She would have preferred them in the back. She considered asking. She saw the father look at the back seats too, and then at his son, and then decide something.
"He likes to see where we've been," the father said to no one in particular, settling the boy into the seat opposite Celeste. "Riding backwards. Doesn't make him sick. It's the other way around makes him sick." He buckled the boy's lap belt, checked it, checked it again. Then he looked across at Celeste and put out his hand. "Marcus Hale."
She shook it because there was no way not to. His palm was rough and very warm. "Celeste."
"And this is Theo."
The boy was looking out the window at the wing. He had put the blue folder flat on his knees and both hands flat on top of the folder.
"Hello, Theo," Celeste said, in the voice she used for the children of board members at summer parties.
Theo did not look at her or answer. His thumb found the edge of the Velcro tab and pressed it, gently, sealing it.
The door came up. Dana leaned back through the cockpit opening to give the safety briefing: belts, oxygen, the exit over the wing, the fire extinguisher under the front seat. Through the opening Celeste could see the back of the captain's head, gray hair cut very short, a headset, a big hand moving across a panel of switches. He didn't turn around.
"Captain Ferris says welcome aboard," Dana said. "And Theo, he says he's going to need you on the checklist for descent, so stay sharp."
Theo said, to the window, "Descent checklist. Seat belts. Seat backs. Approach briefing. Altimeter."
"That's my guy," Dana said, and pulled the cockpit curtain most of the way closed behind her.
The engines came up. The cabin filled with a sound like the inside of a seashell. They taxied out through the rain, turned, held for a moment at the end of the runway, and then the jet leaned forward and ran, and the ground fell away beneath them, and they were climbing into a gray so thick it pressed against the windows like wool.