Miles To Go Before I Sleep (9 page)

I was so sad when she died, two years ago, at the age of ninety-three. But when she died, I wasn't worried. I knew she was going to a beautiful place.

Now, we were together again….

Grandma and I were pure spirits without bodies. She was a whiteness to me. I moved toward her. I felt the edge of our spirits softly merge, as if we were touching fingertips. The two of us gently floated through a long dark passage—like a tunnel—toward a shimmering bright light. I knew what was happening: I was leaving earth.

It feels so good being here, in the light, with Grandma. I was so sad when she died. Now I know she is okay. I want to go with her.

Being in the light was a tremendous feeling. I was wrapped in a blanket of perfect love, perfect joy, and perfect peace. I was surrounded and filled with perfect knowledge. I knew all things. When I was in my body earlier, I felt alone, afraid, sad, and mad. But when I left my body, all emotions and feelings attached to the world left.

This must be heaven.

I stopped.

I wanted to go further, but something held me back. I didn't use words, but there was a clear “knowingness” about what I needed to do.

“I love you,” my spirit was saying, “but it's not time to go yet.”

Grandma didn't try to stop me or change my mind. She didn't look sad or disappointed. Instead, her spirit just continued drifting toward the light. I quickly found myself back in my body.

I startled at the roar of the jet engines and felt the hardness of the tarmac pressing against my head.
Why am I here?
I thought. Then I remembered. I was in a hijacking and I was shot in the head. The dull, heavy feeling reminded me. If you're shot in the head, I knew, either you don't live or you don't live normally.
Either way
, I thought,
I'll take it.
The important thing is not to get shot again, like the Israeli woman was when she moved.

Stay calm. Don't move. Play dead.

Though I felt weak and alone, I kept feeling something else—a flow of energy and a voice inside saying,
Be still, you're going to be okay, just be still.

When I was in my body, I was full of worry, fear, concern. When I left it, all that went away. I was no longer attached to a body that could feel that. I remembered the feeling of deep peace.

My left hand, still underneath my body, hurt after bearing my weight for so long. I was afraid to move it, afraid that the hijackers would see me. Eventually, I moved my hand and nobody saw it.

I continued to drift in and out of consciousness and sleep.

It must have been mid-afternoon when it started to rain again. I felt a sharp, throbbing pain in my head as a cold, unpleasant drizzle seeped into my bullet wound. The pain was so intense that I didn't think I could stand to lie there without moving if it continued.

I started talking to God again.
God, I need this rain to stop. It will be difficult to lie here, still, with the rain.

Almost instantly, the rain stopped.

This only happens in the movies!
I thought. I fought hard not to smile or let the tears of joy flow from the knowledge that I was being protected.

At some point, I heard something coming toward me. It was faint at first, then grew louder.
What's that noise? It sounds like a truck. What is it?

I was really curious about the vehicle. Very gently, very carefully, I opened my eyes. All I could see were black shoes scurrying around me. I quickly shut my eyes again.

The color black was very significant to me. The hijackers were wearing black shoes, slacks, and masks over their faces.

Oh my God, it's the hijackers! They're going to kill me. Stay calm. Don't move. Keep playing dead. It's your only chance.

“Okay, pick that one up!” I heard a man yell, as if through a far-off megaphone.

Suddenly, two men lifted me up by the armpits and started dragging my body across the runway. I made sure my body was dead weight, so the hijackers would keep thinking I was dead. I didn't dare open my eyes to see who they were or where we were going. My only chance was to keep playing dead and wait for the right moment to make a break. Little did I realize that I couldn't walk, much less run, from my attackers. But it was my only chance.

Keep still. Keep still. Keep playing dead.

They dragged me about thirty feet, then stopped. “Let's do this one right,” one of the men said. “One!—two!—three!”

The two men lifted me up and slammed me facedown on a metal bed. It had ridges on it and they were filled with water. I remember thinking,
this is really rude laying me in all this water.
They didn't know I was alive. I just lay there trying not to breathe.

They lifted me up on the metal bed and shoved me inside a van. The doors closed and we started moving. I thought I was still with the hijackers.

What now? What do I do? Where are they taking me? How do I get out of here? Please, God, I need Your help.

I kept hearing,
Be still. You're going to be okay, but just be still.

I was lying facedown, with my bullet wound exposed. The man riding in back with me, on my right side, didn't like looking at the gaping hole in my head. So he took my body and flipped me over.

When he did, I gasped for air.

“She's alive! She's alive!” he screamed.

Dear God
, I thought,
they know I'm alive. Now they'll finish me off.

I waited for the final gunshot to end my life.

Nothing happened.

More screaming and yelling.

Terrified, I slowly opened my eyes. But I couldn't see anything.

“Are you guys the good guys or the bad guys?” I softly cried.

“Honey, we're the medics,” the young man said. “You're going to be okay.”

The van was heading to the morgue. Now, I felt the vehicle spin quickly around as the driver made a beeline back to the airport control tower and a waiting ambulance.

I heard men talking but couldn't see their faces.

My dark skin and bruises made it hard for the rescuers to identify me. “She's Filipino,” one said.

“No, I'm American,” I said, hoarsely. “I'm Jackie Pflug.”

Near the control tower, I was briefly examined by a Dr. A. J. Psaila, an American trained surgeon and head of surgery at St. Luke's Hospital in G'mangia, Malta. Medics rushed me to the emergency room at St. Luke's.

I was so tired, but so relieved. My prayer was answered. I was going to live. I thanked God.

SCOTT AND THE GIRLS' VOLLEYBALL TEAM were still in Athens while I was being hijacked on Saturday night. They won the tournament that night, a few hours after I left for Cairo. Their victory celebration extended late into the night. Before going to bed, they planned to meet at the Acropolis at eight the next morning. From there, they'd board a tour bus to do some last-minute sightseeing before flying back to Cairo that afternoon.

Scott arrived at the rendezvous point early, about 7:45
A.M
., to greet the tired girls as they straggled in. About half the team had arrived at the checkpoint when Tonya Smith, an eleventh grader at CAC, pulled up in a cab where Scott was waiting.

Tonya walked up to Scott and jokingly said, “Well, we don't have to worry about getting hijacked. An EgyptAir plane was hijacked last night.”

Hijackings were so common in the Middle East that year that people often joked about the possibility of being in one.

“What!” Scott said, in stunned disbelief.

“EgyptAir was hijacked last night,” she repeated.

This time the incredible news sank in.

“Jackie was on EgyptAir!” he shouted.

Scott knew right away that it was my flight that had been hijacked. I'd changed my reservations so many times, but he'd remembered that I was on the last EgyptAir flight leaving Athens on Saturday night.

“I'm out of here,” Scott told Peter, the other CAC chaperone in Athens.

Scott hailed a cab to the EgyptAir office at the Athens airport. On the way to the airport, he listened to a British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) news report on the hijacking:

Late last evening at 9:37
P.M
., EgyptAir Flight 648 was hijacked by members of a terrorist group calling themselves “The Egypt Revolution.” The hijackers' original destination was said to be Libya, but the plane was low on fuel and was forced to land at Malta's Luqa Airport.

The hijackers demanded fuel to be able to continue on to Libya. They threatened to begin executing passengers every fifteen minutes until their demands were met. Two Israeli women were shot and thrown from the plane. One apparently managed to survive.

An American, Patrick Baker, was also shot. His condition remains unknown. Two American women are also on board: Scarlett Rogencamp, of Oceanside, California, and Jackie Nink Pflug, of Pasadena, Texas. Negotiations for the release of the ninety-eight hostages continue….

When Scott arrived at the EgyptAir office, they were expecting him. He spent several frustrating hours at the EgyptAir counter, waiting for more news but learning nothing new. The only thing EgyptAir could verify was that I was on the flight. They didn't know any details beyond that.

Scott hung out there for two or three hours, then got fed up and left. Before leaving, he heard news reports that I'd been shot in the face and had a broken nose. It was still very sketchy.

The early hours of the hijacking were hard on my family and friends back home. My parents learned of the hijacking from the Saturday night news.

My mom had a sinking feeling as she watched the images on her TV screen. I'd written a week earlier to tell them I'd be in Greece with Scott and the girls' volleyball team that Thanksgiving weekend.

“Oh, my God, I think Jackie is on that plane!” she said.

During the first few hours of the crisis, information was incomplete. There was confusion about exactly what happened. From the early news accounts, they still didn't know if I was, indeed, a passenger on the plane.

No one in my family knew exactly who to call for more information on the hijacking. Gloria called Channel 2 and said, “I think my sister is on that plane.”

“Where do your parents live?” the Channel 2 reporter asked, smelling a news story in the making.

“I can't tell you that,” Gloria said.

A reporter from Channel 2 called back to say that I was on the plane. The reporter also contacted the U.S. State Department and, from then on, the State Department stayed in close contact with my family.

Barb Wilson called my friend Debbie Reno to ask if she was watching television. “You might want to turn on CNN,” Barb said. “They have something about Jackie on.”

“What?” Debbie said.