By the time we start the long walk to the runway, I am ready to chicken out. I want to run away and cry and stomp my feet. But I am too embarrassed to quit. It was all my idea, and now, finally, Gatsby seems genuinely excited. The plane is parked on the runway, and I walk up the staircase well aware of the fact that the only reason I am still going through with this is that I’m too afraid not to. And that’s an awful reason!

The door to the plane locks behind me, shutting out the outside world. I am sitting next to Gatsby. He takes my hand. He is so excited; his eyes are twinkling in anticipation. No one seems to notice that this airplane looks like it’s a cargo plane from a third world country. The seats are metal benches. There are no seat belts to buckle. The windows are tiny and covered in dead bugs.

We take off. My heart starts to race. My throat closes up. Gatsby starts to push and tug on me, connecting all our straps together. He makes me sit on his lap and buckles us closer together. But I am in a daze. I barely pay attention. The world is closing in around me. I want to escape. I need someone to open the door to let in some air.

Soon enough, at about 30,000 feet, my wish is their command.

“Ready?” someone yells. The door opens.

“Woo-hooo!” Wyatt screams as he and his partner jump.

Gatsby scoots across the bench. I am helpless to resist. Now that the door is open I don’t want go. Cold air rushes in, and the sound that it makes frightens me. I don’t watch Logan go. I take a deep breath and try to focus my mind. This isn’t normal. This is crazy. Outrageous. Why the hell did I ever suggest this?

My mind is racing so fast; it’s impossible for me to keep my breath still. I try to take a full breath of air, but my lungs contract. I try again, but even less air gets in.

“You ready?” Gatsby asks. He is scooting toward the opening. I am sitting on his lap and have no leverage to resist.

“No!” I scream. But he laughs.

“C’mon, it going to be awesome!”

---

We jump.

It’s not so much of a jump as a tumble. A gust of wind hits me like a ton of bricks. We start falling to the earth at hundreds of feet per second.

It should feel like flying, but it doesn’t. Wind is gushing passed me, forcing my mouth open and filling my cheeks with cold air. My cheeks and the skin on my face is flapping around as if it were fabric. The air is so cold my teeth hurt.

I feel air pushing us out toward the sky even though we are getting closer and closer to the earth.

And then suddenly, there’s a jolt.

We stop rushing all together. The parachute above our heads is open and filled with air. Now, we are gliding toward earth. Barely moving.

“How was that?” Gatsby asks.

“Awesome! Amazing!”

“I knew you’d like it.” He laughs. He steers the parachute with his hands and hands me the controls.

We are still falling, but it no longer feels like falling. It feels like we’re gliding. There’s no air rushing past me anymore. A wave of relief sweeps over me as blood starts to circulate within me.

I lose all track of time as we glide above the earth. Mountains hug the horizon and frame the valleys below. A small, winding line cutting through the valley is the highway we drove on. The tiny moving spots on the line are the cars.

The road is so insignificant from above. The cars are barely the size of ants. I find it hard to believe that there are people in them. Being so high makes me think about perspective. The people back on earth barely register as creatures, and it’s difficult to consider them as fellow creatures. Being so high makes me feel as if I am separated from them, somehow. As if I am not one of them. Like I am someone higher and more important. It’s a dangerous thought. And an irresponsible one.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Gatsby yells into my ear.

“Yes!”

The mountains are getting closer to us and more majestic. I can now make out the trees. The pines are thick, and many are more than seventy feet tall. From up here, they appear like matchsticks.

---

When my feet get close to the ground, the earth reaches up and pulls me in. A new wave of adrenaline surges through my veins.

Gatsby quickly disengages our harness. We embrace before it hits the ground. He throws his arms around my shoulders and brings my face to him. I feel the warmth of the sun on my eyelids as I kiss his lips. Tears of exhilaration and relief are building behind my eyes. I kiss him harder to try to keep them at bay.

But before we get too lost in the moment, somebody collides into us.

I open my eyes.

It’s Wyatt and Atticus. They are slapping us on our backs. Gatsby pulls away from me and shakes his brothers’ hands.

But quickly, as if on a second thought, the chaste and reserved handshakes that they exchange morph into something more. They all start to laugh and hug each other.

Everyone’s riding a high, which we carry with us into lunch. We continue to smile and laugh and joke around well into the main course. During a brief moment of reflection, while they order a third round of drinks, I realize how different these people are from the ones I met yesterday.

Last night, I saw three brothers who did not have much in common with one another. They were strangers, but even worse than that. They knew each other and chose not to spend time together. They carried a hatred and contempt for one another, the likes of which I only saw once before.

But today, the three men who sit before me are no longer afraid of each other. They do not have regrets, resentments, or hatred for one another. They are smiling, laughing, and joking around. Their worlds aren’t divided. Instead, they are connected.

“Hey, do you remember that camping trip we went on in high school?” Atticus turns to Gatsby.

“The one you almost didn’t come back from?” Gatsby jokes. “Atticus decided to climb a giant boulder somewhere in Utah. It was perfectly smooth. Hardly a groove to hold onto.”

“I got up there just fine,” Atticus cuts in.

“Yeah, that was pretty impressive,” Wyatt admits. “Gatsby and I could barely get a few feet off the ground.”

“As it turned out, that was the easy part.” Atticus shrugs.

“Why? What happened?” I ask.

“He got all the way to the top but then couldn’t get down,” Gatsby says.

“He was up there for close to an hour trying to get down,” Wyatt explains. “The boulder was about twenty feet or so high.”

“Oh my god, I can’t believe I survived that.” Atticus laughs and shakes his head. I still don’t know what happened.

“Me too. Getting away with a broken foot was lucky,” Wyatt adds.

“You broke your foot?” I ask.

“Yep. I couldn’t really climb down because it was so smooth and it was getting dark. So I just grabbed onto the top and tried to ease myself down. But that didn’t work out too well. I fell and broke my foot. I thought it was a sprain at first, but the doc in the emergency room confirmed it.

“But that’s not even the really impressive part. What was really amazing was what these two guys did for me.”

“Oh please,” Gatsby cuts in. “What did you want us to do? Just leave you there?”

Atticus turns to me. “I couldn’t really walk, so they basically carried me all the way back to the car. It was like ten miles up and down really steep terrain.”

“You did?” I ask them. They smile and nod but look a bit embarrassed.

“Man, that was fun,” Wyatt jokes. “I had no idea you were such a lard ass!”

“Yeah, I know. He was so fucking heavy, wasn’t he?” Gatsby adds.

They continue to make jokes, and through the laughter, I can see that they were both happy to do it. The incident tied them to each other, connecting them in a way only adversity can. We all clink our glasses to that night. Taking a sip, I realize that this is how brothers should be.