Part 4 (1/2)

For seven horrible minutes, seven minutes that felt like hours, years, a whole lifetime, everything seemed to be in slow motion. Ruby heard only the thump of her own heart, not the screaming, not the wailing, not the two-hundred-pound wrestler seated behind her reciting the Lord's Prayer.

This is it? This is how it's going to end? No, it has to be a mistake. Please, G.o.d, make it be a mistake. She held the baby close, feeling the warmth of his little body, kissing his soft cheek. He looked right into her eyes.

Outside the window the wing broke away from the plane.

Then they were falling...falling diagonally out of the sky.

Henry As Henry and Todd came out of the Elks Club and started down the long flight of stairs to the street, they heard a roaring sound. ”Jesus, is that what I think it is?” Todd asked, looking skyward. He opened his camera, framed the image, then clicked. Henry hoped he'd captured the plane trailing smoke, flames billowing back nearly to the tail, maybe one hundred feet above them and banking steeply to the left.

”Your car or mine?” Todd shouted.

”Mine. Let's go!”

Henry already knew this would be his first front-page story. He drove with his hand on the horn, following the path of the plane. ”Get everything you can,” he told Todd, who had no experience but was the nephew of the managing editor. ”Every detail. Don't stop to think-just do it or you'll miss your chance.” He was talking as much to himself as to Todd.

Miri Outside the theater, the weather had grown even worse. Miri and Rusty locked arms and walked quickly with their heads down. Miri had never felt so cold, so weak from hunger. The candy bar at the movies was the only thing she'd had to eat today. A few more blocks and they'd be home. She could almost smell the leg of lamb rubbed with garlic and rosemary that would be waiting, with pan-roasted potatoes, mint jelly, and green beans, plus a wedge of iceberg lettuce with Russian dressing. Irene would have already frosted the birthday cake she'd baked for Rusty. Miri's mouth was watering just thinking about it.

At the corner of Westfield Avenue and Lowden Street a small child, one of the Bell kids, probably, was sledding in front of her house. There was a Bell in every grade. Miri knew at least four of them. Suddenly the child screamed and pointed to the sky. Miri and Rusty looked up to see a ball of fire rus.h.i.+ng toward them. Miri could feel the heat from above as Rusty grabbed her, pulling her across the street. They ran as fast as they could but the fireball kept coming. They heard a deafening roar. Then a splintering crash, followed by two explosions only a second apart. They were knocked down by the force, Rusty covering Miri's body with her own, trying to protect her.

When Miri opened her eyes she saw feet, dozens of feet, and at first she was so disoriented she didn't know where she was. She couldn't hear anything. There was a ringing in her ears. From every direction people were running toward the flames that were shooting up, toward the thing that had crashed and was burning in the frozen bed of the Elizabeth River.

Rusty helped Miri to her feet. ”Go home and tell Nana we're okay,” she shouted. ”Hurry!” Rusty gave her a gentle shove. ”Go, Miri!”

She ran for home. Her feet were numb in her saddle shoes. Snot ran down her face and froze on her upper lip, on her chin, as she rounded the corner of Sayre Street and raced up the front steps. ”Nana,” she called, bursting into the house. ”Nana, where are you? Nana!” she shouted. ”Nana!”

She found her under the dining room table. ”A bomb?” Irene asked.

”No,” Miri told her. ”Something crashed in the river. They say it's a plane.”

Irene clutched her chest. Miri grabbed her pills from the kitchen counter. Irene put one under her tongue. ”Rusty?” she asked.

”She's okay.”

”Thank G.o.d.”

”I have to go back,” Miri said.

”Over my dead body!” Irene told her.

”Nana, please...I have to help!”

Irene came out from under the table. ”Not without me.” She pulled galoshes over her shoes. Miri helped her into her coat, all the time arguing, ”It's too cold for you, Nana.” Cold wasn't good for Irene's angina. But Irene wouldn't listen. She wrapped a wool scarf over her mouth and nose so the wind wouldn't take her breath away.

Outside, Miri held her arm, afraid Irene would slip and fall on the snow that had turned to ice from Friday's snowstorm. When they got to the crash site, Irene looked around and gave one cry. Her hand went to her heart. Miri shouldn't have let her come. She was afraid to let go of Irene's arm, afraid someone would knock her over. She didn't see Rusty anywhere. But she recognized Rabbi Halberstadter standing with a couple of priests, all of them stomping their feet in the cold.

And then Uncle Henry saw them and ordered Miri to take Irene home. ”Now!” he barked, and Miri wasn't about to argue with him.

Henry He'd had to elbow his way through the crowd to where the plane lay on its back in the Elizabeth River, belly ripped open, rubble spilling into the frozen stream and onto the banks. The river was a ma.s.s of roaring flames shooting a hundred feet into the air and surrounding the mangled wreckage, one wing pointing straight up.

Firemen, policemen and other rescue workers swarmed to the scene, armed with cutting torches, grappling hooks, blankets, stretchers and bags. A white-clad intern, stethoscope around his neck, went with them, but he didn't stay long-just long enough to know he wasn't needed.

When they started separating the debris, a few bodies, or parts of them, became distinguishable. The bodies were brought out in bags and folded blankets. Workers formed a chain to hand up the remains.

A woman who had somehow evaded police lines and tumbled through the snow too close to the carnage was sick and had to be helped away.

As darkness gathered, floodlights were set up on either bank of the river. The cutting torches went deeper into the tail. More bodies were brought out.

The plane just missed taking down the water company offices, where fifty employees worked during the week. Hamilton Junior High was only a block away. These details would make it into his story.

Miri None of them was hungry that night but Irene insisted they eat something. She whipped up scrambled eggs and toast while Henry's girlfriend, Leah, told them how close the plane had come to the Elks Club.

”Henry had just left when we saw it. I ran out after him but he was already gone. So I went back inside and started playing the piano really loud. I played a march and told the children to pretend they were elephants. One of the volunteers pulled the velvet drapes closed so the children couldn't see anything. We didn't want to frighten them, so we just kept singing and playing games until their parents came to take them home. We heard the explosions but we pretended to be lions in the jungle, roaring. No one told the children to use their indoor voices. No one told them to settle down. For once they did whatever they wanted, making as much noise as they wanted. And all of them in their party clothes. All those patent-leather Mary Janes. Really, I didn't know what I was doing. My friend, she went crazy. She saw it out the window and just slumped to the floor. One of the mothers had to take her to the ladies' lounge to lie down. What could I do? I was responsible for all those children. One hundred children. It could have crashed into-”

Rusty covered Leah's hand with her own, like a big sister. ”But it didn't and the children are fine, thanks to you and your quick thinking.”

Until then Miri hadn't thought about how close the plane had come to her school. Suppose it had been a weekday instead of a Sunday? Suppose the plane hadn't made it to the frozen riverbed?

Henry came home just long enough to drop a kiss on Leah's cheek, scarf down some food and change into dry clothes. He must have gotten wet at the crash site. Miri could tell by the way he was walking that his leg hurt. He had a cane but Miri had never seen him use it. ”I have to get back,” Henry said. ”It's the second worst air disaster in this country, the worst disaster since...” He looked around the table, shook his head and left.

The worst disaster since what? Miri wondered.

The doorbell rang as Miri was clearing the supper dishes. ”I'll get it,” she called, running to the front door. It was Natalie, with her mother and little sister. They stepped into the foyer. Natalie hugged her and gushed tears. ”I was...we were...so worried. I couldn't get through on the phone and I thought...I thought...you know...because you live so close...” She took in a big breath. ”We were at The Tavern when we heard but we didn't stay to finish. They wrapped our food and we took it with us because Daddy had to...had to...”

Corinne finished for her. ”Dr. Osner was called in to help identify the bodies.”

Miri stiffened.

Fern said, ”Babies died.”

”They say you could hear them crying,” Natalie added.

”No,” Miri said. ”I was there and you couldn't hear anything.”

”Oh, my gos.h.!.+” Natalie cried. ”You were there?”

”I was coming home from the movies with my mother. We saw it.”

Corinne hugged Miri. ”Oh, honey...” she said in her southern drawl. Miri teared up, wis.h.i.+ng she could apologize for her fantasy. She'd feel guilty forever for wis.h.i.+ng something bad would happen to Corinne, who was kind and good and smelled expensive.

”Miri, who is it?” Rusty called.

”Come in,” Miri told Corinne.

”Oh, no, we don't want to intrude,” Corinne said. ”We just wanted to make sure you were all right.”

Suddenly, it seemed important for Natalie and her family to stay, to help celebrate Rusty's birthday. ”It's Rusty's birthday and we're going to have cake.”

”I love birthday cake,” Fern said.

”Well...just for a minute,” Corinne told Miri, following her into Irene's dining room. Leah jumped up and brought extra chairs to the table.