Excerpt from "Arlene"

            The flight attendant announced that they would be taking off.  The plane began to move forward.  Arlene got nervous.  The nervous turned to panic.  She wanted to jump up and start screaming.  She knew that these days they wouldn’t just let her off the plane.  The air marshals would come in and handcuff her.  Her chest started rattling.  She had COPD but had quit smoking 20 years ago when first diagnosed. It only acted up when she was scared and her heart was pounding.  She often told Sara that if she could quit smoking then Sara could quit that heroin.  Sara always got mad.  Arlene loved smoking.  She’d smoke while doing laundry, washing dishes, taking the dog for a walk.  When Sara was little, she’d bathe her with a cigarette dangling out of her mouth.  Arlene started coughing.  She pulled her bottled water out of her bag and gulped it down.  The COPD was in the same stage that it was when she quit smoking.  It stopped progressing when she quit.  Sara didn’t like to talk about it.  Sara smoked cigarettes in the house.  The plane was moving fast.  Arlene realized she forgot her fear by thinking about Sara.  Everything was always about Sara.  She had been going to family night at different treatment centers for years.  When Sara wasn’t in treatment, Arlene wasn’t sleeping.  She was pacing the floor, screaming at God to help her baby, and if the phone rang, her heart began to hurt and worry washed all through her.  Everything was Sara.  Now Sara had over two years clean and had that beautiful little baby Angel.  Arlene needed to live again.  This is why the trip.  The trip across the sea and out of the country.  Arlene needed freedom.  Arlene needed a life.  Arlene needed to be Arlene again and not just Sara’s mom.  The plane was in the air.