Somewhere Ten Thousand Feet Above Asia.
Minne and I had did our best to stick together on the
plane but to no avail. The front seats were crammed packed full and the back
ones were almost empty. Minne still wasn't allowed to join me though. It didn't
make sense but when I questioned it I was told that the empty one's were
reserved for people getting on at
Calcutta. Tarom Airlines were in their own inimitable state of chaos yet again as
everybody seemed to have been allotted the wrong seats. Behind me there were a
group of staunch anti-smokers and I remember thinking to myself "you've
got a surprise coming when this baby takes off cos I'm gonna be smoking all the
way to
London". And to top it all off nobody had a clue what was happening or
why we'd been standing on the tarmac for forty-five minutes.
I got up
to go to the toilet, and just as I got back Minne beat me to the mark in
stealing my seat. I usually take one next to the aisle but as there was a
vacant seat in front of the window one I sat there. I knew that once we'd taken
off I could fold the leg obstacle down horizontally and make myself a
comfortable bed for the duration of the journey. Of course you could never do
that on any half decent airline but Tarom were a law unto themselves. With any
communist business or organization I'd found that it was a case of anything
goes, so in the case of the particular airline I was travelling with you could
fold the seats in front of you down if it was vacant. Minne knew that too
though, and when she'd jumped into it like it was the last available seat in
the world I didn't have the heart to move her. Before I had a chance to ask how
it was that she'd came to join me the aeroplane's intercom answered my
question. "Ladies and gentlemen, we have had to move you all to the back
of a the plane because with all the weight at the front we wouldn't have been
able to take off". Now that was a boost for our confidence in the airline.
Any half decent company would have given us a load of bullshit to help put us
at ease, but not Tarom. They just came right out with the truth of the matter
and fuck what we thought.
While we'd
been waiting for the check-in Minne had squashed some of her layers of clothing
into her luggage which on reflection wasn't the best of moves on her part as
Tarom's last chance to getting something right was with it's air conditioning.
Unlike everything else though it was working too good if anything, and whilst
the plane wasn't too cold it certainly wasn't beach temperature. Consequently,
when we'd taken off and finished our first in flight meal, we'd put the back
seat in front of Minne's down, I'd squashed my legs over to her, and we cuddled
up together to keep warm.
From what
I've disclosed to you already in the pages of Comeback
you'll never believe that what happened next was an accident but I swear to you
it was. As I put my arm around her my hand landed firmly onto her breast, and
upon realization of my fortunate mistake I did nothing about it for a few
minutes except think. At that point we hadn't even kissed, so it wouldn't have
looked too good trying to molest her in the middle of a plane full of people.
Sensing that she was still awake the indecision was driving me crazy. I had to
do something soon and do it with conviction, so in the end I pretended to toss
and turn in my sleep, making sure to move my hand around at the same time.
Casually I brought myself back to life and started stroking through the layers
of clothes. Slowly moving from one mound to the other I was making it obvious
that I knew what I was doing but at the same time ensuring that I wasn't too
rough. She didn't stir, or say anything, or give any recognition of what was
happening until my hand slipped down to her waist. As I grappled with her two
shirts and jumper I tried to dislodge them from the grip of her trousers but they
were stuck. The tails were fast under the weight of her body, and I was just
about to give it all up when she raised her middle. Gently pulling at the
clothing I felt the bareness of her skin for the first time as my hand rose up
to cup the shaping of her bra. She was a lot bigger and firmer than she'd
looked under the clothes and as I unclipped the last remaining obstacle and
slipped my hand inside she showed the first real signs of acceptance.
"Mmmm".
She didn't say anything else as she turned to me, but we still didn't kiss. It
reminded me of the film Pretty Woman, the bit where the two ladies of the night
were talking and the one said to the other "don't kiss him on the lips, if
you do it's the end". Even without the lip contact though she still seemed
to be enjoying it as we explored one another's bodies on our way to
Calcutta.
Calcutta was a pain in the arse as we
weren't allowed off the plane but still had to stop there to refuel. If Tarom
had used proper forms of transport like B.A. or any other half decent airline
there wouldn't have been the need to stop there at all but Tarom's not like any
other airline, except Aeroflot maybe. Minne had told me that they were as bad,
if not worse. "You have to take your own food on some of the planes" she
joked, but from what I'd seen of the Eastern Block I could easily believe it.
The so
called passengers that we picked up in
Calcutta amounted to the
grand total of five and when one middle aged lady boarded she made a total
mockery of the hand luggage ruling. She staggered to the back of the plane with
a full sized suitcase and then returned to the front. A few minutes later she
reappeared with a twenty-six inch television set in her arms.....and then
another.....and another, and to top it off she finished by putting a cardboard
box that had been punched full of air holes into the rack above her seat.
After the
plane had taken off it didn't take Minne and I long to get back into our
lustful contortions and in no time at all we'd forgotten about the events of
Calcutta. It wasn't until
we were well into the flight to
Abu Dhabi that the plane was
again jogged into a state of absolute lunacy. The Indian woman in a moment of
infinite wisdom had decided to check on the contents of the cardboard box and
as she lifted the corner to look inside three birds got out. There we were, ten
thousand feet up in the air and birds were flying around us. People ducked and
screamed, and hid in the toilet and chased, and did all sorts of things that
they wouldn't normally do on a plane. Minne and I had the best idea though. We
laughed. Not smiled, but uncontrollably laughed until the stewardess had caught
the last one in her coat. And as the box was re-opened to entrap the last
remaining bird the whole episode started again.
By then
Minne and I were absolutely roaring with laughter and everybody else thought
that we were crazy. Even after it had all blown over and we got off the plane
at
Abu Dhabi I thought of it as
I looked at the customs man and started giggling again. Of course Minne knew
exactly what was going through my mind so she followed suit and we again went
into raptures of uncontrollable insanity.
Still with
the tears in our eyes we went to the cafeteria and had a few drinks. Minne
really was a little gold mine in every conceivable way. She had money, good
looks, a natural ability to speak my language, a great sense of humour and a
better than average body that she didn't mind sharing. I'm an amenable kind of
chap when it comes to things like that though, so if she wanted to put it about
a bit then who was I to spoil her fun?
It was
about an hour after our next take off and while we were again up to no good
that I whispered in her ear "have you ever made love in a plane"?
"Yes, let's wait until we get to
Bucharest and do it in a cardboard
box". Damn, I was more than overdue in renewing my subscription to the
mile high club and I don't know what there was about it, but somehow the
thought of a box in
Rumania's only
international airport didn't have the same appeal. The last part of her
statement was nothing more than a joke on her part as like me she'd been to
Bucharest before and we both
knew that the only amenities in that god forsaken airport would be a box if we
could find one.
We
eventually tried to get some sleep but had too many things on our minds. We
were spending too much damn time on that plane so maybe we'd look for a box in
Rumania after all. I had a
five hour stopover and Minne a seven so who knows, there was no telling what
kind of fun we could get up to when we touched down.
"In
ten minutes we will be arriving at
Bucharest's
Otopeni
Airport. It is five fifteen a.m. local time, the temperature is three below
zero, and it is snowing". In a mixture of Rumanian, English and various
other European languages everybody said "ooh", but there were few of
the lesser educated passengers who substituted it with "for fuck's
sake". There were people on the plane who were still dressed in shorts and
even Minne with her many skins wasn't prepared for what was to follow.
The
thought of making love at Otopeni was the furthest thing from our minds as we
plodded arm in arm through the snow. Admittedly I'd noticed on my previous
visit what a complete shithouse the airport was, but when it's three below zero
you notice a hell of a lot more. There was no heating or facilities for the
unexpected weather like had just arrived, All around the building the windows
had been smashed and we were made to stand in a queue where one of the staff
took up to ten minutes on each person just to give them a stamp on their
passports while the rest of its employees stood around doing sweet fuck all.
I noticed
that on the first floor there was a restaurant that had some seats so I held a
few while Minne tried to rearrange her flight. There was one to
Amsterdam at nine, and if
she could get on that she'd be able to take the train down to her hometown of
Borwem. She didn't mind all the extra travelling as long as she could get out
of the cold. I couldn't say that I blamed her after she'd spent three days in
similar conditions in
Moscow. If I was in her
position I would have did the same but under the circumstances I was doomed to
freeze my bollocks off.
When the
cafeteria opened Minne had asked for a glass of water but the airline staff had
insisted that she'd have to pay for something. As a result she'd came back with
two bottles of red wine and those same two bottles later and another two had
arrived on the table. Good god, it was only seven-thirty in the morning and we
were acting like a couple of lushes. It wasn't only us though. Everybody else
seemed to have the same idea. So there we were, the entire human displacement
of flight three five eight and all getting pissed together. I don't know if the
drink had warmed the cockles of our hearts or what but despite the cold we
still managed to laugh as we looked at all the birds in the departures lounge
and thought about the plane.
Minne went up for another bottle of wine and as
she got back one of the airport staff addressed her. "You can get on the
plane but you have to come now". Her suitcases were in transit for
Antwerp but she didn't
care. All that she wanted to do was leave. Looking me straight in the face
there was a hint of sorrow in her eyes. The laughter had stopped. Reaching up
she kissed me for the first time, and then she was gone.