“Naomi,” I whispered, “we need to talk about this.”
She turned toward me slowly, her professional composure finally cracking slightly, though not into the devastation I expected.
“We’ll talk,” she said quietly. “Once we land. Not here, not now, not while I’m working a flight I still need to complete safely and professionally for a hundred and forty other passengers who don’t deserve to become collateral damage in whatever difficult, painful conversation you and I eventually have.”
I nodded slowly, understanding, even amid my own panic, exactly how much genuine professional integrity that particular restraint of hers actually required to maintain throughout an entire shift.
The plane landed in Verlaine roughly three hours later, Naomi completing her final duties with the same composed professionalism she’d maintained throughout the entire devastating flight.
I watched her move through the cabin during those final preparations for landing, checking seatbelts, securing trays, offering the same warm, practiced reassurances to nervous passengers she offered every single flight, and I found myself, despite everything, genuinely marveling at exactly how thoroughly she’d managed to compartmentalize her own devastating discovery in service of doing her job properly.
I lost track of her once we disembarked, understanding she likely had post-flight duties requiring her attention before she could finally address the personal devastation she’d been carefully containing throughout our entire journey together.
Selene, still entirely unaware of the flight attendant’s actual identity, chattered excitedly about our hotel plans as we made our way through the terminal, and I found myself unable to focus on a single word she said, my mind entirely consumed by whatever conversation awaited me once Naomi finally found the time to address everything directly.
Naomi called me that evening, her voice steady but carrying an exhaustion I’d never once heard from her throughout our entire marriage.
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