The whole plane trip to Dubai was around 19 hours by flight. Having a family where all 3 people, excluding my dad, got motion sick, flying wasn’t the best and most comfortable way to travel. Unluckily, our dad wasn’t able to come as he had just switched to a new office and got assigned to a new manager recently so, his boss wasn’t going to let him travel halfway across the world in his first week of a new department. We were about 20000 feet up in the air, close to landing, as we saw the “put on your seatbelt” sign switch off. I took off my black, sony headphones and turned the mini tv that was buckled on in front of me off. I looked to my right and saw my sister, laying her head on top of my mom’s lap as my mom rested her head on the seat. I reached for my seatbelt to unbuckle my it when a macabre and unsettling sound escaped the overhead speakers, creating a colossal clamor that banged against the walls of the plane. It took a while, with all the ruckus that the passengers were making, before I clearly understood what the pilot was trying to pursue to us. “Um… ladies and gentlemen, we are experiencing some technical difficulties with the landing gears as the emergency signals are flashing on and off. Please remain calm and fasten your seatbelts, we still have an hour till arrival and we can figure it out by then. Thank you!”  I should have been scared with this message, but, I just wasn’t. “Mom!” I tried to wake my mom out from her sleep. Half conscious, she looked at me, seeming like she was ready to listen to what I was going to say. “What, Rayan? What?” She responded. “While you two were sleeping,” I continued, “they announced that the landing gears weren’t coming out of the plane and they were getting stuck.” An insecure expression hit her face.

The rest of the one hour, I couldn’t help thinking about my grandma that lived in India. I had heard that two years ago, she had gotten diagnosed with ovarian cancer, cancer that affects her ovaries.  The last time I saw her, she couldn’t speak. The cancer was like hell living inside of her, as she described it. She tried her best to smile when we left that time. I thought of her, taking me and my sister trick or treating, buying us chocolates when our mom was gone to work, making us fill up our life meters with joy because that is what made me look up to her. She knew life was a fragile thing, god’s greatest gift to us. She knew how to live life as a fearless human being. She sacrificed everything to with us, and I was glad that we were going to get to see her again.

“Brace!Brace!Brace!” The pilot started to scream as we approached our destination. “Rayan! Rakshita!” She put her arms in front of us, not letting us form into the brace position that they had told us to. “Rayan!Rakshita! Hold onto my arm! Don’t let go! I don't want to lose you too!” Even though we were starting to crash land, all I thought about was when she said she was going to lose us too. Who else did she lose? A sudden thump blocked my thoughts, waking me up into full consciousness. The gears broke off as we suddenly approached the runway, slamming the entire plane into the ground. I saw the wheels, or what was left of them, screeching, twisting, and turning, sending huge sparks into the thin air. The plane hit something that it was not supposed to. Within a few seconds, we were in the air again, this time, with no one under control of anything. The wheels started to catch fire, melting the rubber till it was just plain metal. With the metal in contact with the rough surface on the ground, the back two landing gears broke off, striking us back into the ground. It was now just the front gear that was pulling up the whole plane. The seats started to rumble and shake, throwing people and overhead bags onto the ground. We slowed down, then to a complete stop. “Thank god, you guys are safe!”

She started to hug us as the pilots declared it was safe to start to move and exit out the plane. “What did you mean when you said you were going to lose us to?” I asked my mom as we started to walk down the isles, flight attendants and pilots apologizing for the crash. “I will explain as soon as we get everything checked out, ok?” She responded at a delayed timing. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a baby held in the grasps of her mother. Although we were far away, I could still hear the conversation the mother and the entire cabin crew were having with her. It had turned out that the baby had suffered a major concussion from the accident, at only two months old. It was terrifying to hear, that a baby was maybe going to die, at such a young age. We were outside, waiting for my uncle to pick us up and bring us to his house. We grabbed something to eat when I hear my mom weeping. “Mom, are you ok?” I asked. “I know you loved your grandma, I really do.” What was she talking about? “But the...there are just times when eve..even if you were a brave, fearless soul. You just have to lea..someday.” I got what she was hinting at. She just didn’t want to say it. She didn’t have the right mindset, the dignity to say it. We got to my uncle’s house. I saw everybody, gave them nice hugs and kisses and ran to my room in the house. The room my grandma requested my uncle build for me. I started to swell up inside, crying and crying till I completely soaked my pillow. I started to reach back into my old memories, of her taking us and teaching us new things and new places. Wherever she was, I missed her. And I bet she misses me too.