Avery bent to retrieve the notebook.
Margaret moved into her path.
Avery straightened.
“Move.”
“You do not order me.”
Avery stared.
“Get out of my way.”
For the first time, anger had entered her voice.
Margaret heard it.
And perhaps that was what she wanted.
A reaction.
Evidence.
Something she could point to afterward.
“See?” she said to Daniel. “She’s aggressive.”
Avery’s face became perfectly still.
She understood.
Suddenly she was thirteen years old again.
Standing beside her father in a Boston hotel lobby while security questioned whether they were guests.
Her father had remained calm.
Avery had been furious.
Later she asked:
“Why didn't you yell?”
Her father answered:
“Because sometimes somebody has already decided who you are. Anger just becomes something they use to congratulate themselves.”
Avery hated that lesson when she was thirteen.
She understood it now.
She stepped back.
“Daniel, please call airport security.”
Margaret laughed.
“You think they’re removing me?”
“No.”
Avery looked at the scattered items.
“I think somebody should document what just happened.”
Margaret’s face tightened.
“Fine.”
She picked up her champagne flute.
“What are you going to tell them? I moved your purse?”
Avery bent again toward the bag.
Margaret said something under her breath.
Avery did not hear it.
She straightened slightly.
“What?”
Margaret stood.
The next movement happened too quickly for anyone to stop.
She raised the champagne flute.
Swung.
The side of the glass struck Avery near the temple.
It did not shatter.
But the impact produced a sharp sound.
Champagne splashed across Avery’s cheek and beige lapel.
A collective scream moved through the cabin.
Avery stumbled sideways into the seat partition.
Melissa shouted:
“Oh my God!”
Daniel seized Margaret’s wrist.
The glass fell onto the carpet.
The man in 1D stood.
Another passenger reached toward Avery.
She lifted one hand.
“I’m okay.”
She was not.
A hot pulse of pain moved from her temple into her jaw.
Champagne ran down her neck.
The cabin blurred for half a second, then steadied.
Margaret seemed stunned by what she had done.
Daniel moved between them.
“Sit down.”
Margaret said:
“She came at me.”
Nobody believed her.
Not even her own face.
Avery straightened.
She touched her temple.
No blood.
Pain.
Swelling beginning.
But no broken skin.
Melissa brought a cold towel.
Avery accepted it.
“Thank you.”
Daniel said:
“Airport police are coming.”
Margaret’s composure returned in fragments.
“This is absurd.”
Avery pressed the towel gently against her temple.
“No.”
Her voice was calm again.
“This is assault.”
Margaret stared.
“I barely touched you.”
Several passengers reacted visibly.
Avery heard that phrase and almost smiled from disbelief.
“Apparently today is full of things you barely did.”
Daniel looked toward Melissa.
“Notify the captain.”
Avery reached into her handbag.
Her phone was still intact.
Margaret saw.
“Who are you calling now?”