Several ground crew members moved around it with practiced efficiency.
Naomi stopped walking.
"Mom."
Evelyn looked down.
"What?"
"Whose plane is that?"
Her mother followed her gaze.
"Some businessman's, I think."
Naomi stared.
"One person owns the whole thing?"
"Sometimes a person. Sometimes a company."
Naomi's eyes widened.
"Can anybody buy one?"
Evelyn laughed.
"Anybody with enough money."
Naomi thought for a moment.
Then said, "I'm going to have one."
Her mother looked at her.
For several seconds, she said nothing.
Then smiled.
"All right, baby."
Naomi looked up.
"You don't believe me."
Evelyn shook her head.
"That's not what I said."
"Then what?"
Her mother knelt beside her.
"If you ever own one of those airplanes, promise me something."
Naomi nodded eagerly.
"Anything."
Evelyn looked toward the ground crew moving beneath the aircraft.
"Remember the people who load the food."
Naomi frowned.
"Okay."
"And the people who clean the cabin."
"Okay."
"And the people who maintain the engines, fuel the aircraft, and make sure everybody gets home safely."
Naomi nodded.
Her mother's expression became serious.
"Because that airplane won't move without them."
Naomi looked toward the beautiful white jet.
Then toward the workers surrounding it.
For the first time, she understood that the magnificent aircraft depended on an entire world of people whose names its owner might never know.
She reached for her mother's hand.
"I promise."
Evelyn smiled.
Then stood.
"Good."
She looked toward the enormous aircraft once more.
"And if you become rich enough to own a plane, don't become too important to say thank you."
Naomi laughed.
"I won't."
Twenty-four years later, standing inside a private jet that bore her mother's initials, she would remember that promise with painful clarity.
Because the man wearing the captain's uniform had forgotten the very thing her mother had tried to teach her when she was eleven.
A uniform could identify responsibility.
It could establish professional authority.
It could represent decades of training.
But it did not give the person wearing it permission to humiliate anyone else.
And it certainly did not give him ownership of an airplane that belonged to somebody else.
Naomi's father never laughed at her dream of owning an airplane.