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.