“My parents are taking me out to dinner. You wanna come?” asked Chris.
“Sure,” I said.
Since I considered Chris barely more than an acquaintance, his invitation surprised me. Still, to a college freshman, a treat to a restaurant was preferable to another cafeteria meal.
Chris Bettiker (not his real name) was a fellow freshman at Dickinson College in 1974. He was of medium height and build and wore glasses below a startlingly shorter-than-average-for-the-1970’s light-brown haircut. He worked as an assistant trainer in the athletics department. In other words, he taped ankles and handed out towels at soccer practice. I assumed his position was work/study, whereby the College subsidized his tuition in exchange for employment, like the kids who ladled breakfast. Though my family was not wealthy, my parents paid all my college expenses, and for that I was deeply thankful.
I met Chris in my capacity as goalie for the soccer team; during practices, when my teammates scrimmaged, I idled in front of the goal nearest the locker room. Though my inactivity was occasionally interrupted by a shot, I had ample time to chat with the folks who hung out behind the goal, namely: the Spanish professor who volunteered advice to the team that merited credence solely due to his accent; the ten-year-old neighborhood boy who I thought worshipped me, until the day he declared “If you really were any good at sports, you’d play football;” and, Chris.
Chris and I never discussed anything substantial. I didn’t even know where he was from or what he studied. We just prattled away without making a personal connection, I suppose, like males, stereotypically, can do.
“Be outside your dorm at six,” said Chris, when I handed him my towel after practice.
*****
I expected his parents to arrive, so I was surprised when a bright yellow Mustang roared to a stop with Chris in the driver’s seat.
“Hop in,” he said.
I glanced to see if his parents were following behind, but there were no other cars.
“Wow,” I said. “Is this yours?”
“Yep,” said Chris.
I was surprised he had a car. Few of my friends had cars, and those who did tended to have vehicles nearly as old as themselves. As for me, I’d turned down my uncle’s repeated offer of a twelve-year-old Pinto; our campus was small, and I saw no need.
Chris, whom I knew only as the mild-mannered guy at the locker room, shocked me by being outfitted in driving gloves, a soft brown leather jacket, and dark glasses, even though it was already dusk. As soon as I wedged my body into the tiny front seat, and before I could locate a seatbelt, he floored the pedal.
“Here we go!” he said, his expression like a madman’s.
“Where?” I said, alarmed. “Are your parents meeting us?”
“Sort of,” he said.
I didn’t focus on his reply. I was too busy cringing as we careened through the quiet streets of Carlisle, PA, without regard for speed limits.
“Um,” I ventured with relief, once we reached a straightaway just outside town. “What restaurant are we going to?”
“Our club,” said Chris. “It’s good.”
“Nice,” I said, hoping my clothes were adequate.
*****
Chris barely braked before jerking the car into a side road with a final squeal of the tires. A sign flashed through my peripheral vision: “Cumberland County Airport.”
“Is there a club at the airport?” I asked.
“No,” said Chris. “We’re FLYING to dinner.”
“We are?” I gasped.
“Yes,” said Chris. “I keep my plane here. It’s a pretty short flight, about 150 miles.”
“We’re flying?” I said, still processing that basic fact before concerning myself with the flight.
“Um, I’m not so good at flying,” I said. “I’ve never been in a small plane.”
“Don’t worry,” said Chris. “I’ll make it as smooth as driving.”
I was not comforted in the least.
Chris parked adjacent to the terminal, a single-story cinderblock building. He led me through the entrance and nodded to an older man seated at a card table with a newspaper.
“All gassed up and ready to go, Mr. Bettiker,” he said to Chris.
“Thanks, Bob,” said Chris.
“Where are you headed this evening?” Bob asked.
“We’re going to dinner,” I volunteered, anxious to gauge the man’s reaction.
“Oh, out to Latrobe,” said the man, as though this happened all the time.
“Yeah,” said Chris.
“Little windy to the west,” said the man, before he added, looking at me: “but nothing Mr. Bettiker can’t handle.”
Latrobe, I knew, was somewhere near Pittsburgh.
We passed through a door and stepped onto the tarmac. Six or seven small planes were present. I followed Chris as he strode purposefully to the nearest one. I was still trying to process what was happening.
“You sure get a lot of respect here,” I said, thinking of Bob calling him “Mr. Bettiker.”
“Yes,” Chris said, “my plane’s the best they’ve ever seen here.”
He went on to enthusiastically explain some of the plane’s characteristics. I understood words like “speed” and “altitude,” but once he began to explain its finer points, I barely recognized that he was speaking English.
Chris helped me to access the passenger seat in a tiny cabin. I had a little steering wheel of my own, like in a child’s toy car, but I had no more desire to operate it than to use the flotation device that served as my seat.
Among my jumbled collection of thoughts was that I did not appreciate having this “experience” foisted upon me as a surprise. However, I also realized that if it had not been a surprise, I would surely have turned down his offer and missed what I recognized as a likely lifelong memory.
An instrument panel spread before us with gauges and knobs worthy of a spaceship. “I hope you aren’t expecting any help,” I said.
“No problem,” said Chris. “The route via Johnstown and Altoona is pretty dark, but I’ve handled it plenty of times. You can just sit back and relax.”
“Haha.” I said, cringing. “I’ll be as relaxed as a goalie facing a penalty kick at the World Cup.”
“You’re funny,” said Chris.
Of course, I did not think I was being funny at all. In my mind, I recall wondering: “How high can human blood pressure go?”
*****
Chris pressed several buttons and flipped several switches while I squeezed my tiny armrests. A propeller sprang to life in front of us, and Chris steered the plane slowly towards the lone runway. For a moment, I was comforted by the fact that he appeared to pilot the plane more cautiously than he did his car. But then he thrust a shifter forward, and we lurched ahead with a roar. Before I fully comprehended we were aloft, I saw treetops, houses, and twinkling lights receding like props in a toy train set.
“Wow,” I said, shouting to be heard. “This is amazing!”
“Glad you like it,” shouted Chris, pleased. “Hold tight!”
With a renewed maniacal glint in his eye, he shifted his steering column from side to side, causing the plane to shudder.
“That’s okay, Chris. You can just, kind of, like, go straight,” I said, alarmed.
“Oh, you’re no fun,” he said, but he mercifully straightened us out.
“So,” I asked, relieved, “do you do this often?”
I was hoping the posing of inane questions would take my mind off what I feared was a precarious hold on life.
“I go home most weekends,” said Chris. “But you’re the first friend I’ve brought.”
This information shocked me, since I’d assumed Chris must have had friends closer than I. In fact, I’d never thought of us as “friends” before that day, or even thought of Chris at all outside soccer practice. It occurred to me that I’d never seen Chris on campus except at the soccer field and once or twice in a classroom building. In what dorm did he live? At what table did he eat at the College’s single cafeteria? As if reading my mind, Chris shouted:
“I get pizza most nights, or I just make something in my kitchen.”
“You have a kitchen?” I asked, not knowing anyone but seniors could live off-campus.
“Yep,” he said. “I don’t like dorms, and I don’t like cafeteria food, so I rented an apartment.”
I wondered how this apparent extravagance – car, plane, apartment- squared with Chris’s laundry- and tape-related duties at the locker room. Perhaps, I supposed, he is not “work/study.” But why would anyone choose to handle smelly feet and sweaty towels?
We’re at cruising altitude,” said Chris, after a moment. He pointed to a dial indicating 6,000 feet. At that moment, excruciating pain afflicted my right eye, as though it were being squeezed in a vice.
“My eye!” I shouted.
“Oh, that’s just the pressure. Most people are okay up to 8,000 feet,” said Chris, apparently unconcerned.
“It feels like it’s breaking,” I said, trying not to sound pathetic but also hoping to convey that corrective action needed to be taken, if any were possible. I was sure I was being blinded.
“Hang in there,” he said. “Your sinuses will eventually adjust.”
After several additional minutes of agony, the grip on my eyeball relaxed. It continued to grab intermittently, to a lesser extent, for the remainder of our fifty-minute journey. When we landed at Latrobe, an airport only slightly more elaborate than Carlisle’s, I craved escape from the plane forever. Of course, I was painfully aware we would be flying back several hours later.
Perhaps taking pity on me because of my eye, Chris landed and parked without excitement. We entered the terminal and were greeted first by Chris’s handsome, silver-haired father, who shook my hand and hugged me like a dear friend, then by his mother, who looked like Sophia Loren in a full-length fur coat.
“We’re so glad to meet Chris’s best friend,” she said.
“Yes, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” added Mr. Bettiker. “Chris has told us so much about you.”
I glanced at Chris, who averted his eyes.
“We’ve been telling him to bring his friends to dinner,” he continued, “but he says there are too many to choose from. So you must be really special.”
Mr. Bettiker drove us in a Bentley to the local country club that was festooned as a virtual shrine to Latrobe’s most famous citizen, Arnold Palmer.
“Do you golf?” he asked me when we were seated.
“Not really,” I said, as true then as now. “I play soccer. That’s how I met Chris.”
“Chris plays soccer?” asked his mother.
“No, he works…”
Chris interrupted me: “I met Stuart in economics class. Um, what are the specials tonight?” he asked, turning the conversation to food.
I realized his parents did not know about his job. Perhaps he was ashamed for some reason.
Mr. and Mrs. Bettiker treated me like a visiting dignitary. I recall dinner was delicious. During the course of it, I learned Mr. Bettiker owned a steel company in Pittsburgh and several other businesses. Besides the plane, they had homes in Florida and at the Jersey Shore and had multiple boats in both places.
“You’ll have to join us at the beach next summer,” said Mrs. Bettiker.
After dinner, we drove back to the airport with a short stop at the family mansion. Mr. Bettiker proudly showed me one particular room, a wood-paneled library, which contained more equestrian trophies than books.
“Chris’s sister is a candidate for the Olympic team,” he explained. “We tried to interest Chris in riding, too, but he prefers flying.” I nodded.
*****
The return flight to Carlisle was, happily, not particularly memorable. Apparently, my sinuses had cleared. My mind was adrift with the entire evening, from Chris’s driving, to the flight, to the Bentley, to the luxurious dinner, to Chris’s lie. I didn’t even take economics. I momentarily considered asking Chris about it, but reverted to my default reluctance to discuss anything meaningful. Chris certainly agreed, except to volunteer, at one point, by way of explanation: “My parents don’t know much about me, and that’s how I like it.”
“Just one question,” I ventured. “Since it doesn’t appear you‘re short of money, why do you work at the trainer’s?”
“Well,” began Chris, looking stricken, “I spend a lot of time by myself and volunteering there makes me leave the apartment and do something each day. It sort of keeps me connected.”
“Amazing,” I thought to myself, “Chris is the most isolated person I’ve ever met.” All I said to him, however, was: “That makes sense. Anyway, your parents were really nice.”
“They can be,” he said, hinting at another side.
I was shocked by Chris’s situation. How could a person with so much money appear so unhappy? I’d encountered characters in books and movies that were miserable or lonely despite every advantage. But I hadn’t personally met someone who embodied that situation so starkly as Chris.
After the soccer season ended, I never spoke to Chris again, though I saw him striding across campus once or twice from a distance. While I was no whale in the world of social life, I had other minnows with whom to share a meal or a ballgame or a walk to class. In the rush of college life, I didn’t give additional thought to Chris’s situation. It wasn’t until the following fall, when soccer resumed, and the trainer told me Chris had transferred, that I realized he was gone.
My belated recognition that money and happiness are not always equated wasn’t profound. Most people come to understand that obvious truth, on some level, before the age of eighteen. However, I think my understanding was derived more dramatically than most.
EPILOGUE
Out of curiosity, I recently searched Chris’s (real) name. An unadorned page, posted by the Florida Civil Air Patrol, described a retired commercial pilot, single, living in a fly-in, fly-out community. His time was spent, said the posting, restoring his collection of vintage airplanes. He’d recently received an award from the organization for “Volunteering his time on a daily basis.”
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