Girl on a Plane Read online

  He hesitates, then, refusing to be affected by my behavior, perches on the end armrest. “So, are you going crazy yet?” He smiles.

  “Yes, I am,” I say. “And it’s not funny.”

  But, weirdly, it’s then that I understand what he was talking about earlier. And it occurs to me for the first time that he is risking his life by being here, that, even if we’re freed, he may very well be killed. Maybe he’s feeling as scared as I am.

  I turn to him, feeling more like conversing. “What did you think when my buckle caught on your belt?”

  He raises dark eyebrows and says, mock severely, “I thought you were serious trouble.” Then his face turns solemn. “But I saw how you dealt with fear,” he says. “I know you are strong.”

  I shake my head. “You don’t know me at all, Jamal. But what about you? Are you strong?”

  “Yes. And I have a good heart, like yours.”

  “Do you?” I look disbelieving.

  “You see only the gun,” he says. “The hand grenades . . . When you are dispossessed of everything else, your body is all you have left to fight with.” He looks at me. “But of course you cannot see who I really am. How can you?”

  “Well . . . it’s not that easy.”

  “It’s impossible to see properly in this place,” he mutters, as if talking to himself. And it’s true. Everything’s a muddle in here. Out of control. I think of Maria, about what happened to her.

  “Jamal, where’s the other guy, the thin one with black hair?”

  “Oh.” He looks down, embarrassed.

  “We haven’t seen him today,” I insist.

  “No.”

  “No one’s talking to us about it, but something happened last night with him and one of the girls from first class.”

  “Yes.”

  “She was incredibly upset.”

  “Yes.”

  I wait. He looks away, then back at me. “He’s not allowed on the plane anymore,” he says.

  “Well, yes, I noticed,” I say impatiently. “So what happened?”

  He pauses, then takes a breath. “He touched her.” I feel the shock of the words, the idea of it.

  “He touched and frightened her,” he adds, and I’m quieted.

  “He’s been disciplined,” he continues. But I don’t want to know any more.

  “My friend, the tall guy,” he carries on, “he’s spoken to your captain—​and to the girl.” He shakes his head angrily. “He was so stupid.”

  Suddenly I feel a wave of exhaustion. I stare at Jamal’s arm, lying along the top of the seats, at his khaki shirt cuff, the gold face and black strap of his watch. This day might be my last. His last.

  My throat constricts; tears rise. I mustn’t blink, or they’ll fall and he’ll see. I really want to ask him something, though, but no words come for a moment.

  Jamal waits, watching my face.

  I take a deep breath.

  “If we are released tomorrow, what will happen to you? I mean . . . afterward?” I ask. “Aren’t you scared?”

  “Yes, I am. Of course I am. But some of us aren’t.”

  “Like who?”

  “My tall friend.”

  “We call him the Giant.”

  He smiles. “He is—​a giant among men. I’ve known him since I was little. His light went out long before he came here.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that he doesn’t fear death. He has lost too much already: his wife, his girls, his son. He says he doesn’t want to stay anymore. He says dying for the cause is all he can do now, so that others might one day go home.” He leans forward and looks at me. “Can you understand that?”

  “Yes, I think so.” I’m aware of the rise and fall of his chest.

  “Is it the first time you’ve had to face death?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “Don’t be too afraid. In the end it will make you stronger.”

  Easy enough to say, I think, but I let it go.

  “What will you do,” I ask, “when this is over? If . . .”

  “If I survive?”

  “Yes.”

  “Until I can return to my homeland, my dream is to go to university, maybe in Beirut, in Lebanon. I have sent my brother to our aunt there. She writes often, begging me to come too.”

  “Well, then you must. How can you not get away from all this?” But, of course, it isn’t a case of just jumping on a bus. “You should go,” I say. “I know someone at school who lives there . . .” I stop, realizing that what I’m saying is going nowhere.

  “Are you on your way back to school in England?” he asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Then you are lucky. You can learn about the world and, afterward, go out into it.”

  “So can you.”

  He shrugs. “Maybe one day.” He looks away, then back. “Your parents are in Bahrain?”

  “I don’t know. They were due to fly home today. If we’re released, I hope they’ll be waiting for me.”

  He frowns. “They will never abandon you, Anna.”

  “No.” Suddenly I feel the weight of his words. As I try to control my emotions, he waits quietly, looking down the aisle, his black boot resting against the chair fabric.

  “Come, Anna, no more sad thoughts,” he says eventually. “Instead I must thank you for letting me practice my English. I love to hear it; it reminds me always of my mother.”

  When he goes, I feel calmer for having spoken with him, as though a little of my fear has been smoothed and folded away, as though, just for a while, I’ve been somewhere else.

  Through my little window, I watch the sun sink and the desert burn gold and, as the sand loses its heat, sheets of gossamer-thin clouds unfurl high up.

  And night falls on our third day.

  40

  2000h

  It’s our last night, the last night before the deadline tomorrow. What can anyone say? What can anyone do? We can only carry on. I’m stuck in a cycle of sudden and awful remembering, followed by anxiety, fear, exhaustion, and forgetting.

  I wish I could stop thinking, unhook myself from my mind.

  Instead David, Tim, and I play Scrabble. We sip our water ration and eat another scrap of unleavened bread. David is intensely irritated by everything: by the Giant pacing up and down, by dropping his Scrabble tiles, by the annoying jiggle of the hurricane lamps. In the end, we’re all irritated by each other. Like the bundles of dynamite, our fuses are short.

  I try pretending nothing significant is happening. I push dangerous thoughts to one side, and when I fail, I have to stand up, leave the others, walk away, recover, return, sit back down again.

  In the middle of all this, Mrs. Green finds two batteries in the bottom of her wash bag that fit the Newtons’ radio.

  Everyone crowds around in time for Big Ben. The radio buzzes, crackles into life. The newscaster’s voice is crisp:

  “The Palestinian guerrilla spokesman said tonight that unless there is a last-minute reprieve and the British government frees Leila Khaled, the guerrilla held in London, the airliner and the hostages will be blown up tomorrow morning.”

  There’s an awful silence. I feel like I’m drowning.

  The mother of the baby turns away and starts to cry. Mrs. Green takes her daughter in her arms and hugs her. The little girl moans and wriggles free. Mr. Newton snaps the radio off. “Bloody government!” he cries. He’s beside himself. “Christ! What are they thinking? No doubt those bloody bastards are sitting in Downing Street, sipping a nice glass of port before bed. Don’t worry about us!” He slams his hand down on the seat in front of him. “We’ll just sit here in this metal bloody time bomb, trussed up with explosives.” His face is purple with rage.

  The captain puts a hand on his shoulder. “Now, Tom, that’s no way to speak.” Mr. Newton shrugs him off, but the captain keeps going. “I’m sure there’s a great deal of activity going on behind the scenes,” he says to the rest of us. “That’s what we have to believe
. It’s an incredibly tense time, but we all really must stay calm and weather it.”

  Mr. Newton attempts to stand up. “Well, let’s see what our captors have to say, shall we? Let’s talk to them, shall we?”

  The captain bars his way. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Tom. No point causing trouble at this stage. And no point upsetting everyone else.”

  Jim steps up. “Come along now, everybody.” He puts his arms out and starts herding people away from the Newtons’ seats. “Let’s not get carried away. No point in panicking.”

  Rosemary joins him and guides the blond sisters back up the aisle. “We need to stay calm,” she says to them, “and try to get some sleep.” She puts a hand out as she passes by and touches me on the shoulder. “OK?”

  I nod, but I’m beyond misery; my last hope has been shattered. A deep dread settles in my stomach. Another day of negotiations has ended with no release for us.

  David collapses into the seat opposite me, looking like he’s been punched in the stomach. He glances across at me, his face drawn. “The only thing that can save us now is a miracle.” He wipes his forehead and his face with his hands. “Unless you think that good-luck badge of yours can do it.”

  I turn hopelessly away.

  The dynamite charges are in place. We’re locked in. Eventually the hurricane lamps are turned low, and the night feels suddenly longer, colder, and more hostile than ever.

  I try to sleep, but, like everyone else, I just lie waiting for morning.

  I think about Marni, how she’s not afraid to ignore silly rules. I see her hair, her scarf, the man’s wristwatch halfway up her arm. I remember how Dad’s jokes misfire, how he dries my hair with a towel, how once he taught us army hand signals on a deserted beach. And I think of the boys. Oh, the boys—​I love them all so much that it hurts. And I think how lucky I’ve been to know them, to spend my short life with them.

  The void around me grows and expands, and my tears pour out into the dark.

  Eventually I sleep fitfully, restlessly. At intervals throughout the night, my eyes jerk open, my heart races, thumping in my ears. And for a split second, I don’t know where I am, what I’m so terrified of.

  Then I sit upright—​and remember.

  I pull up the blind, stare out the window. When we were small and upset, Marni would take us to look out at the night, at the moon and the stars. And there is the moon’s sheen, and there are the stars, calm and bright in the black firmament. But where’s Marni? I need her so much.

  41

  Saturday, September 12, 1970

  0600h

  When I wake again, it’s that soft time after dawn. Threads of pink clouds lie in lines above the horizon. In the trenches around the plane, old campfires glow red-gray. A long line of camels treads rhythmically on a distant ridge, each step throwing up a puff of sand.

  At the front of the plane, Alan has his arm around Rosemary. Is he comforting her? Has something happened? Across the aisle from them, the captain talks earnestly to Jim. Have they heard something?

  I watch the Giant pass a piece of paper to the captain, who sits on the arm of a nearby seat to read it. Have they released Leila Khaled? Is it good news? Are we going home? I can’t see the captain’s expression. He turns to Jim, says something. Jim nods and beckons to the other crew members. They move to huddle around the captain. What are they deciding? Who is going to be shot first? My stomach lurches. I feel so sick. I never really believed this moment would come. But it has.

  It really has.

  I lean across the aisle. “Something’s happening.”

  David and Tim crouch up on their seats to look.

  “The captain’s giving instructions to the crew,” David says.

  “What for?” asks Tim.

  “Dread to think.”

  I feel lightheaded and sit down. I open my table and press my forehead onto it. My whole body is in a revolt of fear. I can feel the nausea rising.

  “Do you mean . . . ?” Tim says slowly.

  The captain stands up. The crew take their seats.

  “Good morning, everyone,” the captain says. “A moment, please. A moment of your time. I have something important to tell you.”

  Saliva rushes into my mouth. I am going to be sick. I scrabble to find the bag in the seat pocket.

  “Would those people still standing sit down, please?”

  There’s a great shuffling about; the bald man in front is trying to put something in his overhead locker. We wait while he carefully folds his coat. I want to scream at him to stop, to sit down! Eventually he does.

  There’s an uncanny stillness. I open the sick bag and turn away toward the window.

  “It’s good news.” The captain smiles. “We’re going home!”

  His words are greeted with a great uproar of clapping and whooping. I slump back in my seat, dropping the sick bag. I look over at the boys, stunned. Tim is jumping up and down with his arms in the air. He leaps on David, hugging him. Then he scrambles over, picks up my limp hand, turns it over, and, grinning, quickly kisses the palm. Then he’s off to see the twins.

  At the front, Celia is hugging Alan, the bald man shakes the captain’s hand, the blond girls sob, their arms around each other. Rosemary hugs Sarah and plants a big kiss on the baby’s forehead. Behind me, Mr. Newton is slapping everyone he can reach on the back. I look over at David. His smile is a mile wide. He comes over and gives me a long hug.

  “How about that?” he says.

  I stare at him, speechless, a great sob gripping me. He puts his arms back around me again. “We’re going to be OK, Anna. We’re going to be OK.” I nod into his chest, and I don’t want to pull away.

  When the clamor finally dies down, the captain, smiling broadly, continues. “I expect you’d like to know the details. The British government has negotiated with the Palestinians. We don’t know everything yet, but I have a letter here from the chief British negotiator, which I believe to be genuine; otherwise, I wouldn’t raise your hopes. He says that the plan is for us to leave the plane at about two p.m. today. Minibuses will apparently be sent from Amman to take us back into the city, where we’ll be put up overnight, some in hotels; others—​mainly the unaccompanied young people—​will stay with diplomatic families in their homes. Initially the guerrillas refused to accept the decision made by their main commando leadership, the central committee, but in the end an agreement of sorts was reached. We are to be released on humanitarian grounds. The king of Jordan has arranged for a Jordanian Airlines plane to fly us to Cyprus tomorrow morning, where we’ll transfer to an RAF flight home. That’s all I know at this point.” Relief is written all over his exhausted face. He pauses and looks around the cabin. “I don’t have to tell you that the situation is still grave and potentially very volatile. There is much that can happen before we are on our way. We must be calm and polite and not create any tension at all between now and two o’clock this afternoon, nothing that will put the plan at risk. I’m sure I can count on your cooperation. When I give the command, we’ll need to proceed to the waiting buses quietly. If we behave as we have done so far, we may all leave in one piece. I’ll talk to you all again at one forty-five. In the meantime, please speak to a member of the crew if you have any questions, but, remember, none of us has any information about the plan other than what I have just told you. Again, I urge you to remain calm and quiet. No rocking the boat at this critical phase, please.”

  Everything is different. The relief inside the plane seems to change the air we breathe. If I didn’t know it to be impossible, I’d think the air-conditioning was back on.

  But then, as the minutes pass, we become more muted. Because now we have hope, and with that comes a new fear—​the fear of what we might lose. We’re so close to actual freedom, but now anything, anything at all, could go wrong.

  I don’t seem able to calm the turmoil in my exhausted mind. I feel strung out, balancing between relief, elation, and a quiet dread, the dread that someone
or something might jeopardize this fragile chance of freedom. What if someone on one of the other planes . . . ?

  But I mustn’t think about that. There’s no point. What matters now is getting off this plane, getting as far away as possible from the huge bomb we’re sitting in.

  I pack my things into my bag very slowly: Wuthering Heights, the almost-empty pot of Nivea, my BOAC fan, my badge, Marni’s letter . . . and as I do, my anxiety and confusion grow.

  I’m going to live. I want to leave. And yet—​and yet leaving the plane, going outside, away from it, feels incredibly dangerous too. We have no idea what’s out there, what we’re getting into next.

  42

  London—​0900h (British Summer Time)

  Marni looks down at the plate of food her sister has cooked for her breakfast, at the lacy egg white and the yellow globe of yolk, and her eyes glaze over.

  “Come on, Marni,” Diana says gently. “It might be a long day.”

  “I know . . . but . . .”

  Her sister puts an arm around her and kisses her on the forehead. “You must eat.”

  “Yes, it’s just . . . I don’t know what to say to them anymore,” she says hopelessly. The sound of the television filters in from the living room, where the two boys are watching.

  Suddenly Mark shouts out. Marni starts to her feet, but Diana puts a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll go,” she says, and marches out of the room. “Now, you two little tinkers, what’s going on?”

  The egg on Marni’s plate congeals. The bacon has rigor mortis. They’ve been given a phone number to call. She’s tried it twice already but hasn’t been able to get through. James was so frustrated that he borrowed Di’s car this morning and has driven in to the Foreign Office, saying he’ll call if he finds out anything new. Marni listens. Was that the phone?

  “Marni!” The shout comes from the living room. “Quick!”

  She leaps to her feet and dashes to the open doorway.

  The news is on.

  “They’re letting them go!”

  Oh my God. They’re letting them go.