Miles To Go Before I Sleep (10 page)

“The plane Jackie was on was hijacked,” Barb reported, “and she has been shot. They think she might be dead.”

When Debbie got off the phone, she called a prayer hot line at her church to pray for me.

Mom and Dad only got an hour's sleep on Saturday night. A spokesperson from the State Department called every thirty minutes with updates on the hijacking.

The early news offered little comfort.

At about 2
A.M
., the phone rang again. My dad answered.

“I'm sorry to have to tell you this,” the State Department spokesperson said, “but your daughter is dead.”

“What does she look like?” Dad asked.

“She's blonde,” he answered.

“No, she's not,” he said, “Jackie is dark.”

On further checking, the State Department discovered it had confused me with Scarlett Rogencamp, who had light hair.

For my parents, the ordeal was far from over. The news kept changing so quickly. My parents went from hearing that I was dead, to hearing that I might have just broken my nose, to hearing that I was okay and on my way to the hospital.

Scott didn't believe the early reports because, in his mind, the officials didn't seem confident about the accuracy of their information. Someone at the airport offered Scott a ride to the American embassy. His goal was to somehow reach Malta and be near me while the drama unfolded. Scott knew that the American embassy was the place to go for help in a situation like this.

The embassy was already on top security alert. All vehicles entering the embassy compound were checked for bombs by security guards.

At first, it appeared that Scott couldn't get to Malta. Embassy officials told him that Malta's tiny airport would be closed until the hijacking was over. He might have to watch the drama unfold on television.

Embassy officials continued to pass on any information they had about the hijacking. The red tape, bureaucratic nonsense, and frustration were getting to Scott. He lost his cool and shouted at one embassy secretary. Soon after, things started to change. A down-to-earth, straight-shooting embassy official read the anguish on Scott's face and calmly introduced himself.

“One way or another, we'll get you to Malta,” he told Scott. “Don't worry about it. We've got the ambassador's jet on standby.”

Though Edwin Beffel, a first secretary at the embassy, was powerless to speed up the time frame of when Scott could leave, Scott felt better now that he was finally dealing with someone who acted like a human being.

Scott continued to get reports on the Maltese government's lack of progress in negotiating with the hijackers. Information about the fate of individual passengers, however, remained sketchy. Scott, and the rest of the world, couldn't know what was going on inside the plane.

Scott spent Sunday afternoon restlessly pacing back and forth in a hotel room a couple of blocks from the American embassy, waiting, hoping, and praying that I'd be okay. He continued listening to a stream of news reports, including some reporting that I was dead.

Late that afternoon, Scott collapsed on the bed for a few hours of fitful sleep. Fearing the worst, he tossed and turned, and prayed for my life.

Suddenly, a loud crack of thunder—the loudest he'd ever heard—jolted him awake. He saw the brightest flash of lightning he'd ever seen.

Seconds later, the phone rang. It was Beffel. He had a report that I'd just been shot in the face and pushed out of the plane. That report seemed to jibe with what EgyptAir officials had told him earlier.
Maybe they had gotten it right after all
, Scott thought….

Beffel told him to head over to the embassy as fast as he could.

The loud crack of thunder and lightning coinciding with the call from Beffel seemed to confirm Scott's worst fear: I was dead. Scott thought his role now would be to help with the process of identifying my body and bringing it home for burial.

Scott's first thought was to call his parents in Hopkins, Minnesota. His mom and dad, June and Greg Pflug, were both on the line. They'd been watching the news on television and tried to support Scott.

“I just got a call from the embassy,” he said. “They told me Jackie has been shot in the face. I don't know if she's alive or dead.”

“Oh my God,” June Pflug said. Then she started to cry.

Scott couldn't talk long; he had to get to the embassy.

At the embassy, however, there wasn't much more anyone could do. A few hours later, State Department officials were less clear about who was actually shot. It might have been one of the Israeli women or Scarlett Rogencamp.

Scott was miffed about the confusion. He was angry at the embassy personnel for planting in his mind the thought that I was dead.

Beffel was doing everything he could to get Scott to Malta. He was pushing hard to get a plane, but no one could land in Malta until the hijacking was over. There was also some bad weather.

There wasn't much more Scott could do. He had to sit tight and wait. Scott was helped by a woman who was vice-consul at the American embassy. She was a real caretaker and sweetheart, encouraging and sympathizing, just like a mom would be. She also helped Scott find a place to stay on Sunday night while he anxiously waited for a flight to Malta. She introduced Scott to a gunnery sergeant employed at the embassy who generously opened his home to Scott.

Early on Sunday morning U.S. time, the phone rang again at my parents' house in suburban Houston. My parents felt a mixture of dread and relief. Would this call inform them that I was dead or alive? My father answered. It was the State Department.

“Another woman was just shot, but we don't know who it is,” the U.S. government official reported.

A few minutes later, the State Department called back to confirm that I was shot in the head and taken to St. Luke's.

On Sunday afternoon there was a knock at their door. A reporter from Channel 26 stood at the door, asking to come in and shoot some footage of my family sitting down for Sunday dinner.

“No,” Mom said. “We'd like to be together just as a family. We'd like to say our prayers for Jackie in private.”

To her credit, the reporter understood and left.

My sister Gloria's husband said a simple prayer. “Lord, we just pray that Jackie will come through the hijacking okay and that we can hear from her soon. Bring her back to us safe. Amen.”

Debbie and Barb came over to my parents' house to help answer the telephone, field the reporters, and provide support.

After I gasped for breath in the van, and the van reversed course for St. Luke's, the medics immediately began cutting off my blood-stained blue jeans and T-shirt. I couldn't see what they were doing, but I heard the sound of ripping fabric.

Darn, there go my favorite blue jeans!
was the last thought I had before everything went blank. I must have passed out, because I don't remember riding to the hospital.

When I came to again, in the emergency room at St. Luke's, I was lying on a metal hospital bed. I was dressed in a hospital gown. Medical technicians were sticking needles in my arm.

I closed my eyes briefly and, when I opened them again, I was staring into a pair of soft brown eyes.

A young man, about my age, hovered over me, wielding an electric razor. “I've got to shave your hair,” he said, simply.

He pressed the buzzing instrument to my head and started shearing my dark brown curls. The sound was almost soothing until, suddenly, I jumped.

“Ow! That hurts!” I winced. I was really out of it—just barely able to hold a conversation. He'd run the rotating blades over my bullet wound. “You have to be careful.”

“I'm sorry, but I have to go over it. I have to get the hair around it,” he said, apologetically. “I'll try to go easier. You're going into surgery, and we need to shave your head to reduce the chance of infection.”

Every few seconds, he'd stop shaving and let me take a breath. Then he'd announce, “Okay, I'm going back over it again.”

My muscles tightened as I braced myself for more pain.

After the young man finished, another medical aide came in to finish the job with a smaller razor. He also gave me some shots to calm me down and reduce my pain.

A serious man with glasses who looked like a doctor walked over to my bedside. He put his hand on my shoulder and said, “I'm Dr. Lawrence Zrinzo. You're going to be all right. We just need you to sign something.”

“What?”

“It's a release giving your consent to the operation, relieving the hospital of liability.”

I felt dazed and out of it, but the humor of the situation didn't escape me. “Here I am with a bullet in my head and you want me to sign something?” I laughed.

He nodded.

“Well, I can't see well,” I informed him.

“That's okay. We'll just hold it for you.”

The doctor put a pen in my hand, and I asked him to steer my hand to the spot where he wanted me to sign. My pen contacted the hard surface of a clipboard and I moved it in broad strokes through the air, like I used to write my name with sparklers on the Fourth of July.

I could only see pieces of the doctor's face, but I felt his reassuring hand on my shoulder. I sensed his positive energy and could tell he was a very sweet, caring man.

I had lost some blood, Dr. Zrinzo reported, but not enough to require a transfusion. He assured me that I was going to be okay. In a few minutes, I started feeling the effects of the anesthesia I'd been given.

The doctor and nurse walked on opposite sides of my bed as they wheeled me into surgery.

“And to think, we just got our equipment last week!” the nurse said, laughing.

What does she mean by that?
I wondered, just before passing out.

The doctors at St. Luke's didn't know my medical history. They didn't know that I had a rare allergic reaction to succinylcholine chloride—a muscle relaxant commonly used along with surgical anesthesia. When I had my appendix out as a little girl, the doctors had given me succinylcholine and I had stopped breathing. If they gave it to me again, I could die.

My mom knew my medical history. When she heard that I'd been shot, she immediately thought about the danger of an allergic reaction. She asked my sister Mary to call Pasadena Bayshore Medical Center and tell them to forward my medical records to Malta.

Thanks to Mom and Mary, doctors in Malta used the right anesthesia.