“Go put on your seatbelt.”

The plane shuddered. I looked back. Palmeri had her arm up, throwing toggles and pushing buttons on the panel over her head.

I sat between Allison and Charlene. “How is he?” I motioned toward Dave, as I buckled the belt.

“What’s going on up there?” Allison said.

Dave sat with one arm folded, his face buried in a hand. I thought he was going to take his life. I actually feared he’d been a heartbeat away from blowing out his brains. We needed a break here, a chance to regroup.

“Chase? What’s going on up there?”

“We’re just low on fuel,” I said, hoping it sounded light and non-important.

“Are we about to crash? Did they tell you that? That we’re going to crash?”

“Palmeri’s not sure if there’s enough fuel to reach the airport.”

“So we’re about to crash. I knew it. I knew getting in this thing was like signing our own…” She stopped talking, cut herself off, and looked over at Dave.

“Palmeri knows what she’s doing. She’s going to land us somewhere just as safe,” I said. “We don’t have anything to worry about.”

“Running out of fuel a million miles up in the air? Why would I worry about that? I mean, what did Palmeri tell us? She had a hundred hours of flying experience in what? A Cessna? I’m not worried, Chase. I’m not freaking out.” She crossed her legs, folded her arms and turned her head. Then, she unfolded her arms, uncrossed her legs and looked directly at me. “Where is she planning on landing the plane, Chase? Did she tell you that?”

“I-79,” I said.

Charlene rolled her eyes, as if silently calling me crazy for being so honest. Then she sighed for punctuation.

I didn’t know where we were over Pennsylvania, or how far the airport was. I didn’t know how long we flew in silence waiting to land. I kept looking at Dave, and then at Sues. I held one of Allison’s hands, and one of my daughter’s and felt guilty.

“We’re going to be landing!” It was Erway, a shout from the cockpit. Part of me wanted to go look out a window. There were a few, but none near where we were seated.

Allison and Charlene both squeezed my hands. I squeezed back and stared at Dave. He hadn’t moved, his face still in his hand.

The plane bounced up and down as we began the descent, tipping left and right. I closed my eyes tight and remembered things I wanted to forget.

#  #  #

I’d gathered up some things and stuffed them into a duffel bag. I looked around the bedroom. Looked at the items on the dressers. It felt surreal. My stomach, knotted, threatened to explode. That was what had made it real. Too real. I was going to be sick.

I walked with my bag into the living room which held a big screen television, sofas and a recliner. With the exception of a large clock that matched the motif, an array of framed photographs of Charlene and Cash decorated the walls.

Charlene stood there staring at me. I sat on the sofa and placed her on my lap. I thought at the age of nine, she’d never understand what was really going on. She’d know something was wrong, but it wouldn’t mean anything to her. It wouldn’t impact her.

I looked at Julie, who was on the loveseat with Cash on her knees. She couldn’t meet my eyes, and looked away. She wasn’t going to say anything. It was going to be up to me to explain. I hated her. I really did. I hated her for so many reasons, but right now, I hated her most for this.

“For a little while, honey, Daddy’s going to go and stay someplace else,” I said. Toughest words to ever come out of my mouth.

I expected her to say, “Why, Daddy?” or “Okay, can I play now?”

Charlene’s head just dropped and the tears were immediate. “No,” she said.

I put my arm around her little shoulders. She fell into me and cried.

Cash looked at his sister and touched a finger to his mouth, like he was thinking. He was only four years old.  “Mommy?” he said.

“Daddy and I need some time apart,” she said. Cash wasn’t going to get it. He couldn’t. Not at four.

“Daddy isn’t going to leave,” he said.

Charlene shook as she cried. Her tears felt hot as they soaked through my shirt. “No, Daddy. I don’t want you to go,” she said. “I don’t want you to leave.”

I wasn’t going. I wasn’t leaving. She was making me. I couldn’t say that. I couldn’t point fingers. The kids didn’t need that. They didn’t need to be in the middle of anything, especially shit caused by their parents. “I’m not going far.” I was crying, too. Hard. I held my daughter, and couldn’t wipe away my tears.

We stayed that way, on the couch, holding our crying kids for nearly thirty minutes. Cash cried himself to sleep.

When I stood up, Charlene in my arms, I kissed Cash on the top of the head before Julie laid him down on the cushions.

I hugged Charlene tight. She wrapped her legs around my waist, like she knew what was next. That I’d have to set her down, and about to walk out the front door and leave. That I was going.

“I’ve got to go for now,” I said.

She squeezed me with her legs. Her arms around my neck cut off my air.

Julie put her hands on Charlene in an attempt to remove her.

I spun away. “I got this,” I said, seething.

“Stay with us, Daddy.” It was whispered over and over in my ear.

I don’t remember setting her down, or handing her over to her mother. I don’t remember walking out the door and getting into my car. My brain blocked out that portion of the memory. A possible defense mechanism that kept me from losing my mind. I don’t remember anything until I found myself in a gas station parking lot buying my first pack of cigarettes in nearly a decade.

Their voices begging me not to go, and to stay home with them has haunted me from that moment on. It reoccurred in nightmares. I heard it always for years. Still hear it all of the time, and it is always like a machete chopping through my chest and splitting my heart in half.

Then their mother was a zombie on a bed, crawling toward me. I was swinging the edge of a shovel at her head. Her skull was splitting open and spraying gunk all over hardwood floors.

Chapter Ten

I opened my eyes when my stomach dropped. I opened them wide. My mouth was open wide, as well. I think Charlene and Allison were both screaming, but it was hard to tell for sure over the sound of my own screams. I didn’t think the descent should have occurred so abruptly. The plane jostled up and down and from side to side. We were either hitting pockets of turbulence, or we were not just low on fuel, but out.

Someone yelled, “Brace yourselves!”

I still held both my daughter and girlfriend’s hands. I knew I might be squeezing too tightly, but could not help it, could not stop. I was scared; terrified. The fact that it felt like we’d been falling for several minutes, and continued falling, was disheartening to say the very least. With each foot we fell, we picked up speed. I wondered if my stomach would stop dropping. It didn’t. Catching my breath was difficult, except for screaming. And we continued to, what felt like plummeting towards earth.

I kept thinking about the landing gear. Did it go up when we took off? Had it been lowered as we fell? Were we pointing straight down? Would we just smash and explode on impact?

Closing my eyes and keeping them closed made the most sense. I couldn’t do it. I needed to see what was happening. I did not like not being in control. Sitting back here and not up at the controls irritated my OCD.

I turned my head to look at my daughter. Her eyes were tightly shut. Her mouth was pulled down into a frown, and then opened wide into an O. She might be screaming, but I couldn’t tell. I could not hear her over the whine of engines. I wanted to hold her, hug her. She shouldn’t die this way, should never have to live through something this catastrophic either. No one deserved it, but she didn’t deserve it the most.