Page 17 of Forced Proximity
I needed to be at home.
And bonus, there was a certain lady, who was literally holding on to my arm, crying now, that would be there, too.
If we made it out of this…
I cut off that repeated thought and looked over at the woman at my side as I reached for my own oxygen mask and pulled it over my face.
We were spinning now.
A loud crack had me glancing out the window, and my entire stomach pitched sideways as I watched lightning hit the plane.
Horror continued to overwhelm me as I listened in terror as the sound of the engines just…stopped.
The loss of the sound was like a shock to my senses.
At first, I couldn’t comprehend what I’d been hearing, then it all came back like a horrific blow straight to the solar plexus.
“Holy fuck,” I breathed.
The words felt like they were torn straight from my soul.
“What?” she gasped.
“The engine’s not on!” I heard yelled from somewhere behind me. “It’s on fire!”
The pilot yet again came over the intercom.
He didn’t sound calm any longer.
“Passengers, we’ve lost an engine.” He took a deep breath. “And we’re missing the tip of our left wing.”
Nothing else could be heard after that.
It was pure chaos.
I don’t know what made me do it.
Something in my heart just told me to reach out and unbuckle her seat belt.
I left mine buckled and pulled her into my arms.
“Are we going to crash?” she asked just as I slammed my mouth down on hers.
It was stupid.
I should’ve left her where she was.
I should’ve done a lot of things differently, but if I was going to go down, then at least I’d know what she tasted like when the plane made impact.
“Prepare for emergency landing!”
I thrust her back into her seat and hastily buckled her in, then remembered a video that I’d seen a long time ago that pointed out that when we crash landed, first class usually died.
That was the last coherent thought I had for a while.
The next five minutes were the third worst of my life.
Things popped and crashed.
