Up in the Air

I was about to read my parents’ farewell card when I got the alert on my phone. It was just after liftoff, and everyone got the same message, the passenger section of the 747 brightening with chirping phones going off all at once. I checked the message: COORDINATED BOMBING ATTACKS IN MULTIPLE AMERICAN CITIES. EVACUATE THE FOLLOWING TARGETED AREAS IMMEDIATELY. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.

It was early afternoon, and I was inbound to university from Arizona to New York for my first semester of culinary school. Today was my first day out of the big city since I graduated high school. I’d finished with a 4.0 GPA and won a scholarship for the Culinary Institute of America, where I planned to spend the next three years obtaining a Bachelor’s Degree—the only dream I’d ever wanted to pursue.

Now, there was this.

I stared at my phone’s screen, scrolling through the list of targeted cities, my mind unable to comprehend what was in front of me. Images of Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles, and Dallas on fire filled every front page news site. Uncertain gasps broke out all around the cabin, and suddenly the tight space was filled with agitated chatter—people asking if this was a joke, some saying it couldn’t be real, and others in such disbelief that they began to cry out hysterically.

On the list of targets was Phoenix, my home. I called my mother and spoke to her amid the drone of the captain’s voice telling everyone to remain calm and seated, the din of panicked passengers filling my ears.

“Mom, it’s not real, is it?” I asked. “It can’t be.”

“I don’t know, Claire. It’s… It’s so hard to believe…” Her voice sounded strained and frightened. Then, she began to sob.

“Mom, where are you? Can you get out?”

She sounded as if she were running. “We’re just leaving the airport.”

“Hurry, Mom,” I said, “the airport is on the list of targets.”

My mother fumbled for words but couldn’t make a coherent sentence. She kept telling me about if they didn’t make it home, about how the house wasn’t paid off yet, about how they couldn’t evacuate because the dogs hated riding in the car. She spoke of my bedroom, and what would they do when I came to visit from New York if my room wasn’t prepared?

Around me, people made their own phone calls. The air was so loud I could barely hear my mother’s senseless rambling.

In the background, I heard my dad’s voice, and he got on the phone shortly after, sounding out of breath. In a tone which reminded me of the cop he’d been for thirty years, he got to the point. “Claire, you’ve seen the news?”

“I’ve seen it.”

“They’re hitting the whole country, Claire. The airport is a target, but it’s not the only one. I don’t know if we can make it out of here.”

“What are you saying, Dad?”

He sighed. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, kiddo, but…” He paused, took another deep breath. “In case something happens to us, know that your mother and I love you. You are the best thing that’s ever happened to us. You are the light of our lives. Remember that.”

I began to cry, tried to speak through my tears. “Dad…”

“Never forget how much we love you. We—”

The call disconnected at the same time that I heard a series of deep, heavy Booms from beyond. All around, people cried out in fear and disbelief, their eyes diverting to the window, gazing toward the source of the horrendous noise.

Oh my God!

What is that?

This can’t be real.

But it was real. In the near-distance, dozens of yellow-orange infernos blossomed like unfolding flowers, the explosions rising into the sky and spreading at the base. I tuned out the cries of my fellow passengers and looked on with numb dread, the phone still dangling from my fingers. At some point I dropped the phone and forgot it existed.

Somewhere in the burning hellscape miles and miles away were my parents, my dogs, my home. There was my bedroom where I’d grown up and brought over boyfriends and girlfriends—the same bedroom my mother was worried wouldn’t be there for me when I returned home from college. There was the kitchen where I’d learned that cooking was my passion, and I wanted to create dishes inspired by cultures around the globe.

Now, that globe seemed smaller and smaller as I stared at the bright, blinding sun which engulfed the only home I’d ever known.

Suddenly, I got out of my seat, pushed past an overweight woman who was gasping but couldn’t catch a proper breath. I ran down the aisle and didn’t bother closing the bathroom door as I hunched over the toilet and vomited bile—once, twice, three times until the ache in my gut became pronounced, and I had nothing left to give.

My head felt woozy, my energy abruptly sapped. I stumbled down the aisle like a drunk, though I’d never had a drop of alcohol in my life. I tried returning to my seat, but all bodies had moved to the left side of the plane to view the unfolding calamity. Young and old people kept their eyes glued to the outside world, a world which had changed for the worse in a moment. I heard terms like “World War Three” and “apocalypse,” along with biblical references to the End Times—but I couldn’t convince my mind that it was real.

I was still processing the last words I’d heard from my father: “Never forget how much we love you.” As I looked on at the big Arizona city which looked like the crash site of rogue meteorites, I realized my dad would never speak those words to me again. A chirp like that of my phone’s alert sang loud and true in my mind: THIS IS NOT A DRILL. YOUR PARENTS ARE DEAD AND THE LIFE YOU KNEW WILL NEVER BE THE SAME. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.

After what felt like hours, the captain’s voice spoke through the speakers: “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, his voice tremulous, “we’re going to be up in the air for a while until we find a safe place to land this bird. Stand by for details. Take care of each other back there. We’re in for a long afternoon.”

The intercom suddenly cut out, and that was all the captain would say for a long time. I imagined him straining to maintain course at the front of the plane, hands shaky and uncertain, his eyes transfixed on the flames and smoke which seemed so close—much too close.

I looked down and noticed my parents’ farewell card lying on the floor, still halfway concealed by a bright green envelope. I extracted the card and found a cartoon drawing of a mother, a father, and a daughter standing in a field together, watching a sunset. The words “To Our Beloved Daughter” were inscribed at the top. I opened the flap and read my mother’s words, which were scrawled in her perfect cursive handwriting:

To our lovely daughter, Claire, we wish you safe travels and splendid experiences. You are the best daughter we could have ever hoped for. We love you to the moon and back. No matter what the future holds, we believe in you, and we know you’ll be a wonder for this world. Take good care.

Love, Mom and Dad

I cried long and hard, grasping the letter tightly to my chest. How I longed for yesterday, when I was so nervous about leaving my home that I couldn’t eat, and when my heart ached at the thought of being away from my parents, my friends, my home.

Now, there was no home to go back to.

In that moment, I thought of what the future might hold, and wondered whether or not I would live long enough to see it.

It was the end of the world, I realized, and the fate of our species, like our plane, was left up in the air.