We joined the crowd
of passengers near the aircraft door.
Through the long window I could see the Northstar jet at the gate, white and blue, with its engines cold and its crew moving behind the glass.
A baby fussed.
A man somewhere behind me coughed.
Then the cockpit door swung open at the end of the jet bridge, and a pilot stepped out.
He was tall, in his late fifties, with graying hair cut short and the easy, composed stance of a man who had spent half his life behind a windshield.
At first, I assumed he was checking on the boarding.
But he wasn’t looking at the luggage, or at the flight attendants, or at his watch.
He was looking at us.
At the passengers.
His eyes moved slowly across the faces, one after another, like a man reading a very long list.
Then they landed on my father.
