the engines were squealing, but I didn’t see no fire or smoke. Not until that thing hit the field and blew. Biggest fireball I ever seen. I was probably a good mile or so away, but I felt the ground shake, and then a big blast of heat hot enough to singe my hair.”
How long does it take a plane to tumble from the sky? One minute? Five? I think of what that must have been like for Will, and I lean over the sink and gag.
Claire reaches for the remote and hits Mute. I grip the countertop and stare at the scratched bottom of the sink, waiting for my stomach to settle, and think, What now? What the fuck am I supposed to do now? Behind me, I hear her scrounging around my kitchen, opening cabinets and digging around inside, the vacuumed hiss of the refrigerator door opening and closing. She returns with a pack of saltines and a bottle of water. “Here. The water’s cold, so take tiny sips.”
Ignoring both, I move around the counter to the other side and collapse onto a bar stool. “Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance.” Claire gives me a questioning look. “The stages of grief according to Kübler-Ross. I’m clearly in the denial phase, because it makes no sense. How could a man headed to Orlando end up on a westward-bound plane? Was the conference moved to Seattle or something?”
She lifts both shoulders, but her expression doesn’t seem the least bit unsure. I may be in denial, but Claire’s clearly not. Though she might not say it out loud, she accepts Liberty Air’s claims that Will is one of the 179 bodies torn to pieces over a Missouri cornfield.
“It’s just not possible. Will would have told me, and he definitely wouldn’t have kept up the running dialogue about going to Orlando. Just this morning, he stood right where you’re standing and told me how much he hated that city. The heat, the traffic, those damn theme parks everywhere you look.” I shake my head, desperation raising my voice like a siren. “He’s been so stressed, maybe he didn’t know the conference had been moved. Maybe that’s where he’s been all this time, roaming around the scorching Orlando streets, trying to track down the new location. But then why not call me back?”
Claire presses her lips together, and she doesn’t respond.
I close my eyes for a few erratic heartbeats, the emotions exploding like bombs in my chest. What do I do? Who do I call? My first instinct is to call Will, like I do whenever I have a problem I can’t figure out myself. His methodical mind sees things differently than mine, can almost always plot a path to the solution.
“You should design an app,” I told him once, after he’d helped me chart out an entire semester’s worth of drug and alcohol awareness programs. “You’d make a fortune. You could call it What Will Will Say?”
He’d patted his lap, smiling my favorite smile. “Right now he says you’re adorable and to get over here and give me a kiss.”
Now I press my fingers to my lips and tell myself to calm down, to think. There must be someone I can call, someone who will tell me this is all just one huge misunderstanding.
“Jessica!” I pop off the stool and sprint to the phone, resting on a charger by the microwave. “Jessica will know where he is. She’ll know where the conference was moved.”
“Who’s Jessica?”
“Will’s assistant.” I punch in the number I know by heart, turning my back on Claire so I don’t see her creased brow, her averted gaze, the way she’s chewing her lip. She’s humoring me, just like Ted did.
“AppSec Consulting, Jessica speaking.”
“Jessica, it’s Iris Griffith. Have you—”
“Iris? I thought y’all were on vacation.”
Her comment comes so far out of left field, it takes me a couple of seconds to reboot. Jessica may be a whiz at answering phones and coordinating the schedules of a bunch of disorganized techies, but she’s not got the fastest processor in the cache.
“Um, no. What makes you think that?”
“Because you’re supposed to be on an all-inclusive, baby-making vacation to the Mayan Riviera. Will showed me pictures of the resort, and it looks ama—” She swallows the rest of the word, then sucks in a breath. “Oh, God. Iris, I must be confused. I’m sure I got the weeks mixed up.”
I know what Jessica is thinking. She’s thinking he’s there with another woman, and I don’t even care because what if she’s right? What if Will is alive and well and lounging on a beach in Mexico? Hope hangs inside me for a second or two, then fizzles when I realize that he wouldn’t. Will would never cheat, and even if he did, Mexico would be the very last destination on my heat-hating husband’s list. A cruise to Alaska would be more like it.
“He can’t be in Mexico,” I say, and it’s everything I can do to keep my voice calm, to smother my frustration in a coating of civility. “He’s one of the keynotes for the cyber security conference, remember?”
“What conference?”
My eyes go wide. Why would anyone at AppSec ever hire this woman? “The one in Orlando.”
“Wait. I’m confused. So he’s not in Mexico?”
And Lord help me, this is where I lose it. I suck a breath and scream into the phone loud enough to burn the back of my throat. “I don’t know, Jessica! I don’t fucking know where Will is! That’s the whole fucking problem!”
Shocked silence all around, from Claire behind me and from Jessica on the other end of the line. It’s like silence in stereo, ringing in both ears. I should apologize, I know I should, but a sob steals my breath, and I choke on the awful words that come next. “They—They’re saying Will was on that flight that crashed this morning, but that can’t be right. He was on a plane to Orlando. Tell me he’s in Orlando.”
“Oh, my God. I saw the news, but I had no idea, Iris. I didn’t know.”
“Please. Just help me find Will.”
“Of course.” She falls silent for a moment, and I hear her clicking around a computer keyboard. “I’m positive I didn’t book his flight for today, but I have his log-in credentials for the airline accounts. What airline was the plane that crashed again?”
“Liberty Airlines. Flight 23.”
Another longish pause filled with more clicking. “Okay, I’m in. Let’s see... Flight 23, you said?”
I drop both elbows on the countertop, cradle my head in one hand, squeeze my eyes shut, pray. “Yes.”
I hold my breath, and I hear the answer in the way Jessica sucks in hers.
“Oh, Iris...” she says, and the room spins. “I’m so sorry, but here it is. Flight 23, leaving Atlanta this morning at 8:55 a.m., headed to Seattle and returning on... Huh. Looks like he booked a one-way.”
My legs give out, and I slide onto the floor. “Check Delta.”
“Iris, I’m not sure—”
“Check Delta!”
“Okay, just give me a second or two... It’s loading now... Wait, that’s so weird, he’s here, too. Flight 2069 to Orlando, leaving today at 9:00 a.m., returning
