Page 7 of The Last Man on Earth
He nods. “Can you twerk?”
“Mr. New—“
“Villain. I done told you. I’m just sayin’, this a long ass flight. Entertain us. Pop that pussy for a real nigga.”
Laughter explodes in the air yet again, and I realize he’s punishing me now. He was already rude, but when I had the nerve to challenge him, his ego couldn’t take it.
“How much longer on this muhfucka,” Sharif asks, coming up to stand beside me. “Feel like we been in this hoe for two goddamn years.”
“There’s a flight tracker on your screen,” I say. “If you hit the power button—“
“I’m askin’you,” he says as his eyes drop to my lips. “Yo, you fine as hell, girl.” He takes a step forward, so close we’re almost touching. “You got a nigga?”
I swallow hard, taking a step back. The smell of weed is seeping through his pores. “I have a boyfriend, yes.”
“I’m sayin’ though.” He steps right back into my space. “He ain’t gon’ know. All we gotta do is walk to the back real quick, and—“
“Nah,” Villain cuts in. “Leave her alone.”
Sharif looks like he wants to object, but my guess is that he can’t if he wants to stay on the payroll. Grumbling, he turns on his heels and moves out of my line of sight. Villain stares up at me, his eyebrow raised.
“You really got a boyfriend, or you just sayin’ that?”
Unlike Sharif, I knowexactlyhow much longer we have on this motherfucker, and I’m also on my last flight ever, so I cross my arms in front of me and challenge him again.
“Whether I do or not, it isn’t your concern, Mr. Newcastle.” My skin prickles with heat, which I like to think is anger. But it may be something else.
And he looks like he feels it too.
My sister was right. Heisfine. Irritatingly so, with those thick black eyebrows, smooth brown skin, full lips, perfect white smile. His hair is cut low, his beard and goatee perfectly shaped. He’s giving 90s fine, and it’s making me uncomfortable.
He’s opening his mouth to speak when the plane shudders hard.
It starts as a bump, the kind you expect when crossing into rough air. But then it rolls into something heavier. The fuselage rattles. Drinks slosh. Someone curses as a bag drops from the overhead.
“What the fuck was that?” one of the boys yells.
“Everyone, please take your seats and fasten your seatbelts,” I say, projecting calm, steady authority. I move quickly down the short aisle as the plane trembles, checking latches, securing overhead bins, meeting eyes that are wide with terror.
When I pass by Villain on my way to the cockpit, I see something that gives me a jolt. For the first time today, that swagger is gone. No more bravado. That’s a little boy in that seat with white knuckles clinging to his armrest, eyes wide and afraid. For one brief moment, I almost feel sorry for him.
“It’s just rough air,” I say as I pass, smoothing my voice into practiced calm. “Happens all the time.”
I know they’re looking to me for comfort and cues. All passengers do. If the crew is calm, they know there’s nothing to worry about.
But then the plane jolts again, more violently this time, and my stomach drops. Something metallic clangs above us as the rest of the plane plunges into silence.
The cockpit door is cracked. I step toward it, stopping when I hear Captain Dorsey’s voice. It’s thin and tight, nothing like usual. “Mayday, mayday. This is flight control. We’ve lost—“ Static swallows half his words. His hand is white-knuckled on the controls.
My blood turns cold.
The plane lurches again, and we lose altitude so suddenly, my knees buckle. Amidst yells from the passengers—terrified now, rather than joyous—I crawl to the first passenger seat I see and climb in, somehow instinctively knowing there isn’t enough time for me to unstow the jump seat.
The yells grow louder. So does the engine. The roar is deafening. Luggage flies again as we list to the left, then the right. I’m about to speak, to tell everyone to cover their heads, when we drop again, freefalling with stomach churning speed.
There are a lot of people in my life who I love. My parents. My nieces. Those two pilots up there who are no doubt doing their best to keep us alive. But it’s my sister’s face that pops into my head now. We started in the womb and came into the world together. Holding hands, Daddy always says. The idea of leaving this world without her, of leaving her behind, pushes a sob out of me just as Captain Harris yells out a few feet away in the cockpit.
That’s when I know. That’s when I pray.
