It was hot in the shop. It was after six on a summer Friday night and we'd driven to Lakeland, Florida, to talk to Mike about a new interior for the Cheyenne. Our interior was original and we liked the seats, but the carpet and drapes were well past their life expectancy. When the airplane was built, Jimmy Carter was president. And, to tell the truth, the seats were pretty rough once you pictured them sitting in a fine vessel of new carpet and headliner. So we were thinking of doing the seats, and I was just beginning to suspect that this might lead to new cabinetry when the phone rang.
My wife and I had liked Mike immediately. He'd been recommended by our mechanic, Turley, and he had a nice, patient way with us. He didn't press about the seats, he just sort of let us come to our own conclusion about the need to bite the bullet and buy some leather. Mike's in his mid forties, compact and soft spoken. He looks you in the eye.
We were skittish, though. We'd done an interior on our Cessna 340 years ago and had been disappointed. The seats looked tired just a few months after we did them, and no amount of leather care seemed to help. So we were being tough on Mike when he was pulled away to answer the phone.
The shop was in a hangar with an outfit that prepares general aviation airplanes to go long distances so as to take up residence in far away countries. While they install extra fuel tanks, Mike works in one bay in the hangar and out of a small shop with an even smaller air conditioner. The shop smells powerfully of paint, varnish and glue.
We looked around at a few seats he was recovering for a Cessna 414. They were beautiful. The 414's cabinets were being sanded and refinished. They glistened. Turns out that those really slick interiors you sometimes see on the ramp in fancy jets often involve plastic pieces that look like wood. Mike was doing the real thing here.
I gradually became aware that the phone call was personal, not business, and that it was serious. I heard Mike try several times to cut the conversation short as he was aware that we were waiting. "I'll call you back soon," he said.
Then he said, "I love you, too."
When Mike approached us, I could see tears forming at the corners of his eyes. "I'm sorry about the interruption," he said. "Let's look at some different types of leather and different colors. You don't want anything too light or too dark."
"I couldn't help but overhear you," I said. "Is there some trouble?"
"My folks live in North Carolina and that was my dad. My mom let the dogs out and a fence gate hit her on her right side and she's been hurting. They took her to a doctor today and they did a CAT scan and she has a liver tumor, a big one."
