by Cari Noga
He finally stood, joining them at the railing. “Isn’t what right?”
“That this area will be secured. We won’t be able to get back later.”
“Oh. Right.” He waved at the other side of the boat. “It looks like they’re letting us off. I’m going to check it out.”
Robby stayed at the railing, staring into the waves. Watching her husband drift away, absorbed in her own head, Linda finally remembered the word. Manifests. Passenger manifests. That was what those lists were called.
“We’re fine,” Christopher argued to the EMT conducting dockside exams. “We need to get back to LaGuardia. Our car’s there.”
Aboard the ferry they were given thermal blankets and coffee. Someone had even produced extra uniform sets for the ferry employees, and Christopher and Deborah both now wore the ill-fitting but dry navy pants. The EMT had confirmed all their vitals were normal. Out of danger, either from drowning or freezing, Deborah just wanted to curl up and call Helen back, but her phone was at the bottom of the river.
“Sir, the airline has to do a thorough intake of all survivors.” The EMT was implacable as he steered them to a taxi line. “The Park Central Hotel’s been established as a command center. They’ll provide more information there.”
“All right.” With a loud sigh, Christopher capitulated.
Deborah felt grateful for the quiet of the cab and the blast from the heater. Behind the Plexiglas divider, the backseat felt like a cocoon amid the Midtown rush hour traffic. She closed her eyes. Christopher reached for her hand.
“You OK?”
“I think so.” Her mind felt numb now. As her body thawed, she became aware of the soreness in her rib cage, where the seatbelt had restrained her as they’d smacked onto the river.
“That was pretty intense.”
She nodded.
“I mean, you were pretty intense. Right at the end, just before we got on the ferry.”
“I guess it’s true what they say about near-death experiences. It really puts life in perspective.”
“Yeah. For me, too.”
“You mean about having a baby?” She opened her eyes eagerly, searching his face.
“Not exactly.” He shook his head.
“Then what? What were you thinking?”
“I was thinking about how grateful I was for our lives. Together, as a couple.”
She squeezed his hand. “That’s sweet.” What was he getting at?
“But I feel like . . . like we haven’t been living them these last two years.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “What do you mean?”
“Ever since we started trying to get pregnant, we’ve been stuck in this limbo loop. We haven’t made love spontaneously since 2007. Waiting for the right time to try. Waiting to find out. Waiting to try again. The IVFs made it worse.”
“Worse how?” She slid her hand out of his.
“You get so obsessed, so fixated on the results. It’s total tunnel vision. And then you’re so depressed.”
“Well, it is depressing. Not being able to do what normal women can. Normal couples,” Deborah amended, stressing the last word.
“I wanted children, too, but I don’t think it’s abnormal if we don’t. Especially in our circles. We’re both professionals. We do work that matters. We—”
“‘Work that matters?’ Christopher, are you honestly telling me that after what we just went through, work is more important than having a family?”
“I have a family already. We’re a family, Deborah, you and I. I want to protect that family first.”
A protest rose to Deborah’s lips, but they were arriving at the hotel. Another horde of media swarmed the sidewalk. Stepping out of the cab, Deborah saw the woman she’d noticed on the wing, the mother and her baby, at the center of the cluster of microphones and cameras.
“Where are you from?” someone shouted. “How old is the baby?” another asked. “What was it like out there in the river? Isn’t New York the greatest city in the world, to have handled the rescue so quickly? Do you have anything to say to family at home?”
The woman opened her mouth. The media stopped shouting, waiting breathlessly.
“Well, of course it was terrifying when the pilot told us to brace for impact,” the woman said. “I just prayed my baby would be OK.” She patted him—Deborah was pretty sure it was a boy—on the back and smiled at him. At his round, drooling face, not at the cameras, Deborah noted.
“Come on, Deborah. Let’s go.” She felt Christopher tugging her hand. She pulled it back, as mesmerized by the woman as the media.
“And now I’m just so grateful. To God, to the pilot, to the other passengers who helped me. It was a miracle. A true miracle,” the woman said, shifting the baby to her other hip.
“A miracle on the Hudson,” offered one of the reporters.
“That’s right.” The woman nodded.
Security burst from the hotel. “All right, press conference is over. We’ve got to get these folks inside ASAP.” Shouting questions again, the media turned their cameras as the lead guard placed a protective hand on the shoulder of the woman, below the baby’s head. They looked like a family, Deborah reflected with a pang, watching him shepherd them into the hotel.
Where was Christopher? There he was, already through the revolving door, inside the lobby, talking on his phone. Checking in at the university, no doubt. She knew he was waiting to hear whether his department had won a big grant application, five million dollars from the US Fish and Wildlife Service for a study on the nesting habits of migratory birds. Tunnel vision, my foot. She also noticed he had used the past tense in the cab. He’d “wanted” to have children.
Silently she walked right by him, to the registration desk. “Two beds, please.”
THREE
Amanda flew around the kitchen, pouring juice, popping a bagel in the toaster, turning on the TV. She glanced out the window at their backyard bird feeder. Her mom was right, it needed refilling. She’d do it on her way out. She really wasn’t late, but when she created a commotion she didn’t feel so lonely. Her dad was already gone, leading a “prayer breakfast” that he’d told her about the night before over the Chinese takeout he brought home, apologizing because some counseling session had run late. He hadn’t blinked when she told him her mom was staying away another night.
“Well, I guess it’s father-daughter night, then. We don’t do this very often, do we?” said the Reverend Richard Stevens, segueing automatically into grace over the kung pao chicken and egg rolls. “Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest. Let these gifts to us be blessed . . .”
After his “amen,” silence prevailed. Amanda wouldn’t have known what to talk about even if she hadn’t been preoccupied with both her missing mom and the auditions.
She knew what not to say, though: anything about the musical. Not after that one time in the choir. At least not until she’d gotten a part. Then it could be about keeping her word to the cast and director. Fulfilling a commitment she’d made would trump the risk of appearing proud and vain.
The bagel popped up. Amanda spread cream cheese thickly, thinking. Before yesterday, when was the last time she had eaten breakfast by herself? Her mom was always there in the mornings, even as the church’s food pantry consumed more of her evenings—evenings when they used to make experimental omelettes with whatever happened to be in the fridge and play Scrabble or cards or watch movies while her dad offered counseling or Bible study at the church.
So, measured by meals, it was official, Amanda thought, chewing another bite. Everyone and everything at Fellowship of Hope got a piece of her parents before she did.
The TV anchor intruded on her thoughts. “Investigators will begin to work in earnest today to learn the cause of yesterday’s emergency landing in the Hudson River, which riveted New York and much of the nation for hours.” The plane appeared, bal
ancing gracefully on the waves again, the passengers backlit.
“CNN has learned that the probable cause of the crash is assumed to be a bird strike,” the anchor continued.
Bird strike. The words reminded Amanda she was supposed to fill the bird feeder. Swallowing the last of the bagel, she found the bird feed sack in the pantry and lugged it outside.
Sharp cold greeted her. Filling the feeder took half the burlap bag. Back in the kitchen, the clock read 7:39 a.m. She had to get going. Dropping the sack on the floor, she searched for the TV remote. The crash story was still on.
“. . . Ted Ramsey, thanks for your time this morning. Coming up next we’ll have a preview of the upcoming presidential inauguration. By the way, we understand that Captain Sullenberger and his family may be on their way to that event next week, at the invitation of President-elect Obama. But let’s take one more look at some of yesterday’s stunning scenes.”
There it was, next to the toaster. Amanda aimed the remote over the kitchen counter carefully. It was an old set. You had to press the “Power” button just right for it to work. The shot of the plane balancing on the waves, passengers strung out along the wings, had been stylized into a logo. “Miracle on the Hudson,” she read as a video montage started. She waved the remote. Come on, already. A close-up of a mother holding a baby aboard the ferry deck. The camera backed up, widening the view. A man was talking and gesturing with his phone. Behind him, a woman leaned against the deck rail, her red coat bright against the gray waves.
A red coat. Your mom is on. OMG. OMG. Oh, my God. But yes, it was her mom, now turning toward the camera, walking toward it, her blond hair blowing across her collar, walking behind the man on the phone. Just like Kelsey said. No way. No way, Amanda had said, but it was her mom in her red peacoat, right there on the deck of a ferry. Nowhere near a conference room. What was she doing there? And why didn’t she say she was, after Amanda asked her straight-out?
The montage changed again, to an aerial of the emergency vessels surrounding the plane and then cut to a commercial for blood pressure medication. Finally, the remote worked, vanquishing the image from the screen. But Amanda still saw the stark fact.
Her mother had lied.
Brett stood in the lobby of the Times Square hotel, wanting to meld her body to Jackie’s as they said their good-byes. Neither her hands, nor lips, nor mind were behaving like a proper pastor’s wife’s would. How ironic, Brett thought. It was Richard who had set her on course to this moment, when he said the congregation expected her to be more visible. It was important to him, to his career, he said. To their stability there in Scranton, where Amanda was doing so well in school, he said, expertly manipulating the mantra that guided her life: do what’s best for Amanda.
Brett hadn’t balked then, two years ago, nor did she now. She yielded to expectations, waving to Jackie’s departing taxi and turning to the parking garage. Expectations, damn expectations. Like the church’s, expecting two-for-one when they hired a pastor. Amanda was an excuse at first, but she was getting older and had some good friends. She probably needed more breathing room, anyway.
Instead of co-leading the Bible study or fund-raising for a new church carpet, she decided to expand the existing food pantry into a community meal program. Once, she and Richard had both believed social justice was a major mission of ministry. Ever since he’d accepted the pastor position at Fellowship of Hope, though, Richard had seemed to grow more judgmental and closed-minded, like the congregation. The meal program not only allowed her to re-embrace her old ideals, but it meant spending time with non-members.
She’d considered carefully how to broach this to Richard.
“The Lord has told me we’re meant to serve the entire community, not just those who are already in our flock,” she had told Richard.
Richard nodded solemnly. “Matthew, chapter six: ‘Behold the birds of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.’ ” He nodded again. “God will bless your efforts, Brett.”
Brett steered their eight-year-old blue Honda Accord out of the parking garage, looking for a sign to the Lincoln Tunnel. Duly blessed, she had begun to use the rudimentary kitchen facilities in the church basement to cook a weekly community dinner.
The first week, a dozen people showed up. The second week, it doubled. She created flyers and posted them at the library, at grocery stores, at the bus station. After two months, fifty people were gathering regularly. It was fulfilling. What better manifestation of church fellowship was there, after all, than sharing a meal?
Eventually, though people appreciated the meals, she learned that what was really needed was meal delivery. People whose kitchen cabinets were bare often didn’t have transportation, but did still have pride. Bringing the food to them—in their homes, apartments, cars—would truly help people in Scranton who were down on their luck.
That was what had prompted Brett, again with Richard’s blessing, to attend the annual Meals on Wheels Best Practice Symposium, sponsored by the East Coast Conference of Christian Sisterhood and held at the Charlotte Expo Center in downtown Charlotte, North Carolina, last September.
Ahead, she could see the tunnel brightening as she approached the New Jersey end. It reminded her of seeing Jackie that first night, at the welcome reception. She was a regular at the conference, the wife of a pastor whose star was rising on the southeast megachurch circuit, according to the conversation Brett overheard.
Her eyes had noticed other details. Jackie’s lean, tan figure. Her honey-colored hair curling around her shoulders. Her perfume, when they wound up sitting next to each other at the second plenary session the next morning.
“Wasn’t that so inspiring?” she remembered saying to Jackie after the presentation ended.
Jackie had turned, her eyes taking Brett in from head to toe.
“Absolutely it was,” Jackie said, her southern drawl thicker and sweeter than a milkshake. “Have we met?”
“I don’t think so. Brett. Brett Stevens. From Pennsylvania.”
“Hell-low, Brett Stevens from Pennsylvania.” Jackie had smiled, clasping Brett’s pale, plain hand in between her tan ones with their coral-painted fingernails.
A pulsing sensation rippled from the handclasp up Brett’s arm and down to her core. She’s a pastor’s wife. Like you. The ripple receded.
“First time?”
First time for the sensations? Brett thought back to freshman year at Penn State, in the dorms. Her roommate Donna’s habit of sleeping in her panties and a T-shirt. Brett had requested a single the next semester, the semester she also met Richard.
Jackie was still looking at her.
“Pardon me?”
“First time here at the conference?”
“Oh. Uh, yes.”
“Well, I’m on the welcome committee. So let me be the first to welcome you to Charlotte, Brett Stevens. I think you’ll like it here.”
Absorbed in her memory, Brett let the Accord drift into the left lane. A truck’s horn blast brought her back to the highway, to the present cold, stark January day. So different from the humid, heavy Charlotte air. The air had had something to do with it, she was sure, heating her imagination during their first cup of coffee together that afternoon, as she watched Jackie’s coral fingertips curl around the cup.
She’s a pastor’s wife. Like you. Someone safe, she told herself again in her room that night, after hanging up from the call she was expected to make home. Someone harmless.
But she was wrong, gloriously wrong. Calls, e-mails, and one other stolen day in New York last December, on the premise of Christmas shopping, followed. Then, finally, this rendezvous, under the cover of another fictitious conference. Brett had dared to suggest it after Amanda came home from school talking about registering for her SAT college exams. The offhand remark sent Brett reeling back two decades, to
the Penn State dorm room. She’d denied herself all this time, on the grounds of what was right, on the grounds of being a dutiful wife, on the grounds of what was best for Amanda. Now Amanda was a year and a half away from her own life. Brett’s marriage was hollow. And she didn’t know what was right anymore.
Still, she had half hoped that Jackie would cancel. When they finally found themselves together, twenty floors above Manhattan, releasing those so-long-suppressed instincts, yielding to play and passion and pushing away what was best for Amanda, Brett spent three days veering from exhilaration to terror.
Three days they decided to stretch into four, pushing Jackie’s return flight to Charlotte to the next day. Exhilaration. Then, the fateful decision to take the sightseeing cruise. The crash. And getting caught by the camera—according to Amanda’s friend Kelsey, anyway. Terror.
Another horn blast jarred her out of her thoughts. Brett overcorrected, sending the Accord all the way into the right lane just as she crossed the state line.
“Pennsylvania Welcomes You,” declared the broad blue sign. “State of Independence.”
Brett registered another flash of irony, this one cruel, in the instant before the sign disappeared in her exhaust and tears.
FOUR
Sitting cross-legged on the scratchy hotel bedspread, Robby Palmer watched CNN intently. His parents wanted to go get breakfast, but he wasn’t budging.
“Investigators will begin to work in earnest today to unravel the chain of events behind yesterday’s emergency landing in the Hudson River, which riveted New York and much of the nation for hours,” the anchor said as rescue footage unfolded on the screen.
“New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is praising the efforts of US Airways pilot Sully Sullenberger and his crew for the textbook execution of an aviation maneuver known as ‘ditching,’” the anchor went on.
“Ditching,” Robby wrote in the brown notebook on his lap, underlining it. He could hear the traffic down in the street.