She shivered at the touch of his lips.
“I’ll go with Mom and Seth,” Betsy said quietly.
Seth looked at her. “Really?”
She gave him a shy smile. “Really.”
Jolene moved closer to Seth, placed a hand on his thin shoulder. “You ready?”
“I don’t know,” he said.
“Yeah, well that makes two of us.”
Jolene led the way to the hangar. The last time she’d been here, she’d been deploying …
As they crossed the threshold, moving into the giant space full of helicopters and cargo planes and people in uniform moving from place to place, Jolene stopped.
She didn’t mean to. She just saw the Black Hawk and couldn’t move.
My turn to fly. It’s right seat for you today, no arguing.
“Jolene?”
She looked down at the boy beside her, seeing how pale and sad he looked, and she forgot about her own loss for a minute. You make sure he knows who I was. “She loved to fly,” she said quietly. “She would want you to know that. She loved to fly, but … you … you were her whole life, Seth. She would have done anything she could to get back to you.” She forced a smile. “And she sang off-key. Did you know that? I swear, dogs joined in when she sang.”
Tears brightened his eyes.
Jolene stared up at the helicopter, with its open door and back bay cluttered with straps and metal boxes. She let go of Seth’s hand and walked forward. She didn’t mean to, didn’t really think about it; she just moved forward and stared up at the cockpit.
Her residual limb ached, as if in reminder.
“Can you still fly?” Seth asked, coming up beside her.
“Not a Black Hawk,” she said, and for a split second, she remembered all of it—flight school, Tami, flying into the blue, looking down on the trees in bloom. “I loved it, though,” she said, more to herself than to Seth.
How long did she stand there, staring up at her past, grieving for both the loss of her leg and the loss of her friend and the end of an era?
“You’ll never be able to fly again?” Betsy asked, sounding surprised.
Jolene couldn’t answer.
“My mom would say you can do anything,” Seth said.
Jolene nodded. Those few words brought Tami into the hangar so clearly she could practically smell her gardenia shampoo. “Yes, she would. And she’d kick my ass if she saw us standing here with tears in our eyes.”
He wiped his eyes. “Yep.”
“Come on, guys.” She led him through the building to the locker room. Betsy followed a pace behind.
Jolene limped through the narrow area, lined with metal lockers. At number 702, she stopped.
“Is that my mom’s?”
Jolene nodded, feeling Betsy come up beside her. Jolene hesitated a second, and then spun the lock into its combination. It clicked open.
At the bottom of the locker were a pair of sand-colored boots, a green tee shirt, a helmet, and a silver water bottle. A picture of Seth and Carl, its edges curled up, was taped to the inside wall. Jolene reached in and took the items out, setting them aside. She handed Seth the picture.
That was when she saw the envelope. There was just one—a long, business-sized white envelope with one word written across it: Jolene.
“I knew she’d write you one,” Seth said. His hand made its way to his pocket; he fingered the envelope that stuck up. “It’s her ‘in case I die’ letter.”
Jolene couldn’t reach for it.
“Do you think she knew?” he asked, looking at her.
“No,” Jolene said thickly. “She thought she’d come home. She wanted to, so much. For you and your dad.” She took a breath. “I know I’m not her, Seth, but I will be here for you your whole life. If you need anything—advice with girls, driving lessons, anything. You come to me. We can talk about anything. When you’re ready, we’ll talk about your mom and how much she loved you, and what her dreams for you were. I’ll show you some pictures and tell you some stories.”
“When I’m ready?”
Jolene knew what he meant. She wasn’t ready yet, either. She couldn’t read Tami’s letter until she was stronger, until she was sure the good-bye wouldn’t break her. Hell, maybe she’d never be able to read it.
*
The Keller trial ended amid a flurry of icy rain in downtown Seattle. Michael fought for the jury instructions he wanted, and he got them. The prosecution had amended the charges to include both murder in the second degree and manslaughter to the charges—a good sign for the defense. For weeks, Michael had put on witnesses and offered evidence about PTSD. He’d argued fervently that Keith had been incapable of forming the specific intent necessary to commit the crime of murder in the first degree. One witness after another had confirmed Keith’s deep and abiding love for his wife. Even Emily’s mother had tearfully confessed that she had known something was wrong with Keith, that he’d come home “messed up in his head somehow,” and that the killing was terrible and tragic but that she didn’t see how prison would help. “We just have to live with it,” she’d concluded, dabbing at her eyes.