The Good Father by Noah Hawley

of the machine. But bureaucracies are notorious for their slowness, their incoherence. And so, though I waited to be pulled aside, I passed through every checkpoint with little more than a second look. In fact, it would be weeks before my name made it onto any kind of watch list, a fact that would serve as both a relief and a caution for all the implications it carried about our government’s true ability to keep us safe.
    I flew to L.A. nonstop, the 747 punching its way through the jet stream. Dean had booked me a first-class ticket. There were warm nuts and a pillow for my neck. I tried to sleep, but my head was too busy with thoughts of my son. Being on an airplane brought back memories I had long tried to suppress. Memories of fear and grief. Memories of panic and guilt. Daniel had almost died on an airplane when he was eight. It was on a flight to Los Angeles from New York. It was the first year of my divorce from his mother, and he had visited me for Christmas. As usual he flew alone, entrusted to the care of busy flight attendants. At the airport he had been paired with another child, a young girl, also traveling between divorced parents for the holidays. Jenny Winger. Jenny had turned eleven one month earlier. The kids sat together in the middle of the plane, Daniel in the window seat, Jenny by the aisle.
    I had often wondered what these flights were like for my son. I suppose I had romanticized them in my mind: picturing a young boy on his own, enjoying an adventure. Though separation had been difficult, I liked to think that I was helping my son become a world traveler, that as a result of his parents’ divorce he would reach his teens mature beyond his years. When other parents criticized me for shipping him off, I would point out how much more self-sufficient my son was becoming than their coddled brood. And wasn’t that what we, as parents, were supposed to do? Prepare our children as best we could to function on their own in the outside world?
    This particular flight was early in our divorce. Possibly even Daniel’s third solo trip. If he had ever been scared by these airport adventures, he had not shared it with me. It was a night flight, leaving New York around six. The skies were clear over JFK, but storms had been gathering over the Midwest for days, pounding the region with heavy rain, sleet, and snow. I took Daniel to the airport in a cab, paying the driver to wait. I walked Daniel through security and all the way to his gate, wherea flight attendant checked us in. I told her that my son was flying alone, that I wanted to make sure he got to Los Angeles in one piece. The flight attendant pointed to Jenny, who sat alone, watching the flashing lights of the tarmac through the large plate-glass window. The flight attendant said children often traveled better in pairs. She winked at Danny. Maybe he’d even end up with a girlfriend.
    I was single myself back then, a divorced man with a conflicted hunger for women, and I have to admit that I studied the stewardess’s profile when she turned. I noted the tightness of her skirt, the multiple piercings in one ear—which indicated a rebellious streak, a slight hint of sexual anarchy. She was young and busty and blond. She laughed easily. I mentioned I was a doctor, and that my son was going to visit my ex- wife. The attendant told me she would take extra-special care of Daniel. She gave his shoulder a squeeze.
    On the plane Daniel had a Sprite and some animal crackers. He had a backpack stuffed with clothes, games, comic books. Anything I could think of that might keep him occupied for the long flight. The movie on the flight was Titanic , an odd choice for a mode of transportation fueled by prayer and the suspension of disbelief. It was over Ohio that the turbulence hit, a great sudden jerk, like the plane had dropped off a ledge. After the first jolt the captain put on the FASTEN SEAT BELT sign and instructed flight attendants to take their seats. He tried