nodding. She isn’t and chooses not to be. In this moment more than any other, she chooses not to be.
Fidelman says, “That motherfucker, Mr. Make-America-So-Fucking-Great over there. I wish we could bring back the stocks, just for one day, so people could hurl dirt and cabbages at him. Do you think this would be happening if Obama were in office? Any of this . . . this . . . lunacy? Listen. When we get down—if we get down. Will you stay with me on the jetway? To report what happened? You’re an impartial voice in all this. The police will listen to you. They’ll arrest that fat creep for pouring his beer on me, and he can enjoy the end of the world from a dank little cell, crammed in with shitty raving drunks.”
She has shut her eyes, trying to place herself back in the wedding garden. She wants to stand by the man-made river and turn her head and see her father on the bridge again. She doesn’t want to be afraid of him this time. She wants to make eye contact and smile back.
But she isn’t going to get to stay in her wedding garden of the mind. Fidelman’s voice has been rising along with his hysteria. The big man across the aisle, Bobby, catches the last of what he has to say.
“While you’re making your statement to the police,” Bobby says, “I hope you won’t leave out the part where you called my wife smug and ignorant.”
“Bobby,” says the big man’s wife, the little woman with the adoring eyes. “Don’t.”
A Ra lets out a long, slow breath and says, “No one is going to report anything to police in Fargo.”
“You’re wrong about that,” Fidelman says, his voice shaking. His legs are shaking, too.
“No,” A Ra says, “I’m not. I’m sure of it.”
“Why are you so sure?” asks Bobby’s wife. She has bright, birdlike eyes and quick, birdlike gestures.
“Because we aren’t landing in Fargo. The plane stopped circling the airport a few minutes after the missiles launched. Didn’t you notice? We left our holding pattern some time ago. Now we’re headed north.”
“How do you know that?” asks the little woman.
“The sun is on the left side of the plane. Hence we go north.”
Bobby and his wife look out the window. The wife makes a low hum of interest and appreciation.
“What’s north of Fargo?” the wife asks. “And why would we go there?”
Bobby slowly lifts a hand to his mouth, a gesture that might indicate he’s giving the matter his consideration but which A Ra sees as Freudian. He already knows why they aren’t landing in Fargo and has no intention of saying.
A Ra needs only to close her eyes to see in her mind exactly where the warheads must be now, well outside the earth’s atmosphere, already past the crest of their deadly parabola and dropping back into gravity’s well. There is perhaps less than ten minutes before they strike the other side of the planet. A Ra saw at least thirty missiles launch, which is twenty more than are needed to destroy a nation smaller than New England. And the thirty they have all witnessed rising into the sky are certainly only a fraction of the arsenal that has been unleashed. Such an onslaught can only be met with a proportional response, and no doubt America’s ICBMs have crossed paths with hundreds of rockets sailing the other way. Something has gone horribly wrong, as was inevitable when the fuse was lit on this string of geopolitical firecrackers.
But A Ra does not close her eyes to picture strike and counterstrike. She prefers instead to return to Jeju. Carp riot in the river. The fragrant evening smells of lusty blossoms. Her father puts his elbows on the stone wall of the bridge and grins mischievously.
“This guy—” says Fidelman. “This guy and his goddamn wife. Calls Asians ‘Orientals.’ Talks about how your people are ants. Bullies people by throwing beer at them. This guy and his goddamn wife put reckless, stupid people just like themselves in charge of this country, and now here we are. The missiles are flying.” His voice cracks with strain, and A Ra senses how close he is to crying.
She opens her eyes once more. “This guy and his goddamn wife are on the plane with us. We’re all on this plane.” She looks over at Bobby and his wife, who are listening to her. “However we got here, we’re all on this plane now.