by Geri Krotow
It was a clear day, perfect for the Air Show.
He knew Winnie wasn’t going to be happy with him when Krista told her he was up in this plane, but they didn’t have any agreement, other than that he’d continue to be a father to both girls.
You still hope she’ll change her mind.
Maybe, but he couldn’t dwell on it or wait for Winnie to come around.
“Welcome aboard, Skipper.” The lead pilot, Lieutenant Jimmy Rahal, retired and a Vietnam vet, shook Max’s hand with vigor.
“Thanks, sir.” Max swore his heart swelled whenever he had the honor of working with these old guys. They were the backbone of American history.
“This is Ross, my copilot.” Jimmy put his hand on the other man’s shoulder. Ross looked younger than Max by a long shot.
“Hi, Ross. I’m Max.”
“Skipper. Great to have you with us this morning.”
“Okay, we’re going to get buckled in. Roanna, a P-3C flight observer—” Jimmy nodded to the familiar brunette on his right “—and you need to sign the paperwork. No signature, no ticket.” Jimmy laughed.
As Jimmy pulled out his pilot notes to prep for preflight Max turned to Roanna.
“Nice to see you again. How’s your mother’s cat?”
“Fine, thanks.”
She handed him a release form, and as he started to read it, he listened to the copilot give his spiel.
“Sir, ma’am, I know you’re excited to come up with us, but legally I have to remind you that this is an antique aircraft and the head pilot is over retirement age. By signing, you acknowledge this and agree not to hold the crew or their family members liable for any mishap.”
“Got it.” Max read over the form. If he’d had any fear of flying with these people, he wouldn’t have requested this flight to start with.
He signed and then listened to the preflight brief. This was nothing like the briefs before a combat mission, because their “mission” that day was to get out, enjoy the air and show off what the old bomber could do. And, he hoped, inspire some of the people watching to learn more about World War II.
“Skipper, you’ll be on a headset in the waist gunner position. Roanna, you’ll be in the nose turret.”
“Roger.”
Max walked over to the waist of the airframe; it was not only in the middle of the craft but also where the fuselage narrowed slightly, and the overhead was too low for a gunner to stand upright. This necessitated the small step below the gun, so the shooter could brace himself while aiming.
Max’s height didn’t help. He put his headset on and prepared for a cramped but thrilling flight.
Takeoff was uneventful, and within a few minutes he was looking out his window as Whidbey Island’s northern tip emerged below him. Linked to Fidalgo Island and the town of Anacortes by Deception Pass Bridge, the island was covered in dark green firs. Deception Pass twisted under the high bridge and its relatively smooth surface reflected the clear skies.
Staring down at the bridge reminded him of the day he and Winnie had hiked Deception Pass—and the kiss that had followed.
He wished he could share this view with Winnie and the girls. Krista would have a blast up here. If he wasn’t mistaken, she was a pilot-in-training, judging from her attention to every aircraft that flew over the soccer fields and her incessant questions about flying.
“Winnie, why do you have to be so damned stubborn?”
He spoke the words aloud, but no one could hear him over the audio system unless he pressed the talk button on his chest piece. The decibel level of the engines made ordinary conversation impossible.
It didn’t matter, anyway. There was only one person who had to hear him and she was on the ground fifteen hundred feet below.
“We’re coming back around for the flyby. All stations check in, please.”
Max listened to the pilot, copilot and flight engineer check in. Two other observers checked in, too, and then Max gave his status. “Waist Position, all secure.”
There wasn’t anything to secure, as the Browning fifty-caliber machine gun that had once stood there had long since been removed. Still, it was exciting to feel the power and imagine the missions this plane and her crews had lived through.
“Okay, crew, we’re going down to two hundred feet for our low-altitude flyby. Wave at the kiddies!”
Max chuckled at Jimmy’s enthusiasm.
He enjoyed the image of Krista and Maeve smiling up at him. Then his mind flashed to an image of Winnie, scowling at his foolhardiness for getting on such an old plane. Especially after he’d survived the suicide bomber attack in Afghanistan.
“Ah, Winnie, you’ll see. It’s not all tragic.”
* * *
MAX HAD TO RETRACT HIS own words a few moments later.
A loud bang and resulting shudders rolled over the airframe. He waited for it to steady and when it didn’t he went into emergency mode.
He pushed back from the window and looked up toward the cockpit.
“Bird strike!” He read Roanna’s lips.
“Son of a bitch!” Max ripped off his headset and ran forward.
He yanked open the door to the cockpit, careful to use it as a body shield in case there was flying glass or plane parts. He met with a rush of air. The flight engineer, Roanna, yelled above the roar. She’d climbed up from the nose/bombardier position. He could make out the words, “Take the throttle.”
His eyes couldn’t handle the air coming in through an open windshield. He glanced furtively around the radioman’s area and saw a vintage leather helmet that hung in the corner. He reached for it.
The helmet had a set of old, yellowed goggles attached. He pulled them off and shoved them on his head, then over his eyes. They certainly weren’t polarized but gave him the protection he’d need.
He went into the cockpit and relied on Roanna for the casualty assessment.
“We’ve got to get Jimmy out of the seat and you in there!” He barely made out her words but saw that Jimmy was completely incapacitated—if not dead. His copilot, Ross, held a dustcloth over his eyes, blood seeping out. His other hand was pulling back on the yoke, but he was losing the battle with the aircraft.
As Max got to work lifting Jimmy’s dead weight from the left seat, he saw that only the pilot’s windshield had blown out from the strike. The other remained intact, for now.
It felt like forever but they managed to wrestle Jimmy out of his seat. There was no time to worry about spinal injury. If Max didn’t get into the pilot’s seat and fast, they were all going to die.
He slid into the seat and grabbed the yoke. As soon as he had the controls, he yelled at Ross. “I’ve got it!” He proceeded to level out the plane.
The B-17’s controls were nothing like a Prowler, but as Max was fond of saying, “You could teach a monkey to fly,” because the fundamentals of flight were the same across all aircraft.
He looked over at Ross, who still had his headset on in spite of the windshield shards that must have hit his face.
Not that there was a chance of talking to him. They had to bring the plane in. Max wished he could hear someone from the tower, at least, to talk him through the landing.
He looked out the hole where the windshield had been and saw that they’d overshot the landing pattern and lost a lot of altitude—too much to land safely.
“I’ve got to circle her around one more time,” he yelled to Ross. Roanna was tending to Jimmy in the area behind the cockpit where they’d dragged him. He still had a pulse—Max had felt it under his fingers.
“Make it tight.” Max thought that was what Ross said, but he didn’t know for sure. It was too loud, and Ross wasn’t in any shape to be yelling.
Max pulled the throttle to starboard and turned the plane, his entire focus on staying level and landing it on the tarmac.
And walking the hell away from it.
Winnie. He saw her the way she was when he’d made love to her. He saw her as she held Maeve, Krista a
t her side. Winnie.
He was going to see them all again. If this bird held up…
* * *
MAX HAD NEVER LANDED without landing gear. He cursed to himself. “I can’t get the hydraulics back,” he muttered, praying that Ro had Jimmy and herself strapped down. At least he knew the bird was solid, that she could withstand a belly landing. How many vintage reels of WWII footage had he watched, in which the B-17 did just that? More than any other bomber in history, she was built to land on her belly, with her wings at the bottom of the fuselage.
Could he do it and save the aircraft, too?
If this wasn’t such a critical time he’d laugh. Was he really worried about saving the bird?
Sure. Save the bird, save all of us. Be with Winnie and the girls.
“Let’s do it!”
He shouted to no one. Ross sat slumped in his seat. Max hoped he was just unconscious but couldn’t tell.
Roanna would know what to do when they landed. She was probably strapped in back there, next to Jimmy.
He knew from hours of Navy training on Whidbey that Runway 7 was going to come at him hard and fast once he cleared the water.
His hands tightened around the yoke and he eased up on the rudders. Focus and landing an aircraft were two of his most polished skills and he drew on them as he’d done each time he landed on an aircraft carrier, each time he’d flown a combat mission. He took the turn over the water and caught sight of the runway just beyond the shore.
The altimeter indicated he was under two hundred feet. He had about another fifteen seconds over water.
Runway 7 lay in front of the nose in a perfect lineup. Not bad considering that he was used to flying much smaller aircraft. The grass on the side of the runway beckoned; it would make for a much softer landing and might save the bird. But he’d end up on concrete for a bit, no matter what, as 7 crossed the other runway, 1, in the center.
“Come on,” he whispered under his breath, and prepared to hang on to the yoke while he pulled up with all his might at the first jarring hit to the ground. Mud, muck and grass flew at him and into the cockpit, but he kept the pressure on, waiting for the gal to slow to a stop.
The journey across the concrete X of the two runways was horribly loud, and he hated to see the sparks that flew up in front of the cockpit but it did slow the plane down, enough so that he knew they’d stop in the dirt on the other side.
The plane came to a shuddering halt that lifted Max from his seat. He waited a split second and listened. No more engine noise, no more scraping.
They’d made it.
Now to get out before anything caught on fire or exploded.
* * *
“MOM, HERE IT COMES! Look!” Krista was still bouncing. Maeve was eating a snack of oat cereal. Winnie was hanging on to the last of her sanity by watching Maeve eat the cereal, one little “o” at a time. If she allowed her mind to go anywhere else, she was going to scream.
“Mom, look!” Krista grabbed her arm.
Against her better judgment, despite all her memories of losing someone from an aviation mishap, Winnie looked.
The runway shimmered in the sunlight. Except for the emergency vehicles and their flashing lights, it was quiet. She didn’t see anything.
Until she looked up. Over the tree line, against the cerulean sky, was the B-17. The old bird didn’t appear any different and was, in fact, flying toward the runway in what seemed to be slow motion. Ever so slowly she came closer to the ground, and Winnie wondered if she’d make the runway at all.
But just as the bomber became perpendicular to them, Winnie saw what the problem was. The collective gasp from the crowd said they saw the same gaping hole in the windshield that she did. The smooth plane of glass that would normally reflect the sunshine was missing.
There was a pilot in the cockpit, and although it was way too far to know who it was, she swore the shape of the head was Max’s.
“Please, please…” She couldn’t stop her fingers from digging into Maeve’s jacket sleeves.
The plane finally closed the distance to the runway. In that instant she saw the reason for all the precautions and emergency equipment. She hadn’t noticed that the landing gear wasn’t deployed—she’d been focused on the cockpit.
No sign that the landing gear had deployed. Not good. She couldn’t help holding her breath.
A huge dirt cloud hid the plane from view within seconds of its reaching earth.
Of course, Max had decided to touch down on the grassy verge beside the runway. It made for a much softer landing. But he’d have to cross cement at some point—the two runways on Whidbey met in a cross formation.
Unless he could stop the plane sooner and avoid the fire risk. Her heart skipped a beat, probably two. She took deep breaths to keep herself as steady as she could, as if by staying in the moment she’d will Max through it, too.
She saw the sparks under the belly before she heard the screech of steel, tons of it, scraping the cement runway.
The emergency vehicles swarmed the craft and she saw streams of fire-smothering foam as the firemen sprayed the scene.
Miraculously there was no smoke. The engines had simply stopped. No flying propeller parts, no fire, no explosion.
She eased her grip on Maeve and sent up a silent prayer of thanks.
So where were the passengers?
* * *
THEY WERE MET BY RESCUE crews who brought out stretchers for each of them. Max and Roanna didn’t need them, but both Jimmy and Ross were unconscious and nonresponsive. Max stood with Roanna as the paramedics rushed the pilot and copilot to the waiting ambulances.
“Jimmy’s tough. His pulse stayed strong the entire time. I really think he’s got a good chance.” Roanna’s arms were crossed in front of her chest and her hair flew wildly about her face.
Max nodded.
“I can’t thank you enough for saving my life, Skipper. Great landing.”
“We walked away from it. That’s all.” Max saw she was starting to shiver a bit. “You need to have the doc take a look at you. You’re a little edgy.”
Her eyes were glazing over, but then she snapped out of her daze. “I’m okay.” She rubbed her upper arms. “But I’ll have him check me out, just in case. You, too, Skipper.”
“Will do.”
The fact of the matter was that he felt great. Sure, there’d be some soreness tomorrow—hell, maybe a lot of soreness—but he was happy to be alive, to feel anything at all.
Only one thing was causing him pain at the moment.
He had to get to Winnie and the girls.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“MOM, COME ON!” KRISTA was two strides ahead of Winnie, pushing the stroller through the crowds with Maeve happily enjoying the fast pace.
“Don’t worry about me, just get to him!”
Winnie’s strength surged back as soon as she saw the crew come out of the aircraft. There’d been a man on a stretcher but she refused to think it could be Max. No, she told herself, it couldn’t be; her heart wouldn’t take it.
You’re in it for the long haul. Face it—you can’t live without him.
She was ready to acknowledge that now. She wanted to laugh, to cry, but she had to breathe regularly, steadily, to keep up with Krista. They were well past the crowd now, on their way to the hangar where the flight crews were prepping for the Air Show. She had to get to Max. All of them did.
“Krista, wait, maybe I should go back for the car and drive up to the hangar. It would be faster.”
“No, Mom, we’re almost there. And Uncle Max will know it’s us when he sees my shirt.”
Winnie glanced at Krista’s neon orange shirt. The color of caution, of warning.
Please don’t let it be an omen. Let it be a beacon.
Her mind jangled with her disjointed thoughts and worries, but in this moment it was her heart that ran the show.
“I’m sorry, but I have to ask you folks to go back. This area is off-limits to spectat
ors.” A civilian guard stopped them a good distance from the hangar.
“We’re family of one of the passengers on the B-17.”
“Who’s that, ma’am?”
“Commander Max Ford.”
“Just a minute.” He tapped on his radio button and spoke into the mic.
“I’ve got the family of Commander Ford here. Do I have permission to let them in?”
Winnie wanted to shove the guard aside and make a run for the hangar. She needed to see Max, to touch him. If he was the man on the stretcher, even more so.
“Could I see your ID cards, ma’am?”
“For heaven’s sake,” Winnie muttered as she bent over and dug through her purse in the storage basket under Maeve’s stroller seat. Her hands shook and she fumbled for her wallet. She cursed her shaky fingers, unable to get her military identification card out of its compartment.
“Uncle Max!” Krista’s scream pierced her nervous frenzy. Winnie stood slowly and held on to the stroller handles for extra support. Suddenly the tarmac didn’t feel so steady.
The guard’s attention was no longer on Winnie but on Krista and Max. Krista ran up to him and nearly threw him off-balance with her exuberant embrace.
“Krista, girl!”
He was okay. He was alive.
Max stood ten feet in front of her and Maeve, holding Krista in a bone-crushing hug.
“Did you see us? Could you see my shirt?”
Max laughed loudly. The sound sent waves of relief over Winnie.
He’s still alive.
“Daddy!” Maeve screamed from her stroller seat, wanting in on the reunion.
“Hang on.” Winnie bent down again and unbuckled Maeve’s restraint belt. Maeve wriggled out of the seat and as soon as her feet hit the asphalt she dashed toward her daddy.
It’s like a homecoming.
Winnie had greeted Tom when he came home from countless deployments. She’d witnessed other families reuniting after six or seven months apart. It was the Navy way. It was Navy life.
This was life, too. Feeling similar intense emotions—and one emotion she’d shut out for too long. Her love for Max. It was time for Max to come home, time for all of them to be together.
