Page 43 of The Best Bad Decision

“I missed you, sweet girl.”

“You bring presents?” She asks in lieu of a greeting.

“Slow down, Maisy Mouse,” I laugh, kissing the tip of her nose. “Let me take my shoes off first!”

I slide her down my hip to the ground and she uses all of her strength to pull my bags into the living room.

“Come on, Mama!” she calls as I slip out of my heels and toss them into the coat closet.

“I’m coming, I’m coming.” I enter the living room to find my mum laughing at her granddaughter’s antics. Maisy is hopping impatiently from foot to foot, waving her arms like a little monkey. I reach for mycabin bag and unzip it, then slowly—dramatically—pull out a small gift bag as Maisy screeches.

“What do you say, Maisy?” My mum prompts her from the sofa.

“Thank you, Mama!”

“Don’t thank me yet, Mousey-girl, wait ’til you see what’s inside!”

My little girl closes her eyes, turns away dramatically and sticks her hand into the bag, pulling out a plastic figurine of a dinosaur that spans almost the whole length of her small forearm. I don’t know where she gets it from, but I suspect she may be spending too much time with Paloma.

“OH MAMA, it’s huge!” she yells, dropping the empty gift bag. “Thank you, Mama!”

She rushes to leap into my lap and hug me, never letting go of her new toy. I kiss her head and hold her tight.

I miss beingAmie,but I love being Mama.

twenty-five

Amie

The terminal building inDetroit’s airport is in utter chaos. There are people everywhere, and even more noise. It’s so loud. So many people. I’m over stimulated and on edge just walking through to the exit. It’s never like this—not at Christmas, not during the summer holiday rush, not even when storms roll in and cancel hundreds of flights, leaving people stranded to sleep on blocks of hard plastic chairs. I glance up at the screen to see an unusual number of flight cancellations, and I put it down to weather, until—

“Did you hear?” someone says to me. “There’s been a crash. In Philly. It sounds bad.”

Fingers of ice lick up and down my spine, although my skin burns hot. Goosebumps rise on my arms, fine hairs standing to attention. The cacophonous noise fades to a shrill buzz in my ears and the world around me blurs, tilting just a little off-axis. Cam was supposed to fly out of Philadelphia today. My mouth is so dry I can barely unstick my tongue from my teeth to form words. I stop dead, and the entire group of flight and cabin crew grinds to a halt with me.

“Who—who was it? What happened?”

“It was Jurassic,” the captain says. He pulls me aside and speaks quietly. “It’s bad, Amie. Catastrophic. There’s a company-wide emailsent while we were in the air. Our crews are going to be affected by this. They’ve got counselling services on standby.”

It doesn’t really matter what airline it was. Things like this… they shouldn’t happen. And when they do, they hurt all of us. We all do the same job, we share the same sky. We’re family. But hearing those three words—it was Jurassic—is my undoing. My stomach roils and I clap a hand over my mouth, abandoning my suitcase and rushing towards the nearest desk. I find a waste bin just in time, slamming my knees against the cold tile floor and throwing up my lunch.

I’m still on my knees, bent over the bin and coughing, when Captain Rick Flores and two of my crew members catch up with me a minute later. One crew member crouches beside me on the floor, rubbing gentle circles on my back, while Rick watches, confused. When my stomach finally settles enough, I speak.

“What flight was it?”

“Philly to San Fra—”

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

“What was the flight number?” I demand.

“I don’t know, Amie, I’m sorry,” Rick shrugs. I don’t know why the flight number is so important to me. I don’t know what flight Cam was supposed to fly today, just that he was flying home from Philadelphia. To San Francisco. My stomach muscles clench again and I stifle a groan, leaning over the bin again and dry heaving into it. I’ve attracted quite the audience, which Rick—mercifully—shoos away, before returning to eye me curiously.

“What’s going on, Amie?” His tone is quiet but no-nonsense; it’s his authoritative captain voice—the one I rarely hear directed at me. I shrink into myself. From beside me, my colleagueErin speaks up.

“Her kid’s dad flies for Jurassic. I guess he was in Philly today?”

I nod, desperate to control my breathing.In—one, two, three, four. Out, one, two, three, four—

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