When they arrived at Tan Son Nhut, she leapt off the scooter, eager to distance herself from his intensity. But he grabbed her by the hand.
“You won’t get through without me, so stick close. If anyone asks, you’re a nurse, not a journalist.”
She followed him reluctantly, acknowledging that he was right. An agitated mob, witnesses to the crash, pushed up against the chain link fence. Some women were wailing, clawing their way through the crowd, while others stood off on a small rise in a state of profound grief, stunned and motionless. In the distance, beyond the end of the runway, Mel could see billowing clouds of dense black smoke. Sirens wailed.
She plunged forward with Coughlin, his arm now tightly around her, as they made their way to the securely guarded entrance to the terminal. The soldiers were letting no one through except rescue personnel, their faces grim with the strain of holding back the distraught crowd, their weapons raised and ready.
Mel kept her mouth shut with difficulty as she listened to Coughlin, a civilian without authority over them, talk the soldiers into letting the two of them beyond the checkpoint. Even though the soldiers didn’t know him, they knew
of
him. But it was more than his reputation—part of which she realized she was responsible for, thanks to including him in her article. The image of a frail child in the arms of the handsome, blue-eyed doctor had been beamed around the world. His vivid commentary had had as much impact as any of her descriptions of the severe plight of the orphans.
“Sergeant, I’m Doctor Phil Coughlin, retired Marine Corps, and the physician to the children who were on that flight. If any of them are still alive, I need to be at their side. I know you understand that. I also know you have orders and if I need to speak to your C.O. to give me permission to proceed, I’m more than happy to do that.”
Phil flashed them a smile. Rather than intimidate them, he was professing to understand their position while expecting them to recognize his moral authority. Mel grudgingly admitted that his moral authority was authentic. He cared deeply about those children and believed himself responsible for their very lives.
Mel knew that, had she been alone, she would have been her scrappy, combative, persistent self. She hadn’t gotten as far as she had in the few short years she’d been a journalist by making nice to all the people who told her, “No, you can’t go there.”
But Coughlin displayed a muted self-confidence, absolutely convinced that he had a right to be on the tarmac saving “his” children. Apparently, he convinced the guards as well.
“There’s no need to contact the C.O., sir. I have the discretion to let someone as significant as you onto the compound.”
“Thank you, Sergeant, in the name of the children.”
And with that, Mel and Coughlin were waved through. Once inside the terminal they raced onto the airstrip and grabbed a ride with one of the emergency vehicles heading toward the site of the crash.
The stench of burning aircraft fuel and the thickening smoke engulfed them. Mel looked over at Coughlin and saw that the charming smile had disappeared. In its place was an emotional barrier as opaque as if he had tied on a surgical mask. His whole body leaned forward, poised as if ready to pounce on an attacker.
When the rescue truck came to a halt at the edge of a marsh, Coughlin jumped out, his eyes scanning the smoke-filled, boggy area for signs of activity. He shouted to Mel to stay close.
“I need your help here, Ames. I didn’t bring you along so that you could score another journalistic coup. I’ve already handed you your Pulitzer Prize on a silver platter. Now it’s time to get your hands dirty.”
“I think I’ve already earned that stripe,” Mel shouted back. She wasn’t looking for a story now. She was looking for signs of life.
All around them was chaos—the choking smells, the sounds of screams, the swarm of rescuers trying to get close to the plane, the pulsing of foam cannons on the fire trucks smothering the flames.
Coughlin wove his way through a staggered line of soldiers aiming hoses at the wreckage to a clearing where Mel could see a pile of stretchers near a van emblazoned with a red cross. When they reached the stretchers she could see that they were empty.
The control and focus that seemed to be propelling Coughlin since they had left the orphanage slipped for a few seconds. Mel caught a glimpse of what she took to
be despair behind the mask. She began to tremble, absorbing Coughlin’s realization as if it were her own. Were there no survivors? She couldn’t accept that. Something possessed her—an outrage that she couldn’t quell; a surge of unfamiliar strength and invincibility.
She plunged farther into the smoke-filled bog toward what she thought were voices. She couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead of her, but she kept moving toward shouts and the frail but definite sound of a child’s cry.
She nearly wept when she stumbled into a soldier carrying a child—not the body of a child, but a breathing, screaming child. He thrust the baby into her arms.
“There are more. Parts of the plane are still intact. We’re trying to get them out.”
Beyond him she could see children being passed from one set of arms to another.
“We’re trying to get them away from the plane in case the rest of it blows. Tell the medics in the clearing we’ve got survivors.”
He turned back to the plane.
Mel ran with the baby. Coughlin had followed her and met her halfway to the clearing.
“Survivors coming!” she choked out the words. The despair she had seen in his eyes had disappeared. In its place was something else. Not just relief that some of his children might be alive, but a grudging respect that was directed at her. He took the baby from her and held her gaze long enough for her to absorb that it was meant for her.
She turned back toward the plane to retrieve another child, distracted by the effect Coughlin was having on her. It was as if he had swallowed her emotionally. Each shift in his mood was reverberating through her. She’d been close enough to exploding mines before to have felt the shock waves, and that was what she now
compared to the sensations coursing through her. Dangerous. Overpowering.
She steadied herself both physically and emotionally and concentrated on the task ahead of her, forcing herself to act with purpose as the noise and confusion of the rescue mounted. The mud of the bog sucked at her feet and slowed the movements of everyone trying to evacuate the shattered fuselage. She joined a ragged line that was passing babies from the wreckage back to the hastily organized triage area where Coughlin was.
She had no doubt that he had established himself at the center of that operation as soon as she had handed him the first baby. Mel kept her thoughts on moving the children to safety and medical treatment and tried desperately not to react to what was being put in her arms—the bloodied, frail bodies, most of the children in shock. Out of some long forgotten memory, she began singing a lullaby she had learned from her grandmother to calm David when he’d been restless. Someone had dumped a pile of blankets at her feet and she wrapped each child handed to her, crooning to them as she carried the almost weightless bundles to the medics.
Ambulances were arriving and leaving in a steady stream, carrying the most severely injured away. Stretchers had been brought to the wreckage for the adults on the flight. Like the faces of the children, theirs were dazed, stressed, looks of profound disbelief and confusion staring out at their rescuers. Some of them held babies in their arms and Mel couldn’t tell if they were alive or not.
She kept putting one foot in front of another, not stopping to process what she was observing, what she herself was experiencing. She had lost track of Coughlin and that was just as well. It was a relief not to be so aware
of him. His presence earlier had been a hot breath on her neck, an unwelcome pressure on her heart.
When it was clear that there were no more survivors, Mel’s attention shifted to the triage area. Children needed to be held as IVs were inserted; extra hands were called for to stem bleeding or grab supplies.
It was hours before the last ambulance left the marsh. Body bags were lined up, waiting to be picked up and delivered to a temporary morgue. The chaos and noise of the rescue had given way to a hollow emptiness as the enormity of what had occurred began to seep through the clearing. The adrenaline that had been sustaining everyone was rapidly diminishing, and with its loss came the exhaustion and pain that had been held at bay throughout the day.
Mel’s head jolted up with the roar of a plane taking off again from Tan Son Nhut. She could hear shelling to the north and realized it must have been going on as always. Time had been frozen for her, and she had believed that all else had stopped around her. The understanding that the world had gone on while she had been in the middle of a nightmare filled her with loneliness. Who would understand what she had experienced today, what she had lived through in the last three years?
She felt a hand on her shoulder and was too numb to even flinch.
“You’re going to need a ride home. I asked one of the MPs to bring my Vespa up here from the terminal.”
He pointed to the muddy scooter leaning against the wheel of a truck.
She was going to refuse, not willing to put herself once again in close contact with him. But she was bone tired, and a quick glance around convinced her she’d have to search a while for transportation. Reluctantly, she followed him to the bike.
“You surprised me today, Ames. Usually the members of the fourth estate around here are merely observers—and not very accurate ones. You also held it together pretty well, for all that you saw. As far as I could tell, nobody had to hold your head while you lost your breakfast.”
“I had no breakfast to lose,” Mel answered. It no longer surprised her that, even in apparently complimenting her, he managed to dismiss her because of her profession. As far as she could tell, Phil Coughlin was willing to see some slight value in journalism only when it suited his own ends.
She’d saved lives today, damn it, not holding a pen in her hand but cradling barely breathing children and bearing them to safety. Why did Phil Coughlin’s grudging acknowledgment of what she’d done chafe so much? She tried to attribute her vulnerability to fatigue and hunger. But she sensed that these feelings, however unwelcome, were not going to disappear with a meal and a night’s rest.
“We both could use something to eat, not to mention a shot of scotch. There’s a noodle shop a few doors from my flat. I’ll buy you dinner.”
He pushed down on the kick-starter and they took off into the dusk, Mel’s “No thanks” muffled by the low rumble of the bike.
She had no idea where Coughlin lived, but hoped it was near enough to her own neighborhood to get home under her own power. She was more tired than she realized and found herself leaning against his back, damp with sweat and reeking of the fumes that had billowed from the wreckage. It should have been off-putting in many ways, but there was a familiarity and comfort that tugged at her and she didn’t pull back. She caught a glimpse of herself in his side mirror. Her face was streaked with soot and her shirt, already christened from
the diaper changing early that morning, now bore witness to the hell she had thrashed through in the marshes. She wanted a bath; she wanted a hot bowl of noodles; she wanted her bed, however haunted it had been the night before.
The night before. How long ago that was! The dreams that had disturbed her now seemed childish and embarrassing compared to the true nightmare the orphans today had suffered through. Her reverie came to an abrupt halt as the motorbike skidded to a stop in a narrow alley somewhere in District 1.
The stop threw her off balance, thrusting her closer to Coughlin. She stayed that way a few seconds longer than she meant to, aware of her breasts beneath the loose-fitting shirt pressed against his back. Realizing what she’d done, she released herself from her hold around him and quickly jumped off the bike, turning her head away so that he wouldn’t see how red her face was. Not from embarrassment, but from anger with herself. How could she be throwing her body at him—a man who seemed to find her as annoying and useless as she found him insufferable. She needed to get a grip on herself, get some food into her belly and get home.
She ignored the soft smile on Coughlin’s face as he pushed open the rickety screen door to the noodle bar. With dismay, Mel saw that it had no tables—not even a counter with stools. It was takeout only. She’d thought this was going to be simple—a bowl of noodles surrounded by other diners who also looked upon the meal as no more than necessary nourishment, not as a social engagement. But now she had to add to her already overwhelmed brain the question of where she and Coughlin were going to eat.
That worry was replaced for a few minutes by the
aromas drifting from the bubbling pots on the stove in the corner of the cramped and crowded shop. Coughlin steered her to the front, his touch on her arm as deft and gentle as the one she had observed in the nursery that morning at the orphanage. Nevertheless, her skin where his fingers rested prickled, as if Fourth of July sparklers were shedding their sparks. Dessie had always procured a small supply every summer when Mel had been a girl and her grandmother had lit them for her on the beach in front of their cottage on Martha’s Vineyard. She had loved to hold one in each hand and wave them in wide arcs, watching the trail of white light float through the night air. Sometimes the sparks fell on her bare toes and she danced the tiny pricks of heat away.
She could not dance away from Phil Coughlin’s heat tonight.
Instead, she nodded at the vegetable pot, refused the fish and watched without words but with a suddenly grumbling stomach as Mrs. Ling ladled her choices into battered tin pots with lids and handles. Phil let go of Mel to pay Mrs. Ling and take the pots. Mel followed him out of the shop and the question loomed again about where they would share this meal. If she had paid attention to the route Phil had taken from Tan Son Nhut instead of burying her head against him, she might recognize where she was, take her pot and walk or flag down a cycle taxi.