“Would you like some coffee, darling?”
A blonde flight attendant with a gap in between her front teeth seems to be talking to me. She’s holding out a white mug with the purple and yellow ‘Journey Airlines’ logo carved into the side. She cradles the white porcelain as if it’s her own baby.
“Sure,” I murmur, and I reach for the mug over the two people in my row. Of course I get stuck with the window seats. I always end up with the things or places that no one wants. I grab the mug, then lower it into the cup holder on my tray table.
The coffee in the mug shakes a little as the plane soars through the air. I’ve never been much of a coffee person. Still, black coffee would do. After all, I needed to wake up.
The flight attendant gives the overweight man with balding hair in the aisle seat a mug before scooting to the next row. She starts the same procedure over again.
I can hear the in-flight movie playing through the earphones from the person sitting next to me. Some really bad romantic comedy is playing on the overhead TV.
“I’ve got to make her notice me.”
“But dude, you’re a geek. How is she going to notice you? It’s not like you can sprout attractiveness overnight. Look, if I were you, I would…I would….”
'“You would what??”
“I don’t know. How about you write her a letter?”
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!
I to the R to the O to the N to the Y. What does that SPELL?
I immediately think of the crumpled, dirty paper that’s stuffed in the left pocket of my jeans. It’s some sort of monster.
It’s like HE purposely put a spell on everything during this flight so it reminded me of that stupid letter. He knew I didn’t want to do it. He knew that I didn’t like her.
* * * * * * * * * * *
My father got my mother knocked up the summer of eighty-nine. She was seventeen. She was going to be a senior that year. She was smart, beautiful, and witty. People debated about what school she would pick to go to, after all, she was most likely going to be valedictorian. Stanford? Yale? Princeton? Harvard? And what would she major in? Law? Physics? Medicine?
But my parents had sex in a black El Camino. They’d only been dating for two weeks. Yet my father, like most seventeen year olds, wanted to take their relationship to the next level.
Thus, I was brought into this world nine months later, on a blustery, rainy April night. My mom missed three weeks of school, and didn’t make up enough homework to make top grades. Her valedictorian status? GONE.
Now she had to worry about a baby. Cathy Marks had never wanted a baby. Her parents had basically forced celibacy on her at an early age. When she told them she was pregnant, they disowned her. She lived with my dad and his family in their house until she gave birth.
After that, Dad’s family collected the little money they had and bought my parents an apartment. Apparently, the Johnsons’ couldn’t afford to feed another mouth.
Both Mom and Dad dropped out of school. Dad worked as a mechanic at a local garage while Mom waitressed at a Denny’s. Senior year ended that June, but neither of my parents received a diploma.
Five months later, my Mom fell in love. That’s right, she left a couple days after Thanksgiving and jumped on a Vespa that a guy with greasy, black hair was driving.
And I never saw Cathy Marks again.
* * * * * * * * * *
Grace,
I wish you could’ve picked up my phone calls, or my texts, or my e-mails, but since you didn’t, I decided to write you a letter. I hope they deliver this to you; I’ve heard college mail tends to be confusing.
Your mom died this week. Your real mom. I know you really haven’t wanted to hear about her, but she died from a heart attack on Tuesday. As much as I know you dislike her, she asked in her will for you to receive some or her personal things.
Cathy’s mom bought you round trip plane tickets to and from San Diego. I put them in the envelope with this letter. The viewing’s Saturday, and I was told they’re going to cremate her. They want you to spread her ashes.
Besides that, how’s school going? Is your dorm nice?
I miss you cupcake,
Dad
* * * * * * * * * *
I crumple the dirty paper and squish it into my pocket.
Idon’twanttodothis.Idon’twanttodothis.Idon’twanttodothis.Idon’twanttodothis.
I really wish my mom could’ve forgotten that I’d existed when writing her will. That way I wouldn’t have to do this.
Anyway, why would she want me to come to her funeral? I didn’t really know her at all. The last time I’d seen her I was eight months old. It’d been nineteen years.
Now I’d have to see her in a jar, a pile of gray ashes.
The flight attendant comes back towards our row, out of mugs of coffee. She’s scowling at the bathroom door.
A scene in a flashy club is playing on the overhead TV. A girl in a sparkly pink dress is grinding against a guy in a mohawk.
I feel my heart racing. The crazy part of my brain imagines me prying open one of the plane’s windows and jumping out. It would totally get me out of this whole funeral thing.
But I can’t turn around now. Not only am I thirty thousand feet in the air, but the windows are solid.
* * * * * * * * * * *
“Please fasten your seat belts, we are beginning our descent into San Diego International Airport. Thanks for flying with Journey Airlines, and I hope you choose to fly with us during your next trip.”
The pilot gets off the intercom, and the cabin of the plane is almost completely silent. Besides the engines, none of the passengers make any noise.
My ears pop, and every hundred feet my stomach flips like a flapjack.
I’ve never liked plane landings, but the prospect of having to face my dead mother is worse.
I grip onto my seat belt and fasten my tray table. The passenger next to me with the earphones has put them in her purse, while the balding fat man finally wakes up from a nap.
We fly through thick, cirrus clouds, and the whole plane looks like it’s covered in white.
I close my eyes and think to myself.
MomIwishyoudidn’tleave
Mom I wish you didn’t leave.
Mom, I wish you didn’t leave.
A tear rolls down my cheek.
