Air Crash, Meeting Norman Spinrad

      I dreamed that N and I were changing planes in Chicago for a trip to New York. However, when we got there, the airline had a problem. Even though I had tickets, the airline didn't have seats for both of us. There was one seat available on the flight we were scheduled for, and one for the flight leaving 15 minutes later. After much grumbling, they agreed to give us refunds on both legs of the flight. I hurried N to her gate, and then rushed back to my own so I wouldn't be bumped again as a no-show.
      Then next thing I remember is intense pain in my feet and the feeling that I shouldn't be enjoying the cool breeze on my face. It seems the plane had run into some trouble on takeoff and I was now strapped to the middle seat of three, by myself, half buried in sand overlooking a small river or stream. I looked around.
      There was wreckage, seats, clothing, bodies, everywhere along the river bed. I unbuckled myself with some difficulty and pulled my legs out of the sand. I could hear sirens in the distance. There was a woman crying nearby. My feet pulled out of the sand, and I could feel bits of bone grinding along the tops of my feet. I nearly passed out. I managed to get clear of the wrecked seats, and wrapped my feet in some loose clothing that was lying around. I crawled over to where the crying was coming from.
      The woman was trapped in her twisted seat, she'd also been in the middle seat of the middle of the plane, just a couple of rows ahead of me, I recognized her Victorian costume. I helped her unbuckle the belt. Her dress and feet were also buried in the dune we'd been wedged into. I managed to get her out after much digging around, she wouldn't simple remove the dress and bustle. It seemed easier to dig than to argue with her. Finally free she stood up and looked up the river bed.
      I followed her gaze. Much of the aircraft was actually in the river, somehow we'd been thrown clear and the soft dunes had allowed us to survive, though I was quite sure both my legs were broken and my feet were pretty crushed. The stream was shallow and fast, but the river bed was at least ten times the height and width of the water rushing along its bottom. I thought the stream looked like it was swelling, rising towards us. Another survivor was a couple of hundred feet further up river from where we were. He was shouting at us.
      Although I couldn't make out what he was saying, she could. The river was rising, there'd been an explosion at the dam.
      "We need to climb out of the river bed." I could see that the river curved a few hundred feet further up from where we were, and that there was a levee or retaining wall, at least above the dunes caught in the curve. She shouted my observations to the other survivor and he began to trudge up the dunes towards the levee wall.
      I crawled along behind the woman and her silly bustle. It kept skewing over to one side, I was sure it was broken. The long dress, because the bustle was no longer doing its job, dragged through the sand and saw grass. She finally stopped and took the bustle off, then continued up the dunes holding her long skirt.
      I really couldn't walk so managed to pull myself from tuft of grass to tuft of grass. As I reached the top of a small dune I was able to see further up river. The dam had cracked and a large central part of it had collapsed. A wall of water was racing down the river channel. It reached the bend and banked off the retaining wall, slowing and churning against itself before bouncing to the other side out of view. I crawled faster, somehow managing to pass the woman in her bulky costume. I turned back and offered her a hand up the steep slope of the last dune before what I thought was the levee wall.
      The water rose below us, scouring most of the dunes away with it. We began to slide back down, but stopped after a few feet. The levee wall was actually below us, I could see the edge sticking out from the wet sand. The flood roared past, twelve feet or so below our position, well below the levee wall. The body of our aircraft was lifted and washed back out of sight, but I heard it grinding and groaning against the water. I hoped that the emergency crews had gotten any other survivors out of the plane. It was only at that point that I really noticed the flashing lights and helicopters in the sky. They finally seemed to have noticed us at the same time.
      The woman, still complaining finally looked down at me, thinking me rude for not standing with her, until she saw the condition of my feet and legs. My makeshift bandages were soaked in blood. My pants shredded and my calves looked more like sand covered slabs of meat. She fainted away and fell across my legs, causing me to pass out as well.
      I awoke in a hospital room. I was sharing it with a man who had many visitors. One of those visitors looked familiar, so I asked him his name.
      It was Norman Spinrad.
      I told him I'd been on my way with my wife to New York, to attend a Science Fiction writer's conference, and was looking forward to seeing him there. He didn't think it looked like I was going to be going anywhere. I had both feet and calves cast up to the knee. However, my doctor said there really was no reason why I couldn't be released, now that they were certain I didn't have but a minor concussion and no other internal injuries.
      I took a call from N, she was very worried and was still trying to get a flight back, but was not sure she wanted to fly. Norman suggested that she stay put, we would come to her. I raised and eyebrow.
      "I have a friend who's loaning me a stepvan to make the trip to New York. Not sure how I'm going to get it back to him, though."
      "N or I could drive it back for you, we have to catch our flight back to California from here."
      "You're going to fly again?"
      "Sure, what are the odds of being on two crashed planes?"
      So I found myself released, in the company of Victorian Woman and Norman Spinrad, turns out she was also heading to the Science Fiction Convention. They got me to the back of the step van, and I used a walker to get out of the wheelchair. She tossed the chair in the back of the van and I used my arms to pull myself up to the passenger bench just behind the door of the stepvan. I wasn't supposed to be putting any weight on my feet yet.
      We drove to New York, Victorian Woman and Norman Spinrad taking turns at the wheel while I navigated. We also talked about different story ideas, and Spinrad seemed to like the themes I'd come up with for "Final Symptom." I told him I'd love to see his version of it.
      I talked to N on VW's cell phone and she met us outside Buffalo. I really didn't want to know what the cab fare for that had been, but it turned out the airline paid for it. The airline had also paid for my luggage, even though the bags were loaded on N's flight. We couldn't get the adjustor to understand that I hadn't lost any luggage except my carry-on bag, which just had a sweater, my notebook-- a new empty one-- and some Mega M&Ms.)