Part I: The Flight That Was Never Supposed To Happen

My name is Mariana Ellis, and at thirty-two, I once believed I had built the clean, polished version of the American dream: a high-rise apartment in Chicago, a growing career in supply chain management, and a husband whose title as chief financial officer at a Seattle technology corporation made people assume my marriage was as stable as his quarterly reports.

That afternoon, I sat in seat 12A on a flight crossing the Midwest, watching the clouds spread beneath the window like white islands floating across a deep blue sea. I was headed to Northern California for a supplier negotiation involving semiconductor components, while my husband, Adrian Cole, had supposedly flown there three days earlier for a technology conference.

The cabin smelled faintly of coffee and recycled air, and I had just leaned back to rest when a soft laugh rose from two rows ahead, familiar enough to reach some private place inside me before my mind could defend itself. I shifted slightly and looked through the gap between the seats.