Flying Home by Mary Anne Wilson Page B

fought to obey her. After several failed attempts, he finally managed to pry his eyes open. All he could see were shadows at first and then...
    Merry.
    “Yes,” she said on a choked sob, “Thank you, thank you.”
    “What for?” he actually managed to get past his lips.
    The dim light outlined her sweet face. But he didn’t miss the tears that were trickling down her cheek. She touched him, her hand connecting with his jawline. “For...” She swallowed hard. “For getting us down,” she said, then added quickly, “and for not dying. Thank you.”
    He got his hand to cover hers, feeling her shake, but she didn’t move from the contact. “I hadn’t planned on dying,” he rasped.
    With his free hand he felt along the side of his face, there was dampness there, but not from Merry’s tears. One touch and he knew before he even saw his fingers stained with red, that he was bleeding. He groaned and gingerly felt his cheek again.
    “No, don’t,” she said quickly. “It’s...you’re cut just under your hairline, and it’s bleeding so much.”
    He drew back, exhaled and grabbed the edge of his seat to get into a better position. A cut...not important. But what was important was him checking the plane, to make sure there were no fuel leaks, although he couldn’t find any chemical odor as he tested the air in the cabin. But he had to be sure, and he had to find out how badly the aircraft was damaged.
    But just the simple exertion of sitting up a bit, stopped him dead. His chest raged with pain, and he closed his eyes for a moment. He caught his breath and opened his eyes to Merry. “Sorry, a bit light-headed,” he fudged.
    “How can I help?”
    “First aid. Backseat, underneath,” he said thickly.
    He watched her move back, shifting to one side, getting over the console, then she was gone. “Got it,” she finally said. She reappeared up front with a large white tin with a red cross on its lid.
    She looked at him again, barely suppressing a flinch, but he saw the expression on her face. “It’s just a cut,” he said softly.
    That brought on a rush of nervous chatter from her as she awkwardly perched herself half on the console and half on her seat. She kept her eyes down on the contents of the tin once she snapped the metal fasteners open. “Yep, it’s first aid, all right, and I can do this,” she went on. “I’ve patched up a lot of kids after they’ve done something silly, and they lived to tell about it, so this should be a breeze...”
    His head throbbed, and her rapid speech was grating, but he understood that in some way, this rambling was a coping method for Merry. Without warning, she stopped, and the silence amidst the sound of wind and driven snow, was almost deafening. Slowly, she looked up from the tin, and even in the low light he could see more tears shining in her eyes. He grimaced at the thought of her despair and him having no way to help her.
    “I...thought for a moment that you were...that you were hurt worse than a cut.” She caught her bottom lip between her teeth. “You aren’t, are you? You’re okay, right? Just the cut? Not any broken bones or anything else?”
    He knew his ribs weren’t right, but he guessed that was from the restraints. And his head, well he’d been told often enough how hard headed he was, so he guessed it was a simple cut. “I’m okay,” he told her.
    The exhaled breath said it all. “Good, good,” she murmured and looked back down into the tin.
    “What about you?” he asked.
    She hesitated, then shook her head. “No blood or lacerations, so I’m fine,” she said. “Just grateful that you knew what to do to get us down.”
    “I made a mess of it,” he said flatly. “But any landing you walk away from is a good landing.”
    The rapid-fire speech started up again as the wind moaned and drove snow against the plane. “Bandages, antibiotics, wipes, cotton pads, tape. bandages...four, no, five of them.” She pushed aside the perfectly