In the Unlikely Event

  Miri can’t admit she’s nervous about seeing him. Come on, who wouldn’t be nervous about seeing her first love? Who wouldn’t want her old boyfriend to find her attractive? If you don’t want that, you don’t go to high school reunions, you don’t go to the thirty-fifth commemoration of the worst year of your life. Besides, she’s not fifteen anymore. She’s not that girl whose heart was broken on a sunny afternoon in May. She’s a woman, married with three children and a career. She’s responsible, dependable, mature. Right? she asks herself. Right, she answers.

  She stays up too late that night, watching A Place in the Sun on TV. She’d seen it with Rusty at the Regent movie theater that winter, the year it won six Academy Awards. They’d each gone through two handkerchiefs, bawling over the young Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift. Rusty planned to come with her to Elizabeth for tomorrow’s commemorative event, but Dr. O’s health is too fragile, even though Fern is a doctor and offered to stay at the house.

  —

  THEY GATHER the next morning at the site of the third crash, in the field behind Janet Memorial. The old home is in disrepair, no longer used to house children in need, children without parents or family to care for them. She wonders where those children go now. It’s a bright, sunny day, mild compared to the bitterly cold winter of 1952.

  Miri stands between Christina and Henry, oversize sunglasses covering half her face, a cashmere shawl thrown over her new suit.

  She and Christina had gone shopping for today’s event. They’d each bought a designer suit with big shoulders, right out of Dynasty. They’d laughed their heads off in the dressing room. Christina is the best friend Miri always wanted. The real deal. When it comes to dynasties, Christina and Jack have their own. Irish Jack, that’s what they called him in the early days. He’d built his dynasty slowly, shrewdly—though he swears he didn’t have a clue back then, just knew he wanted to work hard and be successful for Christina and their girls. An understatement, if ever there was one. Went from being an electrician to an electrical contractor to a general contractor to owning one of the biggest commercial construction companies in the West, with IRISH JACK lettered on the side of his plane.

  —

  THE MAYOR, Thomas Dunn, who was a Sixth Ward councilman that winter, speaks from a platform. “The fifty-eight-day period that ended here on February eleventh, 1952, at twelve-twenty a.m., was the most memorable of my life, outside of World War Two. Our mayor at the time called it ‘The Umbrella of Death.’ Others referred to our town as ‘Plane Crash City.’ But we know better. We know our city survived the American Revolution. George Washington slept here, as we learned as schoolchildren. We have been and always will be a proud revolutionary city, a welcoming city to immigrants from all over the world, where your parents and grandparents and even great-grandparents settled. Today I welcome all of you and ask that you bow your heads in remembrance of those we lost, both on the ground and from the air. One hundred sixteen died in that fifty-eight-day period, senselessly, needlessly, randomly. It could have been any of us.”

  Already, Miri feels herself choking up.

  Three clergymen take turns reading out the names of the dead, beginning with the first crash. Miri waits for the familiar names. Ruby Granik, twenty-two, Estelle Sapphire, fifty-nine. Then the second crash. Kathy Stein, eighteen. Penny Foster, seven. She lets out a small, unexpected cry when Penny’s name is read. Henry reaches for her hand. Christina passes her a packet of Kleenex. She wipes her eyes, glad she didn’t use mascara, and blows her nose. When all the names have been read, a children’s chorus sings a medley—“April Showers,” “Pennies from Heaven,” “Keep on Smiling.” Someone with style has orchestrated this day of events.

  After, they form a circle and toss flowers into the center. Most of them have daffodils or tulips but Miri special-ordered a dozen sunflowers through a local florist. Penny loved sunflowers, was always drawing pictures of the sunflowers in the print hanging over her family’s fireplace. Then they join hands and close their eyes for a silent prayer.

  The ceremony lasts just half an hour. Their personal remarks are to be saved for the luncheon to follow at the Elizabeth Carteret hotel. The mayor makes an announcement that the lunch will be hosted by Natalie Renso, who will be signing books following the program.

  Miri looks around the circle but can’t find Natalie. She thought Natalie might show up to honor Ruby. Instead, she spots Gaby Wenders, the stewardess, in her old uniform. She must be in good shape, Miri thinks, to fit into that uniform thirty-five years later. And next to Gaby, the boy who rescued her, the boy who saved her life. Miri half expects to see the boy he was then. The boy she loved. Instead, she sees a grown man. Still, her knees grow weak. For god’s sake, she thinks, trying to remember what her yoga teacher has taught her about breathing in stressful situations.

  He makes the first move, walking briskly across the field to where she is standing. “Miri,” he says. “Jesus…Miri…” He wraps his arms around her. Now she can’t breathe at all. When he lets go, she pushes her sunglasses up so she can get a look at him. Did she hope he wouldn’t be attractive?

  He grabs her hand. “I’m so glad to see you.”

  “I’m glad to see you, too.” The voice that comes out doesn’t sound like hers.

  “Can I give you a ride to the lunch?” he asks.

  Christina and Jack have a car, so do Henry and Leah, but Miri says, “Sure,” and walks with Mason around the block to his red Mazda RX-7. She almost laughs because Andy drives the same car.

  “I’d know you anywhere,” he says, “even with the hair.”

  “I’d know you, too, even without it.” He’s not really without it, just has less on his head, more on his face.

  He laughs. And just like that, she’s fifteen again. Except she’s not.

  —

  THEY’RE SEATED at different tables at lunch. She’s with Christina and Jack, Henry and Leah, four others. He’s across the room with Gaby and her handsome husband, their grown children and young grandchildren, and two men who were boys at Janet then, boys who helped rescue the trapped passengers.

  None of her old crowd is here. Suzanne lives in Seattle, married to a neurosurgeon. Miri tries to see her every year. Robo is divorced and has a gift shop in Westfield. Aside from two years at Boston U, she’s never left New Jersey. Eleanor is a professor of mathematics at Purdue, married to an economist. She hasn’t won the Nobel Prize yet and didn’t laugh when, a few years ago, Miri mentioned the possibility. Some things aren’t funny, Eleanor told her.

  Miri and Mason steal looks at one another through lunch. Miri doesn’t blush the way Rusty does, but she feels her cheeks flush. She drinks two glasses of wine, too fast. It goes straight to her head. You go to my head…

  She must have sung that line out loud because the woman next to her, a daughter of the Secretary of War who was killed when the second plane crashed, says, “What?”

  Miri knows she sometimes sings a line from a song out loud when she means to sing it only inside her head. “I was just thinking of an old song,” she says.

  “Don’t you love the old songs?”

  “I do,” Miri says. “My daughter finds me hopeless that way.”

  “Mine finds me hopeless in every way.”

  “Yes, that, too.” They laugh.

  “My father was a wonderful person,” she tells Miri. “I’ve never stopped missing him.”

  “My uncle, Henry Ammerman, wrote about your family,” Miri says.

  “The young reporter?” the woman asks, eyeing Henry, who is seated on Miri’s other side. “I remember him. I was at the apartment the day he came to talk to my mother.”

  “Henry talked to everyone after the crashes. Everything I know about writing I learned from him.”

  “You’re a writer?”

  “Reporter, now columnist, for the Las Vegas Sun.”

  “Las Vegas…” she says, in a tone Miri has heard a million times, as if ordinary people can’t possibly live there.
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  The program begins as dessert is served, plates of cookies and some kind of mousse that Miri pushes away. The mayor introduces Henry Ammerman. Oh, god, it’s going to be in alphabetical order? She’s going to be next? She doesn’t want to go next. Doesn’t want to get up in front of these people at all, especially not in front of Mason.

  “He was a young reporter for the Daily Post then,” the mayor says. “Today, he’s a prizewinning journalist for The Washington Post. Ladies and gentleman, Henry Ammerman.” Enthusiastic applause.

  Henry speaks well, painting a picture of Elizabeth at that time—the fear, the chaos, the adolescent rumors involving spaceships, zombies, sabotage, ultimately of a community coming together. Miri is as proud of him today as she was then. She smiles at Leah. Miri has never been as close to Leah as she’d once hoped. She supposes it has to do with the distance between them, which has become more than geographical. Leah was maternal to her during her college years, when she chose American University, with a major in journalism. But Miri was into trying her wings when she came to Washington, and Leah wanted to clip them. The last thing Miri needed was another mother. She offered to babysit her little cousins once a month, more if she found she had a free weekend. She’d had plenty of experience by then with her brothers, William and Stuart, born a year apart. She’d spent her high school years surrounded by babies and toddlers.

  By senior year Leah was lobbying for her to stay in D.C. “There’s not one good reason for you to go back to that ridiculous town.”

  “There’s my family,” Miri said. “And a job offer from the Sun.”

  “You can do better. Go to New York. Don’t waste all that talent.”

  When Miri said, “I’m just going home for the summer,” Leah didn’t buy it.

  “There’s a boy, isn’t there? The one you met over the holidays.”

  Well, yes, there was someone she’d met over the holidays, a dental intern working for Dr. O. But so what? Half the girls in her graduating class were already engaged, showing off their diamond rings every chance they got.

  “What’s his name?” Leah said.

  “Andy. He’s from San Francisco. Went to Stanford.” She hoped Leah would be impressed.

  “Andy.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re just twenty-two, Miri.”

  She knew how old she was.

  “Give yourself a chance.”

  “I’m not getting married.”

  “You will.”

  “Someday.”

  “Just don’t settle.”

  “I won’t settle.”

  She didn’t give a hoot about a diamond ring, and the idea of one had probably never entered Andy’s mind. When they became engaged a year later, he gave her new skis and a black pearl to wear around her neck on a chain. She still wears it, is wearing it now. He was a young dentist then and insisted on checking her teeth, like a horse dealer buying a mare. “Nice,” he’d said, once he had her in the chair. “Healthy gums.” Before she’d even closed her mouth he’d asked, “Will you marry me?”

  “This is a proposal?” she’d said.

  He’d nodded, embarrassed, and brought out a bottle of Champagne he’d hidden in the cabinet. He filled two pleated paper cups and passed one to her.

  “I must be the first person ever to be proposed to in a dental chair.”

  “Is that a yes?” he said.

  She gulped down the Champagne, held out her cup for more. “Yes!”

  Her family was happy. Marrying Andy would mean she’d stay in Las Vegas. Henry was always supportive. If she was happy, he was happy for her. They didn’t marry for another year. When they did, Ben Sapphire gave them a bungalow.

  —

  THE MAYOR CALLS Miri’s name. She still goes by Ammerman. If she’d taken Andy’s name, Zinn, she’d be at the end of the program. She thinks about walking out the door and not coming back. But Henry comes to her side, takes her arm, walks her up to the podium, the way he walked her down the aisle on her wedding day, sharing her with Dr. O, who was on her other side. Two of the best fathers any girl could have.

  She hadn’t invited Mike Monsky to her wedding. They’d found out pretty quickly there wasn’t going to be much between them. The first summer he’d picked her up in Las Vegas and driven her back to Los Altos, where she never even met Adela, who’d had such a severe migraine she’d moved into her parents’ house for the duration of Miri’s visit. And that visit was cut short when Mike’s kids came down with chicken pox. The following year it was worse. Adela greeted her, then left with the boys to spend a week with her parents in Santa Barbara. By then she’d had it. If Mike Monsky wanted to see her, he could come to Las Vegas, or take her someplace neutral. But it never worked out. She wasn’t disappointed. She had a lot of people in her life. He was just a complication.

  Frekki stopped by once, with Dr. J. J. Strasser, when Miri was a senior at Las Vegas High. They were on their way to a medical convention in L.A. She’d invited Miri to lunch at the Sands. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay,” Frekki said.

  “I’m fine,” Miri told her. “I got into American University, my first-choice college.”

  “Well, good for you,” Frekki said. “I hear you’ve seen your fa…” She hesitated before saying the word, then changed it to “Mike.”

  “Yes. Twice. But we’re both so busy, there’s not a lot of time to visit.”

  “I understand,” Frekki said. “I’m meeting him for lunch in L.A. He’s flying down for the day, without Adela or the boys.” She sighed deeply.

  Miri nodded.

  “I hear he’s changed his name to Monk.”

  “Yes.” Was she just finding out?

  “Well, I can’t say I blame him. Monsky was always a mouthful.”

  Miri took a bite of grilled chicken and chewed it very slowly.

  When she’d announced her marriage to Andy, Frekki sent a crystal bowl from Tiffany’s.

  Mike Monk sent a $100 check.

  —

  AT THE PODIUM Miri takes the leather-covered journal from her purse, opens to the first page and signals to Henry, she’s okay. She begins to read into the microphone, glancing over in Mason’s direction just once. His head is bowed.

  After enough time it fades and you’re grateful.

  Not that it’s ever completely gone.

  It’s still there, buried deep, a part of you.

  The stench is gone from your nostrils now

  Unless someone leaves the kettle on to boil and forgets about it.

  The nightmares have tapered out.

  There are more pressing things to dream about, to worry over,

  to keep you awake at night.

  Aging parents, adolescent children, work, money,

  the state of the world.

  Life goes on, as our parents promised that winter.

  Life goes on if you’re one of the lucky ones.

  But we’re still part of a secret club,

  One we’d never willingly join,

  With members who have nothing in common

  except a time and a place.

  We’ll always be connected by that winter.

  Anyone who tells you different is lying.

  The final speaker is Gaby Wenders. She introduces the boy heroes, especially her hero, Mason McKittrick. Then her husband, Dr. Larsen, her children and grandchildren present a plaque to Mason. The oldest grandchild, maybe five, says to Mason, Thank you for our Gaby. There’s not a dry eye in the house.

  After the presentation to Mason it feels as if the program is over. People stand and begin to say goodbye to one another, when the doors swing open and Natalie makes her entrance, swooping in like a high-fashion gypsy, the “Queen of New Age,” as she’s known, her Santa Fe jewelry jangling on her wrists and around her neck. A buzz goes through the crowd and people take their seats again. After all, she’s Natalie Renso. She’s famous. You can see her on TV, at readings and book signings, in fashion magazines. Most people don’t know
Renso is Osner spelled backward, the kind of code name children come up with in third grade. But it’s worked well for Natalie. She steps up to the podium, waits for the whispering to die down and begins.

  “It was the winter that changed our lives,” she says. “The winter we learned who we were, and what we were made of.” And that’s it. She doesn’t say a word about Ruby. Just that she’ll be happy to sign books—please write the name of the person you’d like her to sign for on a Post-it.

  Even Lee Patterson, daughter of the Secretary of War, lines up to get her signature. “My daughter would never forgive me if I didn’t bring her a signed book.”

  Miri does not get in line. She hangs back.

  “Did you really sleep with Warren Beatty?” someone asks Natalie.

  “Why not?” Natalie answers. “Everyone who had the chance did.” She laughs, and the crowd laughs with her.

  —

  CHRISTINA DOESN’T LIKE whatever’s going on between Miri and Mason. You’d have to be an idiot to miss it. The two of them making goo-goo eyes at each other all through lunch. Jack tells her to let it be, they’re adults, they’re not going to do anything stupid, anything that would mess up their lives. Instead, she tries to convince Miri to fly home with her and Jack today. The plane is waiting at Teterboro. But Miri says she’s staying another night.

  “Fine,” Christina says. “I’ll stay and fly back commercial with you tomorrow.”

  Miri looks at her. “No.”

  “No? What do you mean, no?”

  “I mean that’s crazy. Fly back with Jack and I’ll see you day after tomorrow. I still need to talk to Natalie, away from her adoring fans, and I want to stop by the cemetery on the way to the airport tomorrow.”

  “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” she tells Miri.

  “Never,” Miri tells her.

  “Is that a promise?”