrapped my arms around her and let her rest her chin on my shoulder. “I’m the one who had the plane crash today, but I will comfort you because I love you.”

As she straightened, laughing, her eyes were full of tears. “Can I come in?”

I pushed the metal door wide for her. “Yes, chick. Come in.”

twenty

The next Saturday, a few hours before the airport office was scheduled to close, I handed over the phone and the keys to Leon. In the restroom, I scrubbed my hands to make sure they didn’t smell like avgas, redid my hair and makeup carefully, and slipped on strappy sandals and the adorable sky-blue prom dress that Molly and I had found at the consignment store. The restroom didn’t have a full-length mirror. Standing on the porch of the office, I checked my look in the glass door. With the airplanes behind me in the reflection, I looked like a model from a fashion magazine spread that showed fine clothes against a gritty background of asphalt and machinery. A couple of guys whistled at me from several hangars down, and I waved to them.

By the time I crossed the tarmac to the Hall Aviation hangar, Molly’s car was parked outside. She stood by patiently in her heels and hot-pink dress while I rounded the Cessna slowly, ru

But when I asked her to help me push the plane out of the hangar, she absolutely refused. She would trip in her heels. The rivets would snag her dress. The plane was too heavy. I could prove her last assumption wasn’t true by showing her how the plane rocked back and forth on its wheels when I shoved it. Still, I thought I was going to have to hunt up Leon or the Admiral or someone to help me when she finally relented. She pushed the strut while I hauled on the guide holding the wheel. The airplane was outside in the breeze scented with meadow flowers.

I closed her into the cabin and showed her how to put on her headphones. She didn’t protest. But when I taxied to the end of the runway and turned the plane around, I finally realized why she’d been so obstinate before. Her hands were shaking.

“Scared?” I asked her.

She looked over at me. Even her glittering eye shadow was unable to draw attention away from the panic in her wide blue eyes. “What do you think? But I said I would go with you.”

“Haven’t you ever flown before?”

“Not in a plane this small.”

“Oh, that’s right.” I nodded. “You only fly to Europe.”

“First class,” she agreed. “I can close the window blind and pretend it isn’t happening. Flight attendant!” She snapped her fingers. “What do I have to do to get an appletini around here?”

I rolled my eyes. “There are lots of things that can go wrong,” I acknowledged, “but I won’t let them. And the plane is our friend. The plane wants to fly. Watch.” I powered the engine up and sped away from the trailer park, then took my hands off the yoke. “Look, I’m not doing anything and the plane lifts into the air when we hit a certain speed. That’s just how it’s made.”

“Put your hands back on the steering wheel,” she shrieked in my headphones.

To placate her, I grabbed the yoke. As we rose above the trees, I made the gentlest turn I could manage so the cabin wouldn’t tilt. To give her the smoothest ride, I pointed us toward the ocean, where the water would temper the air and there would be less turbulence. I wished for the airline pilot’s uniform that would give people confidence in me.

I would get it soon enough.

“It’s beautiful up here,” she murmured. Auburn updo smashed against the window, she watched the late-afternoon sun glinting on the ocean.

“Yes,” I said, “it is.”

The longer we stayed up, taking in the scenery, the more she seemed to relax. But soon we had to come down. As the North Carolina swampland passed under us and the skyline of Wilmington came into view, I neglected to point out that we were landing at an airport much larger than ours, with actual airlines and an air traffic control tower. I’d done plenty of touch-and-go’s at large airports during lessons with Mr. Hall. Besides, the airstrip wasn’t busy late on Saturday afternoon. Still, Molly was so nervous, head pressed against the glass, freshly manicured hands gripping both sides of the seat until her fingers turned white. I used my Chuck Yeager voice to radio my request to land and sailed on in, feeling like an airline pilot already.

I taxied where they pointed me, toward the terminal. Ten teenagers in prom dresses and tuxedos stood gri

I went over my checklist in my head, made sure I wasn’t forgetting anything as I shut the plane down, and slid out of the cockpit slowly. The guy with my airport job, who looked college age, brought out the chocks for my plane. He glanced at me and then did a double take. “You are the prettiest pilot I ever saw.”

“Hey.” Grayson walked forward. “Do you see me standing here in a tux? Get in line.”

“Dude! Sorry.” The guy couldn’t back away with his hands up because he had to put the chocks down first, but he did round to the other side of the airplane.

Grayson slid his arms around me. I caught a whiff of his sexy cologne and wanted to inhale him. “You’re the prettiest pilot I ever saw.” He pulled me close for a long, slow kiss. Behind us I could hear some of the girls say, “Awww.”

Grayson laughed against my lips. But as he broke the kiss and looked down at me, his gray eyes were serious.

“What’s the matter?” I whispered. “Did it spook you to see your dad’s plane coming in?”

“No,” he said in surprise. “I wasn’t thinking about that. I just missed you. A lot.” He kissed my cheek, then turned. “Let me say hi to Molly.”

He passed Alec, who hugged me. I hugged Alec back, pretending it wasn’t weird that I had made out with my boyfriend’s brother. Maybe one day soon it wouldn’t be. He kept one hand on my shoulder as he asked quietly, “Did Molly do okay on the flight?”