Sky Bound
Shelley J Alongi

 

Anne watched Andrew step down from the plane and stride quickly across the open space, urgently heading to the small building that held the company office
and waiting area for passengers. She caught up with him, and he waved, smiling, kindly enough, she thought. She was momentarily annoyed. He could have
stopped and greeted her properly, but then she chided herself: don’t be so petulant. It’s not intentional! She watched him walk into the building and head
straight for the men’s room. She laughed out loud.

You see, you silly girl, he wasn’t ignoring you!

She waited for him to come out, and when he did, she noticed, he didn’t seem quite so hurried. He came up to her, a bit sheepish.

“Sorry about that,” he tried to explain, feeling awkward about brushing past her, “that was a long flight and that is a small plane.”

She laughed warmly, letting herself enjoy the rich sound, watching Andrew’s brown eyes sparkle and feeling him gather her to him in the welcoming embrace
that had become so familiar to them over the past years.

Hand-in-hand they made their way to the small airport restaurant. They sat down, gazed into each other’s eyes.
They ordered coffee and looked at the menu.

“I’m headed out of here in about two hours for one more local flight.”

“That means dinner then,” said the pilot’s wife, relief flooding her voice.

“You bet. Pick your place.”

“Let’s drive out to Ocean Side. Let’s go to our favorite seafood restaurant.”

“We can fly down there.”

Anne took a long, slow sip from her coffee, steeling herself against some inner turmoil.

“No, Andrew, not tonight.”

Andrew glanced at his wife of five years, knowing something was up.

“What? You don’t want to fly in that little Cessna?” He touched her hand, held it, and tried to tease her with a glance, but saw, perhaps to his great salvation,
that she didn’t want to be teased.
“What’s the matter? Something’s bothering you, my little Aviation Queen. So that’s what you want? You want to drive out to Ocean Side so you can tell your
drifter pilot something very serious.”

“Something like that.”

“Okay,” he said easily enough. “Your car or mine.”

“Mine. I’ll drive.”

“Should I be worried? I mean is it really awful?”

“No, not awful,” she admitted, grateful that he had stopped his teasing. “Well, not yet anyway. But it is serious and we do need to talk.”

“Is it your father?”

Her eyes welled with tears. She smiled. Quickly, her face resumed its normally placid demeanor.

“Let’s just talk about it later, honey.”

“alright,” the pilot conceded, “but it’s going to be another three hours before I get back.”

They drifted outside to watch the planes. They sat hand-in-hand on a bench. She caressed his fingers, inspecting each one for any new scars that might have accumulated in his latest absence. She shook her head in approval: there were none.

Andrew’s attention was drawn to a twin-engine Cessna 310 touching down smoothly and gliding gently to rest. Together they walked out to meet the pilot.

“Hey! Nice work! How many hours is that now?”

“Forty more to go, I’ll have my ATP!”

Andrew shook the pilot’s hand.

“Nice job, Eric. Really. You’re doing well.”

“Well, I had a wonderful certified flight instructor.”

Eric Clemmens winked mischievous blue eyes at Andrew’s wife.

“He was your instructor? I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah. Six years ago he signed off on my paperwork. You remember meeting me in the airport about a year before you got married?”

“I do remember that. Yes, I thought you looked familiar.”

“Where’s Catherine?”

“Home with Alex. Waiting. I need a break.”

“Do you get as tired as Andrew does?”

“No, I’m usually wired off flights. Andrew collapses. I just go home and play baseball with Alex then I catch up on sleep.”

“Eric never sleeps,” said Anne’s husband of five years, “he should, though.”

“Now you know that was always a point of contention with us,” acknowledged the younger pilot, “perhaps Andrew is right.”

“You know I’m right,” said the veteran ATP rated CFI.

Just then, a short, plump man wearing overalls and cheerily whistling a tuneless ditty rounded the corner and joined them.

“Karl!”

Andrew walked over to his friend and greeted him effusively.

Hey, haven’t seen you in a while.”

“Busy again,” said the mechanic, “you haven’t slammed any planes into any fences, and you’re married now, so you don’t go looking for me too often.”

Andrew and Anne laughed at that, Karl knowing that perhaps he had been partially responsible for the match between them.

“Eric’s bringing his 310 in today, aren’t you” asked the mechanic who had mercilessly teased Andrew about calling Anne after his accident.

“Sure am. Got any spare planes?”

“No, not today. Go home and get some sleep!”

Andrew glanced knowingly at Eric, then at his wife, then at Karl.

“You see, I’m not the only one bothering you about that.”

Andrew’s smile was light, yet they all understood the seriousness behind his injunction. Eric Clemmens retrieved his chart case from the plane and followed
the mechanic into the building.

Andrew got up and took his wife in his arms.

“Time to go,” he whispered, kissing her, his mouth taking in the familiar tastes, probing.

Wine coolers?” she wanted to know, holding his head, returning his kiss.

“Later,” he said, his tone filled with promise. He separated from her reluctantly.
“I have to go preflight. Come with me.”

They covered the relatively short distance to the flight line and found the C172 sparkling in the early afternoon sunlight. he sumped the tanks and felt
the propellers, checked the oil, moved the elevator controls. All was in order. Confident that his job was done, he stood by his door, turned to his wife,
let his gaze wander over her blue blouse and white skirt, and come to rest on her face.

“You do look a bit tired,” he said, wiping his hands and putting them on her waist. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Andrew,” she said gently, “you are uncommonly sweet. But then that’s one of the reasons I married you, isn’t it.” She put her hand up to his shoulder,
patting it reassuringly. “I’m ok. I’m not pregnant and the world isn’t ending. Just a bit overworked and kind of emotional. I’m really ok.”

He slid into the cockpit, strapping himself into the harness with practiced ease.

He turned suddenly to her, his brown eyes soft, longing.

“Annie, come with me.”

“I could come with you,” she suddenly smiled, “I’ll just get my purse.”

“Ok. I only have to get one passenger. You can sit with me!”

Maybe, Anne thought as she ran hurriedly back to get her purse, “maybe she just wanted to be with Andrew, to look out at the lights, maybe that would help.
Sometimes coming to the airport brought her such solace, and this, while it wasn’t sad news yet, could be, and so maybe what she really needed was to curl
up beside Andrew in the four-seater plane and look out the window, or just be near him, or all of it. Andrew came running up beside her. He passed her,
grabbed an extra headset. She thought he looked happy, too. They went back out to the plane and he helped her into it. She knew how to get into it, but
he still liked to help her and she let him. Resettled, the doors properly latched, the headsets on, they were ready. Anne could feel herself relaxing,
the news that had been so jarring earlier seeming manageable now that she was in this enclosed space with the living, breathing love of her life. He was
sitting beside her, looking at gages, talking to ATC, giving them the number, taxiing down the runway, climbing.

“I forgot to ask you where we’re going,” she said into the headset mike.

“San Diego.”

“Oh.”

She looked out of her window, adjusted her position, put her feet more closely together, and looked at him curled beside her, hand on the yoke, one hand
on his knee, eyes flitting toward the gages.
Anne moved beside him, felt his hand almost touching hers, gently steering the plane. He was so sweetly close. His body was tense, primed, his hands easy.
They turned and she looked out to see the lights winking at her, the cars, the outlines of houses. Finally they descended, Andrew became engrossed in his
conversation with ATC, and then they were down and out of the plane, getting the passenger, and then back in the plane heading for home. Andrew put the
plane into a climb, and finally reaching his proper altitude, leveled off. He was silent, comfortably squeezed into the little familiar place. Anne felt
suddenly better, as if this had been what she needed, the news about her father life-changing, eventually devastating. She reached and put her hand on
Andrew’s. He smiled, not turning his eyes from the airspeed indicator, made some minor adjustments, prepared for final approach. Close to the descent he
gently removed her hand, placed it on her knee. His hand was so confident and warm, the fingers lying against hers, the metal band of his ring cool on
her skin. He let his hand lie on hers only for a second, returning it to its position, fully engrossed in his work. The touch of that hand seemed to buoy
her sagging spirits, he had been right. He knew she needed to come with him. She looked up in surprise when the little plane touched down, taxied, stopped.
He cut the engine, it was quiet. Soon the single passenger had shaken hands with the pilot, disappeared, and they were alone before the plane. He stood
before her, she slipped her hand into his, the warmth of his skin touching her, comforting somehow. He sighed.

“I’m tired. What a day.”

Anne put her purse over her shoulder.

“Ready for dinner?”

“Oh, in the worst way! Feeling better?”

“Yes. Thank you. How did you know?”

“I know,” said the pilot, who knew about these things, “now, are we still driving?”

Anne shook her head and together they made their way through the small parking lot and to her Toyoda Camery.

“She told me that he perhaps has five years. That’s what the doctor said.”

She was driving. She didn’t look at her husband who was buckled in, this time, letting his wife do the steering. He focused his gaze in her direction, intensely
interested.

“She told me in a letter. My parents don’t have email. They’re not online. I called her this morning. Five years. They’re already thinking about us. They
want to give.”

Her voice broke, tears flooded her eyes, then were suddenly gone. She focused on her driving.

“They want to give us the house.”

Andrew sat in stunned silence. He knew her news was devastating, but this was not what he had expected, not at all. He had only met her parents twice, once
when they had flown to California for their wedding and once on a cross country trip when she had come with him, and they took a detour to see them.

Finally reaching the small quaint seafood restaurant they had visited many times, she turned off the engine. Andrew took her hand off the gearshift, and
there passed between them one look that a thousand words could not express, and she felt better. She dropped Andrew’s hand and opened the door.
They had settled into a comfortable routine, marriage, the little White House, the wrought iron fence, and the roses. April 14 had been their wedding day,
a year after Andrew had desperately proposed on the steps of Anne’s small house across from the baseball field where his plane had unceremoniously landed,
spilling him onto the grass. They were happy, settled into their schedules, she at the school teaching English and he continuing his work with the ABC
Charter Company.

A cool breeze gently caressed Anne’s hair, bringing with it the smell of the ocean mingled with the light fragrance of cooking fish. She breathed it in,
her mind easing now that she had spilled her news to him. They walked side by side into the restaurant. He slipped his hand into hers and they entered
the quiet restaurant, both of them ready to unwind, he from a hectic schedule and she from a long, emotional day.

They sat at a small table near the pane glass window affording a view of the quiet pier. Anne’s hands lay comfortably on the table. Andrew touched them, held them. His eyes briefly strayed to the decor, the small fishing boats on the walls,
the seascapes in various stages of God’s handiwork. He let them come quietly back to her face.

“I’m glad you came with me on the last flight,” he mused, letting the music and the soft sounds of voices comfort him into contented languor.

“Me, too. I didn’t really want to tell you on the plane, though. Can’t really do that, but it was nice to just drive back here. Thanks for indulging me.”

Andrew took a drink from his glass.

“Your mom is holding up?”

“For the moment anyway. She’s a strong woman. She has always been independent like me.”

“She’s not going to stay in that house?”

“No, no. There were a lot of us you know, two brothers, two sisters and me, so that would be kind of a big house for her. Do you want a house out in Illinois, Andrew?”

“I don’t know,” he said candidly, “We’ll have to think of that one. We have one here.”

“Yes, I know, and I like it. We’re happy here, Andrew. I’m teaching English like I wanted to do, you like your work, you’re doing what you want to do, you
have an honest reputation, people request you. It just doesn’t seem right to leave all that.”

They noticed the waiter standing discretely to the side of their table, so they ordered their meals and returned to their conversation.

“It’s all kind of confusing,” she admitted taking her fork and gently cutting through her fish. She pushed away a piece of yellow squash. “But I did write
him a letter today saying thank you and just updating him on our lives. Something I had to do. I included the latest picture of our roses.”

That little rose garden in front of the house held so much history: it could tell the story of their meeting and developing relationship. The little garden
had witnessed the first welcoming walk passed those bushes the first year they met, the times she passed it to deposit the mail in his house, the Christmas she had cared for him when he had been confined to bed with influenza. She remembered the first time she had returned to this house after his proposal, looking at the spiral staircase up to the second floor. How many times had she climbed that staircase? She couldn’t say she had climbed it many times, but she did love it; and the man who lived here. Now she would be climbing that staircase every night.

“What are you thinking?”

Her eyes did look far away as she stood at the bottom of those stairs looking up.

“I’m thinking that since I was a girl I wanted to live in a two story house.”

“Yeah?”

“I couldn’t afford one where I live now. I always just wanted to live in one.”

“Well, now you have one.”

She loved that little white house with yellow trim surrounded by the wrought iron fence, with a half-acre of land and the rose bushes. “Hey, Annie you look far away.”

Andrew was talking to her. The waiter had deposited their food on the table.

“I just kind of decided about the house,” she said.

“Oh?”

“Well, I was thinking honey since I was a girl I wanted a two story house. You know that, of course. But if we got that house we wouldn’t have two stories
anymore.”

Andrew laughed, the sound warm, low, sparkling. First it was a soft, gentle thing, and then it was more intense, not in volume, but in contentment, in enjoyment.

“You really like that two story house don’t you,” he said indulgently. “We’ll rent the other one then, or sell it.”

“Yeah,” she said, “You know I moved here to do something different. I don’t want to go back. I’ve almost moved across the country before. I don’t want to
do that again, not for a reason like that.”

“Okay then,” said the pilot focusing his attention on his juicy salmon steak. “Then we’re staying here in the two story house that my aviation queen loves.”

Each detail of that house was special; each room had it’s own memories. Tonight they would return to that house and take part in
their favorite ritual when he returned from flights: she had already baked the chocolate chip cookies. Yet it wasn’t all the physical details that kept
her here. It was the life they shared, it was memories. After moving from the quiet town in Illinois where she had grown up and getting her teaching credential
and teaching here for so long, how could she leave it? Ok, they had five years to decide, but she somehow knew as Andrew paid the bill and they returned
to the car, that she wouldn't leave it.

She followed her husband to the door. She stood behind
him while he turned on the light. The shadow fell across the peaceful place she had called home for five years. She went into the kitchen and got a glass of water. The cool, refreshing water added to her contentment. Andrew came and slipped his arm around
her.

“Tired?”

He kissed her cheek, pushing back a tendril of curling hair that escaped her hair band.

“I am. What a long day.”

“Yes, I know.”

He rubbed her back, his warm fingers sending chills down her spine. He turned her to face him, caught her gaze.

“Annie!”

His voice was warm. She stood in his arms, the refrigerator clicked on and so did the thermostat. She was grateful
for his closeness but she was so tired.

“You drink one wine cooler,” he said gently, caressing her cheek, “you’re going to be out like a light.”

He kissed her, she let him cover her mouth with his, drinking in the tastes of food and the day. She let him take her by the hand and lead her upstairs. After so long together she knew his intensions. She wasn’t against them, only a bit weary.

“Honey, I’m so tired, I.. I doubt I would make you happy.”

He drew her near him, let his fingers work at her buttons. His fingers touched her.

“Okay.”

He seemed disappointed, but understanding. It made her want to try, this understanding, the gentle movements of his hands undressing her.
Andrew helped her out of her skirt, held her for a moment, his head on her shoulder; she could feel his living, breathing body. She slipped her hands beneath
the smooth material of his shirt, massaged his back, and eased it over his head. Moments passed, he helped her onto the bed, perhaps more like a child
than a lover did.
He would not force her, though perhaps she thought if he kept this slow movement up he would have his way with her, and this couldn’t be so bad, even if
she had a long day. She guided his hands to her breasts, his fingers curled beneath them. Later, he eased himself from her. She lay spent, curled into
his arms, almost lethargic in her contentment.

“Did you have a hard three weeks?” she whispered to the man who had gently coaxed her to him.

“Not too hard. Almost missed a few wake up calls.”

“You called everyday. I got your email every night.”
She had her head on his chest; his arm supported her, his fingers rested below her breast. They lay warm and still on her flesh. He lay beside her, happy, wishing for more, but content to be here with this woman whose life had become inextricably linked with his. If she loved the
house, he loved coming back to the house. It had not seemed so alive before, only a place where a weary pilot would recover. But now, it was warmer, softer,
and more alive. He had liked it before, but this, he thought, was so much better. They worked together like a team, perhaps his logical mind blending harmoniously
with her more artistic or feeling one. She had worked to bring out more feelings than he knew existed, and what he loved about her most, he thought, as
she gently drifted off to sleep in his arms, was that she loved his stories, and God knew he had plenty of them. Sometimes when he was flying he would
savor details of her expression when he told his stories and he would try to remember stories to tell her when he returned. It was one of the first things
she had liked about him when he had taken her to San Diego for the first time, when he flew her back to her home airport and drove her back to her house.
She wanted to hear stories.

“What if I run out?”

“Make them up!”

“Make them up,” he had said, laughing. “I’ll try!”

So far he hadn’t run out of stories and he really doubted he would. Tonight he found he didn’t need wine coolers and chocolate chip cookies, he only
needed the living, breathing woman that was his wife. Tomorrow, ritual could play out. Tonight, they were here in this house. Before following his wife’s
example and drifting off to sleep, he remembered what she had said about the house. This little refuge from work and papers and turbulence was a haven
for both of them. Somehow in the sad news of her father’s illness they both knew instinctively that they could not sell it. They would remain here to deal
with life as it came.

 

 

Copyright © 2003 Shelley J Alongi
Published on the World Wide Web by "www.storymania.com"