‘I’ll see you on the ground. Vectors for ILS, please.’
‘Turn left heading two niner zero, Flightbird.’
‘Thanks, City Tower.’
‘My pleasure.’
I sat back in my chair and looked out the window, desperate for his plane to come into view. As illogical as it was, I felt that if I could see his plane, it would be safer. If I was watching it, maybe everything would be all right. Or was I just telling myself that? I ran through the possible worst-case scenarios in my head, and each and every one of them ended in a ball of flames and Andrewnotcoming back to me. The pain I felt in the pit of my stomach at that thought was physical. I ached. Right in the centre of my body. In the centre of my being. I had never felt such an awful feeling before. Or so I thought . . .
‘Mayday, Mayday. This is Flightbird Six Zero Zero.’
The words that everyone working in an airport dreaded.
‘What’s wrong?’ I jumped out of my seat and looked to the sky.
‘We have an electrical failure. We do not have reliable airspeed indicator.’
A combined gasp was taken by every single person in the room. This was the worst-case scenario. If the pilot did not know how fast the plane was traveling, he might travel too slow and stall mid-air. But if he travelled too fast, the plane could rip apart. Without a reliable airspeed indicator, the pilot wouldn’t know how much to speed up or slow down for the landing and, worst of all, if Andrew missed the landing, there was no reliable way of climbing back up if he was having to guess the aircraft’s speed. I took a deep breath and calmed my voice.
‘Acknowledged, Flightbird Six Zero Zero. What are your intentions?’
‘Uh . . . Uh . . .’ He stumbled over his words.
‘Andrew. Take a breath.’
I heard him do as I asked.
‘Right, what are your intentions and what do you need from us?’
‘We are committed to landing on runway seven. We have one chance to get this right. Evacuate anyone in proximity of runway. Have emergency services standing by.’
‘Done,’ I said quickly. ‘You can do this, Andrew! I know you can.’
‘That means a lot, coming from you,’ he replied.
‘I want the frozen peas with you too!’ It flew out of my mouth.
‘Really?’ I could hear a smile in his voice.
‘I want all the frozen things with you. I’ll even have the sweetcorn, even though it gets stuck in the back of my throat – wait, that didn’t sound right – what I’m trying to say is I love you too. There, I said it! I love you.’ I knew everyone in the room had heard me, but I didn’t care, and so I carried right on. ‘I love you, and I’m sorry I didn’t say it before. I just needed some time to think it over and get used to the idea that you loved me. Get over the shock of you saying it. But now I’m over it, and I love you, and I’m sorry that I need these moments to think things through like this, but that’s just me.’
‘Don’t apologize. I like it. I know that when you finally do say something, you really mean it. But I also need to tell you that your timing is terrible.’
‘I know. I’m terrible at a lot of things, but I think you know what those are, and if you want to, because I want to, I really, really want to, we could make this thing between us real.’
‘It’s been real to me for a long time now, Pippa.’
‘Me too. I just took longer to realize that.’
‘I love you too,’ he said. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see my colleagues watching me as if I was the most entertaining daytime drama. ‘Pippa, I have a visual of the runway. Stand by for emergency landing.’
‘Copy! Standing by for emergency landing.’
‘I need silence, now. Please don’t contact me until I’m on the ground. I love you.’
‘I love you too. Good luck!’ I said, and heard that familiar chuckle.
‘Luck! I don’t need luck.’
