As Far as the Stars

by Virginia MacGregor

  I can’t imagine living like that. Mom and Dad are totally different but they’re also still totally in love. They kiss each other on the lips when they’re saying goodbye or coming in from work and they leave each other slushy notes on the refrigerator door. Dad loves to say We’re the best team in the world. And it’s true. In their own crazy way, they are the best team. It must be horrible, having a dad living in one place and a mom in another. Living with one rather than the other. All those splinters between people who are meant to be a family. For Mom and Dad and Jude and Blake – and me – family’s everything.

  ‘Your dad raised you on his own?’ I ask.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘That’s amazing.’

  ‘Dad’s like that.’

  ‘Like what?’

  He pauses.

  Eventually, he says:

  ‘He does the right thing.’

  ‘Do you miss her – your mom?’

  He shrugs. And the way he lifts and drops his shoulders, it’s not like other people, who are just brushing something off or acting aloof. There are a thousand sentences in his shrug, sentences that, I guess, he’s not willing to say out loud right now.

  ‘It’s hard to miss someone you don’t really know,’ he says.

  I wonder whether that’s true. Because I think you can miss the idea of something, even if you don’t have it for real.

  ‘That sounds hard – your parents being split up. Her leaving when you were a baby.’

  ‘I’m used to it.’

  It doesn’t sound to me like something you’d ever get used to.

  ‘Maybe you should call her,’ I say. ‘Your mom. Tell her you’re coming.’

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ he says. But the way he says it, I know he doesn’t want to.

  And I understand that it’s hard. Like I can’t tell my parents that I haven’t got a clue where Blake is.

  I glance at my watch – we’ve been here for over a half hour.

  Then I notice the guy who bashed into me, standing at the counter, buying cigarettes. As he takes his change, he leans in and stares at the TV.

  ‘Crazy – that stuff about the plane,’ the driver says, handing the cashier a wad of dollar bills.

  My eyes follow his to the screen. They’re not showing the baseball game anymore. There’s a picture of the plane, but it’s different from the one back at the airport. There’s a new piece of metal floating on the sea. Search and rescue boats circle the area. The aerial camera zooms in closer. My fingers go to my throat.

  Oh God. It’s the rudder of a plane, poking out of the top of the water. And it’s got a picture of the Union Jack flag running up it.

  Christopher’s head snaps up towards the screen.

  The guy behind the counter gets out a remote control and turns up the volume.

  A newsreader’s voice fills the Mobil store.

  The wreckage spotted floating on the Atlantic has been identified as belonging to UKFlyer0217.

  My stomach flips.

  Passenger names have yet to be released.

  The screen switches to a shot of the airport back in DC. My mind goes back to all those people waiting for the flight. How this news must be hitting them too.

  A weight presses down on my heart.

  The newsreader keeps talking:

  A spokesperson for UKFlyer says that they’re investigating mechanical failure but refusing to rule out pilot error at this stage.

  A new picture flashes onto the screen. A pilot in a UKFlyer uniform. Dark hair. Tan skin. White teeth. A strong, confident gaze that says: I’ve got this.

  Under it, there’s a name: Edward Ellis.

  Christopher gets up so fast his chair crashes behind him.

  He doesn’t bother to pick it up.

  He just runs out of the door.

  Chapter Twelve

  22.01 EST Mobil Station, I-81

  ‘Where are you going?’ I call after him.

  Leda bounds ahead of me.

  He runs past the car and out onto the highway.

  ‘Christopher!’ I yell after him.

  Leda’s barking: long, loud barks, no whining this time. So loud you’d never believe she was this tiny scrap of a dog.

  ‘Christopher!’ I yell again.

  Eventually, I catch him up.

  He’s bent over, like he’s been winded, his hands on his hips, breathing hard.

  ‘Hey!’ I touch his shoulder but he pulls away.

  Up to now, Christopher’s been the one holding it together and staying calm. Who kept me calm.

  But after that picture on the TV, there’s no more pretending, is there? The plane’s crashed. More than that – it’s split apart. Bits of it are floating on the Atlantic. And it’s a UKFlyer plane. A Boeing. The one all those people were waiting for at Dulles. The one Christopher was waiting for.

  Christopher slumps down on the side of the road.

  ‘I can drive us back to DC,’ I say.

  He stares at the road.

  ‘Christopher?’ I say gently.

  ‘It’s bullshit,’ Christopher says at last, shaking his head over and over. ‘It’s all bullshit.’

  I sit down beside him.

  ‘We can call the number,’ I say. ‘The one they gave us back at the airport. They’ll be able to explain to us what’s going on.’

  He keeps shaking his head.

  Sitting here, next to him, I feel the weight of what I’ve done. His dad’s been involved in a plane crash and I’ve taken him off on this crazy road trip, jabbering on about Blake and where he might be and whether he’s going to be late for the wedding. For Christopher, this is serious, way more serious than a wedding being messed up by my unpredictable, disorganised brother.

  Back at the airport, Christopher might have got proper help. Counsellors or something. Someone other than me.

  ‘They don’t know what they’re talking about,’ he says.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘When a plane lands on water, there are ways for the passengers to escape,’ he says. ‘Safety rafts. Life-jackets.’

  He’s upset because he thinks his dad might be okay?

  ‘The plane was torn apart,’ I say gently.

  The thing is, we both saw the same image. Nothing good comes from a picture like that.

  ‘It’s better than a plane crashing into the side of a mountain – or on land,’ he says. ‘There’s a higher survival rate for passengers when planes land on water.’

  I wonder how he knows this stuff.

  ‘So, you’re saying that what we saw is a good thing?’

  ‘I’m saying that we can’t make assumptions.’

  Leda tries to nudge his hand so she can nestle into his lap, but he ignores her.

  ‘You think there might be some survivors, then?’

  He doesn’t answer for a really long time. And then he says:

  ‘They’re idiots.’

  ‘Who – who are idiots?’ I ask.

  ‘Those reporters. The crew on board that airliner are professionals. They wouldn’t have let anything happen to the plane. They’ve flown this route hundreds of times.’ He keeps kicking at the tarmac. ‘People are trying to find someone to blame, that’s all.’

  I try to remember what the news report said. All I could focus on was that image of the rudder with the Union Jack flag and how it confirmed what we’d been trying to ignore this whole time: that the metal they found floating on the ocean belonged to the UKFlyer flight we were waiting for back in DC.

  I look around me. God this place is ugly. Gas fumes. The sound of the highway. No trees.

  I touch his arm. ‘Let’s get back in the car.’

  He doesn’t seem to hear.

  ‘You can’t stay here,’ I say.

  ‘I’ll be fine.’

  ‘You won’t be fine. We’re in the middle of nowhere. And it’s getting late. At least let me take you to Knoxville, then you can decide where you want to go. It’s easy to get a bus from there. Or I c
an drive us back to DC.’ I take a breath. ‘Whatever you want to do, we’ll work it out.’

  I keep looking at him for some sign that he’s taken it in but he doesn’t move or say anything.

  The truck that was filling up in the service station rumbles past us.

  I look up at the stars and wonder where Blake is and what he’d be thinking about all this. What he’d be doing if he were here. God, he’d probably write a song about it. Yeah, that’s totally what he’d do. While everyone’s world was falling apart, he’d climb onto the hood of his Buick with his notebook and his guitar and he’d write a song. Something sad and true and totally beautiful. Blake believes that music can make things better, even impossibly hard things.

  But how can anything make this better, Blake? I keep looking up at the stars. How can anything good come out of a plane crash?

  I look back at Christopher, his head bowed low.

  ‘I’ll go and use the restroom,’ I say. ‘Give you some space. You take some time out here. Then we’ll hit the road again.’

  He doesn’t move.

  ‘Christopher? I’ll be back in a minute. Just wait for me.’

  I barely see the movement – but I think he nods. A small nick of the head to show that he heard me. And that he’ll wait for me.

  As I walk back through the Mobil store, the TV’s on some other kind of news, like anything else in the world matters right now.

  I try to focus on what Christopher said – that there might still be some hope that they’re alive. That there’ll be search and rescue teams all over the coast of Ireland. That should be on the news.

  I use the restroom and then stand at the sink, staring in the mirror. I look at my short hair. Mom wanted me to get hair extensions for tomorrow: she said my pixie-cut wouldn’t suit the look of the wedding. I told her that hair extensions didn’t suit me and if she wanted me at the wedding – the real me rather than some hologram of a bridesmaid from a bridal catalogue version of me – then no one was touching my hair.

  I already gave in to wearing a dress.

  And having my nails done.

  And scattering rose petals for Jude to walk on.

  Enough’s enough.

  I lean forward and look at myself more closely.

  I’m the odd one out.

  Jude looks like Mom. Beautiful.

  Blake looks like Dad. A hip version, obviously. Long-limbed with big blue eyes and thick dark hair.

  And then me, a funny hotchpotch of all of them and none of them at the same time.

  Like most kids, I’d gone through that phase of wondering whether I was adopted and that they’d been lying to me all this time – about being one of them. But the phase didn’t last long. Because I felt it; that – in some totally unscientific, non-evidence based way – I belonged to them.

  I think about what Christopher said, about not being able to relate to his dad or his mom and how that must be the loneliest feeling in the world: to feel like, even in your own family, you don’t belong.

  Blake’s song comes back into my head, the one that made me swerve into the middle of the road, his cover of the Johnny Cash song he recorded at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville:

  Flesh and blood needs flesh and blood…

  Yeah, we all feel it. Mom and Dad and Blake – and even me and Jude who can’t be in the same room for more than a few minutes before arguing about something. We know that we’re flesh and blood. That we belong. That we need each other.

  Which is why, even when Blake is being his most infuriatingly self-centred self, he still shows up when it matters. On Mom’s surprise fiftieth birthday party when, for once, it was down to us, the kids, and Dad, to do all the organising – and without letting her know, which was even harder. He wrote a song for that too. And yeah, it was the highlight of the party. It made Mom cry. In a good way.

  I have to believe that he’s still going to show up at the wedding. He has to. Because we’re family. Flesh and blood. Letting each other down isn’t an option.

  I wash my hands, splash my face and dry it with some paper towels.

  Then I look back into the mirror.

  It’s my turn to be there for Christopher.

  Chapter Thirteen

  22.23 EST I-81

  I run out of the Mobil store, ready to storm up to Christopher, pull him onto his feet and drag him back to the car.

  But he’s not where I left him.

  I look up and down the highway, wondering whether he’s decided to head off alone, but I can’t see him.

  Shit. I shouldn’t have left him.

  Then I hear a bark. Leda. I left him with Leda.

  I spin round and try to work out where the barking’s coming from.

  Apart from the Mobil station and the Buick, the place is deserted.

  More barking.

  I look back at the Buick.

  And then I see him, sitting in the front passenger seat, Leda on his lap, her paws up against the window.

  I take in a long breath and release it slowly.

  Thank God.

  I go back to the car and settle in behind the steering wheel. I’m tired and shaken up by everything that I saw on the news and by the fact that Christopher suddenly went weird on me when he was meant to be the calm, sane one in all this. But I know I’m the one who has to keep their shit together now.

  ‘Where to?’ I ask him. ‘Back to DC or onward?’

  He stares out of the window and then, with a voice so quiet I can barely make it out, he says:

  ‘Onward.’

  I nod.

  ‘Good,’ I say.

  And I pull out of the gas station and head back out onto the highway.

  Chapter Fourteen

  22.50 EST I-81

  As we drive, I switch the radio on and keep it low. I keep my phone on too, with CNN alerts set up. I get that Christopher doesn’t like the way it’s being reported but whatever’s happened to the plane, we need to know what’s going on. It was finding things out by accident, like back at the Mobil station, that made Christopher flip out.

  Most of the stations are talking about the plane now.

  They’ve found more pieces of metal floating on the sea belonging to it.

  The search and rescue teams haven’t found any survivors yet. But they haven’t found any bodies either.

  Every time they mention the reasons for the crash, like that pilot error might be involved, Christopher takes out his phone and looks stuff up, I guess about the plane.

  The calm guy I saw sitting at Dulles, as though nothing could ever touch him, has vanished. Instead, Christopher keeps going through this stress cycle that’s doing my head in. He scans his phone. Shakes his head. Cracks his knuckles. Jiggles his leg up and down. Then puts his phone away again for a bit, takes a scrap of paper from his backpack and starts folding. A few seconds later, he scrunches the model he’s made up into a ball, drops it into the footwell, takes out his phone and starts scanning again.

  I’ve been trying not to let it get to me but I can’t help thinking about the plane and his dad and how he’s going cope with it all.

  He said the crew would have known what to do – and I try to believe that, for his sake. But everything they’re saying on the news makes me feel sick to my stomach.

  An investigation is underway, a spokesman said. Search and rescue teams are working hard. As if that’s meant to make us feel better. A plane carrying over two hundred people has crashed into the Atlantic – what the hell else should they be doing except working hard?

  Christopher keeps cracking his knuckles.

  ‘Maybe you should call your mom,’ I say.

  I feel like, even if they’re not close, he needs someone right now. And if he warns her that he’s coming, at least he won’t have to do all the explaining.

  He stares out through the windscreen.

  ‘I mean, if you’re still going to see her.’

  He still doesn’t answer.

  ‘I know it’s hard,’ I say.


  He turns to face me.

  ‘Have you spoken to your mum?’ he asks.

  I glance down at my phone, sitting on my lap. He must have noticed it lighting up over and over with messages.

  I shake my head. ‘No, I haven’t spoken to her.’

  ‘Well, maybe you should call her.’

  I know what he’s doing – pointing out that I can’t get him to do something that I’m not willing to do myself. But it’s different. His mom’s not my mom. And our situations aren’t the same. Blake wasn’t on the plane.

  ‘She won’t let me talk,’ I say. ‘She’ll go on and on about me being late and not doing the one thing I was supposed to do: get Blake to the wedding.’

  ‘It’s a lot,’ he says. ‘Being responsible for another person like that.’

  ‘I don’t mind.’

  ‘You don’t?’

  ‘I love Blake. He’s a pain in the butt but he’s worth it. You need to know him.’

  He nods slowly.

  ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t be talking about this stuff,’ I say. ‘It’s stupid.’

  His eyes catch mine.

  ‘I’d rather talk about this stuff,’ he says.

  ‘Really?’ I ask.

  ‘Yeah, really.’

  And then I get it. How it’s easier not to think about the big stuff. How thinking about a wedding, even a wedding that’s about to go horribly wrong, is better than thinking about a crash.

  ‘Well, if I don’t make it to the rehearsal dinner, I’m totally screwed. Mom’s already going to be mad about the family breakfast but the rehearsal dinner’s a whole different level of important: it’s public. My sister’s in-laws and their family will all be there.’ I pause. ‘I’m meant to wear a yellow dress.’

  He cranes his neck round to the back seat where the two dresses in their plastic liners are now all bunched up.

  ‘I wondered what the dresses were for.’

  ‘Yellow for the rehearsal dinner, blue for the wedding. Mom made both of them.’ I pause. ‘Mom made everything for the wedding. And I don’t even do dresses,’ I go on. ‘Not ever.’

  ‘Even as a kid?’

  ‘Especially as a kid. Mom tried to put me in dresses as a kid – Jude’s hand-me-downs. But I was this really active kid and I couldn’t crawl properly in them; I kept getting my feet caught in the hems and falling flat on my face. In the end, she packed the dresses away and brought out Blake’s old stuff – shorts and T-shirts and jeans. Proper clothes.’