A Flight Like Most Others

15 February 2017

There is an alarming whirring sound beneath us. Groaning and growling as if pissed off by the combined weight of it’s passengers. Vibrating beneath our feet. We are separated from a 39,000 foot fall by metal and this vibration. Nothing else.

“What is that sound?” Fearful. Concerned.

“I don’t know but it’s really freaking me out.” Equally afraid. Uncertain.

“I’m going to ask a flight attendant. I can’t handle this the whole flight.”

I never ask. I feign ignorance of the noise to stem my fear.

Music is muffled even through headphones. Blasting, bumping, twanging in my head to help me pretend I am not in a steel trap. The ride is rough, like a bus on a rocky road, only we are on a plane high, too high, in the air.

Luminescent squares of light. The sun pours in. Windows are shaped like port holes. There is a crack in one. I do not like it. They show us the clouds, the blue sky, the Google maps view of the land splaying below us. It is so perfect it looks fake to me. A recording played for us.

“Look! Look, mountains!” My over excitable friend declares.

“Another drink.” I request. “It’s an anticipatory order.”

A glance to appease my friend, a quick moment of awe, before I must lean back and return to my happy head space. There is food, and a bonfire, a cold crisp autumn air. The smoke sinks into my clothes and my hair, and there is solid ground beneath my feet. The cold seeps through my boots as I drink my beer and stare into the orange flames until my vision blurs.

Announcement in Progress message printed on the display in front of me pulls me from my fantasy. I remove a head phone.

“...we are now making our final descent. Please return to your seats and-”

I replace a head phone. I do not need to know more. Awareness of what is coming makes my heart jolt down, up, and side to side, as if intent on bursting from me like I am a cartoon character in love.

Only it is not love. It is fear.

“Taking off and landing are the hardest part. Most crashes happen during those times.” Repeats over and over in my head on a sickening loop of doom.

Concentration. Breathe one, two, three, four. Exhale one, two, three, four. Repeat. Repeat. I am queasy, though it is not from the liquor. Despite all the flights I’ve taken I’m still gripping my arm rests, sweat is beading down my neck, and I fiddle with the air conditioning to bring myself some sort of relief.

Odd sinking sensations in the belly and chest as the plane dips down further and further. Intestines and all the rest are floating in my body. They will not stay in place.

The ground grows closer, but not quickly, like a teasing. A taunting. A you’re almost there but it will still be awhile.

The touch down is the pinnacle of my anxiety. The climax. Up and up. Hammers the heart harder and harder. My palms are damp and clammy.

And then the plane is firmly on the ground and still. Exhale and I can breathe. A giddy kind of joy takes over. I am alive. It is over. Until next time.