by Alana Terry
Except it isn’t.
I’d like to think that we had some heavy, weighty discussion about God, the afterlife, anything. But like I said, Kennedy and I didn’t usually talk religion. At all. She’s quiet. Unassuming in her I’m-going-to-study-until-three-o’clock-in-the-morning-and-ace-all-my-tests overachieving kind of way.
My best guess? We were talking about things like how excited I was for Kaladi Brothers coffee once I landed back in Alaska and whether or not I thought I’d take Math Babe up on his offer for drinks at the airport.
Sometimes I hate how frivolous I can be. I mean, if I’d had any idea what was about to happen, if I had any clue how close I’d come that day to spending an eternity in hell … Sometimes I want to grab Kennedy by the shoulders and shake her and demand, “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” Except now that I’m a Christian myself, I totally get it. It’s not like you get saved and all of a sudden have this unavoidable urge to convert the whole world. Or maybe you even have the inklings of an urge, but you talk yourself out of it. I don’t want to scare him away. I don’t want her to think I’m judging her. I don’t want them to assume I’m some kind of closed-minded, religious nut-job weirdo.
I get it. I really do. But it’s sobering, too. Because back when I was convinced I was going to die, I was scared out of my mind. Scared that maybe I wasn’t good enough for heaven after all. It’s only by the grace of God I’m alive today. Except now I’m going to remember the lessons I learned on that flight. I’m not going to take my days for granted anymore. I’m not going to be so flightly that all I care about is getting drinks with some cute math teacher.
And I’m going to thank God every day that he forgave me for my sins and saved me from an eternity of fire and terror. Because I’ve tasted enough fire and terror in this life alone. I certainly don’t want it chasing me into the afterlife.
I’m saved now. And I thank God for that. But it’s terrifying to think of how close I came to the end without knowing him at all.
How close I came to dying with no hope or chance of salvation whatsoever.
CHAPTER 5
While Kennedy and I were wasting our time talking about nothing at all significant, I was still eyeing that big man in the Hawaiian and the teen he was with. At one point, he leaned over and said something to her, and she pulled away. It happened so fast I can’t be certain I actually saw it, but I could have sworn he yanked her by the hair.
That’s when I finally did tell the flight attendant. Tracy. The one whose name I’ll never forget. The one whose family background I’ve checked online a hundred times to see if there’s anything more to learn about her.
Mother of two. The family’s trying to stay out of the public eye (yeah, good luck with that), but one picture from a family vacation has been all over the press. It’s Tracy and her kids, out camping in the woods somewhere. She was married too, so I kind of assume her husband was the invisible man behind the camera. And they look so happy. So happy and healthy.
So alive.
I told Tracy that this man pulled that girl’s hair back. Mentioned that she looked super uncomfortable with him. I don’t know if this is where your mind goes or not, but I immediately started to think human trafficking. It’s absolutely ridiculous how many Americans are convinced that sort of stuff doesn’t happen in their own backyards. I’m pretty sensitive to it. As a feminist, even as a halfway decent human being, there’s no way I can stand for any sort of enforced slavery. It’s terrible. And absolutely disgusting if you ask me how many smug suburbanites sit in their comfortable middle-class privilege and assume that any girl — any child — who’s subjected to rape, violence, and exploitation on an hourly basis must like the life she’s chosen.
So yeah. You probably don’t want to get me started on that. But that’s exactly where my mind went. Strange man flying across state borders with a teen girl who’s obviously uncomfortable with him? No, I’m not paranoid to have worried that’s what was going on.
I didn’t tell Tracy all of my suspicions. You’d be proud of me. I spared her the lecture, the statistics, the stories of trafficked girls I’ve read online. But I did tell her about how that man pulled her hair and yanked her head back. I was sort of thinking she’d poo-poo it away, but she was actually very professional about the whole thing. “Thanks for bringing this to our attention,” and “we’ll definitely keep our eyes on them,” that sort of thing. It’s nice to have your concerns validated.
And then we waited.
Except what we thought we were waiting for was the plane to land in Detroit.
I’m so ashamed to think that after I brought up my observations to Tracy, my biggest concern was whether or not I’d join Math Babe for drinks. We had several hours’ layover, but I didn’t want to ditch Kennedy or make her feel like the third wheel. It’s kind of funny since she’s the one who not only saved my life that day but also introduced me to the Lord, but at the time, I still felt like I was the one who was looking out for her.
She was real sheltered growing up. At least in some ways. Private all-girls’ school. Paranoid, safety-addicted father breathing down her neck. Stay-at-home mom baking cookies every day of the week. That sort of thing. It could have been any upper-class American suburb, except the only difference was it was overseas. You should have seen my face last year when I learned my college roommate grew up as some missionary kid. I was totally convinced she’d be this backwards, socially incompetent child who wore Catholic school-girl uniforms (and I’m not talking about the Halloween party kind, by the way). So I was pleasantly surprised to discover just how normal Kennedy actually was. If spending five hours a day studying for a test that’s still two weeks away can ever be considered normal.
The point I’m trying to make is I felt like it was my job on campus to look out for Kennedy. She had this whole international city chic thing going on, but in other areas she was totally clueless. Like the first time one of my theater friends and I decided to medicinally help ourselves reach a state of deeper relaxation (if you get what I’m saying), Kennedy came back to our room a few hours later and seriously had no idea what the smell was. She asked me if I had put on some new kind of perfume. I should point out that I’m doing my best to give up that sort of thing now that I’m a Christian, but I’m not going to lie or pretend that I didn’t come from a pretty hard partying background.
I actually used to pity Kennedy for being so up-tight. Thought it was my job to teach her how to let her hair down (both metaphorically as well as literally). I thought she was sheltered and naïve for her beliefs. And I’ll go ahead and admit that I teased her sometimes. It was all in good nature, I should mention. She never got angry. Never fought back. On the other hand, she didn’t do what some Christians might have done and made the practicing of her faith that much more obnoxious just to spite me.
No, she kept on living her quiet, Christian life, never realizing how closely I was watching. Never realizing that with each passing week my respect for her grew more and more.
Never guessing that when I came face to face with death on that doomed flight to Detroit, it was the God she served so quietly and steadfastly that I’d call on to come and rescue us both.
CHAPTER 6
Okay, so this is admittedly a little bit of a sidetrack, but can someone please explain to me why the majority of Christians today seem so against environmental progress? I mean, I see how your faith will impact your politics when it comes to things like abortion. I totally get that.
But seriously? When did conservative Christians decide to leave the environmental debate up to everyone else to fight over? Doesn’t God in the very first book of the Bible put humans in charge of taking care of the earth? Hello?
I’ve only been a Christian for a few weeks now, and I know there’s still a ton I need to learn. I also know that my specific political leanings may not line up a hundred percent with the majority of evangelical Christians, and that’s fine with me. I figure that God’s judgi
ng me based on how much I actually meant it when I asked him to forgive my sins as opposed to how I’ll choose to vote in the next election.
But I’m not off my soap box yet. I just need another minute. (And yes, this totally does tie into my near-death experience on that doomed flight to Detroit. I’ll get there.)
Did you know that one of the biggest reasons I never even dreamed of becoming a Christian myself was because I thought I’d have to dye my hair back to its natural brunette and start voting for the other guys? Seriously. That’s honestly what I thought Christianity was. That’s why I’m saying I’m so glad God doesn’t judge me based on which box I check when I go to the polls.
I already told you how upset I get about human trafficking, but now I need to talk for a minute about environmental justice. I took a whole course last semester, and I’m pretty well studied up on it.
Did you know that if you go up to a typical pastor and say, “Hey, do you know what environmental justice is?” you’re likely to either get a blank stare or some kind of tirade about how global warming is a hoax? But that has nothing to do with environmental justice.
You want a living example? Take the Flint water supply. There’s lead in the pipes and no way to fix it. Apparently, it would cost far less to relocate the entire Flint community than to figure out which pipes are leaking lead and poisoning Flint’s children (and adults).
That’s bad. I’m pretty sure we can all agree on that no matter where we lie on the political spectrum. Right?
But there’s more. This isn’t just about clean water. This is about class distinction. Because what are you going to do if you’re a professional working in Flint, making a multi six-figure income a year and you find out the water there is poisoning you and your family and nobody’s going to do anything to fix it?
You move.
Worst case scenario? Maybe your house forecloses (because who’s going to buy land in Flint?). So your credit score takes a hit. But you’ve got the money, the resources, and the savings account to start over.
Good-bye, Flint. Hello water supply that isn’t going to kill you.
Easy as pie.
Now imagine you’re an immigrant single mother. You’re working two jobs just to put food on the table because your income’s just high enough you don’t qualify for food stamps and just low enough that you can’t afford anything. You’ve got three kids. Those kids have to eat. The baby needs diapers. Oh, and since you’re working all the time, you have to pay for all that baby formula.
The problem? The water you’re mixing with your baby’s formula will eventually kill her.
So what are your options? Well you can buy bottled water. Except oops. That costs more money than you have, and you’re already diluting your formula to make it stretch and worried that your baby’s health might suffer as a result. Besides, even if you give her purified water to drink, what happens when she needs to wash her hands or take a bath? She’s still soaking in poison through that soft, porous skin of hers.
So maybe you wait for the government to come and fix things. After all, poisoned drinking water certainly should fall under the category of a national emergency. Except the government’s uncomfortably silent on the matter. I wonder why that is. Could it be because those with the loudest political voices have already taken their trust funds and their retirement accounts and moved away?
Back to choices then. Because after all, this is America. The land of freedom. You have the right to live anywhere you want. Don’t need the state’s permission to move to a new town.
Except how are you going to afford a moving van? Or a safety deposit on a new apartment? And what about the fact that you’re too busy working your two jobs just to keep the kids from starving that you literally can’t start over?
And so you stay. And each and every time you fill up that baby’s bottle, even though you’re using a filter and hoping that will help even just a little, you have to wonder if while nourishing your daughter, you’re also killing her.
Slowly. Methodically.
Because this is what happens when you’re poor and voiceless and living in the land of the free.
Am I off my soapbox? I suppose for now. But I just had to get that off my chest.
Going back to what happened on that flight, there’s absolutely no excuse for murdering an innocent victim in cold blood. No reason anyone should stand up and shoot a flight attendant execution style.
Nor is there any reason whatsoever in which it is justified to tamper with a flight carrying hundreds of people. People who are going to die because of your callous decisions.
Sometimes when I wake up from nightmares, the sound of gunshots reverberating in a stark airplane cabin in my ears and the scent of smoke in my nose, I’m tempted to hate the men who did this.
Except I can’t.
I can’t hate them because — even though I could never justify their actions — I understand exactly why they felt this act of homegrown terrorism was the only solution to their plight.
CHAPTER 7
Before going on, I’d like to apologize to you for my little mini rant back there. Probably wasn’t one of my finest moments, I’ll be honest. But I’ve read some of the news articles involving the crash lately, and a lot of people are asking those kinds of questions.
If things were so bad in Detroit, why didn’t they just leave?
Why’d they hijack a flight with hundreds of innocent passengers on it when they could have just telephoned their state representative?
I’ve made myself a promise not to go off on another tirade. Suffice it to say that comments like these really get under my skin. If I were slightly less self-aware, I might even wonder if this was a case of Stockholm syndrome. If I’m sympathizing with the terrorists who nearly killed me for some twisted psychological reason or other.
But I’d been studying what was going on with Brown Elementary School over there in Detroit for months. I already knew which side of the aisle I was on.
Nearly losing my life to a couple desperate, deranged terrorists didn’t change that.
Not at all.
But I suppose I’m getting ahead of myself.
Kennedy’s the one who should tell you about the letter. She was the one who got it, but it completely confirmed every disgusting suspicion I had about that man in the Hawaiian shirt and the girl he was with.
Everything except for the trafficking angle, at least.
I didn’t see it happen, but Kennedy got up to use the bathroom. She had to go to the front of the plane because there just so happened to be a man planting a bomb in the lavatories in the back. Of course, none of us knew it at the time. We just thought he’d fallen on the wrong side of an argument with a taco truck on his drive to the airport.
I keep trying to remember what I was doing when that girl reached out to Kennedy for help. It’s not like I thought it was my duty to stare at my roommate as she walked all the way up the aisle just to use the bathroom on an airplane. Truth be told, I was probably wasting time on my phone. Or maybe touching up my makeup since we were now less than an hour away from Detroit, and I was still seriously considering taking a quick detour to go on a date with Math Babe.
I heard the man yell first. And I looked up and saw him shouting at Kennedy. The girl he was with, the teen I’d had my eye on, was terrified. I wouldn’t even say she screamed for help. It was more like a squeal. Like something you’d hear from a dying animal.
Everything’s a little fuzzy in my mind as I recall it. Maybe because it was so shocking. Or maybe because watching someone yell at your roommate and hearing a terrified teen screaming, “Help, I’ve been kidnapped,” isn’t as traumatizing as nearly dying in a fiery plane crash.
But there I go again getting ahead of myself.
The girl was screaming. Kennedy stood there dazed, not that I can blame her. I doubt I’d have had any sense to do anything different. A man in a suit jumped out of his seat in an instant. The air marshal
. The hero coming to save the day.
The girl kept shouting, “He’s kidnapping me,” the air marshal got the Hawaiian shirt dude in handcuffs, and everyone lived happily and safely ever after.
I wish.
Because as it turned out, the main point of the whole scene was to get the air marshal to reveal himself. Couple quick moves — I don’t even remember them they were so fast — and the air marshal was knocked out. The guy in the Hawaiian shirt grabbed the officer’s gun, gave it to this other man who was in on the entire thing, and we were officially hostages.
There’s this type of therapy where you go back and relive traumatizing events, but you do it in this almost dreamlike state where you’re in control of the outcome. So you can go back and revisit the moment of terror and give it any ending you want. I haven’t been to any actual psychologist or anything, but I’ve tried this little technique on myself from time to time, and here’s my favorite out of all the happy ending scenarios I’ve come up with.
First of all, who comes to the rescue but Math Babe? (I’ve started to feel awful I’ve forgotten his name, so in my imagination I call him Raul.) Raul jumps out of his seat, halfway graded math papers flying everywhere. “Stop!” he shouts in a deep, husky voice. And then there’s this fairly exciting but totally one-sided scuffle, the end result of which is both hijackers knocked out and bloody. Passengers cheer. The air marshal wakes from his beauty sleep, his assailants are bound and tied, and we all land safely at the Detroit airport where Raul and I share extravagant tapas and wine.
End of story.
Pretty good one, isn’t it?
I was somewhat proud of it.
But of course, if that’s what really happened, I wouldn’t have become a Christian. Which leads me to a question I’ve been wrestling with for weeks. Did God cause our plane to get hijacked because he knew that experience is what it would take to wake me up and bring me to my senses? What about the people who died? What about that poor kidnapped girl?