GROW (Love, Manufactured #1)

Prologue – A Soft Landing

James

Sometime after the events of this book.

There are a few things you should know about what it’s like to die in a plane crash.

First, it’s important to note, as I’ve had plenty of time to consider this now that my memories have fully returned, that the experience is starkly different from dying of a terminal illness, in that it’s abrupt. But not so abrupt, like dying in a car wreck where you don’t see your death coming.

You get about five minutes on average—I know because I’ve looked it up—to sort through your life while the pilots desperately try and fail to solve the problem of your malfunctioning, thus plummeting, aircraft.

It goes like this. One moment you are rising to the pinnacle of your career, pleasantly buzzed off the twenty-year-old whisky served neat and amusing yourself with the latest ridiculous headline about the ethical limitations of your most recent business venture while soaring through the sky on a well-appointed private jet share.

The next moment, there’s a boom right outside your window.

The plane violently jolts, and the lights go out.

Maybe your head slams into the cabin wall, or was that your imagination?

You hear the pilots through the open cabin frantically radioing the nearest control tower to locate a suitable airstrip to make an emergency landing.

Of course, this is unrealistic, as the jet, whose engines are no longer humming, can only glide so far.

Here’s what happens. Your normally active mind scrambles for something to do while you urge yourself to remain calm.

You shoot the whiskey you’ve managed to hang onto, for good measure.

What should you be thinking of? What can you do?

You know nothing of aeronautics, so you’re of no help there.

Perhaps you could make a lucrative deal with God, a disembodied voice says, and you glance in the direction it came from only to see the blinking electronics panel by the emergency door. Your head pounds, but you shake it off.

People! Surely that is what a normal person would think of in an emergency.

But you can’t remember the names of anyone you’ve ever known.

Somehow, however, your name is crystal clear.

James Alexander Fletcher lights up in your mind like a neon sign.

Then a résumé of your life’s accomplishments flashes across your mental landscape, from the day you graduated Dwight with honors to the first condo unit you closed on.

The day you started your company and your first major acquisition.

At first, a swell of pride overpowers your terror. But then the résumé changes.

You had a younger sister. Well, technically, you still have her.

At least for another three minutes. What was her name?

And more importantly, why hadn’t you been able to make it to the hospital for the birth of her first child?

You were in Chicago to meet with an investor.

It seemed very important at the time. Then there was the child’s christening that had inconveniently been scheduled at the same time as that speaking engagement for the Young Entrepreneurs of America.

Surely, the impact of your talk on networking outweighed the need for your attendance at the church.

The baby wouldn’t have known if you were present or not.

But your sister would have, your laptop mutters.

Her name was Abigale, you later remember.

She’d brushed it off. There’d been an aloof edge to her voice when you gave her your regrets.

But the same people raised her. Business First—it might as well have been your family motto.

But the next time you saw her, she’d been a little colder than normal.

You, being the idiot you were, took it as the strain of being a new mother.

You weren’t close as children. Not really.

Side note: I’ve discovered this is when I started anthropomorphizing electronics, if you haven’t figured that out. An apparent side effect of the trauma of my impending death. Exciting, I know.

Hey asshole! the oxygen mask shouts as it pops down from the overhead. You’re probably dead anyway, but you should put this on—just in case. You obey, not thinking anything of it until your phone, which you didn’t bother to put on Airplane Mode, buzzes in your pocket.

Now your cell is speaking to you, too. Care to make any final calls? Any loved ones who will give a shit that you’re dead?

Would you really call your mother in a situation like this? What would you say? The words Sorry for missing your surgery auto-populate in your mind. Where had you been that day?

You have two minutes left. There are flashing lights and the ground seems uncomfortably close. The woman in the seat next to you is crying now, and the man behind her has leaned forward to shut her window.

You stare out your own window at the quickly approaching ground. Outwardly, you appear calm. Steady, able to handle anything. Exactly as you’ve trained yourself to be. Inside, your heart is thumping wildly.

“I’m afraid we’re going to have to attempt an emergency landing . . .” the pilot says over the intercom.

You grip the armrests as the intercom asks, Why did you miss your mother’s surgery? She almost died. Just like you’re about to. And you weren’t there. Selfish prick.

No, that isn’t true. You try to remember something good you did.

Those young entrepreneurs . . . surely, they got something from your talk.

See, your life had meaning. But your mind only wants to flash every single deficiency, every shortcoming before your eyes.

Every meaningless moment you spent in pursuit of success and everything you missed because of it.

Every family gathering. Every Christmas party.

The girl you dated in college who you broke up with because she wanted you to put her first instead of chasing investors.

As your remaining seconds dwindle, the adrenaline pumping through your bloodstream washes through your system and numbness takes over.

An eerie mental clarity strikes you like the clouds parting—a terrible analogy, considering your current circumstance.

Outside the window, the angle of the ground is too sharp.

You will not survive this. Somehow, that hadn’t directly occurred to you until this point.

In concert, all the mechanisms of the plane shout, You’re going to die!

Your sweaty palms slip off the armrests, and you stare wildly at the other panicking passengers.

Then you scream, “I don’t want to die!” It bursts unexpectedly from your normally controlled facade.

Sweat cascades down your temples in rivulets.

You dab at it, but your hand comes away stained with blood.

The pilot announces something about the safety card and assuming the brace position over the chaos.

You glance at the card in the seatback pocket.

Instead of picking it up, you scream again, “I don’t want to die,” more vehemently this time, but no one is listening.

Every plan you’ve made, all the things you’re striving for—it’s all over.

In seconds, there will be no more James Alexander Fletcher.

This is it. Your life will be gone in a blink.

Maybe your parents will put your name on a building, the dormant engines suggest.

You’re torn between throwing up and screaming again, but the engines’ commentary forces out a crazed laugh. “Yeah, maybe.”

Screaming fills the cabin. The pilot doesn’t bother using the intercom as he shouts, “Brace for impact!”

This is where my story is going to diverge from the standard death narrative you might be expecting.

Instead of the lights fading to black or an in-person meeting with my maker, I open my eyes and see that I stand face-to-face with the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

Retrospectively, had I retained all my memories, I might have thought the glowing lights illuminating her angelic form meant she was God.

But that’s the thing. I remember nothing of how I got there. Not the falling plane or my brief but meaningful existential crisis. Nothing that could place me in the room with the woman.

My mind whirls as my heart thunders wildly. Where am I? This woman and whoever she’s working for have abducted me and are holding me for ransom. That is the only reasonable explanation. My wealth makes me an attractive target—and someone is after the money I’m certain I have.

I fix the woman with the most authoritative stare I can muster and boom, “Where the fuck am I and who the fuck are you?”