Flying Leap. Judy Budnitz

pendulous motion. Phil is kneeling on her seat, entranced.

      There is a terrible accident. The Lady Who Hangs by Her Hair is swinging and then abruptly she drops out of the spotlight. In a sudden flash and crinkle and crumple of sequins she is lying on the ground. Shreds of sawdust and elephant dung cling to her skin. I hear her harsh unrehearsed cry, and then she is whisked away on a stretcher.

      A murmur rises from the crowd. Children wailing. Hostile mingled voices. “Ruined the whole show,” mutters a woman behind me. “Great—now the kids will have nightmares,” says another.

      Someone says, “It was bound to happen. She had split ends, don’t you know. They say she’d been putting on weight, wasn’t taking care of herself.”

      A child’s voice says, “Is she Rapunzel?” And her mother answers, “No, honey. In the Rapunzel story the lady sits in a tower, and her lover climbs up her hair. This lady here, she hangs from her hair her own self.” The child says, “Why did she fall?” And the mother: “That’s what she gets for trying to change the rules like that.”

      The lights switch on and I see that Phil has thrown up all over herself. The stuff is pink and smells sickly sweet. She holds her wet shirt away from her chest. Her face is teary-slick, but she twists away from me. “I want my mother,” she says with dignity.

      So I take her home.

      A few days later I knock on the door and ask about Phil. “Still a little sick,” her mother says, and eyes me suspiciously. She’s wondering what I’ve done to her daughter that’s made her afraid to get out of bed.

      “Can I come in and see her?” I ask.

      Her mother says, “No, I don’t think so, not right now; she’s very busy watching cartoons.”

      She shuts the door in my face.

      III. KITCHEN WEAR

      Aprons for every occasion.

      Do you remember: being knee-high, living in a world of pant cuffs, skirt hems, and the undersides of things?

      Your mother stands in the kitchen. She cooks for your father: fondue, meringues, shish kebab, chutney. Gefilte fish, lotus, lo mein, ravioli. Tabouli, tortilla, moussaka, succotash and goulash. Your aunt wears high heels and goes out at night. She dances for men: salsa, samba, chacha, meringuee. Lambada, salome, tango, fandango, disco. Jitterbug and hokey-pokey. Your mother holds the bowl tightly against her stomach; she beats and beats with a wooden spoon. Your aunt practices the tricky steps, heels pounding the floor; sweat darkens her dress under her arms and in a long stripe down her back. Your mother’s tools are called savory, relish, and sage; your aunt’s are rhythm and a roll of her eyes. Your aunt gives you the high-heeled shoes to try on; your mother holds out the spoon. They are hunters: Your aunt’s war paint is the red on her mouth; your mother’s is a dusting of flour. They have the same smell, the smell of desire, the smell of cooking meat. The trap is set: the sprightly meal, the spicy dance. Afterward, your father pats his stomach. A man on the dance floor pats your aunt’s hip. Your mother, your aunt, neither goes to bed alone.

      IV. TRAVEL WEAR

      Versatile cotton and linen separates for the girl on the go.

      I’ve decided to take a vacation. Someplace exotic and warm and far away. The sort of place you read about in books and see in movies where the colors are supersaturated and the focus crystal clear. Impossible fairy-tale things can happen in a place like that. I want to walk through the movie screen, enter another world through the portal of the metal detector in the airport.

      I board the plane behind a troop of Girl Scouts. Their uniforms are flashy as those of dictators in South American countries. Berets and sashes, tassels on their kneesocks, pins and badges and patches for campouts and cookie sales. Handbooks, bubble gum, first-aid kits. They are fully equipped. They walk in jangling pairs—the buddy system. One girl has glasses. One has her hair done up in a mass of fantastic little braids. One looks retarded, with sleepy eyes and a drooping lower lip. Her partner drags her along by the hand.

      I sit down next to a puffy man with a tight collar and sweating face. The Girl Scouts troop past. People bustle about, stowing baggage in the overhead compartments. Most of the bags are made of soft meaty-looking leather.

      The seats on the plane seem unusually small and close. My neighbor and I battle silently for the armrest, both of us trying to force off the other’s elbow while seeming oblivious. The stewardesses recite the safety features in a familiar litany. The plane takes off. The pilot reassures us over the intercom that everything is normal—the weather is good; the sky is clear.

      The man in the seat next to mine says he is a shoe salesman, just returning from a shoe convention. “You wouldn’t believe,” he says, “the synthetics they have now. I’ve seen stuff that looks like leather, smells like leather”—he raises his hands, widens his eyes—”pure synthetics. Incredible.”

      “Yes,” I say. The stewardess approaches, trundling her beverage cart. The shoe salesman offers to buy me a drink. I say no thanks, but he requests two Bloody Marys anyway. “If you don’t drink it, I will,” he says.

      I hear the crackle of cellophane, the crunch of peanuts all through the cabin.

      “What’s your address?” the shoe man says. “I’ll send you some free shoes.”

      “No thanks,” I say.

      “No, really. I can send you some samples. What size do you wear?” A quick glance down. “Seven and a half, isn’t that right?”

      “That’s right.”

      “You know, you have nice feet. Nice thin ankles. You know what I always say—you gotta stay away from a woman if she’s got thick ankles. Even if the rest of her is thin. A woman with thick ankles is doomed. Over the years, or maybe overnight, you never know, that thickness will start creeping up her legs, puffing them up, then her thighs and hips and stomach, and eventually it reaches your neck and fats up your face. I mean, not your face—like I said, you have nice thin ankles, so there’s nothing to worry about.” The back of his hand brushes my arm.

      “Thank God,” I say.

      The plane suddenly swerves and plunges sickeningly; there is a confusion of running figures, a struggle, raised voices, a stewardess shriek. Three figures stand in the front of the cabin, hoods covering their faces. Each holds a gun so ridiculously large, it doesn’t look real. The plane veers over an edge into a realm of impossibility, of bad movies, tasteless jokes, the evening news.

      The tallest one says, “This plane is being hijacked. Please stay seated and remain calm.”

      Instantly all the passengers stand up and move into the aisles. Voices rise to a shrill pitch. People fumble about, push at one another. It seems they are not trying to escape; instead, they are all trying to retrieve their carry-on luggage. Then they sink into their seats, clutching their suitcases for comfort. Some, I think, are sucking their thumbs.

      My head is ringing. I am in denial. I am thinking, No, this can’t be happening; this sort of thing never happens to me; it is some kind of joke, a silly dream. I look out the window, and I’m aware, as never before, of the emptiness of the sky, and our incredible distance from the earth. The shoe salesman tries to rise; he bucks and kicks, panting, nearly weeping, before he remembers to unfasten his seat belt. He finds his case of shoe samples and cradles it in his lap. He remembers the Bloody Marys and gulps them down.

      The tallest hijacker retreats to the cockpit, to talk to the pilot (or perhaps he is the pilot? Their voices seem suspiciously similar), while the other two watch the cabin as the hubbub subsides. Then the shortest hijacker gestures to one of the stewardesses with his gun. It is the blond stewardess, naturally. He leads her into the lavatory in the front of the plane. The cabin grows silent; we listen to the thuds and screams as he ravishes her, in the