At the door to the terminal Trace came to a stop. Key pranced around them, chuffing as if they’d been apart for weeks rather than minutes. Slightly winded, Trace released her legs and eased down so she could get her snowshoes under her. The feel of her body sliding down his back got him half-cocked, so he faced front, shed his gloves, and dug in his pocket for the keys.
“Thanks for the lift.” She said it so casually, while smoothing her hair as if she’d just stepped out of an Uber, it brought a smile to his face.
“Anytime. You can pop the snowshoes off and leave them out here,” he told her, and proceeded to do the same with his. Once they were stacked by the door, he twisted the key in the lock and released it. “Wanna come in and see what you’re working with?”
Her smile matched his. “That’s why I’m here.”
He held the door open for her, but as Key didn’t understand chivalry, he snuck in first and made a beeline to the dog bed he always dragged close to the doors leading to the tarmac. Trace entered last and hit the lights for the main room. As the long, fluorescent bulbs overhead flickered on, one by one, he looked at the place he’d practically grown up in through fresh eyes. Izzy’s eyes.
There wasn’t all that much to see. One set of glass doors bearing the Captivity Air logo welcomed those coming into the terminal through the front entrance. Another set of automatic glass doors served the tarmac access. A rustic wood ticket counter that had been part of the place since his grandfather’s tenure occupied the space to the left of the front entrance, and a gate counter of nearly equal vintage perched by the door to the tarmac.
Glass windows along the front wall gave new arrivals a first look at the town rising up on the hillside. A small bank of chairs sat before similar widows along the back wall and allowed travelers to watch the takeoffs and landings—none of which would happen today until the snow melted or he plowed a runway clear. A charter might opt for a water landing, since the cove hadn’t iced over, but nothing was scheduled. Off-season business consisted mostly of cargo runs and locals, and they tended to work around the weather.
Old black and white photos of Captivity decorated the light blue walls nearest the front entrance. They gave way to progressively newer, more colorful shots of the town, the airfield, the harbor, and the mountain. He watched Izzy work her way along the haphazard gallery, absently taking off her gloves, sunglasses, and ear warmer headband thing as she went. Now that he considered the display, he realized it presented a visual timeline of the evolution of the town, and confirmation that change came slowly and in miniscule increments. The airfield had grown from a single, wood-clad terminal for coordinating water and ice landings, to a single strip of runway with a hangar, to the two-pronged runway, two hangars, and outbuildings to house equipment. Photos of town told their age mostly by the cars and clothing captured by the lens, and color quality. And the mountain? The mountain stood above all else, majestic and unchanging.
“A lot of history here.” Soft brown eyes turned to him. “History of the town, the airfield. You’re about to introduce a drastic change. Have you considered how it affects what pictures will someday go here?” She pointed to blank wall space close to the tarmac doors.
“The future goes there.” One that wouldn’t depend on him once the deal closed.
She nodded solemnly, thoughtfully, as she contemplated the blank wall, and perhaps her role in shaping what came next. After a moment she looked over at him and smiled. “Ready to get started?”
“Yeah.” He was. Absolutely. Relief put that weight in his stomach, along with maybe too much breakfast. “Let’s take this to my office.”
He guided her around the wooden spiral stairway that led to the crow’s nest, and over to the west wall where a small coffee and snack station separated two wide, wood-framed archways. “Restrooms.” He pointed to the archway on the left which was helpfully marked accordingly. Taking the other archway, marked Employees Only, he stopped in front of the first of two doors. “This”—he opened the door and hit the light switch—“is my office. Consider it yours for as long as you need it.”
She wandered in, bright and feminine as a spring rose amongst his big, somewhat cluttered desk, brown leather chair bearing the patina of daily use, and the pair of dark stained wood guest chairs taking up space in front of the desk. Built-in bookcases filled one wall and ancient black file cabinets claimed the other. A large, tinted window behind the desk let in filtered sunlight and a view of the parking lot. A long, wood credenza that matched the desk sat beneath the window and held an old Kenwood L5000 receiver that currently served as a stand for the MacBook, set up for air to ground communications. A couple framed photos of Kat Peak passed for wall decor and a framed photo of his parents sat on a corner of his desk. A little over five years old, they stood together, beaming, in front of the pretty little Cessna 172 Skyhawk they’d bought for their retirement travels.
While completely comfortable and functional by his standards, it suddenly occurred to him that this office might be a steep step down from a senior associate’s office at a large Century City law firm. Especially if Chuck’s corner office was anything to go by.
“This will work. I don’t need a lot of room. Just a place for my laptop and space to spread out a file or two.” Hands clasped together, she looked back at him. “Is this the normal temperature?”
“Uh…” He winced, remembering her seventy-four-degree hotel room. “Yeah. Pretty much. There’s a single thermostat for the building, so we keep it in the high sixties.”
“Oh.” She released her intertwined fingers and retracted her hands into the sleeves of her coat. “Okay.”
Suck it up, Shanahan. “I could get you a space heater.” And you can turn my office into a sauna.
“If it’s not too much trouble.”
“None at all. I’ll pick one up at the general store when I head back to get the truck. In the meantime”—he gestured to a guest chair—“have a seat.”
Once she did, he lifted the messenger bag over his head and handed it to her. Then he shrugged out of his insulated vest and hung it on the rack by the door. He would have offered to take hers, but she huddled in the puffy pink parka as if it was the only thing saving her from hypothermia.
“When does the airfield open?” she asked as he took his seat behind the desk.
“Today? I don’t know that we will. We don’t have any flights scheduled. Bridget might fly back from Anchorage this afternoon, but she’ll call before she comes.”
“Is that typical? A day with no scheduled flights?”
“In the off-season, yes. A few more weeks, when the spring weather really sets in, we’ll be hopping from dawn ’til dusk, and we’ll keep hopping through October. We usually see another little bump around the holidays, but that’s mostly cargo.”