She looked out the window, at a plane taxiing in. “If you fall out of a plane at thirty-five thousand feet, you vaporize,” she said distractedly. “Zap! Gone. Just like that.”
“Well, then, you’d better keep your seat belt fastened,” he said. In that moment he decided he could not tell her. Not now, not ever. She was unable to handle it. She worried about sun exposure, vaporizing, bombs, and hijacking. At her own house, he knew, she had installed an elaborate alarm system. His mother was afraid to fly, afraid of everything. He saw again Debbie’s face smiling out from on top of the television.
Eve tugged at his arm. “They’re calling my flight now.”
“I wish . . .” he said, but didn’t finish.
“I wish you could come with me, see me on the plane safely.” She took her bag from him. “Will you wait here and watch until I’ve taken off safely? That way if the plane goes down, you’ll be right here.”
Jim had no intention of doing anything so ridiculous but he said, solemnly, “Yes. I’ll wait right here.” He kissed her quickly on the cheek. “Have a good trip. Have a Bloody Mary or something. Relax.”
She began to move away from him, toward security. “Ha!” she said. “Easy for you to say. You’ll have your feet planted firmly on the ground.”
Jim waved goodbye. He turned, and the couple was gone, vanished, like they were never there at all.
Suddenly, his mother was back, standing right in front of him, her face close to his. “Jim,” she said, “I think it’s a shame that people can’t be who they are. Whatever that is. If someone loves you, they don’t care what you are. They love you no matter what. You have to be yourself. Be happy with who you are.” She reached up and held his face in her hands. “There is nothing worse than losing a child. That’s what they say. You’re my only child, my boy. And I love you. I accept you for what you are. Do you know that?”
He nodded. He tried to speak but she was off again, walking away from him with great determination, like a small, lemon yellow soldier.
“Mom,” he called after her. “Thank you.”
She didn’t look back. She just lifted her arm and waved, then disappeared down the long hall to her gate.
Slowly, Jim began to walk away. She had left two days early so he still had time off from work. He thought of calling Randy and asking him if he wanted to drive up to Big Sur for a few days. Yes, he thought, he would go home and do that. The loud roar of a jet engine revving made him stop. That would be his mother’s plane, carrying her back home.
He turned and went back to the big window that looked out over the runway. Jim pressed his palms against the glass. His breath steamed a small O in front of him. The plane moved slowly down the runway, then picked up speed, and began to take off. Jim’s heart beat hard against his chest as he watched. He realized he was holding his breath. Then the plane soared into the sky, lifting higher and higher, taking his mother upward, and away. Jim stood like that, palms pressed against the cool, smooth glass, eyes following the now speck of a plane, until he could no longer see it, and he was sure his mother would not fall from the sky.
INSIDE GORBACHEV’S HEAD
ELLIOT IS WAITING on Angell Street for the woman he loves. She is Georgia, his mother’s friend. At 8:20 he finally sees her. She’s driving a BMW 2002, Amazon green and rickety, and stalls right in front of his dorm, where he’s been standing and waiting for fifteen cold, gray, early morning minutes. Instead of getting the car started again, she leans across the seats and opens the passenger door from the inside.
“Get in, Elliot,” Georgia says. “I can’t be late for my shrink.”
Everybody his mother knows, his mother included, has a shrink; Elliot believes there is an entire population of women over forty getting analyzed, Prozaced, and twelve stepped to death.
He can’t get the door shut and Georgia can’t get the car started, so they both sit there with their private struggles until finally the car turns over and Georgia says, “Hold the door shut if you have to.” There’s no seat belt. The door rattles. It’s a precarious situation. Still, Elliot manages to notice what Georgia’s wearing—black leggings, brown Doc Martens boots, a thick woolen sweater, probably Guatemalan, with abstract people dancing across the lumpy wool and too many loose threads.
Georgia lights up a cigarette and offers him one.