25th Annual Cape Town Space Dive

I love Space Diving. I mean, I love it. I used to live it and breathe it. I don’t get to do as much anymore. The last time I jumped in this event was one husband, two kids, and a house ago. I promised myself this year I would dive again in the 25^th annual Cape Town Space Dive. Today is that day.

The only problem is my wedding anniversary is tomorrow, and I may have told one or two white lies to jump. Don’t worry; I got a great present this year. I shouldn’t get him anything. When I asked him to jump, he said no, and didn’t even give a good reason why. I am a grown woman, and I don’t have time for men, even if it is my husband, telling me what to do. So, I am officially on “work” business for twenty more hours. I jump, land, and run to the plane from Cape Town to New York before you know it. I make it home for our anniversary, no problem.

               I counted at least a thousand jumpers this year. I couldn’t believe the staging area. The first time I jumped, I came with my dad. That was year ten of the event, only a hundred or more people dove. The divers were mostly American, European, and Chinese. This year was much different. Every country and at least two space colonies are represented. I saw a lot of new faces but still some old faces I remembered. Either people I dove with or those who jumped with my dad.

               I checked my suit for the one-hundredth time as the countdown to dive reached one minute. I loved this suit. I had it for seventeen years, a present from my dad for graduating high school. It was white with streaks of gold. The white contrasted my dark skin, and the yellow highlighted the golden chocolate brown. Thought the suit felt a little tighter than it used to.

My heads-up display, or HUD, projected on my face shield and was integrated into the suit. The clunky interface was okay, but nothing compared to my old F-44 strike fighter interface. It listed the countdown in growing green numbers against the black inside of the cargo hold. Outlines of the divers were superimposed in my field of vision. The hanger was pitch black, just like space would be when we jumped, since the sun would be on the other side of the planet.

               The massive doors to the hanger airlock opened, exposing us to the void of space for the first time. I felt a rush of energy. The intense feeling overwhelmed my breathing and heart rate — the sudden spike-triggered my suit to respond. The elevated levels flashed red from the green. I chuckled, smiled, and prepared to feel alive again. I love this.

               I promised my husband a lot before we got married. I told him I would stop diving, and I would only train others in simulators. I promised I would retire from being a fighter pilot and fly commercial aircraft. That wouldn’t train MMA any longer and build a fitness studio instead. I promised to be a wife and mother, not because he made me, but because that is what I wanted. At the time, I lost a lot and the last thing I ever wanted was to lose him. Recently, I felt like I was missing something. This was “the something.”

The adrenaline dump felt like I was a drug addict having their first hit after five years of sobriety. I was giddy like my daughter at Christmas. Sorry, Mustafa, I need this. I need to dive one more time for me. Forty-five seconds before launch and I was drunk off the adrenaline. I moved my arms and legs like a fiend looking for a larger hit. I would jump now, but my magnetically attached boots stuck to the deck plating. If we weren’t all attached, we would bounce into each other in the zero gs. It would be a disaster.

               I wish I could see the planet, but I was stuck behind two guys that must play for the Knicks. The only thing I could do was tap into the live feed and watch the Earth spin under the spaceship. I barely heard the hissing of air sucked from the room over the cacophony of noises. Low oxygen flashed on my HUD and the suit went to internal life support. With the constant sound of suits, engines, and other machinery gone, I started my playlist. Every jump needed theme music, and this time I went with an oldie but goodie. The last playlist that I used when I jumped with my dad.

               My HUD flashed a warning that the dive was going to begin. I was now dancing the best I could in the confined space. The field fell, and I wanted to move forward instantly, but I had to wait for my turn. I watched the time tick down on HUD, and we were dangerously close to not getting everyone out in the jump window. A group of divers at the edge of the hanger took too long. They were getting pictures even though prohibited. I checked the time remaining to dive and how far away I was and I didn’t think I am going to make it.

               No, I didn’t risk everything, lie to my husband, kids, and job to not dive out this damn spaceship.

When the time ticked under a minute left to launch, the crowd behind me started to push, and I had two choices at this point. Get trampled or released the mag boots. I released my mag boots and drove off the deck plating. The pushing from the back and the lack of gravity sent my body tumbling. I quickly righted myself with suit thrusters, activated my dive pack, and moved for the hanger doors. I watched in horror as two jumpers who didn’t un mag their boots get crushed in the stampede. Others tried to free themselves but were attached to other people, destroying suits, and sending people into the zero-gravity environment of the hanger.

I searched for an opening during the erupting panic on the deck. Lucky for me, I was trained to function in a pressure situation. Compared to the dog fights of the second Battle of Guadalcanal, this was child’s play. The void of space welcomed me moments later after a couple of crafty moves. When I turned, I saw a nightmare. Divers were trying to do the same thing I had but too many were now floating. My HUD flashed with the updated diver suit information. Many suits were flashing yellow, indicating damaged suits and, in some cases, divers flashed red, meaning their suit was breached. They will be lucky to make it ground.

I ran a diagnostic on my suit. I had a couple of integrity issues, but nothing critical. The forcefield closed the hanger exit before more damaged suits could exit but also trapped good suits. Warnings flashed over my HUD warning of falling debris, injured divers, and the dreaded dead divers update. The feed ended the farther I was from the starship and I refocused on my dive. I couldn’t think about the others any longer.

Mustafa’s words from five years ago jolted me to reality, “Some generational curses are out of the control of everyone. This one, you can control.”

               I took a deep breath I promised him I would make it to the ground in one piece. The chaos knocked my trajectory off course but a couple of corrections later, and I was traveling in the dead center of my reentry path. The black of space, the blue glow of the Earth, and the infinite stars on the horizon, were priceless. I loved this.

I looked toward the planet as the sun crested Antarctica and then checked my speed.  A flash of red on my HUD was the first sign of reentry. The outside temperature of my suit increased from the atmospheric drag at the highest reaches of the atmosphere. In front of me, I can see jumpers hitting the atmosphere. Red streaks of human meteorites crisscrossing the sky. Deep stains of the super-heated plasma training behind against the ever-bluing sky.

               I rolled over and took the reentry shield from my back. I tucked into a ball and put the backside shield on my feet. A second later, I activated the mag boots, and it tightened the grips even more. I felt a tinge of pain in my foot, the remnant pain from a Lego I stepped on four days ago. Thank you, Naomi, for not putting away them away when I asked and for knowing the best spot to place it to blend in with the tile in front of the coffee machine.

I extended my legs, hoping another pain did not manifest and crossed arms over my chest in the pharaoh pose. I tensed my butt checks, locked the suit into position, and prayed that the shield would hold. A second electromagnetic armor activated when the temperature inside the suit reached 125 degrees. The kinetic shield, on the other hand, reached temperatures north of two thousand degrees. For the first time, in two hundred dives, I feared for my safety, and the life my children and husband would have to live without me. I pushed the negative thoughts out of my head and sang my heart out to the music as I was engulfed inside a shell of fire and superheated plasma.

               Eventually, the flame subsided when the speed slowed. I maneuvered to a face-first position once again but dropped the shield instead of stowing it behind my legs. It would fall harmlessly to the ocean, and that was the main reason the launch took place over the ocean if I dove again though it would be costly to replace. I guess I am getting rusty.

               At the velocity that I was going, it was still hard to open the wingsuit configuration of the suit, but I spread my legs and arms as much as possible to maintain altitude. I didn’t want to have to bail to one of three dive boats in the path and hope they save me before I drowned. I saw that happen before and that I would rather slam into the water at hundreds of miles per hour instead of drowning.

               Around me, I was starting to see the effects of the chaos of the dive. Streaks of superheated suits fell to the ice of Antarctica at hypersonic speeds. The thunderclap of the sonic booms filled the skies interrupting my playlist with a song of fire and ice. Over the coms, cries for help, from those suits not damaged enough to burn in the atmosphere, but had wingsuit failure, parachute failure, and other mechanical failures. I still love this, right?

               I had to refocus. Everyone knew the risks before they jumped. I used to believe that, but now, the older and more emotionally fragile person that took joy daily from giving my daughter afro puffs instead of dog fights felt different. I drifted into thoughts about the families of those people and who they would be leaving behind. This is it, I told myself and I refocused; this is it. Enjoy this because you never jump again.

               I took in the breathtaking vistas. The continent of Africa raced toward me. The magnificent ocean replaced the Icebergs and ice sheets of Antarctica that once dominated my view. I could see birds flying and large whitecapped waves below. The wingsuit fully deployed, and my speed became manageable. My younger self would redirect downtown and rip between buildings and get arrested after landing. After the events of the last hour, I was going to land and put this life behind me for good. For now, I was going to enjoy the final minutes of pure bliss and freedom. I needed this. I needed to feel alive once more.

My neck hurt, not because I just slept on it wrong, but because the wind battered the weaker neck. The wind must be stronger since the global cooling incentive started. That must be the reason and not that I am this out of dive shape. I promise. I banked one last time to reduce my speed a little more and recentered on the trajectory I toggled in the preflight.

My lower back was starting to hurt, but not because my daughter jumped off the couch onto my back when I was looking for my cellphone, but because the wingsuit tightened. Of course, the wingsuit I used since high school was a little tighter, but I didn’t gain that much weight, did I? This is something I will have to evaluate during my Sunday afternoon ice cream and red wine session this week. This is unacceptable.

               In the distance, I saw the landing strip. Air traffic control put me into the queue. About twenty other divers slid in front of me. The beautiful and graceful divers landed in the area about a minute apart from each other — all of controlling our speed and decent until touch down. I maneuvered out of the landing area and knelled on the grass. I kissed it for the last time, a smile extending from cheek to cheek.

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I congratulated the other divers and walked to the staging area. The only thing I wanted was a long hot bath, a massage, and sleep. A tear formed in my eye when I strolled to the exit, where racers greeted love ones. I saw sad faces and wide eyes pleading for a loved one to appear. It sobered my happy mood. I know the look, and I know how they feel.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something that shouldn’t be. I turned to a look again and yep. My husband was standing in the crowd. It wasn’t hard to spot him because the man was six foot six inches of chocolate goodness. He had a freshly shaven bald head, pink cotton shirt gripping his muscles, and a stern look on his face.

I am a grown woman, but I felt like a ten year that got caught with both hands and both feet in the cookie jar. I blushed, put my head down, and marched to my doom. Each step I grew more nervous than the space dive itself.

               “Hello, Olivia.”

               “Hey,” was all I could muster. “How much trouble am I in?”

               “Come here,” he said. I walked closer and he gripped me with the tightest bear hug I ever felt. My back, the one that was sore because I am not out of shape but because the suit wasn’t working correctly flared in pain once more. I took the pain and allowed him to hold me. Something was different. The shoulders were moving and when he pulled back tears flowed freely from his eyes.

“A lot of trouble.,” he said, wiping the tears away. “I am not mad at you for jumping. You were jumping when I met you. I don’t like it, we have kids and I would hate for them to grow up without a mother because so idiot didn’t know how to brake properly, had a bad suit on reentry, or one of the ten thousand ways you can die doing it. No, I knew this is who you are,” he said. I took a sigh of relief and braced for the but. “You did something that you can never do to me again. LIE.”

               It was a gut punch. I did lie to him. Multiple times and in numerous ways. I tried to speak but the words ended at my throat, unable to form.

               “Why are you crying? I am safe now.”

               “I didn’t know. I didn’t know if you were here or…or if you found someone else. I guessed it was this and prayed. The kids are with my mother, and we have a room here at the beach for the next four days. I figured if you were here, we would celebrate our anniversary. If you weren’t. Well, I would have needed the time,” he finished. The rest of the tears falling from either side. “I love you, Olivia.”

               I was speechless. I lost the person I loved the most in the world the last time I jumped here and I almost lost the most important person in the world this time. I cried too thinking of him and thinking of my dad hitting the water at terminal speed. All I could say was, “I am sorry.” I said it a hundred times before I let go.

 We left the area and went back to the hotel. I took a shower and then rewarded my fantastic husband. He has this one thing he likes and I…well I did it you perv, and I am not going to tell you what it is.

               Later that night I was awake, thinking about the day. I did it, I jumped and still loved it even though it cost me a father. This time, it almost cost me a husband. It would be the last time. I felt him snuggle close, and I had a question I needed answered; my crazy brain just wouldn’t let it go. “Why didn’t you just let me come? You said that you didn’t have a problem with it but you said no.”

               “Remember last year, when you wanted to get reservations for Malcolm’s, but you need to get it six months before. Well, I got one and I wanted to surprise you.” Thanks, brain, now I feel even worse.  He continued, “I couldn’t tell you, it was a surprise.” For the second time that day, I was speechless. I rolled over and did the thing he liked. Again. I have a lot of making up to do.