Mistress(10)

I remove the chocks, the triangular blocks that prevent the wheels from moving. I walk around to remove the wing and tail tie-downs. I get a funny look from a pilot tying his plane down next to me. Most pilots just use chocks for short stops of an hour or so and only use tie-downs if the plane remains outside overnight or longer. I use both. You can never be too safe.

President Kennedy fantasized about his own death. He talked about assassination frequently and even reportedly made a playful home movie about it.

The routine of the preflight inspection comforts me, freeing my mind from weightier subjects. No frost on the wings—fat chance in this sweltering August heat. Sufficient oil; external lights illuminated. I’ve already called in the flight plan, so I won’t have an unexpected air force escort. The SFRA—the Special Flight Rules Area all around the District—isn’t really a big deal unless some idiot pilot forgets to notify anyone that he’ll be flying through. Then he just might have the nation’s finest airmen using him for target practice.

Cargo door secure. Rudder control and elevator control cables okay. VOR antennas in good condition. The VOR antennas, radio beacons that create the “highways” in the sky, are crucial to instrument-guided flight. With two or more bearings to or from a station, I can triangulate my position on a map—but only if my antennas are working properly.

One of Kennedy’s favorite poems was “I Have a Rendezvous with Death.” He would often ask his wife to recite it to him.

I climb up in the cockpit and start the next checklist. Seat belt: fastened. Brakes: set. Mixture: full rich. Carb heat: cold. Prime the fuel. Throttle in one-eighth inch. Master and beacon: on. Open the window, yell out “Clear!” Crack the throttle and hit the starter. The plane rolls forward.

I have a rendezvous with Death

At some disputed barricade,

When Spring comes back with rustling shade

And apple-blossoms fill the air—



Or apple geraniums, tumbling to the sidewalk six stories down.

A blood droplet in free fall will take the shape of a sphere.

A crackle of muted static, frantic squawks from the radio. To my right, the pilot who shot me the funny look is screaming and pointing. I hear a strange loud thrumming, like the metro rumbling by the Eastern Market while I walked with you, Diana, in the cherry blossom–scented spring sunlight—

No!

I slam on the brakes. The prop on the front of my Skyhawk nearly takes the wingtip off a Piper Mirage as it taxis past me. Jesus, Ben, wake up!

The three most important things to remember when you’re in the cockpit, Benjamin. Fly the plane. Fly the plane. Fly the plane.

Breathe, Ben.

My heart creeps back down my throat to its cage in my chest, and I taxi out for takeoff with trembling hands.

I have a rendezvous with death.





Chapter 12



I take a rental car from the Dane County Regional Airport to this place, the Partridge Funeral Home, which is bordered on the north by its cemetery, on the south by residential housing, and across the street by some kind of forest preserve or park. The building looks like an elementary school, a one-story structure of faded brown brick with simple shrubbery and a small lawn that’s withering in the blasting summer heat.

I slow my pace as I approach the front door. Through the glass door I see a blown-up photograph, placed on an easel, of Diana from long ago, a high schooler in her purple homecoming dress, her hair poofy and sprayed, wearing a gaudy white corsage and, as always, that carefree, crooked smile.

A tremble runs through my body. I stifle the instinct to turn and run, to return to the capital. But I have to do this.

There are some things in life you just have to do. That from my dear father as he knotted my tie on the morning of Mother’s funeral. I always thought that was a stupid thing to say, but now I guess I understand what he meant.

I enter the building, take one more look at the photo of the smiling Diana, and follow the directions on a sign. At the end of the hallway, a large parlor area hums with the quiet, respectful tones of those paying their last respects. There are flowers everywhere. More photographs are displayed throughout the room: Diana as a newborn; as a toddler in a Halloween princess costume; as a teenager setting a volleyball; as a graduate in a posed yearbook photo, her eyes full of promise as they look off into the distance. In the middle of the room, several women who look to be Diana’s age gather around a laptop computer that plays a slide show of images.

Where’s the casket? With my question comes relief. I’m not sure I’m ready to see her lifeless. It was one thing to see her facedown in the dark; it would be another to see her posed in cruel artificial lighting, broken and damaged and on display.