Amber

“Good afternoon passengers. This is the pre-boarding announcement for flight 343 to Tel Aviv . We are now inviting those passengers with small children, and any passengers requiring special assistance, to begin boarding at this time. Please have your boarding pass and identification ready. Regular boarding will begin in approximately ten minutes time. Thank you.”

I opened one eye to the high ceilings of the terminal. The wait had been three hours, which was enough for brunch and a nap. I could feel the airport turkey sandwich weighing my gut down, and I hoisted myself up and headed for the bathroom for relief. After finishing, I washed my face to get rid of the crusty, post-nap tingles that cover the body after you wake up. I hadn’t had much sleep in the last six months, so the nap was needed.

I gathered up my backpack and headed to check in with the flight attendant. She was kind; brown hair and brown eyes with a courteous half-smile on her face. Usually you can see the growing frustration behind the eyes of any airport attendant, but this woman was patient. I had forgotten my jacket with the ticket in the pocket and she allowed me to run and get it while still holding my place.

The cabin steward greeted me at the entrance to the plane.

“Good afternoon!”

I nodded back with a small smile. Too much excitement was off-putting. My eyes rarely rose from the ground anymore.

My seat was 3F, a window seat. I put my carry-on in the overhead compartment and sat down with my phone and headphones. It would be a long flight, but I didn’t need much to stay entertained. I had a lot to think about, from the past and for the future.

I reached into my pocket and pulled a photo out, faded at the edges. A little girl, about seven years old, with light, curly brown hair and green eyes, grinned back at me. She clutched a backpack and wore jeans, tennis shoes, and a simple light green t-shirt with an embroidered stegosaurus in the middle. Around her neck was a small amber necklace. A necklace I had given her after a trip to a dinosaur museum with her. She loved that trip, I thought with smiling sadness. Those days would never come back, no matter how hard I wished. I was about to put my phone away when a voice- proper British- came from over head-

“What a beautiful little girl. Is she yours?”

I turned to see a woman sitting down in the seat next to mine. She wore a large fur coat, it was January. She carried herself with very straight posture, sitting without touching her back to the seat, and she only held a purse with her. She wore sunglasses and a large hat as well, covering her hair and most of her face completely. Her lips were red with a simple lipstick, I’m not sure what kind.

What a strange woman, I thought.

“Excuse me?”

I refocused, “What?” I asked. I really hoped she couldn’t read minds.

“You’re lucky I can’t,” she remarked, re-applying her lipstick, looking into a small hand mirror.

“I don’t understand,” I mumbled with a nervous chuckle.

“You stated that you hoped I couldn’t read minds, and I told you that you were lucky I couldn’t.”

“Oh, I see.” I was very confused. Had I said that out loud?

“Anyway, who is that doll in the picture?”

I shook my head to clear it and turned my phone screen on again.

“Oh, her. She’s my daughter.”

The woman took my phone and lowered her glasses, then looked into my eyes.

“Her name is-” I was cut off as she grabbed my face with one hand, and drew it closer. A sharp pain in my chest, like my heart was ripping in two, paralyzed me in agony. Though we almost touched noses, I could not feel her breath at all. I could have sworn her eyes were black, but she pushed me gently back to my seat before I could process. The pain was gone in an instant. I adjusted and looked back at her eyes, but the sunglasses were back on. She was putting her things back in the purse, and then closed it with a decisive click.

“Indeed, yes this is quite interesting,” she sat back against the chair finally, hand to her mouth in contemplation. I rubbed my cheeks, looking the woman over. Did she look a bit familiar? Like an actor in some B movie that I saw when I was a teen, but never anywhere else.

“Is… everything alright miss?” I asked tentatively.

A few moments passed, and she turned to look at me again. She took off her glasses and her eyes were a deep green, nothing like the ones that had torn my soul before, but HAD they been different before?

“Where is this daughter of yours?”

I blanched at the question. It wasn’t exactly something I was ready to answer. Not so soon. I stumbled out an answer, a half-truth, and resolved to try and get away from this woman.

“I-I don’t really know right now.” My armpits began to sweat. I gathered myself and tried to get up. She made no movement at all. I sat down again, awkwardly. She was still looking at me.

Her eyes narrowed. It felt like there was someone sifting through my brain, opening it and searching for something, anything. I felt exposed despite the few words that were said. Abruptly, she spoke.

“For some reason, I don’t seem to believe you. Only a broken man answers a question in “half-truths.” She air-quoted with the last words and I felt a chill tickle the hairs on the back of my neck. Something about this woman… was I that predictable? Her face was expectant, drawing the answer out of me.

My throat clenched, and I swallowed hard. I could feel my heart beating fast, but time seemed to slow down. I had spent the last several months trying desperately to forget the pain, the grief. My loss had come back to hurt me.

“I’m sorry. I really don’t-” She put a hand up, and I silenced.

“I feel you have a story to tell me, stranger,” she stated. “A story and a soul to open up. You hurt terribly, I can practically smell it on you. Someone very near is willing to listen, so you may as well speak away.” She looked away and peered back from the corner of her eye, something like a mischievous glint shining for a second. “Perhaps you may even learn something special from me. I AM the smartest person I know.”

I sighed, and gave in. It was useless to fight off the waves of pain, and I let them wash over me. After a few moments, I began.

“Yes, this is my daughter. I truly don’t know where she is, but I haven’t seen her since last August. She was going to the local elementary school, the year had just started. I was a high school teacher nearby. One day I… ” I fell silent. Each word was a needle in my throat. My eyes were stinging.

The woman stared expectantly, hands placed gently on her lap. I didn’t notice earlier, but she was wearing white gloves. I closed my eyes for a moment, gathering my thoughts together and trying to prevent a mental breakdown. A plane was the worst place for this because I couldn’t escape. I swallowed and began again.

“I lost her.” There was nothing left in me to resist. I felt my eyes well up with tears, and one fell down my cheek. The salt stung my chapped lips. The air was dry in January.

“The school didn’t have metal detectors. There was no security guard either. He just walked right in. Nobody at the front desk was left alive, so there was no time for a warning. He made it through two classrooms. 12 children and a teacher were dead before police had arrived and he commit suicide before he was captured.” My lip was quivering by now and I lowered my head. “My daughter was unrecognizable.”

The plane was rising into the air, but I did not notice. I was stuck in memory, unable to escape the sickness in my stomach. I wiped my eyes and raised my head.

“I quit my job, and I’ve been searching for a reason to survive ever since. I don’t have a wife, she died during childbirth, and I sold everything I had. I’m alone now.” A strange catharsis began to take hold, taking over the pain of reliving. I was emptying myself, a sick grief began to ooze out along with my voice. I began feeling as though I could catch my breath again.

A gloved hand placed itself on my own, which was sweaty and twitching with nerves. I was wringing them the whole time that I spoke. I tried to jerk away, but she held on with a gentle firmness. I looked up at the woman, but could not see an expression. Her lips were a thin line, neutral.

“You want to die, don’t you.”

It was not a question. She knew, and I knew she knew. This woman, a stranger just moments ago, had dug into the deepest shadows of my soul. My greatest fears come alive. Of course I wanted to die, my life had ended on that day in August. There should be no reason to carry on.

“For some reason, I feel compelled to carry on, though. Everything inside me is telling me to lay down and quit, but I can’t help but feel that I’m still needed here.” I fell silent. I wasn't sure if I should continue.

Her hand did not move, but I could sense she was listening, almost absorbing the information out of me. Soon, she spoke in soothing words, a balm.

“You have gone through so much. To lose love is to lose life. Yet despite this, you are here. Why is that?” She truly seemed curious, an eyebrow arching inquisitively.

Before I could stop myself, I answered. “I’m headed to Tel Aviv. I need to get to Gaza, and that’s as close as a plane would take me. I feel stuck in this limbo of wanting to die and wanting to live, and it’s tearing me apart. The only way I feel I can be at peace is if my surroundings match the chaos inside me.” I shook my head and wiped my eyes.

“I see children dying there. For weeks I sat in front of the TV watching footage of air strikes, hospital raids, bombings, you name it. I would watch the numbers rise on the internet. Each day another digit added. Each face that would cross the screen was hers, my daughters. Mothers and fathers picking up pieces of their children. I wonder, maybe my purpose is there, saving others from the fate my daughter suffered.”

I looked at her, at this stranger that held my hand, like a nurse with a dying patient.

“I don’t know if it’s possible for me to save anyone though. If I die, then that is the end, I’m okay with that. But if I can save someone…” I trailed off. Was it possible for me to live anyway? I felt as though I had been condemned to die long ago.

The woman sat for a bit, then smiled. A genuine smile, as if she had known me my whole life. Like a friend seeing someone they loved after a long time.

“It IS possible to live.” It seemed she had read my mind again. “Despite your grief, you have still found a reason to keep going. No matter the danger. No matter the idiocy, confusion, or anger, you have still clung to this life. Something holds you here." She thought a bit, looking up as if she were listening to someone speak to her.

"Yes, I agree. Yes, that's right. Indeed."

She then turned to me and smiled gently again. "You have our blessing. Here, allow me to leave you with something.”

I looked up quickly, my eyes red and blurry from the drying tears. Before I could speak, I felt a deep warmth in my hand. A calm I had never felt seeped into my bones, and I felt the emptiness in my soul filling with something. A physical manifestation of healing, traveling through my arm and spreading across my brain. I instinctively closed my eyes, relishing in the feeling. As I drifted into bliss, words floated into my heart like cottonwood seed on a breeze.

“Your daughter is safe. Carry on, for her.”

A minute passed, and I opened my eyes to a dark plane cabin. The feeling of peace was gone, but the agony of grief was lessened. The woman was gone. I looked around for her and was about to grab for my phone from the ground where it had fallen, when I felt something in my hand. I slowly opened it, and in the dim light of the cabin, I saw something there, gleaming. I turned on my phone flashlight, and saw it was a necklace. A necklace made of amber.