Elgin brought the plane to cruising altitude. The hard part is over until she has to nurse it back down. The co-pilot is bent over his meal to keep crumbs off his uniform trousers. They are already shiny with grease from his hands and age. Her own trousers are sharply pressed. She bought them two months ago, though the old ones would have done until retirement.
The co-pilot is one of the boys and doesn’t care what anyone thinks. He thinks he’s casual, easygoing. A good laugh.
His belly sits on top of his belt buckle. He’s retiring too, but he’s not looking forward to it. No more trips out East where company can be had cheaply. He has a flat in the centre of London. Elgin has seen it in photos of parties with other pilots. All men. Elgin has a house in the country. Small, but there’s some garden around it. She was glad to get it. Every time she went on maternity leave, a huge bite was taken out of her pay, out of her bonus hours. She had to fight to get as high as First Officer. By the time she had paid back the training fees, the youngest had finished college. Free as a bird at last.
“What’ll you do?” The co-pilot means: when we land in Peking. He’s just making conversation, he has no intention of inviting her along to whatever it is he has planned. He wants her to answer quickly so he can tell her about it.
She knows already. Not the details, but it’s “off to a club, then a massage, then an old girlfriend or two.” The word girlfriend stressed to put quotes around it. Girlfriend, you know what I mean?
She has an image of one of his abandoned “girlfriends” and feels depressed.
“Read,” she says.
He scoffs. “Well.…” He tells her everything. She’s not listening but can tick the keywords off on her fingers.
His name is Horn. His surname. He’s an easy-going bloke, but don’t make the obvious joke about his name. He doesn’t like that.
The stewardesses call him Captain By. As in “Horn by name, horn by nature.” As far as Elgin can tell he doesn’t mind, because he thinks that’s the Captain in Mutiny on the Bounty.
“What’s the last book you read?” she asks, when he finally shuts up.
“Don’t have time.”
A Mr Men book? That’s unfair. He had to read in school. Lord of the Flies, perhaps.
She can’t help a glance at his lap. The bulge of the zip pokes up—barely—between belt buckle and thighs, dusted by the crumbs of his meal.
Of course he notices that.
And of course he misunderstands it.
But he doesn’t say anything. He’s not going to risk his pension for her in these hysterical #MeToo times. But she can feel satisfaction emanating from his overfed body.
***
They stand at the door of the cabin to say goodbye to the passengers. As far away from each other as they can in the small cramped space. The humidity of Peking, leaking into the disembarkation bridge, is shocking.
Then the plane is empty, and it’s time to leave.
“Bye,” she says. A question.
“Bye,” he confirms.
