I squeeze into the crappiest seat on a USAir flight to LA. 36E, the middle one in the last row. I crane my neck, search for my daughter twenty rows up, who’s crying, sad to be leaving home — Ithaca, New York — “ten square miles surrounded by reality.” An LA agency had called two days before to offer her a job, her first after college. Two days to pack, organize a move across country.
I see her walking down the aisle.
“Mam, can I sit by you?”
“Nah, you’ll be okay up there. It’s crowded back here. Smelly.”
She puffs out her lower lip, flashes her puppy dog eyes, shambles back to her seat.
I stare at my tray table. Why’d I say “no?” She needed to know it’s okay to be upset, to sit by herself without me? Did she know I had her tethered like the baby in 2001: A Space Odyssey? Not out there alone?
I stack my reading material on the tray table: The New York Times, Vogue, The New Yorker. Look around. Everyone else has e-readers, smartphones. I’m the one who needs to build a bridge to reality. Seriously.
Jump cut: Wheels down. Bam. The tarmac. LAX.
Fear pings my gut, the back of my neck. I deplane, plaster on my mom smile, gird my heart.
