WALTER
I had not heard Adrian say that name in almost six years.
Walter Simms.
The subject Adrian refused to discuss.
The man I knew only through fragments of old stories and one faded photograph.
Whenever I asked, Adrian gave some version of the same answer.
“It’s complicated.”
Or:
“That chapter is over.”
Eventually:
“Claire, please leave it alone.”
So I did.
Now my husband was saying Walter’s name over an aircraft intercom in front of an entire cabin.
And his voice was shaking.
My first thought was terrible.
Walter must be dying.
Then another:
Maybe he already had.
Maybe Adrian had learned something devastating just before departure.
Maybe this announcement was grief spilling out in the one place Adrian absolutely could not afford to lose control.
I gripped the armrest.
Then Adrian continued.
“TWELVE YEARS AGO TODAY, I MARRIED THE LOVE OF MY LIFE.”
My breath caught.
“She doesn’t know what I’m about to say.”
I almost laughed from sheer confusion.
Apparently—
he definitely did not know I was onboard.
Adrian continued.
“Because Claire also doesn’t know that for the last two months, I’ve been quietly trying to rebuild a relationship with someone I refused to speak to for eight years.”
Eight years?
I stared toward the front of the cabin.
“My biological father left when I was four.”
That part I knew.
“Walter married my mother when I was six.”
Adrian’s voice softened.
“For the next twenty-three years, he was my dad in every way that mattered.”
The cabin had gone silent.
“He taught me how to fly.”
I covered my mouth.
WALTER HAD PUT ADRIAN IN A COCKPIT FOR THE FIRST TIME
“I was sixteen.”
Adrian continued.
“Walter took me to a little grass airstrip outside Bellmere.”
“He put me in a Cessna.”
“He sat in the copilot’s seat while I was convinced I was going to destroy both the airplane and probably half the field.”
A few people laughed softly.
“He told me I had good hands.”
Adrian paused.
“He believed I could fly before I did.”
Suddenly, Walter was no longer the shadowy figure Adrian had refused to discuss.
He was the man who had helped create the pilot sitting in that cockpit.
Then Adrian explained why they stopped speaking.
