Something Dark, Turning

Something Dark, Turning Michael Mercurio (bio) I I have carried for years the weight of knowing two people who died midair in a clear September morning,the day the 21st Century was truly born. My former coworkers— my friends— Jesus Sanchez and Marianne MacFarlaneleft Boston for Los Angeles & their flight ended instead in New York.Since that moment filaments of day have threaded into the same small screens, repeatedly moving forward without endand above the impact's greasy peonies of jet fuel people issue forth out of high tower floors and I watch. There's no safety in airfor them, nothing to slow their descent— to mark the difference between flying and falling but gravity's intercession. [End Page 77] II I am a byproduct of United Airlines my mother— New York reservations to New York sales my father— LaGuardia & JFK customer service to Boston sales their romance kindled in a regional sales meeting I arrived sometime later & then, listless after college, joined the family businessmyself— Boston customer service III Perhaps this view is new to you who leave on a trip & things change.The airport's body is static with a thousand human organellesuniformed against disorder — they arrive so you can depart,they chant in the cant of city codes, they pull the jetbridge. IV Jesus and I trained together for working gates, learneddeparture management: when to process upgrades or closethe door so everything was on-time zero & even irregularoperations were easy: delayed flights meant more time cracking wise; angry or confused, passengers are the samewhen you've processed several hundred passing throughbefore a lunchbreak. Once, Jesus was sent to help me worka delay — late plane inbound from Denver & the gate areafull already; when he arrived, he lay his hand on my shoulder, softly punning on his name as he loved to do: Be at peace, my son, for I am with you. [End Page 78] V I didn't get to know Marianne until we voted the union in& we both volunteered as shop stewards. I was 24, unsurewhat everything meant & yet Marianne never doubted me.That kind of kindness to me was uncommon, but she wasunbothered by what anyone else thought, made roomenough to welcome anyone. Her humor like my family's,based in fondness & observation, not cruelty or stingingbarbs. Just sarcasm's bright blade. Sharp enough to slicebetween inflated ego and tender self, leave no scarring. VI What was unthinkable that morning was notwhat we feared two years earlier: Y2K's world-end.During months of preparationsmy United Airlines coworkers had made predictions:plummetsfor both jetliners & stock market. Cars made after 1989 would refuse to start. There'd be shortages of food & ammunition,a new Dark Ages without the shimmer of information:our sleek cities unlit save for daylight;smoked-glass crenellations mirroring the rot & ruin of a post-digital world:we'd scavenge gold from processors & microchipsto trade for pre-digital [End Page 79] commodities — a box of matches orgoosedown duvet; some useful thing. VII On New Year's Eve 1999 I was the soleUnited Airlines agent working in Boston baggage claim& few flights were airborne that night; no one yet knew if systems would crash when double zeroesflipped onto the screen.& at 11pm, with empty bag carousels rotating in dim-litclaim area I realized Australia had alreadycrossed the date line and was in the inevitable future, so I typed a message to Sydney Lost Luggage: Y2K any change? & got no response.Flights arrived and departed. I left that job and still, flights arrived and departed. VIII My father told me this: even before UA 175knifed between the South Tower's girdersJesus & Marianne had been murdered [End Page 80] along with the other passengers in first class;to this day I don't know if my father sharedthis as comfort — a wick to draw my liquidgrief towards him — or if it was his own immolation spreading unto me. IX & after 9/11, self-appointed seers scried the dark eye of cathode-ray tubes scrolled through...