The Bridge Across Forever: A True Love Story

Why is it that so many airplane pilots also sail boats? Airplanes have freedom in space, sailboats have freedom in time. It's not the hardware, we want, it's the unshackledness that the hardware represents. Not a big airplane we like, but the speed and power that come from controlling its flight. Not a gaff-rigged ketch, but the wind, the adventure, the working purity of life that the sea demands, the sky demands. Unlatched from outside constraint. Sail for years nonstop in a boat, if you want to.

Boats, they own time. The longest an airplane's flown is a few hours; longer is a stunt. Someone ought to invent an airplane that has as much freedom in time as a boat.

I've got my freedom from all my other women-friends; why not from Leslie? They don't criticize me for being distant, for leaving when I want; why does she? Doesn't she know? Too long together, and even courtesy is gone . . . people are more courteous to strangers than they are to their own wives and husbands! Two people tied to each other like hungry dogs, fighting over every little scrap between them. Look at us, even us. You raised your voice to me! I didn't come into your life to make you angry. If you don't like me as I am, just say so and I'm gone! Together too long, and it's chains and duties and responsibilities, no delights no adventure no thank you!

Hours later through the night, the first faint glow of light on the horizon south. Not dawn but Key West street-light bouncing from mist way high in the sky.

Sailing is altogether too slow, I thought. You change your

mind, you don't want to be where you are, in an airplane you can do something about it; a short while takes you a long way. A sailboat, you change your mind, you can't even land the thing and get off! Can't glide if you're too high, climb if you're too low. Sailboat's always -at the same altitude. No change. Boring. Change is adventure, whether it's sailboats or women. What other adventure is there, than change?

Leslie and I agreed to certain rules of friendship: total equality, freedom, courtesy, respect, nobody takes anybody for granted, a nonexclusive pact. If the rules are no longer all right with her, she ought to tell me. This whole affair is getting too serious.

Sure enough she'll say, Is there no room in your life Richard Bach for something more than rules?

Wish I could just say no and walk away from her.

Wish I could talk with her about it now.

Wish sailboats were a lot faster, wish they could fly.

Sorry state of the world. We put people on the moon, but we can't build a sailboat that can fly.

twenty-eight

"ARE YOU READY TO go, wookie?" she said.

I'm spending too much time with her again, I thought, altogether too much time. She's as organized as a microchip . . . everything she touches runs in order, honest and clear. So beautiful she blinds me still, she's funny and warm and loving. But the rules say I'll destroy myself if I spend too much time with one woman, and I'm spending too much time with her.

"Are you ready to go?" she asked again. She was dressed in a brush-of-amber suit, golden silk at her throat; her hair combed and pinned back for a long business meeting.

"Sure," I said.

Curious. She's the one hauling me from the sticky shards of empire, she's doing the job of all my fired employees.

Stan, calm to the end, said as he left that he was sorry I

had lost so much money. That's the way it happens sometimes, he said, the market turns against you.

&nb

sp; Stan's tax lawyer apologized, sorry he had missed the IRS deadline, said he thought they weren't being fair ... he was only two weeks late, filing his appeal, and they'd refused to consider it. If it weren't for that, he said, he could have proven that I didn't owe them a cent.

Harry the business manager smiled, said the IRS problem was a shame; he didn't like it any more than I did, and he had done his best to keep it from me as long as he could. By the way, he'd appreciate it if I could come up with a month's severance pay.

If it weren't for Leslie, I'd have left for Antarctica or Botzwezoland, so disgusted was I with money, with taxes, with accounts and ledgers. Any paper with numbers on it, I wanted to shred.

" 'Bye," she said, as I got into the car.

" 'Bye?"

"You're gone again, Richard. 'Bye."

"Sorry," I said. "Think I ought to apply for Antarctican citizenship?"

"Not yet," she said. "After this meeting, maybe. Unless you can come up with a million dollars plus interest."

"I can't get over it! How could I owe that much in taxes?"