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Ruby nods. "Yes. Thank you."
"Do we need to start singing Stevie Wonder, or can we save it for takeoff?" With this question, Banks cracks a half-smile.
Ruby takes another sip of her sparkling water before laughing. "I think we can save it," she says.
"Excuse me, ma'am?" A gate agent is approaching them, and Banks stands out of habit.
They've really relaxed their formal behavior while on Shipwreck Key, but the minute they leave the island Banks snaps right back into Secret Service mode. He folds his hands together in front of his body and waits while the young woman in the navy blue dress stands a few deferential feet away from Ruby with a nervous smile.
"Yes?" Ruby smiles up at her.
"We've begun general boarding following our First Class boarding, and as soon as the cabin is completely full we'll escort you onto the plane. Our crew has saved an overhead bin for your belongings, so no need to worry about space being an issue."
Ruby smiles again. "I'm not worried."
"Okay, good. I wanted to let you know that, while we're in the air, our entire crew will be available to make your journey as smooth as possible. And if there's anything specific that you need them to know or to do, I would be happy to pass that information along to them."
"Do you think that they could get the entire plane to sing a Stevie Wonder song with me?" Ruby asks, grinning at the young gate agent whose name tag saysKate.
Kate frowns quizzically. "Ma'am?"
Ruby shoots Banks a glance, and though his smile is so slight that it's nearly imperceptible to the naked eye, she knows that inside he's laughing.
"I'm kidding," Ruby says, standing up and reaching out a hand to gently touch Kate on the arm. She's notentirelykidding, as it would definitely lighten the mood and lessen her anxiety if the entire plane joined her for a rendition of "You Are the Sunshine of My Life," but that seems like a lot to ask for. "I'm actually pretty low maintenance," she assures Kate. "I find that the people around me on planes might notice me and say something, but people are mostly in their own bubbles on flights like this, so it should be fine. I want to cause as little trouble as possible."
"You'll be no trouble at all, Mrs. Hudson," Kate says, dropping her chin and her gaze. Ruby has noticed over the years that people tend to do that to her--act as if she were some kind of royalty--and while she always wants to put them at ease and insist that they just call her Ruby, there's something nice in a world where politeness seems to be vanishing to find that people still feel as if they need to be on their best behavior with a former First Lady. So while she doesn't need the reverential treatment, she'll always take the kindness.
Within twenty minutes, she and Banks have been escorted onto the direct flight to Paris and seated in the very last row of First Class with the cabin divider behind their backs. Ruby is tucked in next to the window, and Banks is beside her, his body language telegraphing an imposing presence to anyone who might be inclined to disturb Ruby during the preparations for takeoff.
Once in the air, Ruby takes several deep, soothing breaths as she calms herself. It's not always easy to get into the zone that she needs to be in to persevere through a long flight, but having Banks at her side is helpful, and when he leans over to her and hums a few bars of "I Just Called to Say I Love You," she feels a laugh bubble up inside of her.
"Banks, you get me." Ruby bumps him with her elbow gratefully. Just then, a jolt of turbulence rocks the plane and she feels her adrenaline shoot up into the sky-high range.
"We got this," Banks says, nodding his head slowly and turning his hand so that his palm is facing upward. "We totally got this."
He's never offered her his hand before, but as the plane shudders again, she slips her own hand into his, squeezing it tightly like a stress ball as she re-starts her breathing exercises and waits for the bumps to subside.
* * *
About three hours into the flight Ruby awakens from a short nap. Somehow her stress has mellowed, leaving her exhausted enough to doze briefly. Banks is still seated beside her, sitting straight up and alert. He's not reading or watching a movie or doing anything as far as she can tell.
"Banks?" Ruby sounds groggy to her own ears. He turns his head to look at her, ready to accommodate whatever need she might be about to voice. "Have you ever been deeply conflicted?" Ruby stretches her neck from side to side as she waits for him to answer.
"I have," he says, giving a single nod. "Are you feeling conflicted?"
"Well," she says, raising her eyebrows as she exhales. "Yes. About this trip, for all the obvious reasons."
It would be bizarre if she wasn't feeling conflicted about this trip, but she's also nervous, uncertain, and--truth be told--kind of angry. A full year after moving to Shipwreck Key to start the next chapter of her life as a widow, she's finally making a trip to the place where her husband died. But this isn't just any pilgrimage made by a grieving widow searching for closure: this is Ruby going to Bordeaux to meet with the woman who had given birth to Jack Hudson's love child.
Love child? Ruby thinks to herself, scoffing at the old-fashioned term. When she'd spoken to her mother on the phone before leaving for the trip, Patty Dallarosa had referred to Julien Boucher as Jack's "love child" and Ruby had had to stop herself from correcting her mom. In truth, she hardly cared what anyone called him, because to her, he was simply the physical embodiment of a marriage that had failed in some major way.
Since Jack's death more than two years ago, she's searched the darkest depths of her soul to try to understand where things went wrong. In some moments she's blamed herself, in others she's entirely blamed Jack. There have been questions for her about whether the power of being President may have gone to Jack's head, and other questions about whether he'd maybe been unfaithful to her all along. But when he'd intentionally flown his own plane into the Bay of Biscayne, he'd taken some of those answers with him, and Ruby has had to come to grips with that.
Banks clears his throat. "It would be understandable if you felt anxiety about this trip, ma'am."
"I guess anyone would, right?" Ruby looks at him expectantly, and he nods. "I mean, this woman--Etienne--god, I really need to start calling her by her name and not just referring to her as 'this woman,'" Ruby says, almost to herself as an aside. "Etienne sends me an email saying that I essentially mucked up her ability to receive a life insurance payout on behalf of her son, and it's like I'm thrown right back into shark infested waters."
Banks holds up a hand to stop Ruby from talking, stands, takes a quick walk up and down the First Class cabin, and then returns to his seat and refastens his seatbelt. "Just checking to make sure that everyone around us is otherwise occupied if you want to discuss personal business," he says with no trace of judgment in his voice. "Carry on."
