The Seat Beside Me (11 page)

Idiot! Now’s not the time to be a fool
.

The woman took it, and Anthony felt a surge of disappointment. But then, suddenly from the sky, another lifeline fell. The man caught it and again handed it toward the others. But it was caught by the wind and bobbled over their heads, landing in Belinda’s range. She reached for it. But when she fumbled the line, when it moved past her to the space within Anthony’s grasp, he grabbed hold.

There was a moment’s hesitation as Belinda looked at him, her hand extended, wanting the line back. But Anthony quickly looked away and placed the rope around his body.

His adrenaline surged. “Go!”

The chopper rescuer seemed to hesitate a moment, but then Anthony felt himself being lifted. He did not look down at the water where he’d been. He did not look down at Belinda.

He was alive. That’s all that mattered.

I should dump him in the river
.

Floyd tried to calm his anger with the man who’d taken the line from the woman. He knew the survival instinct was strong—by necessity—but to witness such a blatant act of selfishness made his heart pump in a way that had nothing to do with the heat of the moment.

You’ll get yours, buddy. People saw what you did. They
saw.

Henry closed his eyes. The cold lured him toward sleep. But he couldn’t give in. Such sleep would be eternal. And there were two more people to save.

To save?

The thought shocked Henry into wakefulness. Save? He needed saving too!

This is
my
way; walk in it
.

The words came to him so clearly that for a moment, he wondered if they had been audible. Then he knew: They weren’t words for all to hear. They were words for him alone. Words from God.

Henry sucked in a breath, ignoring the pain that came with it. In this one moment everything was clear.
This
was his purpose.
This
was his destiny.
This
was the road God had been leading him toward. The road of a plane crash. The road of man against nature. The road of life against death. The road of sacrifice.

But he still had a choice. God wouldn’t force him to do it. God was big on free will. He gave opportunities; He gave chances for excellence. He gave encouragement for goodness. But God did not push. He offered.

This is the way
 … will
you walk in it?

It was odd to hear the words formed as a question. A slice of pain shot up Henry’s arm, urging him to think of himself.
Don’t do it, Henry. You have a right to live as much as any of these other people do. You don’t know them. You don’t owe them a thing
.

The whap-whap of the helicopter cut through the air. The rotors made the wind and water blast Henry’s body as it hovered above them. A lifeline was thrown. And then a second one.

Henry caught the first one.

I don’t owe them, but I do owe Him
.

And with a clutch to his throat, knowing full well what he was doing, once again Henry Smith handed the lifeline to the woman who should have gone the last time; the woman who had the line stolen from her.

With a look of shock she nodded her thanks and placed it around herself.

The second lifeline brushed past Henry, grabable, takeable, but
he let it go, directing it toward the young woman who’d called out to Mallory. She took the line weakly.

The helicopter moved away with two people holding on to two lifelines.

Henry watched as it left him alone.

But not alone. He smiled. Never, ever alone.

“No! No!”

Floyd watched in horror as one of the women lost her grip and slipped away as she was dragged over an ice floe. The helicopter couldn’t gain much altitude with the weight of two, and the victims were being towed through the water. He couldn’t imagine their pain. He didn’t want to imagine their pain.

“We lost one!”

And then, within seconds, the woman in pink on the other lifeline lost her grip and fell back into the water. Both lines bobbed free and useless.

“What do you want me to do?” Hugh asked.

Floyd had to make a split-second decision.
One was on top of an ice floe; the other was in the water
. “Back to the one in the water.”

As soon as they reached her, Floyd could see she wasn’t going to be much help. She lay nearly dead in the water, weakly gripping a seat cushion that had floated by.

“Go lower. I’ve got to put the loop around her.”

“Put it
 …
?”

“No choice.” Floyd positioned himself in the open door, setting his feet on the skids.
Please God, please let me get her
.

As they neared the top of the water, the woman opened her eyes and her eyes met Floyd’s. She nodded. There was life there. And a will to live.

Floyd held the loop of the lifeline over her, as if he were attempting a ring toss. “You have to get this,” he yelled above the
whir of the rotors. “Put your arms through.”

He thought he saw a flash of understanding. The helicopter was only five feet above the water. Floyd balanced on the skid and tossed the line. It landed perfectly over her head. She awkwardly put one arm through, then the other, the seat cushion bobbing away. Floyd took up the slack as much as he could.

Hugh was struggling to keep control. The skid dipped toward the water, then raised. They had to go. Now. The woman looked ready, but was she?

“Okay, Hugh. Go. But go slow.”

As they moved through the icy air, Floyd locked on to the woman’s eyes. “Look at me! Look at
me
. We’re almost there. Hold on.”

As they got to within a few feet of the shore, she could hold on no longer and plunged into the water. Rescuers on shore waded in and pulled her to safety.

It wasn’t pretty, but it worked
.

Floyd called to Hugh. “Get to the woman on the floe.”

When they reached her, the woman appeared dead. She lay on her stomach, gripping the chunk of ice like a person sprawled face first on a mattress. She appeared to be asleep.

Is she dead?
“Hey! Lady!” She stirred and managed to turn her face enough to see him. “It’s your turn. I’m throwing you the line.”

He was shocked when she actually turned over to receive it, but her actions were the stilted movements of an old, old woman. The ice floe teetered dangerously. Floyd threw her the line, and she caught it.

“Yes!”

She slipped the loop around her torso and they pulled her up. The ice floe broke in two beneath her. They were about thirty feet from shore. “Come on; you’re almost there …”

Warily, the helicopter made its way back to the shore. As they got close enough for their success to be imminent, Floyd let his thoughts race back to the one last survivor still in the wreckage. He
could hardly wait to meet the man who’d handed over the lifeline three times. He had never, ever witnessed such selflessness—

Once the line was free he said, “Clear! Let’s go get him.”

In the far corners of his mind, Henry could hear voices, sirens, and even the helicopter. But they were of no use to him anymore. They were not of the world where he was going.

A small part of him held on to the hope that the helicopter would return in time. But as the minutes passed, Henry let even that hope slip away. A bit reluctantly at first, but then with the peaceful joy of full surrender. God loved him. God would take care of him—even in the end.

Henry tried to adjust his body against the fuselage, but his grip was slipping. His hands were like two bricks, incapable of movement. Plus, the tail was sinking, and his lungs had tightened around his heart, which beat ever so slowly like a windup toy winding down.

His heart.

My lovely Ellen
 … 
my boy, Joey. I love you
.

With that final thought, the tail shifted, and Henry Smith was pulled beneath the black water.

Floyd strained to see through the blizzard. Strained to see that familiar head and torso held erect against the fuselage.

Where is he?

Hugh called from the cockpit. “Do you see him?”

“No. Go around again!”

“It’s been so long, too long.”

“I know, I know. Go around again. He has to be here!”

The helicopter dove and circled, making figure eights above the sinking tail section of the plane. Floyd searched the water for a
body. If only they could see him floating somewhere and go down and scoop him up as they had done with the woman.

“Come on, be there.”
Lord, make him be there
.

But he wasn’t there. The man with the black beard was gone.

The man who’d given everything had lost it all.

But death would not win. In the final moments of his life, as he descended into the blackness of the river, Henry Smith, an ordinary man, laughed at death. And as he died, he smiled ever so slightly.

For Henry knew a secret. A secret known to him and to God: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.”

And when the final breath left his body, when death tried to grab hold of his soul, the angels of the Lord shoved death away and said, “You may not have this man. Not this special man.” Then they lifted him out of the dark coldness and took him to a place where the warmth of the Father enfolded him. And then Henry heard the words he’d been longing to hear; the words that made everything perfect.

“Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Six

My heart is in anguish within me; the terrors of death assail me
.
Fear and trembling have beset me; horror has overwhelmed me
.
I said, “Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
I would fly away and be at rest.”
P
SALM
55:4–6

E
llen Smith put the sack of groceries on the counter and flipped on the kitchen TV. Her attention was drawn to a special report. She stopped to watch with a carton of eggs in her hands. She’d gotten all the fixings for the best omelet Henry would ever eat. In just a few days he would be home.

A reporter stood in the midst of a blazing snowstorm, yet his parka hood was down around his ears.
Vanity, thy name is television
. Behind him was an icy river. The tail section of an airplane stuck out of the water, an awkward testament to a catastrophe. A helicopter circled overhead, whipping the water with the wind of its blades. Ellen shivered.

“God be with them.”

The camera zoomed in over the shoulder of the reporter as he spoke. “Sun Fun Flight 1382 headed for Phoenix went into the water right before 3
P.M.
Witnesses say it strained to gain altitude then clipped the parking garage of Rapid Rentals with the tail, the landing gear still down. It broke in two and slid into the water. The front section of the airplane disappeared immediately. Passengers were seen still strapped to their seats. The tail section fell away and landed where we see it now. Seven survivors have been plucked
from the icy water by a helicopter lifeline. We are told that one remains. Witnesses say one survivor—a man in his forties with black hair and a beard—repeatedly handed off the lifeline. Now, finally, it is his turn.”

His turn. She remembered Henry’s words that morning.
“Bill’s son is getting married. He covered for me last year when Joey graduated from high school. Now it’s my turn.”

Fortyish. Black hair. Beard. Phoenix. Snow.

My turn
.

“No!”

Ellen’s hands flew to her mouth. The eggs broke. As did her heart.

Ellen hurried to the couch in front of the living room TV, grabbing the phone on her way. She dialed information.

“The number for Sun Fun Airlines, please.” She thought of their absurd jingle,
“Come fly with us; we’re having sun fun now.”

A recording gave her the number, and she realized that she didn’t have anything to write with. She found a pen and scribbled on the back of a magazine. She hung up and called. It was busy. She hit redial. Busy.

She took a moment to watch the news programs, flipping from one station to another, looking for one that had close-ups of the tail section. In the meantime she took in the disaster: the flashing lights of emergency vehicles; cars on the highway; swirling snow; people on either shore, waiting, hoping, needing something to do. That was the core of all disasters. Once she’d witnessed a car accident and experienced that awful feeling of helplessness, of wanting to help but not knowing how.

Maybe it wasn’t Henry’s flight. He’d never told her the flight number, and there were dozens of flights to Phoenix every day.

She dialed Henry’s office. Maybe they’d heard from him. Maybe he’d called from Phoenix, faithfully checking his messages,
being the conscientious man she loved. Maybe—

“Cosgolds. May I help you?”

“Hi, Amy, this is Ellen Smith, can I speak to—?”

“Oh, Mrs. Smith,” said the receptionist. “Have you heard anything yet? We’ve been watching on TV. It’s just awful. Simply awful. We—”

She disconnected the phone with her thumb, not wanting to hear. The phone rang, sending her heart to her toes. “Amy?”

“Mom? Have you been watching the news? Wasn’t Dad going to Phoenix today?”

“It’s his flight.”

A moment of silence. Then the sound of Joey’s tears cut through her. “Ahhh … Mom, what can we do?”

She glanced at the screen. The helicopter hovered over the wreckage. “There’s one man left, Joey. They said so. The helicopter’s come back for him.”

“Black hair, beard … I heard. I even saw footage of him handing off the line to one of the other survivors.”

“Was it your dad?”

“Do you think it could be? Oh, Mom, do you really think …? If only the pictures were closer … the snow makes it blurry. They say he’s handed the line off to six people. It came to him, but he gave it away. Over and over! Ahhh … if it
is
him …”

Ellen slumped in the chair, a horrid certainty flowing through her veins like acid. “It’s him.”