If she wanted, Marge could move up the ladder, make more money as an administrator. But going on thirty years now, she still prefers to stay in the classroom.
Which leaves a waitress, an underpaid teacher, and a part-time flower shop worker trying to cover a mortgage on a house we never should have bought as it attempts to fall to pieces around us.
But Mom and Marge are happy. That’s what matters.
This is mainly my fault anyway. A grand gesture of love gone wrong. Mom and Marge always talked about buying this place and growing old in it together. The idea was one of those future fantasies they’d tease each other about after a few glasses of wine.
“We’ll buy that cute house. Spend our days fixing it up. Build a greenhouse and plant a huge garden. The townsfolk will think we’re witches. Maybe we can start casting spells…”They’d cackle, and I’d smile while coming up with dreams of my own.
Then Mom felt a hard lump in her breast. When the doctors figured out what was wrong—when they put a timeline on my mother’s future—I saw all that joyful planning disappearing.
I called Shawn, and he came without question, picking me up from the hospital. Actually, Shawn’s buddy picked me up, with my brother in the shotgun seat. The guy driving was a quiet, hippie type—hair past his shoulders, van painted to look like the Scooby-Doo Mystery Machine, and smelling like pot. Not that I cared. All I wanted was a ride to this house. To my mother’s dream that I refused to let her leave life without achieving. I took theFor Salesign off the lot and called the real estate agent the next day. Didn’t take more than a single question to get Marge on board.
A few months later, we were homeowners.
I don’t regret that wild decision, even as the mortgage melds with all the other debt to dig deep, painful gouges into my shoulders where the phantom weight of responsibility rests.
So Marge battles squirrels, and I study electrical work on YouTube, and we keep this place standing. Meanwhile, Mom tends to her plants. Dirt under her nails and a smile on her face. The same one she wears now as Marge presses a quick kiss to her shoulder.
“Have fun at the park.” I down my water, then head for the stairs, planning to change out of my work clothes and put on something that can get a little scorched if need be. Usually, I can keep the sparks to a minimum. I’m getting better the more I practice, and of the three of us, I have the most success with electrical work. Helps that I now know I should flip the breaker off for whatever room I’m working in, which I pop down to the basement real quick to do.
In my bedroom, as I peel off the Cornfield Diner uniform, my mind goes back again and again to George’s offer.
Every time my heart starts to hope, I smother the flame with reality.
What if—
I don’t have the time.
But what if—
The man loathes me.
But what if—
It would cause Mom stress.
But what if this is my only chance?
Dressed in an old pair of sweatpants and a paint-splattered sweatshirt, I pause to stare at the poster I tacked up on my wall a few years ago. It shows the cockpit of a Cessna 172, the most common training airplane. I walk up to the image, and, like I used to do before bed every night, I tap each gauge and state the instrument’s purpose.
“Attitude indicator shows the artificial horizon. Tachometer for the engine RPM. Altimeter is the altitude. Heading indicator shows compass heading. Turn and bank indicator. And vertical speed indicator is for climbing or descending.”Well, we certainly descended fast yesterday. My eyes track to the avionics that are apparently out-of-date on this poster. The radio looked completely different in George’s plane.
That’s the problem with learning flying facts from old library books. I tried to absorb knowledge from reading and studying diagrams and watching videos. But things change all the time. And applying my knowledge is different in the air.
Especially when the engine stops.
My breath catches at the memory, anxiety lingering in the back of my mind despite what I’d told my mother.
“The longer you wait, the worse the fear will get.”The ghost of George’s deep voice scolds me, and my fists clench in response.
What if it takes me so long to pay off my debt that when I can finally afford flight time with an instructor, all I can remember about flying is the terror of what can go wrong? What if my joy is eclipsed by this one bad run?
What if I get in a plane with a male instructor—which is what they all seem to be within sixty miles of me—and he sees my anxiety and refuses to teach me? I can envision it now: him calling me “sweetheart” like that flight club president did, then explaining that controlling an airplane is tough, and if I like planes maybe I should just book myself a destination vacation.
The possibility has my throat tightening as I swallow back tears of anger and hopelessness.
My hand falls away from the poster as thoughts of my mom surface. Charlotte Lundberg is a loving mother. She also spent a good part of her life full of righteous fury and dissatisfaction after what Karl Newton put her through.
