“Excuse me, ma’am.

I’m so sorry to wake you.

Do you happen to know if anyone near you has military flight experience?

The captain is asking for a pilot.” Maya looked at her, and then past her, down the long dim cabin at all the people who had no say at all in what happened next, the children, the families, the strangers who had each boarded this airplane trusting that someone up front knew what they were doing.

She looked, last, at her own son, at the dark hair falling across his forehead and the complete trust with which he slept.