The 6:00 am to Seattle

I wake to a ringing in my ears and a pounding in my temples. I have no idea where I am or how I got here. I slowly sit up to find myself on the floor of a conifer forest. Confused, I try to get up, I feel a sharp pain. I fall back to the ground, my pained screech overtaking the ringing in my ears. I look down at my leg to find a thin metal rod stabbing into my thigh. The tranquil scents of rain and pine are quickly replaced by the thick stench of blood.

I rip the sleeve off my sweater and tie it around my leg like a tourniquet a couple inches above the wound, trying to slow the bleeding. I look around for help, and see dirty green water through the tree branches. I get up and limp toward it, leaning on the trees as I go. As I approach, I can see the small lake in its entirety.

My stomach drops. I realize what has happened.

My brother and his wife had just had a baby, and Asher had a week off school, we were going to visit them.

The wing of the airplane is half submerged in the murky lake.

Hot flames catch my eye through the fog from just across the water, another part of the plane. The smell of burning fuel hangs softly in the air

I have to find Asher. I have to remember what happened.

The ringing in my ears has been replaced with distant cries of other passengers I swivel my head around to face them. I begin my way toward them, back the way I came. As I tread closer a path of trees above me have been broken and bashed. The ground becomes cluttered with branches and safety cards, tattered luggage and battered bits of plastic and aluminum. Hanging in the branches are oxygen masks and - wait.

I reach into the tree in front of me and grab a small, unraveling hat, a thin metallic needle still holding stitches on the unfinished crown. A needle identical to the one protruding from my thigh.
I was knitting a hat for the baby. I was almost done and Asher had gone to the bathroom and he said he’d be right back and then the plane started shaking and the seat belt sign blinked on, and the captain was saying something, but he was cut off.

He went to the bathroom. He wasn’t sitting, he didn’t have a seat belt on.
I collapse to the ground, shaking with the recoil of the realization of what had happened. I had to find him. I have to find him, NOW.

I brace my leg with one hand and tear out the cold needle with the other. My pained shrieks shattering through the air. I move the cloth down onto the wound, get up off the ground and run.
My feet thundered across the ground. I darted through the trees, over the broken branches, I didn’t stop until I saw the others.

There was a mess of scrambling passengers. Most were fine. Some were badly hurt. At least three were already dead. They were all panicked, looking for their loved ones, trying to call help, all of them as confused and terrified as I was. They surrounded what looked like the front half of the plane.

The plane had been torn in half in the air. The rest must have crashed down in the forest somewhere.

The front half rocketed down through the trees before hitting the ground, and skidding to a stop 30 yards later. The plane was demolished.

Off to my right, I see a man frantically fiddling with his phone, trying to call help. He’s tall and thin with shaggy dirty - blonde hair. His right hand is wrapped in a bloody gauze bandage.

“Hello! Can you hear me? Hello? Listen, there’s been an accident -- Dammit!” He said, throwing the phone in frustration.

“Excuse me? Have you seen my son? He’s fourteen, short brown hair. I think he had gone to the bathroom”, I asked the man.

“Uh -- no, I don’t think so.”, he replied, turning around to face me. Jesus Christ, your leg! You should really sit down. I think I heard someone found a medical kit. I’ll g--”

“Huh? No, I’m fine. I gotta find Asher”

“ Alright, calm down. I’ll help you find him--, Asher, you said? My name is Gavin.” he said, standing to meet me. “ But we’re looking for a first aid kit on the way” he added, looking back at my blood soaked bandage.

I nod “Thank you. I’m Nadia “ I said holding out my hand. “Were you traveling with anyone?”

“Nope. Just me.” he answered. “What about Asher’s father? Have you seen him?”

“Not for a while, no.” I said. “But that’s unrelated”

We started scanning the crowd, yelling his name, asking if anyone had seen Asher. No one had seen him, they all pointed us toward what was left of the plane, but that a lot of people had fallen out of the plane (like me) and could be anywhere. They said a group had been sent to look for survivors. I don’t think I saw anyone else between here and the lake, but then again I wasn’t looking.
I thought it was strange how some people, other that minor cuts and bruises, were fine while others were so hurt. There were a lot of head injuries, and some abdominal injuries from seat belts.
We approached the battered front half of the plane. Both the left engine and wing were gone. Holes had been punched in it’s aluminum shell, the airline logo streaked away from the tailfin.

“Hey! Is there anyone in here?” Gavin yelled.

“Ash! It’s Mom, are you here?”

“No, honey, I think we’ve got anyone out of here”, said a woman from inside the plane, walking out to meet us. Her dirty blonde hair was streaked with blood. She was a flight attendant, judging by her uniform. “ There was a boy, he was hurt rea-” she trailed off looking at my leg. “ That must be your kid? He was hurt real bad. They took him and some others down that way. Said they found a stream and a doctor, you should go, too” she said gesturing to the woods beyond the nose of the plane.

“Wait, how hurt are we talking?” Gavin asked.

I didn’t wait for her answer. I hurried through the trees in the direction she pointed. I could hear the soft sound of rushing water beneath a cacophony of rushed voices.

I came to a break in the trees next to the creek, a beach of sorts. There were six or seven people here, people who were really hurt in the crash, and a couple flight attendants, and who I assumed was the doctor. There was a woman they’d dragged from the plane and laid up against a boulder. She looked like she was in her early twenties. She was clutching at her stomach, she was clearly in a lot of pain. The lean, red - curly haired woman I assumed was the doctor asked her if she could bend her knees. She yelped in pain when she tried. Out of the corner of my eye, lying unconscious on the ground next to the water, bloodied and broken, I saw my Asher.

They had his head propped up on a life jacket, and one of the flight attendants was dabbing away the blood with a wet rag. His dark hair was streaked with blood. It wasn’t raining too hard now, but it was still really cold. He was soaked in blood and rainwater, we all were, all I could think was that he was going to become hypothermic.

I collapse to the ground next to him. I’m too afraid to speak. Without even thinking about it, I take his cold, motionless hand in my own.

“Are you his mom?”

I look up at the young, male flight attendant. I hadn’t realized that I was crying. I nod.

“ Sam, we’ve got the kids mom! ”, he shouted.

The woman I now knew as Sam turned her attention from the boy to me. She hurried over to meet us.

“What are your names?” she said, taking the wet cloth from the man.

“Uh --Nadia, a-and Asher Clark. He’s fourteen.”

“ I’m Sam, I’m a doctor. That’s Jasper” She said, pointing to the man cleaning Asher’s head. “We’re not exactly sure what happened” Sam began, but she was interrupted a the flight attendant from the plane. She and Gavin had arrived with some first aid kits, and a young man I recognized from a few seats ahead of me.

“I saw” she said. “He was headin’ to the bathroom when the plane started shaking. I told him to sit down, but before he could --” she trailed off. “Before he could, whatever happened happened , and the plane jerked down and he smacked against the ceiling.” Gavin sat beside me, handing Sam the a med kit . “This is Emmett, says he’s a nurse”

Emmett was a tall and scrawny black man with short curly black hair. He had steri strips over a nasty cut on his cheek.

“Sam. That’s Amara, I think she fractured her pelvis on impact” She said, gesturing at the woman sitting against the rock. He sat beside her, smiling kindly and reaching out to shake her hand when he did. “Is this all that was on the plane, Wendy?” Sam asked, digging through the med kits.

“ All we found, anyway.” Gavin said.

“ I’m goin’ to see how the others are. Get a head count, figure out who's missing. Find the pilot. ” Wendy said, keeping one of the med kits. “I’ll send anyone hurt too bad your way” She said.

“ Lay your legs flat ”, Sam said.

“ Him first ”, I rebudled.

“We’re doing pretty much all we can for him for now.” Jasper said. “Her too” he continued, following my gaze from Ash to Amara.

Reluctantly, I leaned against a rock with my legs flat on the ground. Sam sat next to me with a med kit.

“What was it?” Sam inquired.

“Knitting needle” I replied.

She cut away the bloody sweater sleeve, and then she cut a square out of my jeans around the wound. She pulled a roll of gauze out of the bag, folding a strip into a square and pressing it over the lesion. I felt the cold morning air rush through my grit teeth.

“Sorry” Sam said. I put my own hand over the gouze, and cleaned around it with an alcohol wipe. She then wrapped gauze around my leg, securing the bandage with medical tape.

“ How bad is it? When will he wake up?” I asked.

“ He’s been out for over an hour, and his pupils were unequal dilated, neither of which are good signs. Other than that, we can’t really gauge the severity of it until he wakes up “ Jasper answered.

“ And we don’t know when that will be. “ Sam added.
Emmett walked over, kneeling beside Sam.“ I think she’s got some pretty severe internal bleeding. She’ll need surgery as soon as possible“ Emmett said with concern. “ She needs to be in a hospital. They do, too.” he continued, looking at Asher and then at me.

“ It’s been a little over an hour since the crash. Do we know if the pilot contacted anyone? Or if anyone’s been able to contact anyone?”, Gavin asked, a hint of urgency in his voice.
For a moment we were all silent, exchanging looks of worry. Was anybody looking for us? How long could we wait for help? How long would they look? Would we be okay? Would Ash be okay?

“ Wendy’s working on all that.” Jasper said finally. “It’ll be alright”

“You should tie something around her waist” Sam said to Emmett. “Really tight. It’ll help slow the bleeding.”

“I’ll see if I can cut a seat belt out of the plane” Jasper said. Walking off toward what was left of the plane. Emmett nod and turned back to Amara.

“I know you’re worried.” Sam said, turning back to me. “But we can’t do much more until he wakes up. You should stay put until he does.” I nod.

“What can I do to help?” Gavin asked.

“See if you can find any drinking water?” She answered.

“ On it “ he said.

It was his first flight. There were plenty of times we could have flown, and would have for that matter, but he was always terrified by the idea of flying. Not that he wasn’t this time, it’s just that this time he’d reached the age that you pretend you aren’t scared even if you’re terrified. Even if you’re only lying to the one person who doesn’t care that you’re terrified. I told him that it would be fine. I reminded him that statistically speaking, flying is the safest mode of transportation. How did this happen? How did things go so wrong?

“Knitting needle, huh?” Sam asked. She must’ve noticed my zoning. “Never heard that one before.”
I grinned slightly. “Are you in the ER?” I asked.

“ I’m an orthopedic surgeon” She said. “But I started off in the ER. What do you do?”

“I manage the Hampton Inn in Salt lake City. But I’m also working on an associate in psychology”.

“Seriously though” Gavin said from behind me, tossing Sam a water bottle. “Knitting needle? That’s gotta be the lamest thing ever to put a whole in someone’s thigh”
Jasper followed behind him with a seat belt cut from the plane, Gavin with an armful of bottled waters and a backpack. He set two next to Amara and Emmett, and sat next to me with a bottle for each of us.

“It was on my way home from a back country trip. Think I’ve got some water purification chemicals in here somewhere" he said, looking through the bag.

Jasper handed the seat belt to Emmett. “Wendy says nobody else is hurt too bad so far. Still quite a few people missing, though.” Jasper began. He paused. “She hasn’t seen Matthew. The pilot.” Despite his goofy and cheerful attitude, I could tell that Gavin was worried and frustrated with the uncertainty of all this.

“Sam, could I get some help?” Emmett called. Sam stood and walked to meet them. She threw Amara’s arm around her neck and stood, pulling Amara up with her so that Emmett could tie the seat belt tightly around her waist. Even with Sam holding her up, she couldn’t stand well, her legs nearly crumbling beneath her. She screamed out in pain. I noticed her belly was sort of … portuded and soft looking. I guess because it had been filling with blood. It must have been excruciating.

Somehow over her loud cries, I heard a soft, yet sharp inhale. He brought his hand up and pressed it against his forehead, stirring as if he were to get up.

“Asher!” I said, scrambling over to meet him.

“Woah, calm down. Don’t try to stand up” Jasper said, kneeling next to Asher. After easing Amara back against the boulder, Sam and Emmett rushed over, instructing Jasper and I to back away.

“ Asher? My name is Sam, were in a plane crash. You smacked your head pretty hard. Do you remember where you were going? ” Sam asked.