My head slams into the window as Theo’s shoulder collides with mine. “Ow!” I yelp in pain.
“Switch seats with me,” he says immediately, but I wave him off. I don’t need special treatment, and I’m too scared to unbuckle now anyway. This storm is rougher than anything I’ve ever felt. Books, water bottles, and phones crash through the cabin; Theo and I duck to avoid being hit as we strain against our seat belts.
Silence settles over us as the turbulence intensifies, until Naomi yells “Sorry about the nail polish on the leather” from the back of the cabin.
“Where’s Comet?” I ask.
“Buckled in his safety harness,” Victoria confirms from somewhere behind me.
“Buddy system?” Naomi jokes. “In case we crash or whatever.”
“We’re not going to crash,” Brooke says. “Flying is safer than driving.”
“Even so, you probably shouldn’t have let all three of us on the flight, Your Majesty.” Henry’s voice is strained, and Theo’s jaw clenches in response.
I close my eyes and try to slow my breathing, but I can feel my panic bubbling to the top. “Remember we’re in Jell-O,” I say loudly.
“Care to explain that?” Henry calls, his fingers gripped tightly around his history book.
“The plane is a shaken-up cup of Jell-O and we’re the peas safely inside. It’s physics,” I say, fairly certain that I could explain it better if I wasn’t worried about our plane falling out of the sky, cracking the Jell-O cup, and crashing our little pea bodies into the ocean.
“Do Americans eat peas in their jelly?” Victoria asks, managing to sound haughty even in dire circumstances.
“Who said anything about jelly?” My fingers are starting to ache, but then Theo relaxes his white-knuckle grip, and I realize the turbulence is lessening with every second. I open my eyes and look around. The cabin is a disaster, and rain still lashes at our dark windows, but the worst of it appears to be over. The chaos churning inside me settles.
Winston appears from the front of the plane and physically checks to ensure that Theo’s seat belt is fastened. I use the moment to quickly swipe tears off my cheeks.
I pull my hand from Theo’s loose grip and shake off the remaining terror. My heart hasn’t caught up with my brain, and it’s brutalizing my rib cage. “Do you think it’s over?”
“I reckon, yes,” he says.
A voice comes through the speakers. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is your pilot speaking again. Storm conditions have shifted rapidly. If the cabin loses pressure, oxygen masks will deploy.”
“Just a precaution,” Theo says quickly.
“We’re going to be fine.” I smile tightly.
“We’re Jell-O.” Somehow his hand has found its way back around mine.
“We’reinJell-O,” I correct. “But if something goes wrong, no worries, Your Majesty. Everyone will help you put your mask on first.”
“You would take the piss out of me even on the brink of death,” he whispers back, a glint in his eye.
“So dramatic.” I try to swallow my fear, but my throat is burning with it, my eyes brimming with unshed tears. For about a week this summer, I thought I was going to die, but I never came to terms with it; I wasn’t ready then, and I’m even less ready now.
He squeezes my hand, and I squeeze back, all my flimsyresolve about keeping my distance vanished in an instant. Our knees are pressed together, and I’ve made a liar of myself. It’s just a little turbulence, but we’re conditioned to reach for each other as if the world is ending.
“Do you remember when we jumped off a ferry because we thought it was capsizing?” I ask as fear prickles along my spine.
“Is now a good time to be reminiscing, Wheeler?”
“This is just like that. It feels like the plane is crashing, but it’s not. I’m sure we’ll be laughing about this in a—”
The lights go out, and the plane plummets. Oxygen masks fall. A strong tug behind my belly button nearly yanks me out of my seat. For a heartbeat or two, our luggage hovers in midair.
All I hear is screaming, pierced through by Comet’s scared whimper. I picture him hiding under his paws, and I might throw up. Theo’s fingers are bruising on the back of my hand. I close my eyes and brace for an impact that doesn’t come.
Disaster is slower than I thought.
