4. Frankie
“Iput the plane down on the water when I couldn’t keep it in the air any longer,” Scotty says into the microphone. The room goes silent.
“Were you scared?” someone finally asks.
“You’d have to be a f—” He stops when he gets a glare from the attorneys. “You’d have to be stupid not to be scared,” he replies. “We started losing fuel sometime after we were over the Indian Ocean. By the time I realized it, we were too far away to turn back.”
“Did you call for assistance?”
He heaves a sigh. “Many times.”
“We can skip these questions,” one of the attorneys says. “You’ve all heard the recordings.”
Scotty and I look at one another. There are recordings?
“The recordings sounded like you weren’t even concerned.”
Scotty shakes his head. “What good would it do me to panic? I had to put a plane down in the middle of the ocean, and I knew it would fill with seawater in a matter of minutes. I had to get my children and one passenger out of the plane and to safety. That was my priority.”
One minuteI was staring out over a sea of a color blue I’d never seen before, and the next I was clutching the armrests as the plane began to descend. “Scotty? What’s happening?” I called out. I’d moved back to my seat in the middle of the plane with the kids when I’d gotten tired of his stony silence and the sound of his teeth grinding together as he clenched his jaw.
“We’re losing fuel. I need for everyone to buckle up,” he called back, his voice deadly calm. “Then I want you to reach down under your seat and get the life jackets that are down there. Put one on yourself, and then put one on each of the kids.” He was still calm as we continued to descend, getting closer and closer to the rough sea, which didn’t look as blue the closer we got to it. It looked greener. Darker. And not nearly as inviting.
I reached under my seat and retrieved my flotation device, pulling it over my head as I blew into the small tube to inflate it. Tanner was already pulling his out, putting it around his neck, and buckling it tight. I reached for one for Livvie and pulled it over her head. “Everything is going to be fine,” I said, as I bent and blew up her life preserver. “You all set over there?” I asked Tanner. He nodded and stared out the window. I reached over and slipped my finger below the nylon strap around his waist, testing the life jacket’s buckle, just in case. He didn’t seem to notice. The water rushed up toward us, getting closer and closer.
“Brace for impact!” Scotty yelled.
We hit the water hard, bouncing as loose items flew around the cabin. Tanner slammed against the wall, letting out a cry. Livvie fell forward, her head smashing into the seat in front of her. I watched as a trickle of blood dripped down her forehead. Water sluiced by the plane’s windows, the spray violent as the plane torpedoed into the water and then righted itself. Then we skimmed across the surface of the water, and we stopped.
Dead silence filled the cabin. Then I heard a terrified whimper from the little girl, Livvie. Her father ignored it, and so did I. But her brother reached over and unbuckled her using one arm, the other hanging limply by his side. He took her hand in his free one.
“We need to get out,” Scotty said, as he jumped out of his seat and opened a cabinet, retrieving two large packages. “As soon as I open the door, the cabin is going to fill with water,” he explained. “It’s going to happen fast, so I need you to get out as quickly as you can.” He pointed toward three duffel bags. “Tanner, get those,” he instructed.
Tanner grabbed the straps of all three bags with his uninjured hand, standing beside his dad, both stoically awaiting our fate. Livvie clutched Tanner’s shirt in one hand and a stuffed dog that still had a tag on it in the other.
I looked back at the dogs, and I remembered the keys to their cage locks that were hanging around my neck. I clutched it in my fist and went back to unlock their cages.
“What are you doing?” Scotty hissed at me as he grabbed me and shoved me toward the doorway. I’d managed to unlock both cage doors, and they hung open, but only barely. The dogs whimpered in fear. They were terrified. And so was I.
“I have to save the dogs,” I explained, barely able to breathe, my heart raced so fast. “I’m not leaving without the dogs!”
“Oh yes you are,” he growled as he forced the plane door open. Water flooded the small compartment, immediately rising to lap around my shoes, and he pushed me closer to the door. He shoved the two packages out the door, and they inflated right in front of us, almost immediately. Life rafts. Two of them.
He motioned for Tanner to go first into the life raft. Tanner jumped into the middle of it, the inner liner sagging under his weight. Scotty picked Livvie up and tossed her into the raft. Tanner caught Livvie against him and helped her to sit up. He wiped the blood from her forehead with the tail of his shirt. Then Scotty tossed their luggage, which was essentially a few duffel bags, which the boy deflected with his good arm. They landed next to him on the bottom of the raft. Scotty followed those with the first aid kit and bottles of water from a case on the floor.
“In,” he commanded me.
“No!” I cried as I turned back toward the dogs. He grabbed me and shoved me so that I fell into the second life raft and started to drift away from the plane. “No!” I screamed again. I leaned over the edge and paddled to get back.
He turned and opened the doors of the animal cages all the way. The dogs huddled at the backs of the cages and refused to come toward him.
“I can get them!” I tried to explain. I paddled furiously. “They’ll come to me. You just have to let me back in there.”
I could see them in the cages, pressed against the back, as they lifted their heads to breathe over the rising water.
“Please, Scotty! They’re going to die,” I cried.
The plane tilted as it filled with water. Scotty disappeared for a moment, and then he reappeared. He gave the raft a shove as he jumped on it with me. The kids and I watched helplessly as the plane filled with water.
I made a move to jump off the life raft, but he held me back, his arm tight around my chest, his front pressed to my back. The plane gurgled as it settled deeper in the water. “Don’t,” he said. “You’re going to get us all killed.”
I watched as the plane disappeared below the surface of the water. A sob escaped my throat.
“It’s too late,” he said quietly.
It was only then that I realized his arm was bleeding. “What happened to you?”
“I thought maybe I could set them free. I reached in to try to grab them. They didn’t appreciate it.” He had several wounds up and down his arm, and what might have been a big puncture wound that was probably a bite mark on the center of his hand. He leaned over the side of the raft to wash his arm, hissing when the saltwater hit the abrasions.
“They were terrified.” I tried to explain their behavior, although there was no need.
“Yeah, well, so was I,” he replied as he splashed off the blood.
The plane disappeared beneath the waves, and grief hit me like a freight train. I’d raised Spot and Annie from the time they were pups. I’d bottle-fed them. I’d cared for them. And now they were drowning. And there was nothing I could do to stop it.
Suddenly, I heard a splash next to the raft, and I saw Annie’s head breach the surface of the water. She looked around, dazed, as she paddled there in the middle of the ocean. Then bubbles broke the surface next to her and Spot joined her. They swam in circles, as I hopped up onto my knees and reached over the side of the raft.
“If they get their claws in the raft, they’re going to bust it,” Scotty called out in warning.
That was a chance I would have to take. I reached into the water and grabbed Annie by the scruff of her neck, but she was too heavy for me to pull into the raft alone. “Can you help me, Scotty?”
I grabbed her scruff again and pulled, while he hoisted her rear end. Then he grabbed Spot all by himself, and the regal dog, who didn’t look so regal at that moment, allowed himself to be pulled onto the raft. Both dogs froze as they stared at him, their hair stuck to them as their chests heaved. They shook their heads to get the water out of their eyes and ears.
Scotty shrugged out of his shirt and leaned over the edge of the raft, tossing one end of the shirt toward the other raft. Tanner caught it and pulled us closer. When the rafts touched, Scotty scrambled from one raft to the other, leaving me with the dogs. We were mere feet apart. Scotty tied the two rafts together with a loose bit of nylon rope that was attached to the raft.
“Jesus Christ,” I heard him swear. He swiped a hand down his face. He motioned toward me. “Come over here.”
I shook my head. “They wouldn’t hurt me,” I explained.
“They might not hurt you on purpose,” he replied. He held up his hand to show me. He turned to his kids. “Are you guys okay?”
Tanner said nothing while Livvie sobbed quietly. Tanner clutched his useless arm to his side as Scotty looked over her forehead wound. It had already stopped bleeding. Scotty reached out to palm the top of her head.
“What’s wrong with your arm, Tanner?” Scotty asked.
“I don’t know,” the boy groaned. “But it really hurts.”
“I think maybe his shoulder got dislocated,” I said.
“How do we fix it?”
“We could try to pop it back in.”
“Do you know how to do that?”
“Not really.” I’d seen Claire do it on Outlander. But I’d never been up close and personal with anyone who had a dislocated shoulder.
I crossed over to the other raft, and it rocked under the added weight. I reached for his arm and Tanner hissed out a breath.
“It won’t stop hurting until we fix it,” I explained.
He went completely still and squeezed his eyes shut, as Scotty grabbed the arm and started to move it around.
“I’m going to throw up,” Tanner warned.
“Go ahead,” Scotty said softly.
Then I heard a pop and Tanner released a long sigh.
“Try not to move it,” Scotty told him. He unzipped one of the duffel bags and took out a small tank top that had to be Livvie’s and quickly made a sling to keep Tanner’s arm as immobile as possible.
While he did that, I searched through the first aid kit, found an adhesive bandage and antiseptic wipes, and I cleaned and covered the small cut on Livvie’s forehead.
“Is she okay?” Scotty asked quietly.
“As okay as any of us,” I tossed back.
Livvie started to cry again. He palmed the top of her head. “Shh,” he crooned. “It’s okay. We’re safe. We just lost the plane is all.”
I dug around in the first aid kit until I found some more antiseptic wipes. “Let me see your arm,” I said.
He shook his head. “It’s just some scratches.”
“And a bite. No matter how clean an animal is, its mouth is filled with bacteria. If you don’t let me clean that bite, it could get infected.” I stared at him until he held out his hand. I cleaned the wound as thoroughly as I could, and I washed his scratches with more wipes.
“I lost my new stuffed dog,” Livvie said with a whimper.
Tanner put his good arm around her and said, “We’ll get you a new one.”
Even with a dislocated shoulder, a busted forehead, and a sunken plane, I’d never been so relieved in my life as I was at that moment. His kids had survived. The dogs had survived. We had survived a plane crash. We had survived a plummet into the ocean from thousands of feet in the air.
Scotty flopped back against the side of the raft with a curse and stared up at the blue sky as I transferred back to the other life raft. He said a few choice words to himself, muttering about things I couldn’t understand.
Then he sat up, looked at me, looked at the dogs, took in the miles and miles of water that surrounded us, and said, “Well, ain’t this some shit?” His eyes searched the horizon. Nothing but water could be seen in any direction. Ocean, more ocean, and even more ocean.
“What are we going to do, Dad?” Tanner asked, his voice surprisingly calm.
“We wait for rescue,” Scotty said.
“Someone will come?” Livvie asked, her voice as quiet as a whisper.
“Of course, they will.” He nodded. “They know we went down.”
“Do they?” I asked.
He nodded again. “I told them.”
“Did they acknowledge it?” I stared at him, watching his face for clues, but I saw none.
He finally shook his head. It was a subtle movement and I felt like it was meant only for me.
“My cell phone doesn’t work out here,” Tanner said as he pulled his phone from his pocket and started tapping. I reached for mine, but at the last minute I remembered that it had been in my hand when we’d hit the water and had gone down with the plane. Scotty had his in his pocket, but he’d sat in a puddle of water, and it had gotten wet. It was dead.
“There aren’t a lot of cell towers out here in the middle of the ocean, Tanner,” Scotty said.
“Oh,” the boy said, his face falling.
“Maybe when we get closer to land. Turn it off for now so you can save the battery, just in case.”
“Do you have any idea where we are?” I asked.
“I know where we went down. Where we’ll end up is a completely different story. It depends on the currents, the wind, the weather, and how much the universe likes us at the moment.” He narrowed his eyes at me. “How’s your karma?”
My karma was shit, apparently.
Spot and Annie sat huddled in the corner of the raft. Spot appraised the little family in the other raft with shrewd eyes, and Annie licked the water from her paws.
“It’s hot,” Livvie said quietly as she rubbed her arms, which were already turning pink. I grabbed my backpack and opened it to retrieve a bottle of sunscreen. I made a tossing motion at Scotty, who lifted his hands. I tossed it over to him, and he gave it a shake and poured some into his hands. He started to slather it onto Livvie’s arms and face, and then he did Tanner’s, and then his own.
“We should put up the canopies,” Scotty said, and he reached into a hidden pocket in the side of his raft and retrieved a small canvas bag. I watched his movements and rooted around until I found the same compartment in my life raft. “They double as water collection units when it rains,” he explained, as he started to spread out the cloth.
“Aren’t life rafts supposed to have emergency beacons?” I asked him.
“The ones that should have been on the plane do. These, however, do not.”
“How do you know?”
“These are too old.”
“How old are they?”
He looked at the raft with an appraising eye. “I’d guess World War II. Maybe Vietnam.”
“You’re joking.”
He shook his head. “I wish I were. They’re not new. The new ones are yellow, so they’re easier to be seen. And they do have emergency beacons.”
The little canopy covered half the raft, and the dogs settled in the shade.
“So, what do we do now?” Tanner asked.
“Now we wait,” Scotty said.
I stared out over the water, looking for a glimpse of anything at all. But there was nothing out there. Nothing we could use to save ourselves, anyway.