“Thanks.”

“No need.”

“Could you get in trouble for doing this?” I asked.

“Maybe I could. Wouldn’t be the first time. Besides, what are they going to do to me? It’s not like they can fire me, because I don’t work for anybody but myself.”

We were flying just above the treetops but not that much higher. Below us was lush, green jungle, dotted with houses and lined by roads.

“It all just looks normal,” I said.

“Here it is. It’s only when we get to the coast that you’ll notice anything. When was the last time you slept?” he asked.

“I caught a few hours on the plane.”

“You must be beat. Maybe you should close your eyes and catch a few winks,” he suggested.

Yeah, like that was going to happen. My thoughts were racing, my heart was aching, and I was looking out at the most spectacular view I had ever seen in my life. Even though I was exhausted, sleep was the last thing on my mind. Which was okay, because I wasn’t the one flying this helicopter.

“Maybe you should sleep, too…I mean, once we land,” I said.

“Believe me, if I go to sleep up here we’ll land soon enough!” He started laughing again. “Beautiful country, isn’t it?” he said.

“It is. Probably the most beautiful place in the world.”

“That’s what makes it even more tragic. You know how beautiful it was. And now…” He let the sentence trail off. “We’re coming up to the coast right now.”

In the distance I could see the green of the jungle give way to the blue of the ocean. Between the two was a thin line of brown, the beach. It all looked so natural, so normal. At least from up here.

As Steve closed the distance to the ocean I started to realize that things weren’t so normal. The beach wasn’t a thin line. It got thicker and thicker, wider and wider, and it wasn’t open beach, it was littered with logs and debris. The trees at the edge of the beach had all been flattened or snapped or had simply disappeared. I tried to imagine the power of a wave that could do that. I couldn’t.

“See the fishing boats?” he asked.

I looked toward the ocean. There were half a dozen boats out on the water.

“Those are the lucky ones,” Steve said. “When the tsunami hit, they were out fishing.”

“How does that make them lucky?”

“Boats that were in harbor, tied up to docks, or even on the shore, were smashed. Those out on the ocean survived.”

“But that doesn’t make sense. Shouldn’t they have been hit by the wave first? Shouldn’t they have gotten hit the worst, with nothing to protect them?”

“That’s not how a tsunami works. Out in the deep ocean the wave is deep, too. A ship out there would feel only a slight bump, maybe a foot or three, as the wave passed underneath. I’ve talked to people who were out on cruise ships, even snorkeling when the wave hit. They didn’t feel anything,” Steve said. “It’s when it hits shallow water that the wave starts to slow down and pile up. Do you know what the word ‘tsunami’ means?”