My phone pings in my pocket as I wait outside the departure doors for my boss to arrive, sucking in the last threads of fresh-ish air deep into my lungs before the next 48 hours of recycled farts and honeymoon energy. It’s my girlfriend. On the phone.
She’s sending me detailed screenshots of how to crossfade songs in Spotify so my playlists take on a cinematic travel soundtrack function. I can hear she’s been crying in her voice notes. For a moment, I feel entirely unreal in my body and my heart trips over its own feet, panicking that we’d forgotten to pack something important like how to breathe. It swells hard, then pours out through my ankles, which I’ve moved into an anxious semi-sidestep that’s uncomfortable but confirms they are still attached. I have feet after all. If I have feet, I can travel. Good.
First flight. Domestic. I’m in a middle seat but that’s never bothered me as much as it does other people. There’s a pair of new hiking shoes to my right – grey, too tightly laced and embarrassingly new. I guess post-divorce, late 30s- early 20s. Hiking’s a new hobby and it probably won’t stick but he’s trying it on.
To my left is a sensible crossed leg, patient hands and polite family heirloom jewellery that’s expensive but not gaudy. I fight the need to see their faces because it’s hard to get a look at people sitting directly beside you without them knowing that’s exactly what you’re doing.
Left turns her head to take in the oval-eyed view from the window seat. She’s blonde. Wait, grey. Same as Right’s shoes. I wonder if they’ll notice and strike up a conversation, hell, a friendship that lasts for decades! What a story, what symmetry, what a trip! They’ll laugh over wine at their annual catch up, always held close to Christmas but not too close. They’re not maniacs.
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Left’s mask is cotton thin, sagging around her chin and generally reluctant. I want to throw words at her to see if she catches them. Trump? Abortion? The gays? Mask placement + conservative jewellery speak of a lady who values a good mortgage rate over a good time. No judgement here. She’s had more time to figure things out than I have. Maybe in 20 years, I too will have become politically middle seat.
Now, Right is taller than me, which is immediately a problem. I always like to be the tallest in the room and, at 5”11, I often am. Spiritually, at least. Right’s got a harsh chin that’s sloping down towards me writing this in my Notes app.
He’s at the perfect incline to be reading this over my shoulder.
Right now.
As in this very sentence.
Now.
Only one way to tell for sure.
Hi. So, are you reading this?
He doesn’t move in either direction. I go again.
Because I really feel like you are.
Nothing. I breathe in and collapse back into my seat. His head twitches, following my screen ever so slightly. I fucking knew it.
I’m about to do a gentle cull of my recent nudes so you’d better say something quick or -
His elbows suddenly jar forward like something’s bitten him on the small of his back. I keep typing.
Great, well. Can you not? It’s rude. Cheers.
I close my Notes app and wait.
Right flips open his phone-in-a-wallet combination case (black casing, yellow plastic lining, completely hideous) and starts scrolling idly, like this never happened.
Quietly disappointed at the lack of a spectacle/throwdown, I decide to pay it forward and quickly glance over to Left, who’s just peeled open her own phone-in-a-wallet combination case (light brown leather with a peeling gold monogram, old money). She’s flicking through messages sent in a group text named TERRIBLE BLUE BOTTLES.
Terrible. Blue bottles?
I spend the rest of the flight wondering if Left is, in fact, spy. Or if she grew up on the coast and now, at the daring age of slightly-older-than-usual, she’s a champion open water swimmer and this is the chat of her leathery training mates.
Or if the TERRIBLE is a hint and the BLUE BOTTLES is code and this is the secret chat of a group of women who buried a body together in their youth. Occasionally, they get in touch when evidence has to be squashed or dangerous tongues ripped from whispering mouths.
If you think about it, if you had to pick who, on an aeroplane full of people, was guilty of a murder, you’d go straight for Business. They’re keeping themselves comfortable but concealed. Not First, too flashy and reckless, too obvious that they’re splashing their victim’s cash on their final journey away from freedom.
Economy? Maybe, if they were a master of disguise and assimilation. But even then, you’d never suspect 5D. 5D has first boarding group, printed tickets and a disappointing roast dinner cooked by a well-meaning man on arrival energy.
I swell with a sudden respect for the elder fugitive sitting beside me. Well played, Left, well played. You did it.
We land at our first port through thick whorls of rain cloud and altitude streaks. Suddenly, I don’t feel ready to leave the comforting suspense of Middle Seat Murders.
But the seatbelt sign sounds like my phone alarm and I find myself being rushed off in a semi-stampede for the doors, scanning for things still in their wrapper in the Business class detritus.
Nothing.
I look up to see Left disappear around the corner, swallowed by the warm airport.
Under my breath, I make a pledge to the TERRIBLE BLUE BOTTLES and swear on my mother’s grave (but please, spare her) that while I may not be able to take their secret to the grave, it will definitely get as far as Japan.
TN