The door closed.
Captain Brooks entered the cockpit.
Evelyn stood beside 1A.
“Mr. Grant.”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry.”
Darius looked up.
“For what?”
Her eyes filled unexpectedly.
“I knew you were confirmed.”
“I should have said more.”
“You did say something.”
“Not enough.”
Darius considered the distinction.
“You were in a hierarchy.”
“That doesn’t remove responsibility.”
“No.”
He appreciated that she did not ask him to.
She continued.
“When he told me to stop, I stopped.”
“Yes.”
“I keep wondering if I would have stopped if you were not…”
“The CEO?”
She nodded.
Darius leaned back.
“That is the question worth keeping.”
Her eyes reddened.
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“Now do your job.”
She smiled faintly.
“Yes, sir.”
Flight 418 departed forty-three minutes late.
Darius remained in 1A.
That mattered.
Several advisors would later tell him he should have deplaned.
Optics.
Conflict.
Potential distraction.
But leaving would have turned the incident into the entire purpose of the flight.
It was not.
He still wanted to observe the actual service.
Captain Brooks made a short announcement apologizing for an operational crew change.
No details.
Professional.
The aircraft taxied.
Darius watched the terminal slide past.
His phone entered airplane mode.
For the first time since the radio call, he had no incoming messages.
He looked at his reflection in the window.
Deep-purple suit.
Black shirt.
A man in seat 1A.
Nothing about the glass said chief executive.
He thought of something his father had told him when Darius was sixteen.
His father, Leon Grant, had worked twenty-nine years as a baggage handler at Chicago O’Hare.
He came home smelling of jet fuel and winter air.
Strong hands.
Bad knees.
No tolerance for corporate slogans.
When Darius received his first college acceptance letter, Leon had said:
“You're going into rooms where people will decide what you are before you speak.”
Darius had laughed.
His father had not.
“Don't spend your whole life trying to dress so they guess right.”
At sixteen, Darius did not fully understand.
At forty-three, in seat 1A, he did.
The flight attendant brought coffee.
Darius usually drank it black.
Today he added sugar.
His hands were not shaking.
But his body felt exhausted as if he had been physically fighting.
Across the aisle, the woman with the newspaper finally spoke.
“Mr. Grant?”
He looked over.
She was perhaps sixty.
Japanese American, Darius guessed, though he did not assume aloud.
“Yes?”
“My name is Grace Nakamura.”
“Hello.”
“I own a consulting company.”
She paused.
“I fly your airline about thirty times a year.”
“That is either loyalty or poor judgment.”