The Pilot's Wife_ A Novel - Anita Shreve [72]
The captain rose and turned toward the cabin. His eyes found Kathryn’s, and she understood that he meant to express his sympathy. He was an older man with a fringe of gray hair and light brown eyes. He seemed almost too kindly to be in charge. He was hopeless with the condolences, and she liked him for his inarticulateness. She thanked him and even managed a slight smile. She said she was doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances, which was all anyone ever wanted to hear. He asked her if she would be traveling on to Malin Head to be with the other family members, and she answered, quickly and perhaps too emphatically, no. He seemed embarrassed for having asked. She turned then and introduced the captain to Robert Hart. The captain studied Robert as if he might be someone he had met before. Then the man excused himself, went back up to the cockpit, and locked the door behind him. For his safety. For their safety.
The flight attendant collected the champagne glasses she’d brought around earlier, and Kathryn saw to her surprise that she had drained hers. She couldn’t remember drinking it, though she could taste it in her mouth. She looked at her watch: 8:14 in the evening. It would be 1:14 A.M. in London.
The plane lumbered to the runway. The pilot — the captain with the washed-out eyes? — revved the engines for the takeoff. Her heart stalled for one prolonged beat, then kicked painfully inside her chest. Her vision narrowed to a dot, the way the picture used to do when one turned off the TV. Kathryn held the armrests and closed her eyes. She bit her lower lip. A veil of protective mist dissipated, and she saw all that was possible: Pieces of bulkhead flooring ripped from the cabin; a person, perhaps a child, harnessed into a seat, spinning through the open air; a fire beginning in a cargo hold and spreading into the cabin.
The plane gathered speed with unnatural momentum. The staggeringly heavy mass of the T-900 would refuse to lift. She shut her eyes and began to pray the only prayer she could remember: Our Father ...
She had never before known fear on an airliner. Even on the bumpiest transatlantic flights. Jack had always been relaxed on a plane, as both a pilot and a passenger, and his calm had seemed to seep into Kathryn through a kind of marital osmosis. But that protection was gone now. If she had believed herself safe in an airplane because Jack had, didn’t it follow that she could die in a plane if he had? She felt then the shame and revulsion of knowing she was going to be sick. Robert put his hand on her back.
When the plane was airborne, Robert signaled to the flight attendant, who brought ice water and cold towels and a discreet paper bag. Kathryn’s body, unable to perceive relief in having made it aloft, rebelled. To her chagrin, she vomited up the champagne. She was amazed at how intensely visceral the fear of one’s own death was: She hadn’t been this sick even when she’d learned that Jack had died.
As soon as the seat belt sign was turned off, Kathryn rose unsteadily to use the lavatory. A flight attendant handed her a plastic envelope containing a toothbrush, toothpaste, a wash-cloth, a bar of soap, and a comb, and Kathryn realized such kits were kept on hand expressly for physically distraught passengers. Were they for first-class passengers only, or did everyone get one?
In the tiny lavatory, Kathryn washed her face. Her slip and blouse were soaked with sweat, and she tried to dry the skin of her shoulders and neck with paper towels. The plane lurched, and she banged her head against a cabinet. She brushed her teeth as best she could and thought of all the times she’d felt condescending toward people who were afraid to fly.
When she returned, Robert rose from his seat and took her arm.
“I can’t explain,” she said, sitting down and gesturing for him to do the same. “I suppose it was fear. I was certain the plane wouldn’t get off the ground and that we’d be going so fast, we’d crash.”
He gently squeezed her arm.
She pressed her seat back, and Robert aligned his seat with hers.