The Last Flight(16)

Eva had only a split second to make the decision. She could see how she’d do it. Step to the side and lean against the wall and fake another phone call. She’d be just another traveler, consumed with her own life, on her way somewhere new. She could leave the airport, head into Brooklyn and find a hair salon willing to take a walk-in wanting to dye her hair brown. Then pay cash for a later flight using Claire’s ID. There could easily be two Claire Cooks, traveling to two completely different destinations. And once she landed and disappeared, the data would become irrelevant.

And so would she.





Claire


Tuesday, February 22

It isn’t until an hour into the flight that my heart stops pounding, that I take the first deep breath I’ve had in years. I glance at my watch. The plane I’m expected to be on is somewhere over the Atlantic right now, thousands of miles away. I picture it landing in Puerto Rico, taxiing into the terminal and discharging vacationers, Eva slipping by everyone, invisible. Rory will have discovered what was in the FedEx package by now, and when he starts to look for me, he’ll be searching for Claire Cook or Amanda Burns. He doesn’t have a clue who Eva James is. It was almost too easy.

A memory arrives, of a night when I was thirteen, sitting on the porch with my mother. I’d been the target of a group of popular girls for several weeks. They followed me, whispering cruel things, waiting until I was alone in the hallway or the bathroom to deliver their cutting remarks. My mother had wanted to intervene, but I wouldn’t let her, believing that would only make it worse. “I wish I could just disappear,” I’d whispered. Together we watched a three-year-old Violet run around the small yard, the roses swaying in the slight evening breeze.

“If you pay attention, Claire, solutions always appear. But you have to be brave enough to see them,” she’d said, plucking my hand out of my lap and squeezing it in hers.

Her words had confused me then. But I realize now she’d been giving me advice to hang on to, for later. I’d been trapped between two terrifying choices—Rory’s anger or the kind of people Nico might have sent to help me—and then Eva came along and pulled me out.

I think about Eva, of what she’s lost, and I hope that wherever she ends up, she can find a way to be at peace with herself. I picture her escaping to a remote village somewhere, finding a small house by the ocean, her blond hair contrasting with skin darkened by a sun that cascades like forgiveness across her shoulders. Far away from everything. A fresh start, like the one I’m hoping to create for myself.

How extraordinary that we found each other.

A bubble of joy tumbles around inside of me, and I laugh out loud, startling the man sitting next to me. “Sorry,” I say, and turn toward the window, watching the land below us transform from city into large stretches of farmland, the miles between me and Rory growing with every second.

*

Six hours later, the plane bumps down in Oakland. We circled over San Francisco, and though the pilot pointed out landmarks such as the Bay Bridge and the Transamerica building, they’d barely registered amidst my excitement. I wait my turn to deplane, the crowd of people pressing in on me, and close my eyes, thinking of a game Violet and I used to play called Would You Rather. We’d spend hours creating impossible, hilarious choices: Would you rather eat ten cockroaches or have liver for dinner every night for a year? I smile to myself, wondering what Violet and I might come up with now. Would you rather be married to an abusive but rich man or start over somewhere new, with no money and no identity? The decision seems easy to me.

Finally, the door opens and people start to file off the plane. I take my place among them, pulling my cap low over my eyes, at least until I’m out of the airport and away from security cameras. The first thing I need to do is call Petra and tell her I’m in Oakland. And then find a cheap motel that won’t ask a lot of questions. With only four hundred dollars in my wallet, I have to be smart.

When we deplane, I slip around everyone and go in search of a pay phone. But when I get beyond the gates, I realize something’s different. Several clumps of people are gathered around television monitors in the various bars and restaurants, hushed.

Something must have happened.

I sidle up to a group outside Chili’s and peer over people’s shoulders. The television is set to a cable news station, but the volume is turned down. A somber-looking woman is talking, and the screen flashes her name—Hillary Stanton, NTSB Senior Communications Officer. I read the closed-captioning at the bottom of the screen.

We don’t know yet what caused the crash, and it’s too early to say.

The screen cuts to a news anchor, and I get a glimpse of the headline banner that was previously covered by the black closed-captioning text.

The Crash of Flight 477.

I read it again, trying to rearrange the words to mean something different.

Flight 477 was my flight to Puerto Rico.

I push closer. More text flashes up, this time from the anchor.

Authorities won’t speculate on the cause of the crash just yet, though they have indicated the unlikelihood of any survivors. Flight 477 was heading to Puerto Rico, with 96 passengers on board.

The picture flashes to a live shot of the ocean, pieces of wreckage floating on the surface.

The ground seems to move beneath me, and I wobble into the man standing next to me. He steadies my elbow and hangs on long enough to make sure I don’t fall. “You okay?” he asks.