Chapter 23
23
After Kevin left, a shadow of the old shame flickered under my excitement, like a shark passing beneath a canoe. I’d anticipated my guests’ horrified reactions, the intensity of which, I hoped, would pique the universe’s interest. Still, my act of exposure left me queasy. I reminded myself that my reputation would be amended after I’d married N92823. A chill would run up the women’s spines when they heard the news. A plane crash was frightening to begin with, and their horror would be compounded by the memory of my vision board. They’d investigate, and find the plane involved was the same one I’d placed on my board. At first, they might suspect I’d tampered with the plane, though I had insisted this was against my moral code. Once the NTSB cleared my name, they’d repent of their blame-casting. They would miss me and wish they had at least thanked me for the donuts.
I rallied my spirits for the adventure I was about to embark on, shedding the gold dress in favor of hardier apparel—jeans, sweater, and camel coat—and tucking a few last items into my backpack. I bid farewell to my cube, kissing each of its corners, and departed for the bus stop.
It was a foggy summer day. Through the bus window, I admired the shaggy eucalyptus trees of Stern Grove, and then the gray rectangles of the Stonestown Galleria complex, where Karina and I had enjoyed many shopping excursions. The snack kiosk on the San Francisco State campus was swarming with youths clad in shorts and sundresses, determined to abide by summer’s conventions, even at the expense of their comfort. A plane flew north, parallel to the bus, low enough that I could make out the windows dotting his fuselage.
I completed my well-worn circuit for the last time: bus to BART to AirTrain, whose Red Line conveyed me to Terminal3. I approached the TSA podium nervously, fearing I was marked by scandal, though as far as I knew, the video of me and Dave remained suppressed. Possibly, the nosy woman who’d shot it had filed a complaint that was working its way through the airline’s bureaucracy. Simon had promised to monitor the forums and keep me apprised of any developments, though I hadn’t asked him to do this. He’d called to thank me for the five hundred dollars I’d sent him, telling me I was a real one, his friend for life.
The stoic TSA agent inspected my face against my ID, fed it into the CAT machine, waved me on. My bag, too, passed through the X-ray unremarked, my vision board folded, obscuring the images from the machine’s eye. I pierced the secure sector’s membrane for what I hoped would be the last time. One way or another, my journey would end within the post-security zone.
—
N92823 was currently flying from Chicago to Seattle. As he wasn’t scheduled to fly through SFO anytime soon, I planned to meet him at SEA, deadheading there on another plane, as pilots sometimes had to do. We’d spend the night in Seattle, then fly back to O’Hare together in the morning, a flight I hoped would never land, at least in the traditional sense. Universe willing, tomorrow would be our wedding day.
My flight to Seattle was operated by a handsome 737-900 named N18324. I resisted his seductions as we took off, determined to remain faithful to N92823. No longer would I behave like a frivolous youth, driven by lust for any plane I could afford a date with. I shouldn’t gorge on hamburger when I had steak waiting at home, or so went the saying, though I ate no form of beef and found the analogy distasteful. As we made our initial climb, N18324 banked gently right, and my window filled with a view of the coastline, down which I’d just traveled in the bus. I glimpsed the Outer Sunset, the dense grid in which the Chens’ house nestled, and felt a twinge of nostalgia for the home I’d cast off, like a shell I’d outgrown.
When we landed, I rushed toward Gate A13, where N92823 had arrived twenty minutes ago, according to my flight-tracking app. Down the corridor, at the farthest reaches of the A Concourse, I spotted my love through the window. I slowed, approaching him with reverence. I beheld the soft curve of his nose, and the rectangular panels of his windscreen above it. His joints must have ached after a long day of flying. I wished I could rub oil into his wings. “It’s me,” I whispered, placing my palm against the glass. “I found you.”
I made a nest beneath the window, as close as I could legally draw to N92823, short of boarding him. I laid my head upon my backpack and used my coat as a blanket. At one point in the night, I opened my eyes and found his windscreen gazing back at me, as though we were lying in bed together.
—
I was woken by the roar of a vacuum drawing close to my head. I stood and stretched, greeting my fiancé through the window. The tarmac was wet; it must have rained overnight. Now the sun shone upon my love’s back, his form bright against the gray runways and, beyond them, a fringe of pine trees.
I was excited and nervous, as brides are known to be on their wedding day. As boarding began, it occurred to me that I should text my family members. I wanted to say goodbye in a coded fashion that wouldn’t alarm them. I started with Al: Great seeing you guys last weekend! I love you all. To my mom I wrote simply, Love you!
My mom replied immediately, asking if everything was okay. Everything’s great, I wrote. Just thinking of you! I hoped one day she’d accept my marriage to N92823, though she wouldn’t understand it in those terms.
My group was called. As I shuffled toward the mouth of the jet bridge, I had an urge to text Karina. I assumed my vision board had further alienated her, but I didn’t want her to feel any regret after I was gone. Hi Karina, I wrote. I just want you to know that I think you’re an amazing person, and I hope you get everything you want from life. No need to respond. Love, your friend Linda.
The text went through. I toggled my phone to airplane mode.
As I proceeded down the jet bridge, I recalled the day I’d last flown on N92823, seventeen years ago. My family’s journey to the airport had been fraught. We were late, due to an errand my dad had put off until the last minute, a run to the marina to hand off a check for Wendy ’s docking fee. My mom made snide comments from the Camry’s passenger seat, annoyed he hadn’t taken care of it sooner. At the check-in counter, my dad heaved my mom’s suitcase onto the scale dramatically; she’d packed too much, in his opinion, for a weekend trip. I’d been excited to fly, a rare treat, and my parents were spoiling it. As we waited to board, Al tried to lighten the mood, reminding us that vacations were supposed to be fun. He was rallying his own spirits, too, as he hadn’t wanted to go on the trip. He’d just started dating a girl from his chemistry class and would have preferred to spend the weekend with her.
Back then, I didn’t appreciate what I had—my family still intact, all its members alive. I’d taken them for granted, as only the lucky could. I glanced over my shoulder now and imagined our spectral forms shambling down the jet bridge, sunk in our private grievances. We’d been estranged when we entered the plane, but turbulence brought us together. We clung to each other, and I’d hoped our union would be permanent, but it hadn’t lasted through the cab ride to the hotel, by which point my parents had resumed their quarreling.
As I entered N92823, I braced myself for the charge I’d felt when Karina and I boarded the flight to SLC, but I perceived no more than the usual thrill, no indication yet that he’d recognized me. I grazed my fingers along his seatbacks, hoping to awaken him to my presence. I perceived time marked on his body—his wall panels yellowed, his seats dingy. I wondered if he would similarly note my body’s aging, and hoped he would still desire me.
I found my seat, 26F, a window on the starboard side. The aisle- and middle-seat passengers, young men who seemed to be strangers to each other, politely shuffled into the aisle to allow my passage, and after that minded their own business. I draped my coat over my lap. I pretended to fiddle with my seatbelt, and in the process, tucked the chunk of 737 into my underwear.
With other lovers, I’d felt uneasy in the midst of my enjoyment, unable to shake the sense that I was cheating on N92823. Now I felt perfectly contented, having arrived exactly where I was meant to be. My pulse quickened as we pushed back from the gate. N92823’s engines fired, and I took a deep breath, my body filling with his power. We raced down the runway, the landscape blearing past. I was pinned to my seat, my mouth open, my love’s voice screaming in my ears. His nose lifted, and as we rose into the sky, I was overcome by a sense of limitless freedom, as though I were shedding the sticky tendrils that had bound me to the world. At last, we’d finish what we started when I was thirteen. Our love would be infamous, immortalized one day by eerie animations of our doomed flight.
We banked left, and I looked across the aisle to the opposite window, through which I saw gray housing tracts, swaths of forest, a highway slicing north to south. I held my breath, feeling I was suspended on the tightrope of destiny. In a haze of pleasure, I lost equilibrium, and felt the ground rush up to meet me. It was going poorly, this takeoff. N92823’s passions could not be constrained by any pilot.
A moment later, N92823 broke through the clouds and leveled, finding his eastward trajectory. The flight attendant came on the PA with the usual scripted spiel. I detected no hint of agitation in her voice. I assured myself this meant nothing. After all, on our first flight together, the trouble hadn’t begun until several hours in.
—
Four hours later, we landed at O’Hare. I watched through the window as we taxied to our gate, glaring at the ground crew worker with his stupid lighted batons. The other passengers deplaned, while I remained seated, unwilling to accept that our first date had been a bust. Finally, I had no choice but to make my way up the aisle. The captain, a portly gentleman with bushy eyebrows, stood in the cockpit’s doorway with a hopeful expression, as though he wanted me to praise him for his perfect landing. I nodded, resenting his need for validation. He hadn’t even needed to wrestle the plane to keep him flying smoothly. N92823 had snubbedme.
In the terminal, I tucked myself into a restroom stall and wept. I’d hoped N92823 had pined for me all these years, just as I’d pined for him, and that he’d claim me the moment I entered him, refusing to let me go a second time. Instead, he’d treated me like a stranger. After a few minutes, I pulled myself together, emerging from the stall and splashing my face with cold water. I reminded myself that I’d known it might take several dates to persuade N92823 to marry me, which was why I’d secured a sizable chunk of money before embarking on our reunion. We’d been apart seventeen years; it made sense he’d want to take it slow. A few awkward dates were nothing relative to the eternal bliss that awaited us.
When I returned to the gate area, N92823’s next flight, to Dallas, was already boarding. It wasn’t easy to be the fiancée of a plane, as they were always leaving. From my flight-tracking app, I saw he’d return to O’Hare around 6:00 p.m. , then fly on to Denver, where he’d spend the night. I purchased a ticket on the Denver flight. I checked my messages and found a reply from Al: Hey good seeing you too! How’s Frisco?
Karina had also replied: Do you want to get coffee sometime?
I stared at Karina’s message in amazement. A month ago, I would have leaped at an opportunity to have coffee with her. But it was too late. Ties to my old life would only distract me from my goal. I didn’t respond to either message.
Our flight to Denver was delayed an hour due to weather. On my radar app, the storm system resembled a green scab stretching diagonally across the country’s midsection. The wait increased my excitement, so that by the time I boarded N92823, I frothed with desire, the sting of his initial rejection having faded. Our ascent was shaky, and with each jolt, I felt N92823’s heart thawing. I was grateful for this show of affection, and even after we’d reached cruising altitude, breaking through the stormy nimbostratus into the sunny reaches above, I felt confident that the universe would unite us when the time was right.
We landed in Denver at 10:45 p.m. , Mountain Time. I purchased a dinner of fries from McDonald’s and brought it back to A16, where N92823 was resting after a long day’s work. I ate my fries, gazing at my love’s white back, which glowed in the light of a full moon. I felt at peace, having resolved to be patient. I wouldn’t pressure N92823 to commit before he was ready. I decided to slow my pace to a single flight per day, giving my love a chance to miss me. I wanted each date to feel special, as opposed to the frenzy of a binge. As I drifted to sleep, I recalled my trip to Denver with Dave, back in April. Fifteen miles southwest of my current position, Dave’s old enemy Mike was in his office at Barley Bros, or home with his family. I wondered if the new baby had arrived.
—
We flew from Denver to Newark. Newark to Houston. Houston to Chicago. Chicago to Dallas. My hopes soared upon each takeoff, and were crushed anew when we landed safely at our destination. I tried not to betray my disappointment. I wondered if N92823 was angry that I’d made love to other planes while he was out of commission. I’d have to prove to him that my love was true, and that those other planes had meant nothing.
After a week of flying, I was beginning to feel the first stirrings of desperation when an event occurred that restored my faith. I’d arrived at O’Hare after deadheading from Dallas on board an A319 who did his best to tempt me with turbulence shortly after takeoff. Around 9:00 p.m. , I boarded N92823 for a red-eye to Newark. I noted a peculiar energy in the air as I settled into my seat. The cabin grew hot while the flight attendants performed their safety demonstration. Around me, passengers fanned themselves with safety cards. We pushed back from the gate and circled the taxiway for a protracted interval, N92823’s engines revving and sighing. Rather than lining up on the runway, however, we returned to the gate. The captain came on the PA to inform us the heat indicated a problem with the auxiliary power unit, which powered the air-conditioning and also affected pressurization. A maintenance team was on its way.
A problem with pressurization! This was the type of incident I’d always dreamed of. The maintenance crew would apply a cursory fix that would come unraveled in flight, a series of tiny missteps that would later be documented by the postcrash NTSB report. We’d reach cruising altitude, at which point oxygen would leach from the cockpit before the pilots understood what was happening. Oxygen masks would dangle from the ceiling, too late for the already unconscious passengers. I’d grab a mask, having miraculously remained conscious. N92823 and I would cruise together through the night, until his engines flamed out from fuel exhaustion, and the earth pulled us into its embrace.
After a two-hour delay, we took off. I breathed shallowly to conserve the oxygen in my cells. When the flight attendants made their way down the aisle, I observed their movements closely, monitoring for erratic behavior that would indicate the onset of hypoxia. A woman in the row ahead of mine was served regular Coke, when she’d asked for Diet. The hairs rose on my forearms. Perhaps N92823’s pilots were already unconscious beyond the locked door of the cockpit.
The fix must have held, though, as we ultimately proceeded to a safe landing in Newark. Still, I deplaned in good spirits, having gotten the sign I needed. N92823 was trying to sabotage himself so we could be together, and he might have succeeded, if not for the pilot’s last-minute decision to return to the gate. On our next two flights, I perceived additional signs of N92823’s growing affection. A shaky landing into O’Hare through high winds, N92823’s wings pitching with a passion that rivaled my own. The next day, on a flight to New Orleans, we encountered a patch of moderate turbulence, though the sky was clear. After a few minutes, our path smoothed, but the captain kept the fasten seatbelt sign on for the duration of the flight and suspended beverage service. As we descended, I felt a lust in my teeth. I was so close. Surely our next flight would tip N92823 over the edge.
When we landed, I found a new text from Karina, saying she was coming over to check on me. She’d sent a few texts since the one asking if I wanted to have coffee, and I hadn’t replied, which must have alarmed her. I was embarrassed to imagine her talking to the Chens about me, but I didn’t try to stop her. What happened back in San Francisco was none of my business.
—
Our twelfth date brought us to Miami. I sat in an empty gate area, shivering in the aggressive air-conditioning. N92823 had already departed for Cancun, a flight I couldn’t join him on, as I didn’t have a passport. He’d return tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I had to grit my way through eighteen grounded hours.
I closed my eyes, images cycling across the screen of my mind. The comb lines in my dad’s hair as I sat on his shoulders outside John Wayne Airport. Guillaume Faury. The crucifix on Celia’s wall. I thought I heard Karina saying my name, and startled awake to find the gate area had filled with passengers bound for Nashville. In the chairs opposite mine, a teenage boy nudged his dad and whispered something into his ear. They both looked at me and laughed.
In the restroom, I confronted my image in the mirror, and understood why I’d become an object of ridicule. It had been almost two weeks since I’d showered, and my habits of upkeep had grown lax. My eyes were bloodshot. My cheeks and chin had broken out with a smattering of pimples. My shirt had ketchup on it, and when I removed it, I was met with a stench of body odor. I stood at the sink in my bra, scrubbing the ketchup stain with hand soap. I washed my armpits, applied deodorant, and put on one of the two spare shirts I’d brought. I’d already cycled through them in the first days, and they also smelled, though not as badly as the shirt I’d just removed. Nothing could help my hair, which hung heavy with oil. I considered washing it in the sink and drying it using the Dyson, crouching to feed hanks of hair into the gray receptacle. But I’d already noticed women casting sidelong looks of disapproval in my direction as they entered and exited the restroom. I was mortified to have allowed my physical condition to deteriorate to such an extent that it caused offense to strangers. At the same time, I wanted to snap at those women. What did they want? For me to be filthy or wash myself in the sink?
That night, as I assembled my sleeping nest in yet another gate area, I resented N92823 for making me debase myself. What more did I have to do to prove myself to him? Since our flight to New Orleans, he’d reverted to his prior aloofness. Perhaps he regarded me as Anthony had once regarded his coworker Beatrice: as a pesky woman with a crush, a source of ego gratification, to be swatted away like a fly when my presence became tiresome. When he pulled into his gate the next morning, I stared into his haughty windscreen with bitterness. Here he was, back to torture me some more.
—
The end drew near. I sat in a food court at DFW, inspecting my finances over a limp salad. After sixteen flights with N92823, along with five deadheads on other planes, I was almost out of money. My checking account was down to $280, enough for one last spin of fate’s wheel. I booked a seat on N92823’s flight to Chicago the next morning, at a cost of $189. I told myself that the universe might be waiting to unite us at the last possible moment, out of its perverse love of suspense. But it had become difficult to muster enthusiasm after so many disappointing dates. I wondered if N92823’s soul had been sucked out during his long rehabilitation. Or maybe the truth was simpler. Maybe N92823 had never loved me, and the turbulence I’d enshrined in my memory had been the product of nothing more remarkable than air patterns, as everyone else assumed.
I’d felt similarly defeated at the end of my last binge, four years ago. I’d been trying to outrun my grief, and it worked as long as my money lasted. While I was airborne, I could imagine my dad was still alive. Flight was suspended animation, a period in which a person was exempt from obligation, cut off from the grounded world. I felt secure while locked in the pressurized cabin, 35,000 feet above the earth. But planes always land, one way or another. Back then, I’d retained hope of finding my soulmate plane one day, after my life had stabilized and I’d begun earning a steady income. This time, it was worse, as I clung to no such illusions. I’d found my soulmate, and so far, he’d rejected me. If he didn’t choose me on our final flight, I’d have no reason to go on.
That night, I sat at the bar at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Terminal D, getting drunk on rum and Cokes. I no longer cared about conserving my funds, as they weren’t sufficient to purchase another flight, anyway. I’d pinned my remaininghopes on our flight to Chicago in the morning, so I might as well enjoy one last send-off. I hadn’t spoken to another person in weeks, aside from brief exchanges with flight attendants and cashiers, and as the alcohol loosened my inhibitions, I grew itchy with an unexpected desire for human connection. To my left sat a man in a plaid shirt. He drank a pint of beer, his eyes fixed on the TV above the bar, which was showing a football game.
“Where you headed?” I asked.
He glanced at me, then back at the TV. “Cincinnati,” he said.
“I’m headed to Phoenix, allegedly,” said the woman to my right. She was in her late forties, wearing red lipstick and cat’s-eye glasses. “My flight’s been delayed six hours,” she continued, sipping her Bloody Mary. “Looks like I might be spending the night here. Next time, I’ll rent a car. I’m done with the airlines.”
Normally, I had no patience for people who griped about air travel. They failed to appreciate the privilege of being alive in the era of flight. How many humans, throughout history, would have paid a lifetime’s salary for the chance to sail through the sky like a god? But my recent experiences had rendered me more cynical than usual toward the endeavor. I clucked my tongue in sympathy and asked why she’d come to Dallas.
“My daughter lives here,” she said. “She’s getting married next year. I was helping her pick out a dress.”
I thought of Karina. Her wedding was a month away. My eyes grew teary, and the woman placed her hand on my arm.
“Everything okay, hon?” she said. She was looking at me with kindness.
“I’ve been flying all over the country, trying to get close to someone,” I said. “I’m afraid he doesn’t feel the same way I do.”
“Well, that was a mistake,” the woman said, rather harshly. “You should never chase a man. If he wants you, you’ll know.”
I wondered if she was right, though she didn’t know my lover was a plane rather than a man. “I was hoping he just needed more time to decide,” I said.
“That’s BS,” she said. “They know right away. Don’t let them string you along until they find the girl they really want to marry.”
The woman’s phone buzzed, and she let out a whoop. Her flight was boarding.
“You’ll find someone better,” she said, signaling the bartender for her check. “My daughter got dumped by some jerk last year. She didn’t get out of bed for a week. Now she’s marrying a guy who owns a landscaping company.”
She left, and no one took her place. It was just me and the silent man in plaid, until an hour later the bar closed, and I stumbled off to make my bed beneath a bank of defunct pay phones.