He learned not to treat those reactions as defeat. Recovery, like aviation safety, did not consist of pretending every risk had been removed. It meant recognizing when something needed attention and responding before fear took complete control. He began carrying a small notebook again, not for reports or evidence, but for the details of ordinary journeys: a child laughing at clouds, a helpful attendant offering water, the relief of hearing wheels touch a runway. He wanted the world of flight to contain more than the worst day he had experienced in it.
The following spring, Lillian Sloan called with a demand she had clearly been preparing for weeks. "I'm coming to visit you," she announced. "And you are not allowed to tell me to take a train because you're worried about me flying."
Miles laughed. "I wasn't going to."
"You were thinking it. I can hear you thinking it."
"Mama, I've been working in aviation most of my adult life. I know planes are safe."
"Then you can get on one with me and prove you believe that." She paused before continuing. "Your grandfather's birthday is coming up. I want to take that badge to the railroad museum you used to visit together. You know, the place where he told you all those stories."
Miles felt his throat tighten. "I remember."
"Good. Then buy us two seats. Nice ones. I intend to find out what all this first-class business is about."
He booked the tickets that evening, with both names printed beside confirmed first-class seats. The confirmation page looked ordinary, and he stared at it much longer than an ordinary page should have required. This time he was not traveling to an office, a hearing, or a room where strangers would explain what had happened to him. He was going to meet his mother at the airport and sit beside her as a son.
He flew to Phoenix the day before their departure and arrived at Lillian's house in time for dinner. She opened the door before he knocked, as though she had been waiting beside it since sunrise. She was a Black American woman in her seventies with silver threading through her dark curls and the same steady gaze Miles remembered from his childhood. For a long moment she simply held his face between her hands and inspected him, not for scars but for signs of the person she knew beneath them.
"Let me see you," she said. "All this time on television and I still have to look at my own son to know whether he's eating properly."
"I'm eating, Mama."
"Coffee doesn't count. Neither does something wrapped in plastic from an airport counter." She pulled him inside and shut the door behind them. The kitchen smelled of roasted vegetables, peach cobbler, and the spices she insisted made every meal taste like home, and Miles realized that ordinary smells could make a man feel safer than a dozen official reassurances.