l a p s e

the plane

It turned out to be a faulty plane, but it looked okay on the outside, so nobody could tell. It was a McDonnell Douglas DC-9 with a botched paint job and fraying seats, aging like any other, and I should have known the minute I got on that there was something wrong.

We boarded in a hurry. I was usually never in a hurry; in fact more often than not I was slower than everyone else – but I was also unusually impatient, and we'd got on panting and double checking our luggage. As if something going missing was the most important problem we'd face. Funny how priorities change.

We made a lot of mistakes. We should have booked another flight, maybe one a few days earlier. We should have looked at the weather, my mother and I, but because it was getting late, we didn't bother. I was worried about my show, and she was worried about me. Neither of us was worrying about what we should have.

But we'd never expected something like this to happen. There was no reason to. Everybody assumed the plane was in perfectly good condition. Why waste time thinking anything different?

Maybe it wasn't the plane. Maybe the rain had just been too strong, and any aircraft, even one of those big fat Boeings, would have plummeted. The wind was powerful that night, and I could feel it buoying the wings, pushing them upwards like paper, whistling past the aerofoils.

But maybe it wasn't the plane, or the weather. Maybe it was fate. Even though it makes my chest hurt to think about it. It happened because it had to happen - I was supposed to learn something from it, something vast and important enough sixty-three people had to die.

It wasn't really my fault, but it happened because of me. For me. And if I hadn't been on that plane, maybe they'd still be alive – my mother and the sixty-two others that got on that broken DC-9 – but I wouldn't have learned The Lesson, and so everything had to happen the way it did.

It's the only explanation that lets me go to sleep at night. I'm not faced with the why and the how and the what ifs. I'm not faced with endless questions and technicalities and figuring out which screw was put on wrong, which was the gust of wind that did it?

I remember the bump of the plane, the captain's voice saying I'm sorry but we'll be experiencing some turbulence, and the little bit of excitement burning in my belly because it was a tiny taste of danger. I loved danger, lived for it, breathed for it; maybe I asked for too much. Maybe fate was listening, because it gave me more than I could handle.

I remember my mother laying her hand on my arm and asking me if I brought extra bobby pins. I'd rolled my eyes in exasperation and answered snappily. We were about to take off and I wanted to watch the runway blur underneath. I wanted to watch the city lights become smaller and smaller, and I ignored her to push the window shade open as wide as it would go.

After we were in the air I'd drawn my eyes away from the view to ask my mother something. It was something trivial like did you pack my extra sweater? and I don't remember what she said in reply, because it wasn't important either. Nothing was really important except the gathering storm, and I didn't notice that until later.

Soon it began raining. A light drizzle, nothing worrying, but suddenly I could hear it pounding the roof, steady and loud, and I was surprised I'd missed it. I peered out the window again, but all I could see was the light on the wing of the plane. I was uneasy, but only a little.

The last thing I remember is sliding the window shut.