From Charlotte
I once had to miss a college class for a work thing. My professor excused me, but the price was a story. I gave him this.
“The best part of not flying first class,” she says into the cell phone, “is you don’t have to get all dressed up. Nobody cares what you look like when you’re flying cattle-class.”
Her name is Anna. She is taking an early morning flight from Charlotte to Chicago Midway and then on to L.A.
She arrived at the gate with only a couple of bags — a carry-on and a briefcase. She appears to be in her mid-twenties, but has the manner of a well-seasoned traveler.
She is pretty, but her eyes are tired. Her face is slightly pale and her dark brown hair still damp from a quick morning shower. Her nose turns up slightly, pulling her upper lip gently as she spoke. She is wearing tan corduroy pants with a slight flair that covers the tan suede work boots that seem heavy for her slim legs.
She crosses her legs deliberately, and began again.
“Did I get any mail today?” she asks hesitantly, hoping for an answer that she did not get. “Really? That’s why I asked you to go to the post office. I’m expecting a check… a really big…”
Her part of the conversation is interrupted and she crosses her legs again, right over left. She is silent for several minutes.
“Omigod, I am soooo hungry…I need to lose 10 pounds,” she chirps in an adolescent tone. “No, I can’t eat…. Are you saying I’m fat? My butt is so not big.”
“You’re an ass.”
She is silent for a few minutes. She crosses her legs slowly, pulling her left leg tight against her right, flexing her thigh and relaxing slowly.
The gate is filling with people and noise as the flight nears its boarding time. Just then, another passenger squeezes himself into a seat across from her. He opens a box he is cradling and the smell of hot cinnamon wafts through the gate.
“You are not going to believe this….. some guy just sat down across from me with a cinnamon roll…. It smells sooooo good.”
“I can’t do that??!!?” she squeals into the phone. She crosses her legs, right over left, and begins swinging her foot. Her lips dance a repressed smile as her eyes shine mischievously.
“Oh, sure… excuse me sir.. could I have a bite of your cinnamon roll?” she mocks into the phone in a muffled voice. “Like that would work…”
Her legs cross again, left over right. She stretches her dangling foot, pointing her toes into the air and cocks her head to admire the extension. The man with the cinnamon roll stops eating and looks as well. He would have shared had she asked.
“I’m expecting a check… no, it’s a really big check,” she begins again. “It’s the security deposit on my old place.. it’s coming in the mail.”
The voice on the other end of the phone seemingly does not acknowledge her. She lowers her voice and crosses her legs, right over left.
“I’ve decided what I want to do with the money,” she says timidly.
There is a slight pause.
“I want a big TV.” Another slight pause. “I researched them… I’ll get a Sony or Sharp or Pioneer… No, I wouldn’t do that… why do you say that?… I have researched them…”
She crosses her legs deliberately, left over right, pulling them close together.
“You always do that..snap at me,” she says into the phone, wounded but poised to fight.
There is a long pause as her eyes look down to her lap. She pulls slightly at her t-shirt beneath her leather jacket, smoothing out the wrinkles over her navel. Her hand flicks away some lint on her hip. She grips the top part of her thigh, ironing out the coarse fabric of her slacks to her knee. She tilts her head and pivots her leg to look at the outside of her knee.
She crosses her legs slowly, right over left, swinging her foot gently in an arc, pointing her toes to the ceiling, then letting the weight of the boot pull her leg to rest against the other. Her eyes wander the rows of seats across her, now full of people and their luggage.
“You should come out with me next time,” she says tentatively, her eyes still roaming the seats.
“If you plan it, it’s not spontaneous,” she asserts. Then in an awkward, almost forced laugh, she says, “That’s funny! I’m going to put that up on my Web page!”
She is laughing, but her eyes did not dance as they had before. The man with the cinnamon roll was finishing up, licking icing off his fingers. He turns his massive frame around in the seat, looking for the nearest trash. His sides remain clamped to the chair arms and he heaves himself up, waddling off to the trash, the hem of his torn and stained jeans dragging under his tennis shoes.
She crosses her legs again, left over right.
ATTENTION AIRLINE PASSENGERS FLIGHT 3441 TO CHICAGO MIDWAY… the loudspeaker roars overhead. She looks up from her lap.
She lowers her voice and speaks into the cell phone, in muffled tones. After a few minutes, a tone sounds and the flip lid clicks shut.
She uncrosses her legs, stretches them as she sits and pushes herself up from the seat. She walks slowly toward the gate counter, stretching as she does. Her t-shirt pulls up from her waist as her slacks pull down slightly to reveal a flat, supple navel with a small belly-button. The light catches the glint of jewelry.
She turns around at the waist, her arms crooked behind her neck and glances at her bags still at her seat. Her eyes meet the cinnamon roll man and he quickly looks away.
She pulls her arms down to her side and sighs slightly.
ATTENTION AIRLINE PASSENGERS FLIGHT 3441 TO CHICAGO MIDWAY… NOW BOARDING ROWS 20 AND HIGHER….
She walks deliberately back to her seat and gathers up her bags, as she had rehearsed so many times before. She slings the briefcase over her shoulder and extends the handle to the carry-on. It locks in place.
She takes one sweeping glance around her seat. Satisfied she has all her belongings, she marches toward the line of passengers now boarding the plane.