Chapter 7

The Jamaican sun had caressed her skin as she napped under it, next to the bay of a little resort near Kingston.  Dad and mom went there the year before, and it was wonderful.  They had looked so forward to it, and shot frisky looks across the dinner table at each other in the days leading up to it when we kids weren’t looking.  They had not had a vacation of just their own in a while.  They had danced and listened to calypso music and steel drums and snuggled while they watched the sun set.

Another chilled draft shook dad and washed away the memory, returning to him in it’s wake an empty and numb feeling.

This was sure as hell not Jamaica. 

Dad rubbed his shoulders and scanned the sky.  The black tapestry above our airplane was filled with bright stars.  The sky was dotted with them, sparkling clearly.  But he had not seen an aircraft since the distant blinking light he had pointed out to Chris with such enthusiasm what seemed like hours ago.

On any other night Chris would have noticed the beauty of the stars, but he could care less now.  Now they were just stupid stars.  He didn’t feel the same about the moon. 

The moon began as dull yellow lump behind the clouds but peeked out once or twice as the last remnants of the front broke up and floated around it. 

Then all at once it seemed, it suddenly burst into the open sky.  It was two days after the full moon, so it came out big and white and radiated a bright light that splashed across the landscape around them, bringing for the first time that night figures and substance from the dark.  For the first time in what seemed forever, he could actually see a little. 

To the front of the plane, Chris could now clearly make out the tree line that we crashed through.  Beyond that, still a long way off, was the road he had heard earlier, still out of sight.  There wasn’t a lot of traffic on it at this time of night, but what there was he could hear.  A handful of vehicles had gone across his front with the familiar whooshing sound during the hours that they had waited.  They were so close, but none of them had any way to know we were out there, just out of their sight.

           Dad saw the moon too, although it was blurry and dim through his swollen eyelids.  His vision had gotten progressively worse to the point that he could hardly see at all, his face was so swollen.  The blood had slowed it’s flowing into his left eye, but still impeded it. 

He had considered more and more about the possibility of going for help.  When he had seen the airplane fly above them, he had thought that there would be a rescue soon if not immediately.  He hadn’t wanted to try and make the journey for help if he didn’t have to. 

For one thing, it was so dark that he was sure he’d get lost, particularly with no guidance, even from the stars.  For another, he was feeling very lucky that he hadn’t ruptured his spleen yet with the broken rib that floated in his side.  Whatever path led to that road from this field was sure to be rough, and he was worried that a single stumble or trip would finish the job.  He had enough experience with this exact type of injury in the ER numerous times, and knew that if his spleen went, he most likely wouldn’t even make it back to the plane before he died in agony somewhere in the dark and frozen night.

            So there was that.  Not to mention he could hardly see.  At any rate he was getting pretty sure that if help wasn’t on the way now, if it wasn’t here yet, it might not be coming at all.  The though was infuriating and made absolutely no sense to him. 

1976, and no one even knows when a plane crashes? 

He didn’t buy it.  They would have noticed immediately that we were overdue, he would have thought.  All they had to do was come this way.  Why were they not here?  Why were they not looking for us?  

The though suddenly made him feel very alone.

         Dad snorted it off.  He didn’t even know who ‘they’ were.  He certainly had no knowledge of the intense search being conducted only 40 or so miles east of us.  He only knew it was beginning to look like he was on his own.

          Kim and I were still asleep and hadn’t moved since he had placed us in our patchwork nest of clothes behind him, but Rick was becoming a problem.  He was going through bouts of excitement and trashing about.  Dad was worried he would hurt himself or one of us during a violent fit.  Moreover he was worried about Rick’s brain, which he knew was continuing to swell in his head even as he lay there, and that it could kill him at any time. 

It had gotten very cold, too.  Beyond just uncomfortable.  The tingling in his fingers and toes told him it had gone toward dangerous, even deadly if they didn’t get out of it soon.  He had no way to tell the exact temperature, but had been out in it enough in his time in Colorado and Nebraska winters to know it was near freezing.  This was emphasized by an occasional shudder from Chris beside him. 

He began to really worry that none of us would make it till morning, and even if we did, this was Nebraska in the winter time.  Plenty of people had died in cold like that in the middle of a crystal clear and sunny day.  Here, he knew sun would not necessarily equate to warmth.  And God forbid if the clouds returned bringing a storm with them in the next hour or two, which was also not unheard of.

The old joke was that if you didn’t like the weather in Nebraska, wait a little.  Dad knew the joke was based on very real weather phenomena that occurred over the plains all the time.  Violent storms could grow from seemingly nowhere, in the middle of a clear blue sky.  Dad had seen it many times.  Any Nebraskan had.  It wasn’t a joke to dad.  It scared him.

          All of this weighed on him now as he tried to work out what he had to do.  He had been eying a distant point of yellow light glowing from a darkened rise in the land to the northeast for some time now.  He knew it was a farm building.  And a farm building is usually located next to a house...but not always.  It could just be a light on a pole at the corner of a field.  He had no way to know.  He didn’t trust his eyes. 

Then there was that road.  He had heard the cars on it the several times Chris pointed them out, and he thought the road might be closer than the building, or whatever it was.

But he couldn’t tell for sure; his blurry vision made judging distance to either point impossible.  Not to mention that wandering out into the prairie with no light to guide him would be roughly the same as walking into the desert.  People can get disoriented and lost and freeze to death in the fields on nights like this, the distances between aid being so great and the cold so bitter. 

          The moon changed that.  He knew the road was his best bet for eventual help if another car came, but an occupied farm house would mean immediate help.  The darkness of the night had made either option too treacherous, but he could now make out the contours of the ground around us, and knew with the light of the moon, he had at least a chance.  

Either way, he also knew he had to make up his mind quickly.  The last thing he wanted was for the clouds to come back when he was a long distance from the plane, storm or not.  They would obscure any landmarks he could see and very possibly cause him to loose his way and not be able to find his way back.  He would most likely not survive that. 

So now was the time either way, he decided.  He turned to Chris.

          “Son,” he said, “How far away is that light way out there?” he pointed to the speck on the horizon over his shoulder that he thought might be near a farm.  Chris turned to look at it and stared for a long time.

            “I don’t know,” he said.  “It seems to be a long way.”

            Dad faced forward toward the road.

          “How far to the road?” he asked.  Chris thought hard.  Judging by the sound, it wasn’t far, but without seeing it, he just couldn’t tell.  He knew what dad was thinking.  Dad had muttered about going for help a few times in the hours they had been waiting.  He didn’t want to make a mistake now, but it was up to him.  He clenched his jaw and made his decision.

            “I…I think the road is much closer,” Chris replied, trying to sound confident.

            In an instant all doubt was gone.  Dad had the answer he needed and knew what he had to do.  He formulated a quick plan in his head.  He turned to look at Chris.

            “Listen, son,” he said.  “I don’t think we can wait any longer.  I don’t think anyone is coming just yet and we have to get the kids help now.  I am going to try and get to that road and hopefully flag someone down.”

            Chris had locked on to him with his stare, but said nothing.  He only nodded.  The thought of really being left alone was terrifying. 

But dad continued.  He hadn’t really thought about what he should say if this point came, but there was no time for stoicism.

            “I think we can get help there.”  He paused to gather his thoughts.  This was getting difficult, but Chris had to know everything, in case something happened to him out there.          

“If I don’t come back, you need to wait here with the kids, okay?” Dad said.  Chris nodded, wide-eyed.

            “Someone will come sooner or later.” Dad tried to sound reassuring.  “You just need to stay strong.  But don’t come looking for me, no matter what happens.  If I don’t come back, you need to stay here?  Do you understand that?”

            Chris nodded.  He didn’t know what to say.  His impulse was to beg dad not to leave him, but he knew dad was right.  Chris had to trust him. 

Dad went on, and began to pull himself together to get out of the plane.

            “Keep and eye on Ricky,” dad said as he got up, glancing toward us in the middle of the plane.  “Try to keep him calm, but try not to move anyone.” 

Chris watched as Dad worked his way up and out of the plane, using the ripped up fuselage to balance himself.  The breeze hit dad as he stood.  It was really cold. 

He surveyed the ground around him.  It seemed so bright now, bathed in the moonlight.  He could see the tree line we had crashed through, silhouetted against the horizon, which to his injured eyes appeared as a dark blur against a slightly lighter one.  To the right of the trees, he could make out a slight rise in the contour of the ground that he thought looked like it could have also been a path.  Near that, there was probably a road.  Probably a small road, but a road all the same, and that would lead somewhere, hopefully to the bigger road.  He decided to start out that way.

            He scanned the remainder of the area around him for a second and his eyes rested on a moonlit spot of lightness against the dark earth on the other side of the plane.  He stared at it for an instant before realizing with a tinge that it was the blanket that covered mom.  He gazed at it for a moment more, then stooped down to look at Chris.

            “Look, son, your mom is right over there,” he said and pointed to the approximate direction of her broken and dead body.  “You can’t go over there, understand?”

            Chris shifted his eyes away and looked down.  Chris knew where she was.  He knew she was dead.  But dad was horrified at the thought that Chris might look for her and see what he had seen.  He was adamant.

            “Son,” he said trying to be gentle but stern. “You have to listen to me.  There is nothing we can do for her, okay?  You have to believe me.  She is…gone.”

            He waited for a response, but Chris just looked away from him and stared at the busted instrument panel.  Dad tried a slightly different approach.

            “The kids need your help,” he said.  “I am depending on you to watch out for them and take care of them, Okay?  Chris??”

            Chris looked at him again and nodded once.  He knew.  Dad reached in and patted his head. 

          “It’s going to be all right.  We’ll get out of here soon,” dad said, then stood again and began to move. 

Chris watched him as he stepped carefully off of the shattered wing, and toward the front of the plane.  He paused to gain his bearings for a moment, and then took a deep breath of the frozen air.  Resolved, he set off, walking in a straight line across the rough ground of the field toward the right hand edge of the silhouette of trees.  The moon played off of his form as he went, bobbing and weaving his way into the moonlit darkness of the frozen night. Gradually his form dimmed until it blended with the dark backdrop and faded completely out of view. 

Then he was gone.