In the Unlikely Event

The deep voice on the radio continued. “An American Airlines Convair, en route to Newark Airport from Buffalo, with stops in Rochester and Syracuse, has crashed and exploded…” Now Mrs. Barnes screamed, fell to the floor, banging her fists, pulling at her own hair. Fern squatted beside her. “Barnesy…stop, please stop.” Miri had never heard Fern or anyone else call her Barnesy.

Mrs. Barnes didn’t let up. She wailed, “Tim…Timmy!”

“Barnesy!” Fern cried. “Barnesy, you’re scaring me.”

Miri didn’t know what to do so she picked up the phone and dialed Dr. O’s office. When Daisy answered, Miri cried it was Mrs. Barnes’s son flying that plane and Mrs. Barnes was on the floor and wouldn’t get up.

Daisy told her to stay with Mrs. Barnes, not to leave her for a second, and she and Dr. O were on their way. Miri knew from health class when someone was in shock you should keep them warm, so she sent Fern upstairs to get a blanket, then, as an afterthought, a pillow, too.

Fern came back with a pillow and quilt from Natalie’s room and Miri draped it over Mrs. Barnes, who had gone quiet and white as a ghost, lying on her back on the floor. Miri slid the pillow under Mrs. Barnes’s head. Her eyes were open, staring at the ceiling. Miri wondered if she was in shock or if it was something worse. Fern sat close to Mrs. Barnes, stroking her hand. “Barnesy, I need you to take care of me. Roy Rabbit needs you.” She nuzzled Mrs. Barnes with her toy rabbit. But Mrs. Barnes didn’t respond.

Laura

Laura heard the explosions but it was the general fire alarm that filled her with dread. She knew Tim was due in at about that time. The noise of the alarm woke the toddler, Evie, who started screaming. Laura ran to the girls’ room, lifted Evie out of her crib and patted her back. “There, there, sweetie, everything’s okay.” That started the baby, Heather, crying. When word came over the radio that it was a plane, an American Airlines Convair, Laura knew for sure. She lay down on her bed with the toddler and the baby cradled on either side of her and began to sing, “Hush, little babies, don’t say a word, mama’s gonna buy you a mockingbird…”

Steve

At first he and Phil didn’t get what the commotion at the American Airlines counter was about. It wasn’t until Phil’s aunt screamed—a chilling scream you could hear throughout the terminal, a scream that would haunt him the rest of his life—that they understood something had happened to the plane. Phil rushed to his aunt’s side with Steve right behind him, but she had already collapsed and two airline employees were trying to get her to her feet. Phil tossed the keys to the blue Ford convertible to Steve. “Drive it back to my house, okay?”

“Sure,” Steve said. “Whatever I can do to help, you know?”

But Steve didn’t have any idea how to help. He called his father’s office from a phone booth. His father would know what to do. His father would offer to come and get him and Steve would say, Okay. But there was no answer at his father’s office. He wished he’d never come to the airport. He wished he’d stayed at school, then gone to the Y to shoot baskets.

Nobody asked if he was okay enough to drive, which he wasn’t, but somehow he made it back to Elizabeth, to Phil’s house, where he pulled the blue convertible into the driveway, turned off the ignition, rested his head against the wheel and gave in to the emotion washing over him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried, felt his own tears hot and wet running down his face, his throat tight, his nose snotty. He took in a couple of big gulps, willed himself to stop, then got out of the car and started out for home, kicking at stones, leftover chunks of gray snow, whatever was in his way. Fuck fuck fuck!

Christina

Hundreds of people were running with Christina, all of them separated from the roaring fire by just a dozen yards. But only she was screaming Jack’s name, until she turned the corner and saw it wasn’t Jack’s house on fire. It was the wooden house down the street and the house next to that, and where there used to be a three-story brick apartment building was rubble and thick black smoke—the whole area a blazing mess, with flames so blindingly bright red and orange she had to turn away. She covered her ears with her hands, against the screaming sirens.

There was no sign of the plane, or the people on it. She was stuck in a nightmare where something terrible was happening but she was powerless. She willed herself to move but she couldn’t. Her feet were too heavy, as if they were encased in wet cement and she couldn’t lift them. When she looked down she saw her feet were covered in mud up to her ankles—mud from the rain and the fire hoses.

Jack is safe, she told herself, working for the electric company in Westfield or Cranford or some other nearby city. Jack is safe. Unless, because of the weather, he’s not. No, he is. He has to be.

Christina, who never showed her emotions in public, didn’t try to restrain herself this time. She cried out as she saw a woman, her own clothes on fire, frantically pushing a small child rolled up in a rug at a neighbor. The woman tried to rush back into the flaming house, screaming, My baby, my baby, but others held her away. People were running from the burning houses. A boy with his jacket on fire was grabbed by a man, who threw off his overcoat and wrapped the boy in it, putting out the flames.

The girls from the modern dance club in their blue leotards were on the scene, with the gym teacher. Groups of other students who had club meetings after school were hugging each other and crying. A few of them called to her, but she didn’t answer.

She caught a glimpse of Jack’s landlady, and in an instant she was chasing after her. “Mrs. O’Malley…Mrs. O’Malley…” Christina called, until Mrs. O’Malley stopped. “Mrs. O’Malley, I’m Jack McKittrick’s friend, Christina. Was he home? Is he okay?”

Mrs. O’Malley gave her a puzzled look. “Jack?”

“Yes, Jack McKittrick. He rents from you.”

“Are you his sister?”

“No, I’m his friend, Christina.”

“I always thought you were his sister.”

What was she talking about?

“He’s not home,” Mrs. O’Malley said. “I don’t know where he is.”

“At work,” Christina said. “He’s at work. Right?”

“I hope so, dear.”

—

THE WORLD MAY HAVE BEEN falling apart but at Dr. O’s office everything was serene. Christina pulled down the hastily scribbled note taped to the office door apologizing for the emergency that had taken both Daisy and Dr. O away. She got out of her muddy shoes before unlocking the door with the key Daisy had given to her at Christmas. She was safe now. She prayed Jack was safe, too. She scrubbed her feet in the toilet, flushing again and again, wiped herself clean with disposable towels and changed into her white lab coat and shoes. She had no clean socks, no stockings. She’d have to wear her shoes with bare feet. She pinned up her dark hair, washed her face and gargled with Lavoris. Only then did she sit in Daisy’s swivel chair, in front of the Remington typewriter and the leather appointment book, calmly calling patients, asking them to call tomorrow to reschedule.

She felt grown-up, helpful, even important, until her sister, Athena, phoned and gave her hell. “Why didn’t you call us? We’ve been worried sick. Really, Christina—grow up! Take responsibility. Did you give a second’s thought to Mama, who’s going out of her mind with worry?”

“I’m sorry,” Christina said. “I tried to call but I couldn’t get through.” This was a lie. She hadn’t been thinking about her mother or Athena.

“You should have come here.” Athena was using her holier-than-thou voice. “How far is the shop from your job? I’d say, five minutes, if that. And you should have stopped in at the restaurant to see Baba.”

“You’re right,” Christina said. She’d learned the best way to avoid an argument with her sister was to agree. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“That’s no excuse,” Athena told her.

“In case you’re interested,” Christina said, “I saw it happen. The plane came right over Battin. I was outside on Williamson Street a minute after it crashed and exploded.” She was getting worked up, her voice rising with her emotions. “I was there, Athena. I was there when people ran out of their houses screaming, on fire. Do you know what that was like? Do you even care?”

Before she could slam down the receiver her sister said, “Well, that sounds terrible but I don’t see why you’re angry at me.”

This time Christina did slam down the receiver. The palm of her right hand was bleeding from digging her fingernails so deeply into it. She hated Athena!

She ran into the small, narrow lab where Daisy kept a row of white plaster-of-Paris figurines lined up on a shelf, each one a foot high, waiting for Dr. O to smash if he felt a temper coming on. Christina had witnessed his fury just once and it had scared her. How could this kind and generous man have such inner rage? What set him off? She only knew it never happened when there were patients in the office. She only knew that smashing one of the plaster-of-Paris figurines made him feel better. After, Daisy would sweep up the remains and Dr. O would carry on as if nothing had happened.