Atmosphere(18)

When she broke out into the air, she gasped and choked on the water. But when the breath rushed into her lungs, she wondered if anything had ever felt so good as breathing.

She inflated the raft and then managed to throw one leg over the side of it.

She dragged herself onto the raft swiftly, her back soon resting against the bottom, feeling the current of the ocean. She coughed up the salt water in her nose and her throat. She pushed her hair out of her face.

And then she looked up at the clouds, raised her hand in a thumbs-up, and smiled.

My God, she thought, what else can I do?


When the T-38 assignments came in, Joan was grateful to find out she’d be flying with Hank.

He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a Texas accent. He’d come out of Top Gun, the naval flight school in San Diego, so he and Joan shared some of the same Southern California references. Breakfast burritos, fruit trees, how cold the Pacific was. Joan also liked his sunglasses. He wore dark-tinted aviators that made him look like a movie star.

“Come on, girl,” he said to her as they got in the jet. “Let’s go fly a plane.”

“All right, boy, let’s go,” she said.

He laughed as they got in. That was another thing she liked about him: he laughed at women’s jokes.

Joan fit tight into the backseat, the weight of her helmet and harness already bearing down on her before he’d shot them into the sky. She could swear they were perpendicular to the Earth. She tried not to focus on how sick she felt in her belly as they reached higher and higher. She did her best to ignore the force of the air in her ears. She closed her eyes, trying to ward off the intensity of the headache. It reminded her of riding the Round Up as a kid when the carnival came to town, fighting the centrifugal acceleration flattening her body.

It reached a fever pitch, and she was not sure she could withstand the pressure.

But then they leveled out above the clouds and Joan gasped. The beauty of the pale pink puffs—soft blankets against the sky—startled her into focus. The steady hum of the wind drowned out almost everything except the sound of her own voice inside her mind. Which was such a gift. She had always been her greatest friend, her greatest guide.

Up here, all she could hear was that voice. The kindest version of her. Look at the clouds, take a breath, do you see how pale the blue of the sky can be?

Suddenly Hank’s voice crackled in her helmet: “Tell me that’s not the heavens.”


“You are never going to believe this, but I was thirty thousand feet into the air!” Joan said that evening, holding Frances’s hand as the two of them and Barbara walked into Joan’s apartment. “And on Monday, we’re going to fly upside down.”

“Upside down?”

“Upside down! And by the way, I almost puked just going right side up! So who knows what’s going to happen.”

“Oh my gosh, you can’t puke, Joanie!”

“I am obviously going to try not to!” Joan said, “But I might not be able to control it. I might just go, ‘Oh no,’ and then blaaach.” Joan mimicked puking right over Frances’s head. Frances laughed so loudly that Barbara asked her to please use a normal tone of voice and then looked at Joan with reproach.

As they settled in, Barbara told Joan how great the apartment looked and Frances immediately gravitated toward all of the portraits Joan had been working on when she couldn’t sleep at night. There were a few of Frances with her big eyes and long eyelashes, one of Barbara, one of their father.

“You have to do Grandma,” Frances said.

“I know, I really do,” Joan said. “For some reason, I find it hard to draw Grandma.”

Barbara looked at the portrait of herself, which was sitting on the nightstand. Joan saw a small smile on her face, even though Barbara tried to hide it. This was Joan’s favorite part. To be able to show someone what they should love about themselves.

Barbara put the picture down, gently. “It’s because you look like Mom.”

“What?” Joan said.

“You look like Mom. I look like Dad. And you can’t draw Mom because you don’t like to draw yourself.”

“I could draw myself.”

“Oh,” Barbara said. “Well, you don’t ever draw yourself, so I just figured you didn’t want to.”

Joan considered this. “I just . . . don’t find myself all that interesting, I suppose.”

“Joanie, I think your face is very interesting,” Frances said. “I like how you have tiny light freckles all over it and you have three gray hairs on the side of your head.”

Joan laughed. “Thank you, my love.” And then: “I ordered pizza for dinner.” Barbara offered a tense smile, but Joan knew she wouldn’t complain. Joan always paid, ordered too much, and sent Barbara home with the leftovers.

“Did you get pepperoni?” Frances asked.

“Yeah, and with extra anchovies because I know how much you love them.”

“Noooooo!” Frances said, and Joan grabbed her and tickled her ribs. Barbara set the plates for dinner.

After dinner, Barbara sent Frances to get ready for bed. She was spending the night at Joan’s, and the two of them were going shopping for back-to-school clothes the next day. It was their annual tradition. As Joan walked Barbara out, she handed her the leftover pizza. Then Barbara pulled Joan into the hallway.