by Anna Levine
“I got a few days off to help my parents. They’ve got a hatchery up past Nahariya, and all their help has been deployed.” She giggles. “But it wasn’t all chickens and eggs,” she confesses quietly. “Yesterday I got to spend the afternoon with my boyfriend.”
She’s got such a silly grin that I can’t help but laugh, too. She crosses her legs. “So you came all the way up from Jerusalem to be with Lily.” She offers me more chips. “I knew you two stars would hit it off ,” she says.
“Stars?” I say, unable to keep the disbelief out of my voice.
I think of what I’m going to tell Lily, and my head is racing with questions. Tami picks up a chip, pops it in her mouth, and licks the salt off her fingers. Turning to face me, she gives me one of her commander looks, a look I recognize. I steady myself and wait.
“You still have a long way to go, Aggie. There’s basic training, which is tough, a lot tougher than the little sample you had.” She cracks a smile. “But then, if, after two years, you are where I believe you’ll be, you and your sidekick Lily will be leading a group of new recruits.”
“Just like you?”
She laughs. “Why not? You certainly have what it takes.”
I want to ask her more, but just then her cell phone starts crooning a soppy love song. She glances at the number on her phone, motioning me to wait while she takes the call.
“Hey, love,” she says. Her voice drops to a whisper, and she shifts slightly to the other side. I turn back to the window to give her privacy.
I’m wiped. Exhausted. Done in. Tuckered out. My body droops from the strain of it all, except for a slight smile I feel lifting the corners of my mouth.
I slip out the cell phone from Noah’s jacket and dial home. “Hey, it’s me. I’m on the way back home. But listen, I’ve got some great news!”
Epilogue
I am about to jump.
I am about to jump wearing a full load on my back.
Feet, knees, hip, back, roll.
Crammed tightly, the pack is stuffed with my anxieties, fears—and the army-issued parachute. It is secured to my chest with strings and clasps. It holds my heart in place, should it try to break free. When the time is right, I will yank the cord.
At that moment, the pack will open. My fears will rise to the dome of my chute, where they will hover. And for a moment, I will be free of them.
Feet, knees, hip, back, roll . I have been trained to react without thinking. My body knows the drill. I will fall. Drift. Soar. Once my feet make contact with the ground, I will drop to my knees, lean into my hip, flip onto my back, and roll.
Not another rehearsal; this is reality. Am I ready? Yes. I can do this. Really, I can.
The door is pushed open. A rush of air blasts at me. The noise of the airplane motor swells and crashes inside my head.
I am sandwiched in. We shuffle forward like penguins. Birds without wings forced to fly. My hands clench the rungs. I have been trained for this moment, but nothing can tame the terror in my bones and the fear churning in my stomach.
“Green!”
I’m not ready to let go.
“Jump!”
The air batters against my chest, pressing me back. The engine thunders in my head.
And then my fingers are pried from the rungs.
There are moments in life when you have to jump. You throw yourself into the atmosphere hoping you’ll land right, hoping your parachute will open and ease your fall. If you’re lucky, you’ll have a crowd of onlookers waiting on the ground to greet you. Some chutes glide with the wind until you land effortlessly. Others get caught up in turbulence and the ride down to earth is bumpier, the landing harder. The thing is you never know how it’ll be until you step out and take the chance.
And when you hit the air, before your automatic parachute opens, there are a few seconds in which you are suspended. Skydivers call it freefall. I like to think of this time as that fleeting moment in life when you can see everything with unusual clarity.
As I peer out at the land rising up toward me, I am amazed at how small it all looks, as if I can scoop up all the land and cradle it in the palm of my hand. I wonder, as I am watched from below, if I look like a kite that has broken loose from the strings that once held it.
Feet, knees, hip, back, roll.
The ground is hard: feet.
The impact quick: knees.
But I am quicker: hips.
The sky retreats: back.
I am home: roll.
About the Author
Anna Levine has lived in Israel for more than twenty years, having emigrated there on her own when she was eighteen. She is the mother of two sons—both of whom are serving in the Israeli Army. Aggie’s experiences in the novel are partly based on the author’s time spent in underground bomb shelters after rockets hit her kibbutz. www.annalevine.org
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Credits Page
Jacket art © 2008 by Chad W. Beckerman
Jacket design by Victoria Jamieson
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used to advance the fictional narrative. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
Freefall
Copyright © 2008 by Anna Levine
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © February 2009 ISBN: 9780061881206
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Levine, Anna.
Freefall / by Anna Levine.
p. cm.
“Greenwillow Books.”
Summary: As war between Israel and Lebanon breaks out in 2006 and her compulsory service in the Israeli army draws near, teenaged Aggie considers joining an elite female combat unit.
[1. Self-realization—Fiction. 2. Soldiers—Fiction.
3. Israel—Fiction. 4. Lebanon War, 2006—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.L57823Fr 2008 [Fic]—dc22 2008003826
FIRST EDITION 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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