“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your rescue.”

 --Buddha

Flying

 Darwin

                                 Prologue 

            Hamson held his left arm still, braced in the cold cradle, anticipating the inevitable sting as the stainless needle pierced his leathery skin, knowing that the pain wouldn’t be as bad as the sickness that he’d feel in just a few moments.  He held his right hand out through the bars of the cage, palm up, patiently waiting for the banana.  Like always, when the needle was withdrawn by the man in the white coat, the fruit would be placed in his hand.  He could count on this reward for his cooperation, and the man whose hair was the color of the banana would tap his arm, where he’d just had the sting, and that was his cue that he could pull back into the cage.

Squatting in the back corner of the small cage, savoring the ripe sweetness of his banana, Hamson watched the man move from cage to cage repeating the procedure.  Each of the chimps dutifully placing their arms in the cradle, as they always had, for as long as any of them could remember, waiting for the sting, but the sickness they’d feel was new.  And they didn’t understand it but they were beginning to learn that it was associated with this man and his needles.

Hamson studied the banana as he chewed, thinking back to memories of when he was young and allowed to sit in the simulator boxes, push buttons, and watch the colorful lights which would direct him to push more buttons.    He would be rewarded with biscuits and fruits, and the needles in his arm would never lead to the sickness.  He   thought about his father and mother and was proud that a picture of his father hung above the doorway at the entrance to the room.   These thoughts made him happy and distracted him from the pain he would soon face.

With the last piece of banana in his mouth, Hamson heard the man scream.  Toward the back of the room Misha had a firm grasp on the man’s arm and was pulling him close and his arm into the cage. 

“Stop, Misha!” The man yelled.

The chimps knew what this word meant.  They chewed their bananas and watched the activity with indifference.  The man took the device out from a holster on his hip with is free hand and jammed it against Misha’s chest.  She let go of his arm and began screaming and hooting.  Now all of the chimps joined in, turning the room into a chaotic screaming fest.  Misha, knocked to the back of her cage, was not moving.

The man pulled away from the cage, hunched over and holding his arm he was clearly in pain.  One by one the chimps calmed down and turned back to their bananas.  Oliver lay down and covered his eyes with his arm as the pounding in his head began.

Chapter One

Several Thousand Feet Over Gainesville, Florida

          On the eleventh day of August, a searing, sticky day, Trevis Lindstrom watched the ground spinning in front of him like a child’s pinwheel in a strong breeze.  Descending through 3,000 feet he was bored.  Neither the rotation nor the g-forces bothered him; he’d spun the little Cessna training aircraft thousands of times. 

Trevis glanced at the silver dollar sized chronograph imbedded in the instrument panel.  Eleven-forty-five.  Shit, his interview with Jiffy Jets was scheduled for two-thirty.  This would have to be Tudie’s last  maneuver. 

He wanted to make a good impression in the interview, wished he’d gotten a haircut, and had taken the time to shop for a new suit.  If only he’d not been involved in that co-ed wet t-shirt contest onboard the 727 charter to Cancun.  Maybe that wouldn’t have been so bad if the FAA Air Carrier Inspector hadn’t found Trevis in bed with his daughter, all of which added up to his being fired from his first real shot at the airlines.   And at this very moment, with the world spinning around outside the windows, Trevis despised the fact that he was back to flight instructing in bug-smashers, a position aspiring airline pilots saw as the bottom rung on the aeronautical ladder of success.   More than anything else, the twenty-nine-year old, sandy haired, green eyed aviator wished that he was still with his ex-wife Rachel, and that he wasn’t sitting next to Rache’s aunt Tudie trying to teach her to fly.   

The altimeter on the instrument panel of the two-seat Cessna indicated the trainer was dropping through 2,000 feet.  The swampy topography of Paine’s Prairie, southwest of Gainesville, Florida, loomed closer every second.  Tudie Goldberg’s eyes were locked on the bug-speckled windscreen, her arms stiff on the control wheel.  As usual, the 68-year-old-platinum-blonde widow employed none of the spin recovery techniques Trevis had spent the better part of a hundred hours teaching her.  Most students were capable of mastering spins in several hours.  If only she’d worry as much about flaps, Bernoulli’s Principle, stalls, and angle of attack as she did about designer jeans, maximizing mutual funds, and her boyfriend Max, there might be hope for her.

Trevis let the airplane descend as low as he safely could, then decided to wait just a couple more seconds.  Maybe he could scare Tudie into admitting she had no business learning to fly.  He hoped that she would realize that she’d be more comfortable sitting in first class on a United 757, sipping Bloody Marys on her way to visit the grandchildren in New York.  Better to let the professionals do the driving. 

          At 1,700 feet, Trevis unfolded his arms and placed his feet on the rudder pedals. With the engine at idle, the cabin was relatively quiet except for the wind noise created as the two seat Cessna rotated around and plummeted at nearly several thousand feet per minute.

          “Tudie, how would you say things are going here?”

          No response. 

This was typical for her in the throes of a critical maneuver.  She became task saturated.

          1,600 feet: 

          “That’s nothin’ but swamp down there, Tudie.” 

          No response.

“Gators and snakes.  We’ll be six feet under in no time.”

          1,500 feet:

          Nothing.

          “Look, Tudie, I need to level with you.  I have some concerns about your flying abilities.”

Nothing.

“Have you considered shuffle board?  How about running for Condo president.  Just because you’re Rachel’s aunt doesn’t mean that I can extend any special considerations your way.  I have to think about my professional integrity.  You gotta help me out here.”  Tudie’s eyes, outlined in violet eye shadow and thick mascara, were wide.  Her wrinkled lips pressed tight against each other, and the gold dangle bracelets on her wrists gently bling-blinged against each other.

This couldn’t go on any longer.  The moment had come to take extreme measures.  Trevis liked Tudie, and he thought that he still loved her niece, but despite all of that, if she truly wanted to learn to fly, and if he wanted to live, she would have to rise to the same standards generally considered a prerequisite of all aviators—she had to come to her senses and get the airplane out of a spin.  She was going to have to learn a lesson, even if it was a painful one, a lesson that Trevis learned first hand when he was a student pilot.  

          1,400 feet:

          “Tudie, I’m sorry about this.”  With a tight, closed fist, Trevis hauled back, broadcasting the impending punch, closed his eyes, and let go, releasing enough energy to get the old woman’s attention. 

“What the hell is wrong with you?”  Tudie yelled, dodging Trevis’ punch.

Trevis’ fist made contact with the metal frame of Tudie’s seat, sending a painful shock from rapidly firing neurons in his now-broken fingers up into his brain.  “FUCK!”

          At the same time, Tudie’s gaze on the windscreen didn’t falter.  Her left hand, now white-knuckled, never left the control yoke, while her right foot remained planted, extending the rudder pedal.  Yelling, “Asshole!” Tudie Goldberg reeled back and bitch slapped Trevis with the back side of her open right hand. 

          1,300 feet:

          “Shit!”  Trevis grabbed the control wheel and tried to push forward to break the aerodynamic stall.  It was the first step in spin recovery.  Nothing.  The controls were locked in place.  The old woman was strong.  “Goddamn it, Tudie! Let go!” 

          1,200 feet:

          “Not till you apologize.”

          “I’m sorry for trying to hit you!  Let go!”

          “I’m an old woman, Trevis.  I don’t have much to lose.”

          “What the hell do you want from me, Tudie!?” 

          Trevis could no longer make out any of the distinct features on the ground.  The colors landscaping the windscreen blended into a greenish-brown, like a Cuisinart on high speed, pureeing multicolored vegetables.  He sensed the horizon racing to envelop him, what skydivers called ground rush.  He hoped he’d be killed instantly.  The spin was tightening, speeding up, but time was slowing down.  He was sure that he was seeing an image of his father appearing in the windscreen.  He had to be hallucinating.

The Senior Captain Buck Lindstrom, adorned in freshly pressed black jacket, four one-inch-wide gold stripes on his sleeves, shiny brimmed cap tucked sternly under his arm, and standing to the side of a freshly unearthed mound of orange dirt.  The Captain with a capital “C,” with his indignant lips, and cocked crew cut head, seemed to be ordering the uncomfortable mourners at Trevis’ grave to acknowledge, with him, the inevitable end to his screwed-up son’s life. 

It was almost as if his father had been trying to lull him into accepting this fate, to give himself over to it and quietly let the Cessna disappear with a sick thud into the grave so his father could cover up his embarrassment of a son.  Trevis wasn’t about to let that happen. 

“I’m sorry.  I’m sorry.  I’m sorry.  I’m sorry.”

          1,100 feet:

          “You mean it?”

          “Fine.  Kill us!”  Trevis said.

“You shouldn’t give up so easily, darling,” Tudie said, letting go of the controls.  “You got it.” 

          At 1,000 feet the Cessna was about to become a lawn dart.  Trevis had to do something fast.  The spin had gone too far.  G-forces were pulling Tudie and him to the left.  Trevis tried to punch forward on the control yoke to break the aerodynamic stall that allowed the plane to spin.  The yoke wouldn’t move.  It was locked in place.  “What did you do to this thing!?”

           Tudie shook her head in the negative and shrugged. 

           He had to get the controls declutched from his side.   “Grab the wheel!  Hang on tight.”  Tudie did as ordered.  Trevis reached down between Tudie’s legs and yanked on the seat-back adjustment knob.  A loud snap and crack sounded as the frame gave way and flipped backwards, toward the tail of the aircraft.  Tudie went from a full sitting position to lying on her back, yelling “Wooo Hooo,” as she went.   Her side of the control yoke ripped away from the instrument panel, leaving her lying face up, arms extended, her hands grasping the detached wheel.

           700 feet:

           Trevis pushed his control yoke forward, kicked the left rudder pedal, and slammed the throttle to full power.  

           600 feet:

           The Cessna continued to spin, a dog ignoring commands from its master.

           500 feet:

           Like a dazed person coming to his senses, the two-seat responded to Trevis’ commands and stopped its spiral with the nose still pointed at the swamp grass and scrubby trees of Paine’s Prairie.  Trevis had to pull out of the dive gently to avoid another aerodynamic stall, the maneuver that led into the spin in the first place. 

           300 feet:

           With the minimum amount of pressure necessary, he eased the controls toward his belly.  The largest Cypress tree in the middle of a hardwood hammock loomed closer.  Close enough to touch.  

           100 feet:

            The nose rose up toward the horizon and the airplane started to level out, but not before the little blue and white trainer’s fixed wheels crashed through the upper branches of the tree.  Trevis felt his sphincter pucker.  He had to hold the control pressures in place, waiting for the laws of physics to do their thing, or not.  They’d crash or fly.  Whatever happened now was out of his control. 

            The propeller whined and sliced, straining to bite into good air and pull the Cessna away from the ground.  The nose of pointed above the horizon but they continued to settle toward the grass and water moccasins.  Come on, baby.  The airspeed increased to 55 knots.  Trevis figured he was fifteen feet above disaster, the ground sliding by the side windows.  They were level now, flying in the very lowest range of controllability.  Tree branches snapped and scraped against the bottom of the fuselage.  

             Trevis felt the tension in his fingers gripping the control wheel.  Relax, you’re gonna make it.  He sneaked a peak out his side window.  A big gator thrashed its tail and bolted under water.  Trevis eased back a little more on the control yoke as the airspeed indicator read 60 knots.  The Cessna climbed, one hundred feet per minute.  They would live.  He breathed again.

             The airplane ascended to 1,500 feet.  Trevis noticed his hands and legs shaking.   A surge of emotion rose in him, bursting out through his eyes in a deluge of tears.  He turned to look at Tudie, still lying on her back, arms extended straight out, clutching the control yoke.   “I think my hand is broken,” he said.

             “Can we do one more of those?” she said.

© 2007 Wing'd It

 

BACK