Steve is several hours early but was terrified of being late. For a week, he’s had paranoid thoughts of not being at the airport when they got off the plane. He’s dreamed of flat tires, hurricanes, and terrorist attacks. Denise and Jesse have never left California, and neither has ever flown.
At the gift store, he buys a newspaper, a box of candy, and two Washington D.C. tourist T-shirts, size adult small and children’s large.
He scans the paper as he waits. The world is still at war, crime’s still occurring on every front, and the Knicks are still having a bad season. Steve waits at the arrival gate, his FBI badge allowing him the pre-9/11 pastime privilege. Through the glass, he watches the three-dimensional dance of the airplanes taxiing, landing, and circling above. Danny used to love standing at the window with his hands spread wide and his nose pressed to the glass, his breath making a foggy circle on the pane. The thought makes him smile, and the realization that thinking of Danny has made him happy instead of destroying him surprises him and makes him smile again.
He pulls out his phone, and his ex-wife answers on the first ring.
“Steve? Everything okay?” Her concern fills his heart.
“I’m good. It’s why I’m calling. I wanted to let you know I’m okay.”
He can hear her sweet smile. “Oh, babe, I’m glad.”
“I still have my moments, but I think I might finally be coming out of the tunnel.”
“You’ve met someone?” she says, showing how well she knows him.
“Yeah,” he says, feeling guilty, though she’s the one who moved on first.
“Oh.”
“Sorry.”
“No. It’s good. Just hard.”
They both fall silent. He imagines her sitting in their backyard, a book on her lap, her new dog, a terrier mix, at her feet.
“I’m glad you’re doing better,” she says.
“Thanks. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
* * *
Denise and Jesse are almost the last passengers to deplane, and Steve’s nearly having a heart attack by the time they finally appear. He embraces them both so hard when they finally get to him he crushes the candy and knocks the wind out of Denise.
“Sorry,” he says sheepishly as he releases her.
Jesse has moved to the windows and is watching the planes.
“How was the flight?” Steve asks.
“Terrifying. Thank goodness Jesse was with me. People are not meant to fly. We are meant to have our feet on the ground.”
Steve hugs her again, this time more gently. “Thanks for coming.”
She stands on her tiptoes and kisses him lightly on the lips, her arms around his neck. “What are a few gray hairs and years off my life when the payoff is you?”
Jesse’s back. “I made a list of the places I want to go while we’re here. We can talk about it while you drive. There are sixteen must-sees, twelve hope-to-sees, and twenty-two would-like-to-sees.”
“Sounds like we have our work cut out for us,” Steve says, grabbing Denise’s carry-on.
And as they walk through the airport, Denise on his arm and Jesse talking a mile a minute, he wonders if the people around him are jealous.