Flight #116 Is Down Read online

  Tears blinded Laura.

  For a moment she was utterly useless.

  She wiped the tears away fiercely with the back of her wrist and gritted her teeth. She would not cry. She would do her job. She would do what she could.

  Laura’s family was, as her father put it, “very lapsed” Roman Catholic. She had been to Mass no more than a half dozen times in her seventeen years. She had been a spectator at somebody else’s sport. Now, as she wrote down the pulse—it wasn’t strong—and took the blood pressure—it wasn’t good—Laura prayed for the first time in her life. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, prayed Laura. Let her be okay.

  Saturday: 7:59 P.M.

  There is, thought Heidi, an element of Opening Night to this show. We all went to separate dress rehearsals. We all know a little bit of the script, but not quite enough to get it all together. Because it’s a disaster. That’s what a disaster is, I guess. When something is too wrong to make it all right. When you can do your very best, hundreds of you, and still fall short.

  “Grab this side!” said a fireman suddenly, loudly.

  Heidi jumped up from Carly’s side and caught one end of a stretcher. The patient on it had not been strapped down right and had started falling off. Heidi went out to the ambulance to be sure nothing else happened.

  She was completely unprepared for the scene in the courtyard.

  TV people had arrived, and their amazingly brilliant lights were being used to illuminate the scene. They were busily interviewing and filming and peering into vehicles and faces. They offended her. How dare they? People were in pain, they were afraid, they were bloody, their clothes were torn—and they were photographed without permission anyway.

  She almost stormed over and ordered them off her property.

  And yet, in some way, it was not her property.

  It was a plane crash; it was everybody’s property.

  As the ambulance doors slammed and the vehicle pulled off, Heidi heard a television reporter speaking into a microphone. “The Dove House Crash is the worst in recent memory,” said the woman, in that strong carrying voice people got when they had an audience.

  The Dove House Crash, thought Heidi.

  No. Please. Don’t name this after my house! I don’t want to be in magazines and histories like that. The Sioux City crash, the Avianca crash, the Lockerbie, Scotland, crash.… The Dove House Crash.

  She had looked so intensely at the reporter that the woman turned, saw Heidi, and took a step closer. Heidi fled. The last thing she wanted to do was be filmed when she looked like this. The thought of how she must look made Heidi ill. She headed back to Carly’s side again, only to be stopped at her very own front door.

  “Sorry, miss,” said a policeman firmly. “We’re not letting anybody in.”

  “I live here,” said Heidi.

  “Right,” he said sarcastically.

  She probably looked like a dead mouse. They would probably interview Darienne, thinking Darienne lived here. They’d probably let Darienne come and go like the Queen of England. She said, “Really, I’m Heidi Landseth; it’s my house.”

  “Do you have identification?” he said. He actually said that. Heidi could have slugged him.

  “It is her house, Dave,” said the fireman HARRIS, the first uniformed personnel she’d met on the scene.

  They all laughed. Heidi’s was forced.

  “Nice of you to drop in,” said Dave, apologizing.

  “Why aren’t you letting people in the house, though?” she said.

  He smiled sadly. “World is full of weirdos. People who want to gawk, people who want to help but will just be in the way, people who want to do a little looting while the doors are open.”

  Saturday: 8:05 P.M.

  Patrick reached down to help tighten the stretcher straps.

  “I’ll do that,” said the burly man shouldering Patrick out of the way. Patrick was too big to shoulder away, and he glared at the man.

  “It’s nice of you young people to try to help,” said the man, “but now that trained personnel are on the scene, the best thing for you to do is stay out of the way.”

  I’ll deck him, thought Patrick. I’ll redivide his ribs. I’ll—

  “You heard the man,” the paramedic said sharply to Patrick. “This is not a game, kid. This is life and death. Now get out of the way.”

  Patrick said, “I’m fully trained. I’m an EMT. Have been for two years. I had a hundred and ninety hours of—”

  The men paid no attention to him.

  The patient said, “He’s only a boy? I thought he was older. Thank goodness you men are here.”

  Patrick wanted to kick right through the stretcher. It took a real effort to remember that this was not good patient/rescuer protocol. He held his breath, tightened his jaw, and backed away. He had to look down at his hands to order the fists to uncurl.

  He found his father. “Dad, they’re trying to kick me out.”

  “Who?”

  “Adults.”

  His father simply nodded. “You’ll have to accept it.”

  “What? Dad!”

  “Patrick, they do have more experience, they do have more training, you are younger. No escaping those facts. This is not the time or the place to discuss it. Plenty of work to do that doesn’t involve wounded.”

  His own father. Patrick couldn’t believe it. It was years since he had had a screaming match with his own father. In fact, he vividly remembered the last swear-slinging. Patrick had gotten into a fight with the ref at a soccer game, when Patrick was called out sides and he wasn’t. His father’d dragged him off the field, practically strangling Patrick by his T-shirt, saying, “Whether he’s right or wrong doesn’t count, son, he’s the referee. Shut your mouth.”

  Patrick had not shut his mouth. Patrick had hauled out every word he knew to arouse adult rage. Patrick had also been grounded for the rest of the soccer season, by both parent and coach.

  The words came back to him, and the urge to scream at the top of his lungs was so strong he actually put the back of his hand against his lips to cut it off.

  His father didn’t even notice, just strode off. He had things to do. Whereas Patrick, his own son, his own flesh and blood, had been kicked off the team. And his father wasn’t going to do a thing about it.

  Heidi said, “I know how you feel. I just got refused entry to my own house.”

  “They can’t do that,” said Patrick, slamming his right fist into his left palm.

  “Well, they did,” said Heidi, folding her arms with such ferocity she might have been carving meat.

  They glared fiercely at the world, and since the world was much too busy, they glared at each other. Heidi was suddenly aware of her protruding sulky lower lip, her grinding jaw, her frown-lined forehead. She exploded into laughter. Patrick laughed later, and less, but at least he laughed. He said, “I hate being a kid. All my life I’ve hated being a kid. It’s such a worthless thing to be.”

  Heidi understood but didn’t agree. “I like being a kid,” she said. “But the thing is, you get sick of it before the adults do. They want you to be a child until you’re out of college. I’m ready to quit now.”

  “How old are you?” asked Patrick.

  “Sixteen. I’m a sophomore. I’ve seen you in school.”

  “I’m eighteen in two months. I’m a senior. I live for graduation.”

  She smiled at him, counting off the time. “March, April, May, June. I guess you can live that long.”

  He grinned for real this time, nodding. “What day is your birthday?”

  “May tenth.”

  “Hey, how about that! Mine’s May eleventh. Let’s celebrate together. What do you want for your birthday? I could give you a plane piece.”

  “Sick-o,” she said. “Anyway, they’re mine and I’ll probably be picking them out of my woods for years to come.”

  “Perfume? Scarf? Twisted, perverted videos?”

  “Actually,” said Heidi, “for my birthday you cou
ld sign me up to learn what you learned.”

  “Lady, nobody will ever learn as much as I’ve learned.”

  She laughed. “Uh-huh. I mean rescue. I want to know what you know.”

  “No adult thinks I know anything,” said Patrick gloomily.

  “They will in June, so shut up. Whereas I really don’t know anything. How do I learn?”

  “They run teaching sessions twice a year. You can take the summer one.” He smiled. “I’ll probably be the instructor,” he said. “I mean, who else will have had plane-crash experience?”

  “Me,” she pointed out. “Next time a plane crashes on my land, I’m going to be able to take control and save lives and stop bleeding and back up transport vehicles.”

  “So there,” said Patrick, laughing.

  “Better believe it,” said Heidi.

  Saturday: 8:12 P.M.

  Daniel had a mission now. He could not move; the pain was so great that sometimes he could not really even think, but he had resolved to die bravely. He thought of brave deaths, like Davy Crockett at the Alamo, soldiers at Gettysburg, soldiers in Vietnam or on the beaches on D-Day, and he said to himself, They toughed it out. I’ll tough it out.

  Mrs. Jemmison had managed to get a tiny bit of chocolate bar up to him, and it was melting in his mouth. It was wonderful, he loved it, he wanted to write a hundred letters to the chocolate bar company and tell them they had saved his life.

  That made him smile a little. Nothing was going to save his life.

  “I’m right here,” said Mrs. Jemmison, “I’m just shifting position a little bit.”

  But when she moved, he could see a different angle out of the corner of his eye, and he realized that somebody was helping her put on special gear; fire gear; she was getting into big yellow pants, strapping on a breathing pack, getting ready to lower the big plastic gas mask over her face.

  Nobody said anything.

  They didn’t want to scare him. He could tell that there was pointing and miming going on.

  “Mrs. Jemmison?” said Daniel.

  “I’m here, honey. We’re not going anywhere.”

  “Is the fire starting? Is it near me?” He didn’t feel any heat. He couldn’t hear any crackling or smell actual smoke. He knew the fuel smell was still there, but he had gotten used to it by now.

  She said, “It’s not near you, honey.”

  So there was fire.

  She said, “You were telling me about your family.”

  He said, “Do you have a gun?”

  “No, honey. Why?”

  “If you have to leave me here when it burns, will you shoot me first? I don’t want to feel it burning me.”

  Eleven

  SATURDAY: 8:15 P.M.

  “We’ve got eighteen walking wounded I’d like to see at the hospital,” said the fire chief. His voice crackled on the radio. Ty listened sullenly. The only reason anybody at all had gotten to any hospital at all was because he, Ty, had cleared the road. And was he getting thanks? No. He wasn’t even getting a replacement. The only thrill left in his life was listening to the talk of people actually having a thrill.

  He considered the best way to get even with Laura. It should involve pain and last a long time.

  “We could move ’em in a school bus,” said the unknown voice the fire chief was talking to. “We got enough EMTs to take care of ’em. Practically the whole state responded. Might as well give ’em a job.”

  The fire chief said, “So where’s a school bus at?”

  Ty jumped into the frequency. “I can get the bus up here!” He omitted to mention that he had never driven a bus in his life. He said, “I know where they are.” He omitted to mention that the ten-foot wire corral in which the school buses were kept was locked against vandalism. He definitely did not mention that he, Ty, could pick the lock and had once, in his junior-high years, keyed a school bus to demonstrate his hatred of school in general. He hadn’t been caught, which was one of Ty’s mottoes in life.

  “Who’s this?” said the fire chief.

  “Ty Maronn.”

  “Get it,” said the fire chief.

  In the dark road, Ty leapt into the air, failed to click his heels, but did at least land upright. He whirled, his grin burgeoning to encompass his entire body: even his chest, expanding as he ran, felt friendlier toward the world. Maybe he would let Laura live after all.

  Ty raced back to his parked truck, planning his bus theft. Which school bus should he take, the good new one with automatic or that old one with hard seats but the best heater?

  At last, at last, he had something to do.

  Saturday: 8:19 P.M.

  “Hey!” shouted the policeman.

  Heidi and Patrick looked at him from across the courtyard.

  “Me?” said Heidi, eyebrows lifted to question, finger pointing to her own chest.

  “You!”

  “They’re probably going to accuse you of looting,” said Patrick. “You’d probably better not even go to your room and brush your hair.”

  They grinned at each other and jogged over to the policeman.

  “Can you round up your dogs?” said the policeman plaintively. “They are all over the house. Especially the little ones. The little yippy ones make me want to—uh—” he quit talking, pasting a fake smile on his face.

  “Me, too,” Heidi said. “They’re not my dogs, anyway; they’re my mother’s. She has great taste in everything but dogs.”

  Once again she was bounding all over Dove House trying to scoop up Winnie and Clemmie, while yelling “Down, Fang!” It was so humiliating. And now that she thought about it, so was Patrick’s remark about brushing her hair. At the time she thought it was a good joke; now she wondered if he was trying, oh so subtly, to let her know she needed to look in a mirror.

  Patrick, however, did not strike Heidi as a particularly subtle person.

  She had just caught Winnie and was heading for Mrs. Camp’s room to put the dog in for the last time, maybe even tape the door shut, when she saw, in the library, leaning against the elegant marble fireplace, her hair reflecting the civilized little fire somebody had actually started in there, Darienne. Looking beautiful, looking sweet, looking perfect, looking into a TV camera lens.

  Heidi’s mouth fell open.

  They were interviewing the one teenager who really was scum? They were interviewing the one person out of all the hundreds on Dove House land who was not helping?

  Heidi even recognized the interviewer. One of her favorite anchors. Not just some old reporter. An anchor. Somebody Heidi would have been thrilled to meet. Thrilled even to see across a room.

  In my library! thought Heidi. Interviewing Darienne!

  Clemmie wandered innocently by, and Heidi caught the second dog, tucked one under each arm, and headed for the library. She seemed to be holding fringed pillows. The pillows croaked. She really was holding them a bit too tightly.

  “Oh, Darienne?” said Heidi.

  Saturday: 8:20 P.M.—

  Nearing River, Connecticut

  5:20 P.M.—San Diego, California

  Sunday 2:20 A.M.—Geneva, Switzerland

  Alex Landseth struggled to find the ringing telephone in his unfamiliar hotel room. When he finally had it in hand, he could not remember what country he was in, nor what language to respond in. “Hello,” he muttered, blinking, trying to focus on the little glowing digital alarm clock he kept by his bed.

  “Alex!” said his wife urgently. Alex tried to remember where Rebecca was right now. Nothing came to mind. But the sound of the phone—that distant, whistling emptiness—told Alex Landseth it was a world away. “Whassa matter?” he said.

  “There’s been a plane crash.”

  His mind cleared instantly. It wasn’t Rebecca who’d crashed: she was talking. It wasn’t Heidi: Heidi hadn’t been going anywhere. So it was somebody who mattered enough for a middle-of-the-night call, but not the two most important people in Alex’s world. “Who?” he said, sitting up, already
afraid, already shivering.

  “Not who. Where. Our house, Alex! The plane came down in our yard, on top of the rose garden. I just saw a news flash. They’re calling it the Dove House Crash.”

  “Oh my god, Becca! Is Heidi all right? Did it hit the house? Is she hurt? Did you call?”

  “I don’t know. I couldn’t get through. The phone’s busy. I tried the Steins and the Kelleys, and nobody answered.” The Steins and the Kelleys were the only people in Nearing River they really knew.

  Alex Landseth tried to quiet his leaping heart. “Mrs. Camp is there,” he said. “She’ll know what to do.”

  The unspoken statement between them was that Heidi would not know what to do. Heidi mystified and depressed them. She had not turned out to be the daughter they had expected. She was not outstanding at anything. They kept telling themselves she was a late bloomer; she would find herself in a few years; she would develop enthusiasms and talents as a sophomore … well, then, a junior … a senior … in college, maybe …

  “Okay, let’s think,” said Rebecca Landseth. “Who else can I call?”

  “The rector at St. Anne’s?” said Alex. The family went to church three times a year: Christmas Eve, Easter Sunday, and Mother’s Day. Plus they contributed the holly to decorate the churches for Advent.

  “Good idea. He can find out if Heidi’s all right.”

  Alex felt nauseated and ice cold. He huddled under the duvet and wished he were home on their heated waterbed. “They’ll have an information phone line started pretty soon,” said Alex. “They always do for things like this. Keep the TV on, and the minute they put the 800 number up, call. Now, what did the TV show? The house? The plane?”

  “The plane’s a 747,” she began.

  “Of course,” said Alex Landseth. It couldn’t be some ordinary old plane. It had to be the biggest. And he couldn’t be staying tonight in a Hilton, where he’d have a television and with cable be able to pick up US Army stations; no, he had opted for European ambiance and there was no TV in the entire hotel.