Slide - Kyle Beachy [65]
He said, “I don't understand. How does anyone make money selling tickets for these dumb little planes?”
“They don't. These are privately owned. There aren't tickets; it's just a pilot and a few passengers. No peanuts or pretzels.”
He looked at me. “What kind of person owns an entire plane?”
Mr. John Hurst, father of three. Divorcé. Payer of settlement. Marrier of his secretary. Driver of: Jaguar XK8, Mercedes CLK, Land Rover Discovery. Maker of very much income. Secretary adulterer. Owner of private jet, Cessna.
“They must be Jewish.”
“What? No. That's not important.”
A jet appeared from out of a hangar and taxied around the others before turning onto the runway, facing more or less exactly where we sat, waiting for clearance. I watched Ian watching the plane and firmly believed the process of takeoff was going to be of great satisfaction for the kid. We waited. After several minutes the plane turned and left the runway completely, back to the row with the others.
He stood and went to the fence briefly before moving off to my left. I was beginning to fear that we'd come on an off day and that we might end up sitting here staring like cows at this tableau of overgrown blacktop and fence and small unimpressive machine. I got up and followed him at a distance, stopping when he stopped and watching him bend to pick something from the grass. I took a step closer as he held it up to his face with both hands, worried that he was going to eat something little boys should not eat. He dropped it and bent for something else and I realized what was happening. You stretched the grass between your two thumbs and brought your hands up to your face, and if you blew just right it made a sound like a tiny woodwind instrument.
My father buzzing grass and walking through grass, playing catch in and among grass. Good old Dad, my father who only ever wanted what was best for those of us he still had left. Ian turned to face me and blew into his hands. No sound came out. He dropped the grass and leaned to pick a fresh blade.
“My mom showed me this. If you do it right it'll buzz.”
“I like the one where you take that long grass with the fuzzy bulb on the top, and you wrap the stalk around itself and use it to shoot off the top.”
“Buckweed,” Ian said. “It's not grass. Yeah, Mom likes that one too. Mom knows all sorts of things to do with grass.”
There was still no activity on the runways. There was a man in an orange vest holding a set of those noise-canceling earmuffs, but he was just standing there, speaking into a walkie-talkie. I remained incapable of coming up with anything to say to Ian about his mother.
“What about that girl you used to sit with by the creek?”
“Yeah. Two days ago she showed up at my house wearing a backpack and said she was running away because her parents wouldn't buy her a pony. She asked if I wanted to go with her.”
I was surprised to hear little girls still wanted ponies.
“What did you say?”
“I told her running away from your problems doesn't solve anything. Really it just hurts the people who count on you. Then she came inside and we watched DinoChamps until my dad came home and made her leave.”
We turned and moved back to the van. One of the planes began moving onto the runway. After a few minutes, it accelerated toward where we were sitting, front wheels lifting without ceremony and the rear soon after. Takeoff. But the whole thing was too quiet; I wanted explosions of sound I could claim as my own. To say, Listen, Ian, to the massive noise. Cover your ears. This is bigger than all of us.
“Does she ever talk about faeries, this girl?”
“Fairies? She's eleven.