by Nancy Adams
I put a stern look on my face. “Elvira,” I said haughtily, “the upstairs hall way is just filthy! I saw a speck of dust on the floor, so off you go, I want you to scrub it on your hands and knees, with your own toothbrush!”
It cracked him up, and I fell to laughing at myself with him. We both knew I'd never act like that, no matter if I was marrying one of the richest men in the country. I was me, and that wasn't likely to change just because we could afford about anything!
“What happens if they don't like me? I asked.
“Then they'll give their notice and we'll hire someone else. Domestic servants like these are highly professional; they make more money that any of our store managers, and some of them make more than your average lawyer. They'd never make any comments, or talk about you behind your back, because that is simply against the code they live by. They'd just move on and let you find someone else that you can get along with better.”
I thought for a moment. “What about when we have kids?”
That brought out another smile. “I can't wait,” he said. “We'd probably have a nanny, of course, but I don't think you're the kind of woman who'd want to leave your baby with someone else all the time, so she'd probably just be there to help and babysit. And of course, you'll have to put up with my Mom; she's been praying for grandkids since I left high school!”
“And mine,” I said. “Will that house have a guest room? I suspect we'll be seeing my folks at least a week each month.” I grinned.
He laughed. “Maybe we can talk them into moving out there. Your Dad is old enough to retire if he wanted to, or I could always put him in our legal department with a cushy job. I'd be glad to pay the costs, but somehow I doubt your Dad would let me.”
“Yeah, good luck with that! He's where I get my independent streak from, I doubt you’d get him to let you pay for anything! He and Mom are already talking about cracking some of their CD's to pay for the wedding!”
“The wedding? But I...”
I put a hand over his mouth. “If you don't let my parents pay for their only daughter’s wedding, you'll turn my Dad from your number one fan to your worst enemy! Trust me on this, I've heard all my life how it's a father's duty and joy to provide the best wedding he can for his baby girl!”
He nodded so I let him go. “Okay, but how about if I can arrange for some of it to be 'donated' so it doesn’t cost him much? Fair enough?”
I gave him a high five; anything he could do to help without hurting my dad's pride was fine with me!
“I guess,” I said, “we should talk about when.”
“I was thinking about that. I don’t want you to feel rushed, but at the same time, I'll admit I want to marry you as soon as you're comfortable with it. How about next Tuesday?”
I smacked him on the shoulder, not hard, but playfully. “Too soon. I was thinking more like next Saturday.”
“Saturday might not work for me,” Nate said. “I'm pretty sure that's when my buds are gonna want to throw me a big bachelor party, the kind with the dancers, the girl who ops out of a cake, all that stuff. Can you fit into a cake?”
I stared. “Wait a minute,” I said. “You wanted to get married next Tuesday, and then go to a bachelor party on Saturday? Maybe I should rethink this!”
“Okay, okay, I was teasing and you know it! Let's get serious; how about we make it on the fourteenth of next month? That's a Saturday, and just a little over a month from today. Is that too soon?”
I blinked. “Wow, I don't know. Mom would freak out, trying to get everything done, but I guess it could work. The big question, I guess, is gonna be where? If we do it in California, a lot of my family and friends won't make it, and I'm sure you'd have the same problem if we do it here.”
“Well,” he said, I don't think we need to worry too much. Can your friends get off work? I could charter a plane to fly them all out...”
I stared at him. “Do you know what that would cost? Honey, I know you're rich, but...”
Nate laughed. “Babe, what it would cost us to charter a jet for your friends would be less than the interest we'd make for that day. There's a difference between being 'rich' and being 'stinkin' rich,' as my Dad used to say. Babe—we're stinkin' rich!”
Mom just about freaked out when I told her we had set the date for the fourteenth of the following month, but Dad just smiled and shook Nate's hand. “Semper Fi!” he said, and Nate echoed it; it's a Marine thing, you just have to deal with it.
Mom started talking about ninety miles an hour. “Oh, we've got to choose a wedding dress, and figure out where to have the ceremony, and the reception...”
“Okay, Mom? Some of that we need to talk about, cause…” I choked a bit. “We've decided to hold the wedding in California, at Nate's family estate, and we're going to charter a plane to bring everyone out for the wedding who wants to come.” I finished in a rush, trying to get it all out before she could explode. I made it, but only just.
“California? But—but what about all your friends here, and there's Aunt Mary and Uncle Bill, and your cousins...”
“Mom! We're talking about a big plane, Mom. There'll be room for everyone, calm down.”
Dad looked at me and Nate, and his smile was just a little askew. “Nathanael,” he said, “that's an awfully big expense. Are you sure you want to do that?”
Nate just nodded. “Yes, Sir. In all honesty, it would be easier for us to bring the folks from here out there, simply because I'll have to invite a couple thousand of our staff and employees. There's nowhere out here that could possibly hold the whole event, but in San Fran, we can have our pick of churches and reception halls. Which reminds me, can I get your pastor's phone number? We'd like him to come out and officiate.”
Dad smiled then. “Oh, Brother Jimmy would love that! Let me get him on the phone!”
The two of them went to Dad's study, and I smiled. I didn't know we wanted Brother Jimmy to come out and perform the ceremony, but I was delighted with it. He'd been our church's pastor since I was a baby. He'd baptized me and taught me in Bible School and been a big part of my life for as long as I could remember.
I went to Mom and hugged her, so she'd calm down. She was thinking of whom to invite, and I told her to just make a list and we'd invite them all, so she switched to thinking about a wedding dress, and how on earth she and Dad were going to afford the catering and everything for such a huge wedding. I tried to tell her that Nate could get a lot of it for nothing, but she was in a tizzy.
When Dad and Nate came back in, they were both smiling.
“Brother Jimmy says he'd be thrilled to come and marry us,” Dad said, “and Nate and I have worked out a deal on how to pay for the wedding. He's hired me to handle some business investments, and in lieu of the fees, he'll cover the costs.” Dad laughed, then. “Darn good thing, too, when he said he'd have to invite a couple thousand people, I started to think getting you married off was gonna put us in the poorhouse! You've got a real gem, here, Katelynn, and don't you ever forget it!”
“Trust me,” I said with a mile wide grin, “I know.”
Things started falling together after that, and before I knew it, we had everything arranged from our end in North Platte. Mom and I spent most a whole day calling everyone we wanted to invite to make sure they knew in time to take time off or make any other arrangements necessary, and when we said there would be a chartered airliner to take them all out to San Francisco, and that we'd put them all up for a few days in a hotel there, most of them went into happy fits! Corie was absolutely ecstatic, especially since she was now in training to take over my job as Manager of the store; Nate personally authorized the time off, and arranged for another manager to come and run the store while she was gone.
The next Wednesday, we planned to fly out in the company jet so I could meet Nate's family and we could choose our house. I was a nervous wreck, but Nate kept reassuring me that his folks would love me, so I managed not to fall apart as the time to leave drew closer. W
e had dinner with my folks Tuesday night, and said our goodbyes to everyone there locally because we'd be staying out in California until the wedding. Mom and Dad would be coming a week after us, so Mom could be with me in choosing the dress, setting up the bridesmaids' outfits, things like that.
We got up at four AM so that we could have breakfast before the jet landed. We went to Penny's, one of our favorite places in town, and had their pancakes and sausage, then went to the airport to wait for the plane.
It landed about fifteen minutes later, and a man came out of it and loaded our luggage for us while we took seats. The plane was very nice, and had seats that faced each other beside the windows, with a small table in between. We actually could have had breakfast in the air, but I hadn't flown much, and Nate wanted to take it easy on me. It was bad enough when the plane began to taxi out to the runway, and then when the pilot poured on the power, we were moving so fast I was scared, but then the wheels lifted off the ground and things smoothed out. Once we were in the air, I was fine.
I actually enjoyed looking out the window as we rose. It looked like we were going over a tiny toy city, with little toy cars and trucks moving along the little toy roads. I didn't feel like I was way up in the air; I felt like I was on a balcony or something like that, looking down at Toyland.
When we went through the cloud layer, I jumped, because for a moment we couldn't see anything at all, and then we were up above them and I was looking at a sea of white, fluffy clouds below us. That was so incredible that I was lost for a few minutes in just staring at it all. Now and then there would be a break in the clouds, and I'd see lush green forests or fields, or a river passing under us. It was awesome!
Nate said the flight would last about six hours, and we sat and talked while we looked out the windows. I was actually beginning the journey to my new life, at last. In only a few short months, I'd gone from lonely single college girl to lonely single college grad looking for work, to manager trainee of a new store, to falling in love and not being lonely or single anymore, and now I was on the way to being married to the most wonderful man I'd ever met. After all we'd been through this past few weeks, I felt like nothing in the world could possibly go wrong now.
I should have known better.
Nathanael
Chapter Two
High On A Mountain of Love
* * * * *
Katelynn was actually enjoying the ride in the plane, looking down on the world passing silently below and barely being able to make out roads, towns and lakes. Cities were pretty easy to spot as we flew over, and I smiled at her as I pointed out Denver, way down there below us. We were at about thirty thousand feet, so that meant it was almost four and a half miles below us, since it's a mile high itself. She smiled back, just amazed at how this new adventure was going, and I reached across and took my hand.
“I love you, Katelynn,” I said, and she echoed it back to me. I loved her, and I loved looking into her eyes, seeing the love that she felt for me reflected there. I truly had found an incredible woman.
The airplane gave a sudden lurch, and Katelynn looked at me. “Turbulence,” I said. “Sometimes there's a wind at our altitude that is going crossways to our flight path, and it can make the plane bounce around. That's all it is.” She relaxed and smiled, but then it happened again.
I could tell she tried not to be afraid, but when it happened a third time, this time accompanied by a loud bang, she couldn't keep her fear under control any longer. “Nate?” she said, “What's wrong?”
I was looking toward the cockpit, and I know she could tell that I was becoming concerned, too. A moment later, the pilot's voice came over the intercom.
“Mr. Simmons, we've got an emergency situation. One of the engines has exploded, and it's on fire, but we've set off the extinguisher and it's going out. The problem is that we can't maintain this altitude with one engine, so we're going to have to descend and land as soon as we can find somewhere to put down safely. There's no danger at the moment, and I'll keep you posted.” He clicked off, and Katelynn looked at me.
“Relax, Babe,” I said. “Stan's one of the best pilots in the business, he knows what he's doing.”
She smiled, but it was a nervous smile. She'd told me that she had always been a bit afraid of flying, and had only been on airplanes twice, back when her father was in the senate. She was only about ten at the time, and hadn't ever expected to be flying again, but here she was, and in a plane that was having problems.
There was another lurch, and then another bang, and alarms started going off, whistles shrieking and bells ringing, and I felt my heart leap up into my throat. Oh, God, here I was on the way to my future as her husband, and the plane was going to crash, and there was just nothing fair about that…
“Mr. Simmons,” came the pilot's voice, “we're going down. The remaining engine has seized, and we’re going down no matter what. Brace yourselves for an emergency landing, and it won't be long!”
I was instantly in action. I put Katelynn in a seat facing backward, and strapped her in as tightly as I could, then handed her a cushion and told her to hold it in her lap and put her face down to it. “When we hit, make sure you bury your face in that pillow, got that?” I said, and she nodded. I got into the seat across the center aisle that faced the same way, strapped myself in and grabbed another cushion.
“We'll get through this, Baby,” I said, and then the world started coming apart. I heard a horrible sound like a massive wind rushing at us, and then the plane began jerking over and over, as if someone was pumping the brakes, but there weren't any brakes in the air. I heard crashing noises, and sounds like things breaking, and then the plane tilted over onto its right side, and I was laying on the wall as if it was the floor. We were still moving, and there were more of those horrible crashing sounds, but then we seemed to drop suddenly, and the plane began to tumble over and over. A big crack appeared in the fuselage wall right in front of me, and a second later, that whole wall of the plane just wasn't there anymore. I suddenly found myself almost hanging out into the air that was rushing by.
Then I saw the reason for all those crashing sounds, as trees and branches whipped past us. I was hit several times by smaller branches, but I kept that pillow to my face, and I suddenly remembered that I had told Katelynn to do the same. I looked over at her and pointed at it, and she pulled it to her face and held it so tightly that I'm sure she could barely breathe as the tumbling and crashing continued, and then there was one final crash and everything went dark.
Katelynn told me later that she woke up to find herself hanging upside down, and the blood filling her head was causing it to hurt like mad. When she looked around, she saw me hanging just as she was, but she also saw that my face was covered with blood.
“Nate!” she screamed, but I didn't respond, and she started to panic. She fumbled with the seat belt and found the release, and when she pushed the button, she fell forward and down, landing on all fours on what should have been the ceiling. She crawled over to me and wrapped her arms around my chest as she released my seat belt, and tried to use her own body to cushion my fall.
She said that sometimes a sound you dread to hear can be like the most beautiful music! I groaned as she rolled me off of herself, and she knew I was alive. “Thank you, Jesus, thank you, God,” I heard her whispering over and over, as she rolled me onto my back. She had to push and pull, and then we ended up with her legs under me, so she had to get herself free from that, as well.
When she got me turned over, I coughed a couple of times and opened my eyes. I was confused for a second, but then realized what had happened, remembered the flight, the engine failures, the pilot telling us we were going down. I relived the crash itself, at least the part I had been conscious for, and then I looked into Katelynn's eyes and was only thankful she was alive.
“Baby, are you okay?” I asked, and she burst into tears. She couldn't speak, but nodded for a moment until she got her voice back.
“
I think I'm okay,” she said at last. “Nothing seems to be broken, anyway. How about you?”
I moved my arms and legs, and she saw me wince. “Some pretty sore spots, but I think I'm mostly intact. I took a beating from something...”
“Tree limbs,” she said. “I saw it, when the side of the plane tore loose, there were trees and limbs beating at you.”
I forced myself into a sitting position, and winced again. “Feels like maybe a couple of cracked ribs.” I looked toward the cockpit. “Any sign of Stan or Max?”
She shook her head. “No, but I just woke up a minute ago, and saw you so I came straight over. I had to dump you out of your seat belt.”
“No problem. If I happen to have landed on my head, that's the hardest part of me, so it won't get hurt. I've got to go see about them.” I got onto my hands and knees and began crawling stiffly toward the cockpit door. When I got to it, I pushed it open easily enough and leaned inside. The lower half of me was still in the cabin where she could see me, and I backed out a moment later and turned back to her.
“They're both dead,” I said, and she began to cry again. She didn't really know them, other than meeting Max when he took our bags, but they'd died trying to save us, and she knew that much. I crawled inside the cockpit, and she could hear me calling on the radio.
“Mayday, Mayday, is anyone receiving? This is Lear Tango Niner Niner Eight Two Charlie, we are down in the Rockies, is anyone receiving? Mayday, Mayday...” I tried over and over for several minutes, then came out again. “Radio's done for. Do you have your phone?” I was searching my pockets for my own, but didn't find it. Hers had been in her purse, she said, and she managed to find it after a few minutes of frantic searching, but when she turned it on, there were no bars.
“No signal,” she said. I had gone back into the cockpit and returned with another phone, Stan's, but I held it up to show her that it had no signal, either.
