time in the world

“We’ve got all the time in the world.” Eric said as he encouraged me forward in the line. The line slithered through the eighteen switchbacks of tiny posts. We were standing here in the preamble. The foreword. We hadn’t even gotten to Chapter 1: Security guard takes my ID and boarding pass and looks at it as if he is reading the directions to defusing a bomb. He looks at me and he looks at my ID again. There is no way this can be helpful because the ID is four years old. Four years of varying hair colors, on and off weightlifting, on and off online dating; four years of botox injections to lose the 11 on my forehead; four years of make-up products; four years of too-much sun on my weathered skin because I adore the beach and a blue sky; and two years of dating Eric; two years of him showing me who I really am underneath all the products, fad diets, the juice cleanses. Eric had changed who I was at the cellular level, and I am sure that I didn’t look anything like the woman on the ID. And yet, does he really know me?

Chapter 2: Eric is removing his shoes, his belt, his tie clip. I am sliding out of my boots. And both of us are filling our concrete color bins with all of the phones, laptops, luggage, empty Stanley bottles, shoes, socks, and I-products. We are standing in the circling x-ray machines and getting patted down. They are looking through all of our belongings as if we have something to hide. Maybe I can look at Eric’s x-ray to see if there is something in there that I haven’t yet discovered after two years of mining for a reason to dump him out of fear that he would dump me first. Do I really know him? There has to be more flaws than I have catalogued to date because this man is just too good, not too perfect but too good, to be true. He loves me which is what I considered his greatest instability.

Chapter 3: Sitting in the airport waiting for them to queue us up to get on the plane. To this day, I will never understand why they load the front of the airplane first. I realize that rich people shouldn’t have to stand around waiting like cattle in an empty field waiting for their turn but are they really interested in watching the too-poor-to-sit-with-them-in-first-class file past like prisoners being ushered to their last meal? Only you no longer get a meal on a flight unless you have $26 for a dry sandwich and refuse to be satisfied with a tiny packet of pretzels and a four-ounce glass of your favorite beverage.

Eric is sitting beside me in his blue faux leather seat in his white shirt and tie. I look very underdressed next to him in my yoga pants and slip on boots. He always looks like he is about to MC a particularly important fundraiser. I haven’t decided if I like this about him or if it drives me crazy. It may take ten years and a very big fight to find out when I am screaming at him that he always makes me look like a dumpy housewife and no wonder women are drawn to him like cheese to a nacho chip.

To his credit, he has shaken the stiffness out of his tie, and it is hanging like a fallen tree limb to the left of his white dress shirt. He knows I’m a sucker for airplane snacks, so his bag is full of chips, chocolate, and a few of the check-out line magazines I never allow myself to read except on a plane. Who else would do that for me?

Chapter 4: They are finally seating section 6 which is us. Over the wing. He knows that I like the window. I do like to look out on the world as it passes below us like a nature documentary but mostly, I don’t want to be sitting next to anyone I don’t know. I don’t mind the aisle seat except for when it is drink-cart-time and I keep getting hit in the elbow, that’s wafted out into the aisle, by a determined flight attendant who is on a mission to the front of the main cabin. She is incredibly good at backing up and doing the bowing bend and “what can I get for you hon?.” I am doing the stress test of seeing if my seatbelt will do up. I hold my breath. It clicks into place.

Chapter 5: I am nearing the end of my first tabloid magazine, and I am choosing “who wore it best” while Eric is in the 9^th chapter of his How to Win Friends and Influence People-y type book about business and how to bring in new clients. He’s getting sleepy and his head is drifting down toward the binding of the book. The plane suddenly drops, and I grab the handles of my seat. Eric is jolted awake, and he grabs my hand. “It’s just a little turbulence.” He assures. The jostling continues and it feels like we are losing altitude.

Chapter 6: I grab his arm and pull him closer to me. I lift the window shade and I can see flames on the wing. Others around us are seeing the flames and ringing the flight attendant. She whispers in an urgent voice to the other attendant who flees to the front of the plane and disappears into first class on her way to the cockpit. A voice comes over the PA system and requests everyone be seated and belted. There are screams around us the nose dips forward and the plane descends. “Eric?” I whisper. He puts his arms around my shoulders and pulls me tighter into his arms. “You know I love you.” He whispers with an intensity that I have never heard in his voice.

Chapter 7: The plane levels out unsteadily and tips toward the burning wing. But the flames are still growing and lapping the side of the plane. I imagine I can feel the heat inside the cabin. The nose dips again and the oxygen masks drop from the space above us. Eric slips the elastic band around my head and then around his own. I pull my mask down to my chin and his too and I lean into a kiss with my entire heart and soul. He has one hand around my shoulders and the other on the side of my face. He pulls the mask back into place over my mouth and I do the same for him. I push closed the window cover so we can no longer see the flames or the earth rising up to meet us. There’s one last breath and the sound of metal peeling and