it last night when I babysat. I was just told to leave it by a bench in the park and someone would pick it up.”
“It’s wh—” This is no time for questions. “My car!” Sophia makes a strangled sound that might be Daddy, and my arms yank instinctively against my restraints as they try to reach for her. “In the glove box!” I’m hoarse from shouting, but I can hear Becca’s footsteps running outside, I hear the beep of my central locking and a car door opening.
“It’s okay. It’ll be okay, sweetheart.”
More feet, then the scraping sound as the paving slab is shifted from the entrance to the coal chute, and a clatter as the pen slides down into the cellar.
“Pick it up, pumpkin. Take off the cap. That’s it, just drop that. Now straight into your thigh.”
Sophia looks at me, not moving, tears falling down her swollen face.
“Come on, sweetheart. I can’t do it for you. See that Action Man on your pajamas? There. The one above your knee—higher, higher, there. Stab it, then keep the pen there till I tell you to move.”
I know my daughter is brave. She doesn’t cry when she scrapes a knee or wakes in the night with a fever. She’s fearless at the playground, hanging upside down and running across to try the “big slide.” But I didn’t know quite how brave until I see her lift her hand, fist wrapped around the EpiPen, and plunge it into her own thigh. I choke back a sob, scan her face for signs that she’s going to be okay, but her face is still swelling, and she’s gasping for breath. Her fist’s clamped tightly around the EpiPen, and I can’t see if she’s done it properly. I don’t know if the pen’s worked, if the needle’s in the right place.
I don’t know if it’s enough to save her.
THIRTY-EIGHT
3 HOURS FROM SYDNEY | MINA
I press my fingers against the note in my pocket. I picture Sophia lying on her stomach in her bedroom, the tip of her tongue poking out as she forms each letter, carefully looping the tail of each y beneath the line, the way I taught her.
For my mummy.
It isn’t the first time Sophia has hidden some of her baking for me—I unpacked in New York last month to find a piece of banana cake wrapped in a napkin and slotted into one of my shoes—but it’s the first time she’s included a note. The letters I leave on her pillow when I go away barely seem to register, and I’ve often wondered if she even looks at them, but maybe she’s learning something from my leaving them. Maybe we’re finally making progress.
I close my eyes for a second, drawing strength from the thought and from the note in my pocket. I murmur silent affirmations, pouring all the energy I have into them, as though commitment alone will make them true. She’s safe. You kept your side of the bargain to keep her safe. Adam won’t let anything happen to her.
Adam’s name brings into sharp relief all the things I love about my husband, all the things I’ve missed since we separated. Before Katya, everything was good. He’d have done anything for me; I’d have done anything for him. That’s how it works when you love someone.
That’s how it works…
I look past Ganges, along the stretch of empty aisle to where Yangtze now stands by the flight-deck door, and the beginnings of a plan flicker around the edges of my mind. I’m fairly certain I know something about the hijackers that even Missouri doesn’t know, and it might just get us into the flight deck. I picture Cesca sliding into the captain’s seat, her now-familiar voice over the PA, telling cabin crew to prepare for landing, and my heart surges with the promise of home.
“I’ve got Wi-Fi!” A cry goes up from somewhere on the other side of the cabin. I stand, clumsy in my haste and heedless of the hijackers, my urge to speak to Adam far stronger than that of self-preservation. I see an arm in the air, a mobile phone triumphantly aloft. “I’ve been trying ever since we took off, and I finally got a connection!”
There’s a surge of activity: passengers scrambling under seats for their bags, unclipping their seat belts to open overhead lockers. Incongruously cheerful tones sound as devices are turned on, their screens lighting up faces. I look at the hijackers to see how they’re taking this