Chapter 1

A New Adventure

What we are looking for is what is looking.

St. Francis of Assisi

“Mom! I’ll be all right. Please, don’t fret, it’s only two weeks.”

I look up to see the cabby watching me from the rear view mirror while I’m on the phone. Distracted, he barely misses swerving out of the way of a stopping car ahead.

He looks back to the mirror and catches my eye. I frown at him as I continue my conversation.

“Mom—you always worry when I fly. Nothing is going to happen. I don’t care what the tarot says, mother, nothing is going to happen!”

I look at my nails and realize I need a manicure.

I must make an appointment after I land.

“Go feed Harry. She’s probably ready to go into hibernation, you know she needs to eat something first! Give her cantaloupe; you know how much she loves it. I know mom, I know—yes, I will. I love you, too. I’ll text you when I land. Bye.”

I definitely loved the mother person, but she could be annoying at times. At least I’d discharged my duty and called. I’d be free and clear for the next two weeks.

I flipped the phone shut and put it back into my purse where I traded it for my compact. I briefly scanned my image in its miniature mirror, made some minor adjustments, and put it back.

I looked back to the rear-view mirror in time to catch the cabby averting his eyes back to the road.

This is my life. A peeping Tom in a big yellow taxi drives me to the airport. I am always in the company of strangers, never alone, yet endlessly so.

I sigh at the thought and turn toward the window on my right, staring out at nothing. My mind drifts aimlessly.

I tell myself that it feels safer this way, being alone. There’s nothing to clog the pores. Nothing to get under the skin.

Long ago it was different, but with my hectic schedule and the traveling to and fro across this great big blue marble, I really don’t have the time to develop any long-term relationships.

I’ll be fine, I rationalize to myself.

As long as you keep telling yourself this. The cynical voice of my ever-annoying internal critic chimes in. It sounds strangely like my mother.

I’d decided early on that I don’t do relationships. They just don’t work out for me.

It happens every time. As soon as I settle in with someone and we get past the seeing-each-other-naked-phase, I’m off to China, Hong Kong, or Taiwan for two or three weeks and when I come back, Mr. I-Thought-You-Were-Made-for-Me has moved on and doesn’t even bother letting me know.

Maybe it’s you, the irritating voice says.

So, for the time being, I’ve given up on relationships altogether, impossible things that they are. And though I’m alone in a taxi heading for the airport, I really don’t mind at all.

Yeah, right! And if you believe that, I’ve got this bridge from London I can sell you—oh wait—sorry, I forgot, they sold it to the state of Arizona! The voice retorts.

I refuse to rise to the bait and engage the incessant internal battle. Thankfully, because I’ve ignored it, my internal critic slips into the quiet folds of my mind.

Out the cab window, I see a dark gray blur on the Pacific Ocean horizon that I know is the San Juan Islands.

North and behind me, Victoria, British Columbia calls to me across the distance with the sounds of ferry horns and gulls crying, a place I would live if it weren’t so isolated from the working world. A one-way three-hour ferry commute is out of the question, and though I make a good salary, daily trips by seaplane would soon make it pointless.

For now, my three-bedroom, two-bath condominium on Alpine Crest Loop in Mt. Vernon with a celebrated view of the Cascades is as close to nature as I can get. Someday maybe more, but not now.

Out the front window, I see drizzles and dreariness; another monotone Skagit County day no different from the countless others just like it. Gray and smudgy around the edges, the sky spits at me every which way I look.

I hunger for the feel of the sun and the touch of it on my skin, hot and warm like a lover. A lover who is always faithful. A lover who is always there, even if at a distance. A lover who will never let me down.

I know I should feel better since I’m on my way to my first vacation and some real sun in three years; but something feels off, not quite right, like a run inching its way up my nylon every time I move.

Maybe mom’s crazy tarot cards are right.

It started early in the morning as a tickle on the back of my head creeping forward on my scalp; but I deliberately ignored it because I wasn’t going to let anything come between me and my first real vacation in a long time.

Coming out of a daze, I find myself focusing on the back of the cab driver’s neck.

As I look at his neck, I realize that you can tell a lot about a person by their neck. The cabby has a short neck. Short-necked people don’t take chances. Short-necked people seemed fixed and set in their ways. Their thoughts never seem to stray far from their bodies.

Staring at his neck irritates me. I feel my jaw tighten.

The cabby messes with the radio dial as an oldies station suddenly pumps music through a blown speaker in the dash. The cabby must be deaf because it sounds like the songs are playing inside a kazoo. I feel my irritation rising.

“Saturday in the park, I think it was the Fourth of July—” blasts through the kazoo; and even as bad as it sounds, it sends me reeling headlong into the past, the replay button on the internal video automatically activated.

Leave it to Chicago.

The image pops into my head, and I see Connor as if it was yesterday and not nine years ago. His sandy hair is skewed and dragging at his collar.

I realize that Connor doesn’t have a short neck. His is a perfect neck well served by his longish hair. His is a neck that begs for arms around it. I remembered that I couldn’t find a thing wrong with him and how much that scared me. I couldn’t believe that a guy like him would even be with someone like me.

Deeply embedded in my memory, it all comes back to me in a rush of feelings, songs, and smells.

The memory comes to me like something that happened yesterday. I remembered that we’d discovered an old music store downtown. Even now, I can still smell the dank mustiness of old cardboard boxes and damp wood. Tucked away in a corner in the back, Connor unearthed a timeworn display case stuffed with vinyl albums from our parent’s era. He pulls out albums making jokes at some of the bizarre covers; we both laugh until we come across Chicago II.

“I love this album,” he says.

“Me, too!” I reply in amazement. “No guy I know likes Chicago.”

“Well, this one does. My mom used to play it all the time when I was growing up.”

“So did mine!” I exclaim. Glowing green eyes meet mine in a mid-air embrace. My stomach does a three-sixty as if on a Magic Mountain roller coaster.

“It makes me feel good inside. Let’s buy it!” he says as we head toward checkout.

“That’ll be a dollar-six,” says the clerk as we scraggle for change, “I’m getting rid of the whole kit and caboodle, as no one buys albums anymore. I’ll give you a deal if you want anything else.”

“No thanks,” Connor says as we both put fifty-three cents on the counter. “We’re heading for the beach.”

We’d done it: we committed our first act as a couple. We now shared joint custody of Chicago II. At that moment, I fell madly and completely in love.

After that, I remember we walked along Ocean Beach just north of the pier at the water’s edge. I’d taken my shoes off so that I could feel the sand squish up between my toes and the water still felt reasonably warm.

Though already mid-December, it was a typical So Cal sunny afternoon. I’d learned quickly that San Diego winters meant wearing a long-sleeve t-shirt with your shorts and sandals. I don’t think I’d met a local that owned a woolen winter coat, unless they were in the Navy. Most wore car coats and light windbreakers.

It was my junior year at State. I remembered dreading going back to Washington. Neither one of us wanted to go home on Christmas break that year; we wanted to be with the other.

Connor stopped along the ocean’s edge and raised his arm toward the sea, pointing.

“Look, Madison, can you see them?” “What?” I looked to where he pointed.

“Here they come again. You can only see them when the tide turns like this and the waves break short of shore then come in long and low.”

He moved behind me and placed a hand on my left shoulder as he pointed across my right so that I could easily follow.

An alligator clip gripped my long hair atop my head. I could feel his soft breath on my neck. A warm rush cascaded through me.

“See—right there, now watch—watch the waves as they come closer to shore—tell me you see them! Blur your eyes a bit and use your artist’s eye,” he said.

I followed along his arm, more entranced with his breathing on my neck than where he pointed. I blurred my eyes to try to see what he saw.

“Tell me you see them!”

“I see them,” I said excitedly. As if by magic, the long line of the wave rushed toward us like a miniature herd of white buffalo kicking up dust as it stampeded into shore.

That night we ate dinner in an Italian restaurant at a table covered by a red-checkered cloth and adorned with a single candle stuck in a basket-wrapped Chianti bottle smothered in multi-hued wax drippings.

We sat looking into each other’s eyes for what seemed to be hours, without saying much. It felt like a scene right out of Lady and the Tramp, but that was a cartoon and this was real life. The only thing missing was the shared strand of spaghetti, the fat waiter, and a starry night’s view.

I walked on air. I’d never felt this way before. It felt as if my insides melted into Jell-O, sending tingling shock waves throughout my body.

I remembered we moved in together that winter break and we were in love. For Christmas, he sculpted a seal on a rock out of a solid piece of soft wood for me. He used to call me his brown seal because I tanned so easily and I loved to body surf.

I painted him an abstract. It defined my view of life.

“Miss—where do ya wanna be dropped—what termn’l?” The cabby’s voice punched holes in my dream bubble, like bullets piercing tin cans. The interruption brought me back to the moment.

“American,” I said quickly.

In a hurry to get to the next customer, he pulled up to the curb, jumped out the door before the car settled into park, yanked my luggage out of the trunk, and placed it on the sidewalk in under twenty seconds with time to spare.

Why did cabbies rush so? At least he unloaded my luggage for me. Most of them made me do it.

“That’s fifty-three ninety, lady,” I saw his outstretched hand in front of my face as I stepped out of the cab. Digging in my purse, I handed him sixty dollars. Six-ten wasn’t that big of a tip, being a tad over ten percent, but I didn’t have any more singles, and I surely wasn’t giving him a twenty.

“Keep the change,” I said, thinking about his short neck.

I stacked my overnighter on top of my big suitcase, pulled out the suitcase handle, leaned the whole thing over on its wheels, and began my trek toward check in.

As I pulled my luggage behind me, it bobbed and bounced from wheel to wheel catching on every insignificant flaw in the cement. It seemed to grow little hands that grabbed at every crack in the sidewalk in a vain attempt to stay on the ground. Again, I felt that tickle crawl up my neck to sit on the crown of my head.

At check-in, I found the plane delayed and no need to rush anymore. I got my boarding pass and poured myself into a seat in one of the end rows near the gate. After wrestling with my luggage and memories of Connor, arrival at the boarding gate felt anti-climatic. The last few moments drained from my body like water after a shower, and I relaxed.

I turned off my personal cell phone and was thankful that I left my Blackberry in the office. No one could bother me.

This would be my private getaway from my work family and I would allow nothing to disturb me. The anticipation of a two-week date with the sun in the Bahamas while living at no one’s beck and call lured me like a siren’s song.

I pulled a magazine from my large Louis Vuitton Neverfull purse. My boss gave it to me especially for this trip. As I opened up my InStyle magazine, I casually glanced over the top of it and couldn’t help but notice an odd-looking couple sitting across from me.

The man, small and non-descript, did not fit well with the large and overbearing woman. They didn’t look at all like they should be a couple, and yet I knew them to be one because of the demeaning way in which she spoke to him.

She made her voice loud enough that anyone could hear that wanted to, taking in at least four or more rows with its reach. She lifted her index finger and shook it to make her point as she spoke.

“I told you. You always plan these trips and every time, every time something goes wrong. You are a complete idiot. An idiot!”

Her make-up had smudged and melted into her fat creases giving her an evil look. She frowned wickedly, which caused deeply etched and soon-to-be permanent marionette lines to frame her mouth.

Her bleached blond hairy upper lip served equally as well as an eyebrow above her large and now temporarily closed mouth.

I’m always amazed at women who think bleaching a hairy lip is better than removing the hair altogether. Dark haired women need to wax, not bleach; bleaching just makes the hair more obvious.

I watched over the top of my magazine as she turned away from him in a snit. She crossed fat arms atop a heaving chest resting them on her protruding and low-slung breasts. An even bigger belly served to prop them up. To me, she appeared as ugly on the outside as what I heard spewing from her insides.

I felt sorry for the bespectacled husband. He shrunk deeper into himself every time she spoke, his shoulders jerking at the blows of her words.

Like a terrified rabbit, he frantically looked around himself as if waiting for a chance to break free, but his glasses kept slipping down his nose, trapping him in its repetitive motion.

Each time they slipped, he nervously pushed them up the bridge of his nose with the side of his index finger until the next time. The poor man simply needed new glasses.

And, he needed a new wife.

She turned and spoke to him again.

“Why can’t you do just one thing right? Harry—sit up straight when I’m talking to you!”

She reached over to pull him up as he bobbed away from her. You could tell the motion was part of a pattern between them as she kept on with her lecture, not noticing he’d dipped out of reach.

“I knew I should have married John when I had the chance. At least I’d be living in a mansion with servants to wait on me. I wouldn’t be trying to scrape together a decent living on your pitifully minute salary. Thank goodness, your mother put some money aside.”

She pursed her lips together and scrutinized the room, breathing heavily with the exertion of talking. I dropped my eyes to my magazine as she glanced past me. Her stare felt like a searchlight from a prison wall hunting for anything amiss; luckily, she took no other prisoners.

Though she carried a Gucci bag and wore shoes from Italy, her clothes were ill fit. She didn’t realize or didn’t care that she wore something too small and for a younger woman. It definitely was expensive, I could tell by the cut of the cloth, but I would not have recommended the garish florescent green for her size.

Her browbeaten man, a pitiful creature, wore nothing but Wal-Mart knock-offs. I knew their clothing and their accessories; as VP of Purchasing for Hillagos, a high-end West Coast retail department store, it was my job to know.

He appeared to be nothing more than a shipping and receiving clerk or some other non-descript person from a large company, spending long hours in a room with no windows with others of his kind.

Maybe he had evolved, as a point of survival, to blend in with his surroundings whenever needed, much like a wild jackrabbit frozen in fright in a summer’s meadow.

Only he wasn’t blending now.

I could see the woman planned on badgering this poor soul for the whole journey, and I didn’t want to be near them and be subject to any more of her negativity, as I might say something out of hand; so I got up and moved to another seat.

I scooted my overnight bag behind me as I threw both my laptop and purse straps over my shoulder and hunkered for a better spot.

I found a seat in the middle of the waiting area and settled back in. An aisle away on my right, two college-age girls engaged in conversation.

“Whoa, dude!” One slinky girl said to the other. “Can you believe it? I’ve gained five pounds just sitting here.”

I saw them jointly scrutinize an iPhone, heads bent together.

“I log everything I eat into this thing so I can keep track of when I need to purge!”

“Purge—isn’t that like—throwing up? Eeeeeww!”

“Well, yeah!”

“Why do you do it?”

“Dude—look at me, I’m like totally fat!”

“Sue—you are not; you’re not fat at all. In fact, I think you’re kinda skinny.”

“What would you know anyway, Sar-ah?” Sue threw her head to her right as her hair swung behind her back and hung in long oily and stringy strands. She turned her chin back over her shoulder and shrewd eyes appraised Sarah in a head-to-toe look that implied Sarah was the one overweight.

“Looks like you could lose a few, dude.” Sue said.

Sarah hung her head down and avoided Sue’s face.

I looked closely at the two, noticing that while Sarah looked heavier, she wasn’t overweight by any means.

“If that’s the way you feel about it—you can wait for me here. I need to make room for all those margaritas I plan on having,” she said.

As she moved toward the restroom, I could see that her retro hip-hugger bell-bottoms barely clung to her jutting bony hips. Her spine clearly stood out between her pants and crop top like blunt and fossilized shark teeth, jagged testament to her very serious problem.

Sarah gently lifted her eyes toward me as I discreetly averted my face to a view of the tarmac, where I kept my focus for a while.

If the young are our future, where is the world headed? Can’t we go anywhere without our gadgets anymore? Now young anorexics used their electronics to maintain their diseases.

I pulled my laptop closer.

A deep bass voice broke across the room.

“I am not! You can go alone!”

An unkempt, beefy man on the other side of the girls with wolf head tattoos on both upper arms stood up from his seat, knocking over the overnight bag that sat on the floor next to him.

“I will not put up with your ‘effin complaints anymore, woman.”

The man towered over a petite woman sitting next to him. She looked hastily around the room and grabbed at the man’s hand to pull him back into his seat as she spoke softly. I couldn’t catch what she said.

“No, not until you apologize.”

I didn’t hear what the woman said, but the man sat back down, puffing out his chest as he did so.

A woman’s shrill voice pierced the air.

I turned toward the outburst. Am I in Hell? I thought this is supposed to be an airport. I must have booked a flight on Dysfunctionals United. It was beginning to wear on me.

“Delayed? Are you kidding me?”

All heads turned to look at the woman.

Obvious to anyone paying attention, this was exactly the effect she intended.

“Yes, Ms., the plane is delayed. If you could take a—”

“Who in the hell are you to talk to me that way? Don’t you know who I am?”

The woman surveyed the room again to ensure her audience paid attention.

“I am Lucy Wright and I will have you know that my father built and sold this airline before your parents even thought about you.”

“That may be so Ms. Wright, but I must ask—”

The Lucy Wright person kept on talking, steamrolling the counter attendant while rudely interrupting, “In his day, there were no delayed flights, no waiting customers, and definitely no snippy counter attendants. And I might add—I flew free.” Lucy Wright spoke as if she’d prepared the speech ahead of time.

“I could get genetically engineered wings for the prices you’re charging. Since the plane is late, will there be any credit for this wait? Any miles I can add to my account?”

Lucy Wright annoyingly tapped her fingers on the counter, her acrylic nails sounding more like the clicking of a very large cat’s claws as it walked across a tile floor. Obviously an impatient sort, she followed the counter attendant’s every move as if ready to pounce on her next meal.

Not getting the response she wanted, the arrogant woman rotated toward the room to see if she still held her audience. Most people had already turned away from the conversation, not that they couldn’t hear it, they just chose to ignore it. I felt embarrassed for her.

“Hey rich bitch, why don’t you just shut up and sit down like the rest of us?” the Wolf Man said from his seat. “We could care less who you are. We’re just as much delayed as you are.”

The auburn-haired woman ignored his outburst and looked elsewhere. She took one look at the skinny college girls, banishing them as quickly as her eyes could pass over them. She completely ignored the Wolf Man and his demure wife and then spotted me.

Flashing her biggest smile, she pulled her overnight case behind her like an errant dog on a leash and headed straight for me. I mentally whispered don’t see me, don’t sit here, don’t see me— as I shuffled for something in my purse.

I heaved a sigh of relief when she passed by me and took a seat down from me, next to an older guy who appeared gay. Not that I would know that. He was just too good-looking to be straight. His clothes were color-coordinated and his socks matched his shirt. Neatly groomed and thoroughly engrossed in a book, he ignored Ms. Wright.

She sat down with a pout on her red lips that looked bee-stung.

Fat injections.

On closer examination, she had no wrinkles for someone of her age, whatever age that might be. She had that waxy-face-stuck-in-one position-look like that of a doll with sculpted cheeks and thick puffy lips.

I found no ounce of character on her face anywhere. How old could she be? Her cheeks pulled up into her ears (which seemed lower than normal, proof of a face job), and her lips were more than bee-stung. They looked as if several bumblebees had at them.

I couldn’t figure out the women of today who were overly obsessed with their appearance. Funny that, it was my job to ensure our store stocked the soft goods they wanted.

Myself, I preferred the more natural look and frankly, a great smile could do wonders for any face. Only, her face looked as if it would break if she cracked a smile.

The overhead speakers blared Chicago music (what was up with that?) in from somewhere and it made me think of Connor again. I still see his face, uncomplicated, clean, and gorgeous—Brad Pitt gorgeous. But I left him behind. I told myself he wasn’t good enough for me—the truth of it—I felt I wasn’t good enough for him.

I never even said goodbye.

I felt a pain deep in my chest and my stomach turned over. Why did this always seem to happen, this journey into the past, when I didn’t have enough to keep my mind busy?

This is not the way I want my vacation to start.

A voice from the loudspeaker interrupted my thoughts before they took their chance to pull up another reel from the past and rerun it.

“First class passengers may now line up to board Flight 41 for Nassau City.”

Chapter 2

Meanderings

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

George Bernard Shaw

Ms. Wright pushed to the front of the line as if her father still owned the airline. Wolf Man jumped in line behind her, dragging his mousy wife.

I didn’t rush to get in line but ended up behind the gay man who shyly smiled at me before facing forward.

I looked at everyone in line and they all appeared so formal to me. Face forward, hands at side, about a foot or two between each person. It seems that because we’ve all agreed to relax the encroachment rules of the outer edges of our personal bubbles to stand in line, we stiffen up instead. I’m a person that likes to get the conversation going, share a laugh or two while waiting thus, but with this group, I wasn’t so sure.

I watched the flight attendant take Ms. Wright’s boarding pass and then open the velvet rope to let her through to the plane.

“Well it’s about time,” Lucy Wright said as the flight attendant flashed back a raised-eyebrow look.

Wolf Man pulled his wife behind him, impatiently waiting for their stubs, and then hurried after Ms. Wright, following her as if a man bent on taming a wild horse.

The flight attendant ignored them and turned toward the gay man whom she greeted with a smile that could light a room.

“Richard—it’s so good to see you again, I hope you enjoy your flight. I have your favorite foods all ready for you.”

“Thank you Alice. I always get the best service with your airline.”

“You know we’re here to please. Don’t hesitate to ask if you need anything, I’ll be your attendant in first class.”

A little man in a dark overcoat and fedora pushed himself in front of me as I stepped forward.

“Excuse you,” I said pointedly to him. I couldn’t help myself—I’d my fill of rude people.

“Excuse you. I’m always fifth in line wherever I go.” He turned and spoke directly to me, “Would you please stand back a bit, you’re too close for my comfort.”

I took a step back if only to remove myself from his bubble. His thin and scratchy voice annoyed me like fingernails on a chalkboard.

The man fiddled with his briefcase oddly snapping one of the locks open and shut five times. Then he snapped the other open and shut five times.

“And how are you again, Mr. Hardigan? It’s been a while since you’ve joined us for the Bahamas’ jaunt.”

Mr. Hardigan looked out from under the brim of his hat at the lovely woman. I caught the edge of a smile that quickly disappeared from the man’s face. The attendant moved to his side to shield me from seeing any more.

“My wife’s sick and I need to get out of town. Her mother’s been staying with us and it’s just one too many women in my house for a while, if you know what I mean. No insult intended, Alice.”

“And none taken. Your towels and chocolates are ready at your seat, and I’ve placed the reserved sign on it for you. I made sure that the cleaning crew vacuumed it five times.”

“Thank you, Alice—you take such good care of me.”

Mr. Hardigan hunched over his briefcase and grabbed his overnight bag, furtively looking five times one way and then the next before scurrying down the tube to the plane, bobbing about from side to side like a rat sniffing at the side walls of a maze in hopes of finding cheese.

“And whom do we have here? I see it’s someone new!” Alice turned her radiant smile toward me.

“Madison Reeves, ma’am.”

As I leaned in to hand her my ticket, my laptop swung precariously forward on my shoulder; her strong hand grabbed it before it fell and hit the floor.

“Here you go, Ms. Reeves,” she said as she handed me the strap to my laptop

“Thank you,” I said, feeling a tad foolish.

Alice’s hand brushed mine and for a moment, it felt as if a wave of energy passed through me and shed light into the deepest and darkest corners of my soul. Just as quickly it was gone, but it left me with a feeling of something I couldn’t name—longing, hunger, what?

She looked intensely into my eyes and I suddenly felt exposed. I felt like a child caught with a finger in the frosting of a chocolate cake.

“We’ll take care of you, Madison, don’t you worry.” She flashed a big smile again and the feeling disappeared.

I shook my head to clear the cobwebs, smiled at her kindness and moved on.

That was odd.

I continued through the tube. At the plane’s door, another nearly perfect woman greeted me. A brunette this time, I smiled at her, standing eye to eye.

Amazons. I’m among a race of Amazons. I’m the one who is usually the tallest, I thought. Standing five-feet eleven inches, these women were as tall as I was, if not taller.

“Hello miss, welcome aboard flight 41. If you will proceed into First Class, go ahead and seat yourself according to your ticket. We’ll be with you shortly after the other passengers have boarded.”

She placed her hand lightly on my back and I felt that same wave of light and energy pass through me once again.

I chose to ignore this weirdness, as just being in desperate need of a vacation, and diligently headed for my seat. I passed the Wolf Man seemingly complaining to his wife about something and headed to the back of first class. I was glad to get as far away from him as possible.

I saw Richard, the gay man, sitting on the starboard side of the plane already nose deep in his book. I went one row back and found my seat portside. My row was two rows forward of the bulkhead separating coach and First Class.

I’d always been conservative when I flew, mainly flying coach, except the few times I’d upgraded. But with my buying trips to the Orient while training staff, I’d racked up enough airline miles for this trip, including the upgrade to first class, which the company allowed me to keep as an added bonus for personal use.

Unfortunately, not all these first class patrons were first class people; internally I heard my grandmother’s voice agreeing with me: Oh, they’ve got class all right—it’s just all low. I chuckled.

I locked away my bag in the appropriate bin and took the seat next to the window. While the rest of the passengers boarded, I busied myself with the port window and the efficiencies of the ground crew. Not much was happening on the pilot’s side of the plane, so I watched the plane next to us as it was loaded with baggage.

Even though my thoughts were aimless, Wolf Man’s ruminations on the benefits of flying first class kept interrupting them. He lectured his wife and kept turning to see if Ms. Wright, who sat across the aisle from them, paid any attention. He appeared too interested in another woman in the presence of his wife to suit me.

I pity the poor wife.

As the passengers completed boarding, I saw our ground crew hustling out of the way. I looked at my watch and saw we were forty-five minutes out from our original take-off time.

Oh well, I’ve got nothing but time right now.

The pilot spoke over the plane’s announcement system.

“Welcome aboard folks, I am Captain Newman, your pilot for this trip. We can expect about a five hour and twenty-five minute trip to Florida, where we will refuel and head for Nassau City. From there, any of you going farther can make other connections for ships or small planes.

“Please fasten your seat belts and settle in. The attendants will be around shortly to offer breakfast. The in-flight movie for our journey today is Ghost starring Demi Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, and Patrick Swazye. It’s an oldie but goodie and there will be no charge for your headsets. So sit back, enjoy, and leave the flying to us.”

In first class, there would be no in-flight movie as each seat claimed its own pop-up LCD screen and DVD player.

“Miss, when you get a chance, may I see the catalog of movies available to first-class?” I asked the next flight attendant that went by.

“Certainly!” She returned quickly with the booklet.

As I perused the catalog, I could feel the rumble of the four engines through my seat. I knew the plane was a Jumbo 747 and thought that these planes were no longer in use.

Guess not.

The plane vibrated as it backed away from the terminal. The pilot maneuvered the plane into position and headed for the runway where I could see many other planes taking off.

Flying out of Seattle toward the East Coast, not my favorite side of the nation, we’d swoop down into Florida.

I’d always preferred the west to the east, thinking of it as more pioneering in its spirit. On the West Coast, one could wear jeans to work every day of the week. In the east, dress down days only happened on Fridays, which meant dressing down to khakis, no jeans allowed. To me, the east was definitely stuffier and stodgy, more settled in its ways.

At least there should be no weather problems, I thought. A fanatic on safe flying, I checked the weather reports to ensure there would be no trouble. Still, that nagging little feeling from earlier sat on my shoulders whispering its fears.

I didn’t like sitting in the front of the plane in First Class, but decided to treat myself to the larger space. I preferred the back of the plane closest to the tail. All the plane crashes I’d seen broadcast on television showed the tail section intact, and that’s where I favored sitting.

If my number’s up—it’s up. Got to get over this paranoia of flying, since I do so much of it. Even prior to 911, I held reservations about flying, but the job requires so much travel—I have no choice. I mentally bite the bullet every time I get on board a plane. Statistically, I know that takeoffs and landings are the most dangerous times.

The brunette flight attendant came by just as the plane moved into position for takeoff.

“Don’t you worry, Ms. Reeves, you’ll be just fine. Captain Newman is an excellent pilot and has flown for over twenty years. The flight attendants buckle in for takeoff, but once at our cruising altitude, we’ll be back around to serve you breakfast and get your choice of DVD. Sit back and enjoy.” She tucked a small pillow behind my neck and her energy and concern soothed me.

How did she know I was tense? I don’t usually show my feelings.

Once again, I felt that wave of energy sweep over me as the flight attendant removed her hand from behind my head. I must be relaxing into my journey, because this time it felt good. Those nagging little fears fell into oblivion.

I leaned back in my seat, enjoying the comfort of the pillow and closed my eyes, telling myself I felt overtired and needed to calm down.

I breathed in and out slowly, from my belly, as my therapist taught me, and visualized myself on a golden beach with azure skies and gentle rhythmic waves, the sun overhead. This time it worked. In a few minutes, I breathed easier.

The roar of our engines increased and I felt the force held in check, as the plane ahead of us lifted quickly into the air.

The plane jerked forward making a small turn into the runway. The engines revved and suddenly we moved faster and faster. In a moment, the plane left the ground and I could hear and feel the whine of the motor that pulled the wheels into the underbelly of the plane.

I felt the small G-force press me back into my seat and felt thankful the plane kept flying. This is a good sign. We quickly reached a flying altitude of thirty-thousand feet and leveled off. The flight attendant came around to take breakfast orders.

I didn’t care that I was alone; I looked forward to this vacation. I wasn’t with anybody—actually hadn’t been with anybody serious in a while. In truth, I wasn’t looking.

Connor where are you?

My career was at an all-time high. I made good money, enjoyed my hobbies, and didn’t have much time for anyone or anything else, not even a pet. My life felt almost perfect— except for that place inside that I couldn’t quite identify.

I called it the empty place. I sensed a hunger that went beyond food, and I didn’t know for what. Nothing seemed to satisfy me. Alcohol didn’t work and gave me headaches. Relationships—I avoided them like the plague. Oh, I experienced plenty of casual relationships (never more than one at a time) but when the time came to commit—I didn’t.

I kept telling myself I wasn’t ready to settle down and have a family, so I knew it couldn’t be that. The biological clock was ticking, yes, but I felt ambivalent toward children after such a tumultuous childhood myself.

And the world we lived in? It reminded me of that poster from the sixties my mother still owned that said War is Not Healthy for Children or Other Living Things; only in my head, my version said, the World is Not Healthy for Children or Other Living Things.

I made a supreme effort to push all these feelings back into the little box that I kept locked and on a dark shelf of my soul hidden beneath cobwebs and secret doors; thinking about them didn’t serve me. And in that same place, I kept the emptiness locked away. Yet something stirred there, as a skeletal hand rattled the doorknob.

My thoughts turned to death and dying as they always did at this juncture in a flight. I kept telling myself that everybody faces his or her own mortality when flying in a plane, but it didn’t seem to work. I believe that the thought that a plane could fall out of the sky never strayed far from anyone’s mind since 911.

I thought about the religious zealots that took down those planes, as well as their own lives. I envied the strength of their convictions. I know that what they did was terribly and utterly wrong, but I couldn’t help wishing that I believed in something that strongly.

In my head, thoughts of the hereafter never amounted to much. In my teens, I’d signed on as the poster child who stood against anything my mother stood for. Overly spiritual, but not religious, she oftentimes said to me that I was the one responsible for creating the things that were in my experience.

My mother was the poster child for the sixties. “What you think and feel brings to you exactly what you are thinking and feeling,” she’d said often while I was a teenager, “You can learn to create your life consciously, or you can continue on autopilot. It’s your choice.” This never sat well with me.

At that age, who wants to be responsible? There were enough things that I felt guilty for, who needed more? No thank you! I was only slightly grateful that she never forced me to attend her spiritual or church meetings while I grew up, because I couldn’t get away from them anyway.

Church was always at our house.

Our home never fit the vision of what I perceived to be a normal and picturesque American one: white picket fence, flowers in the window box, a dad who came home at night and a puppy in the back yard.

Bereft of a husband and father, our home became a warren for psychics and those who could see, hear, or talk to the dead. Many nights, it became a way station for the forlorn straggler, human or beast. My mother collected the lost; she brought home people and animals, as would a tenderhearted child a stray kitten or puppy tucked under the jacket.

Whether a bum or homeless person, an injured or lost animal, she brought them home and fed them, gave them a warm bed for the night, tended to their wounds and sent them on their way. For the animals, she found homes for them or we kept them. Animals who found their way to mother never ended up in the pound. It’s not her way.

A menagerie of sight and sound, our home sometimes felt more like a zoo. An only child, my roommates were a singled-winged parrot named George who lurched to one side on his perch, and a female tortoise named Harry who buried herself in the closet come winter.

Our two cats, Beans and Bacon, tortured the three dogs, an English Mastiff, Leila (named after Eric Clapton’s song, but spelled differently), a Russian Sheltie, Mischa, and a mutt dog, Percy, found in a paper bag tossed out on a mountain hillside. These animals were the mainstay; there were hosts of other creatures that came and went in our lives.

If it weren’t for the trust fund my grandfather left her, I don’t know how we would have survived. Mother didn’t work outside the home, and I never really knew what happened to my father; she didn’t talk about him all that much.

I vaguely remembered loud fights and doors slamming. She managed to put me through college and after I left home, one of her psychic friends moved into my old room.

Growing up, she told me that I owned the right to create my own path and to choose the things that I wanted or needed to believe in. She’d said that I created my own experiences.

Something must have bled through from her to me; wasn’t I the youngest VP with Hillagos? The problem is, I didn’t know what that had to do with her version of spirituality.

I was the one who created the job I held, not my thoughts! It hadn’t previously existed—I opened up new markets for the company that allowed them to become one of the leading department stores in the nation.

They’d started out as a little shoe store and grew to the mega store they are today through the help of employees just like me. But I admit they rewarded me well for it. Wasn’t I flying to the Bahamas?

How my thoughts followed this odd path, and ended back at work, I’ll never figure out; so I decided to think different thoughts. This was the beginning of my vacation and I didn’t want to think about work at all.

As I chastised myself mentally, Connor’s face once again filled my mind. It came out of nowhere. I briefly thought about contacting him upon return, but then just as quickly dismissed it.

No use dwelling in the past. Just let it go.

The flight attendant came back by and offered several choices for breakfast and I chose traditional bacon and eggs.

It was a microwave meal anyway.

I looked out the window to my left and noticed the sky was clear and the day, beautiful. In the distance, in the direction we headed, a wavering light appeared, not unlike the northern lights, only in broad daylight.

The light splayed across the sky like an undulating curtain moving in tempo to an unheard beat.

Startled by the flight attendant briefly touching my arm sending that wave of energy over me again, I shivered. I briefly forgot about the curtain of light.

“I—uh—here’s your breakfast, Ms. Reeves—eat up—you have a long journey ahead of you.”

“Thank you.”

I thought her comment strange—something a mother or a nurturer would say to a child. Funny thing, I felt like a child in her presence. The woman wasn’t what I would call beautiful—yet she was handsome and compelling; a different light shone in her eyes. In fact, all the attendants on this plane seemed to be otherworldly.

I dutifully ate and though it wasn’t much, it filled me in a way a breakfast never had. For a brief moment, something flickered inside of me and felt a little less empty. As I ate, it felt as though each bite was full of that liquid light I saw out the window.

Chapter 3

Southern Lights

The shell must break before the bird can fly

Tennyson

The flight attendant took my tray and returned my movie request. I manipulated the controls on the seat, and the DVD player and fifteen-inch LCD screen moved into position. I plugged in the earphones and watched as the credits rolled by.

A little strange but intriguing, the movie, What the Bleep Do We Know, came recommended by a woman at work, so I thought I’d give it a try.

It began with comments by physicists and others on the nature of reality. They started talking about waves and particles existing simultaneously.

Now this was a funny thing. It brought to mind when I was last in Barnes and Nobles looking for a book for a co-worker’s birthday. I couldn’t help but overhear a conversation between two people who sat in the overstuffed reading chairs near the section I searched.

I remembered that I was reading from the book The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire, by Deepak Chopra, and something they said pulled my attention away. It was as if, as I read, they spoke aloud from the very book I held in my hands. I was reading the part about the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, just as I tuned into the conversation the two people were having—

“It’s true—it’s been proven. We create our own experience of reality. Think of it like this—a sub-atomic particle is a particle and a wave at the same time. In other words, when you’re not looking at it, it’s a wave—and when you focus on it—it becomes a particle; your focus causes it to become. It takes your focused thought to solidify it—to drop it from its potential state—the wave—to its physical state—the particle. It becomes what you think about.”

I read the exact same thing in the book as the two from the overstuffed armchairs talked about it; and now, watching the movie What the Bleep Do You Know I heard the same thing again—only in a different way.

This was too big a coincidence to ignore. I thought back to my mother and her “there are no coincidences, only synchronicities.”

The movie was saying that the way we create our reality is based on how we think, feel, and emote. Our thoughts, infused with emotion, define and create our experiences.

“Not everything is as it seems,” I heard the gay man say.

I looked over at him, thinking the comment directed toward me, but saw him talking into a phone.

Things are getting weird. I shivered as goose bumps ran crazy over me.

I pushed pause on the movie, not sure I could watch the rest, and though based on Quantum Physics principles; it carried spiritual overtones that didn’t suit me at the moment. Even though something seemed to be telling me something, I chose to ignore it.

I was on vacation, not at a seminar for a life do-over.

Instead, I turned toward the cabin for my entertainment. I heard the Wolf Man barking up front, and caught the eye of the little shipping clerk briefly as he looked around. For a moment, he shimmered and undulated like the light curtain I’d seen out the window, and then he disappeared and reappeared into view.

I rubbed my eyes, thinking I saw things that weren’t there. I looked across toward the gay man and the same thing happened to him. I held my own hand up in front of my face and saw my hand shimmer, disappear briefly, and then reappear.

At that exact moment, the flight attendant paused by my seat and asked if anything was amiss.

“I—I—don’t know— something strange seems to be happening.”

Instead of asking me what I meant, she immediately attempted to soothe me, as if she knew something I didn’t.

“Everything is fine, Ms. Reeves. The plane is traveling at its normal altitude, and the only odd thing is that light curtain out the window—it seems to be affecting us like light through a prism casts a rainbow—but it appears to have no adverse effect on the plane itself.”

I looked out the window and saw that we were approaching the curtain of light, and it looked like we were on track to fly through it.

“What is it?”

“It could be jet fuel particles in the air that the light is hitting in a strange way—but it looks to me more like the aurora borealis. Other than that—I couldn’t tell you.”

“Are we going to go through it?”

“Yes—it lies directly in our path. The pilot has assured me that nothing should happen to the plane. It’s just some kind of light phenomenon; they’re getting no readings on their equipment.”

The flight attendant paused as the captain spoke over the announcement system.

“This is Captain Newman. For your viewing pleasure, we bring you an up-close view of the northern lights—that, I might add, appear to be southern now. Please do not be frightened. Nothing unusual should happen to our flight or us—it is not affecting our instrumentation in any way. Just sit back and enjoy the spectacular light show, folks. This is a one-of-a-kind experience.”

“See, there’s nothing to worry about,” the flight attendant said as she smiled down at me.

“If you say so, Miss, although I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“Nor have any of us—but do relax, and enjoy.”

She briefly touched my hand, and this time I felt a small electrical charge. I looked up at the flight attendant, but all I saw was her back as she moved up the aisle toward the flight cabin.

Looking around first class, everyone winked in and out of existence like the tiny lights on a Christmas tree, first this one, then that one, following no particular rhythm or pattern.

I got up to go to the bathroom and splash water on my face. Maybe it’s just me—everyone else seems to be acting normal. Maybe they don’t see what I see. It didn’t occur to me to tell the attendant what I saw. After all, she would probably think me nuts.

After leaving the bathroom, I sat back down in my seat and buckled the seat belt. However minor, it made me feel more secure.

The people in the cabin behaved as if nothing were wrong—yet all my senses were screaming and the little hairs all over my body stood at attention in total agreement, as if standing ready for the onslaught to come.

I looked out the window again and noticed that we had reached the curtain of light. I watched as we passed through, and as we did—directly across from us, as if by magic, another plane became visible as we emerged from the curtain, just like ours—only it was a complete opposite of our plane pushing away from us at an angle in the sky. The two plane’s paths formed a V that began at the threshold of the light curtain.

It was as if one plane had passed through a doorway and two emerged.

For a brief moment, we were close enough to see into the other plane—I distinctly saw a mirror image of our plane, letters, and numbers in reverse. I looked closer and thought I could see myself looking back at me from the other plane across the sky.

I turned back to the cabin and saw that everyone in the cabin looked either asleep or dead.

“What the—?”

The flight attendant—the only person moving—approached me. Only now, she looked different than she’d looked before. She seemed more present—more there—the colors of her clothes, more intense—her face more defined, as if sculpted perfectly. She glowed from the inside out.

“Everything is going to be all right. Trust me,” she said as she touched me with something that looked like a laser pointer.

I looked up as she faded from my view. Everything came to a small point of light, went dark and then blacked out.