‘Everyone for the Corfu flight, you must wait here!’ It was a tall, dark-haired man shouting this instruction. ‘We wait until everyone has left the plane and then we go through the airport together.’
Becky looked to Elias then. ‘This isn’t good news, is it?’
‘We are only going to be as fast as the slowest person,’ Elias replied.
Becky turned around, sizing up who was left coming up the tunnel from their aircraft. A couple in their forties looked like they would be capable of putting a shift on to reach the gate. Two twenty-something lads might have giant backpacks that probably should have been checked luggage, but Becky reckoned they could motor if required – they were already in shorts and trainers. But then she watched them move to the ambassador who seemed to be collating passengers for the Santorini flight. And then it all went downhill. A family of six with two toddlers walking – barely – and two babes in arms, together with a pram and a buggy the male of the party was trying to put together while moving. Behind them were a man and woman possibly in their seventies, each with a walking stick. If either of those passengers were destined for Corfu, they were screwed in the hurrying stakes…
Becky watched Elias take his phone from the pocket of his jacket. Yes, she was sweating like a huskie in Dubai and the estate agent was still wearing a suit.
‘What are you doing? We should definitely try to head to the gate.’ Petra had come across as resourceful. She had survived Thailand – if those dodgy-spelt wristbands were genuine – and lived to get the T-shirt. She’d be fine. And it wasn’t Becky’s job to sister someone who wasn’t her sister… Old habits apparently took longer than a week to get over.
‘Now you want to go?’ Elias asked, tapping at the screen.
‘You basically said if we don’t then we won’t get the plane.’ She let out a breath. ‘I need to get the plane.’ She didn’t know quite what she did next if she didn’t get the plane…
‘OK,’ Elias said, putting his phone away again. ‘But you need to let me do the talking.’
‘Hello!’
It was Petra, arriving at Becky’s shoulder, her braids now immaculately pinned into a tight bun that looked like it had been wound into place by an Oribe style team.
‘You’re here,’ Becky announced with a degree too much familiarity. ‘I mean… I didn’t see you get off the plane.’
‘Well, I was doing my hair,’ Petra said, pointing two fingers at her braids. ‘No point rushing off when we’re pretty much screwed for the next flight.’
‘Do you think?’ Becky asked, back to panicking again.
‘Oh yeah,’ Petra said with all the nonchalance of a seasoned backpacker. ‘There’s no way we’re getting that plane.’
‘Well,’ Becky said, swallowing her fear, ‘Elias is going to try and talk to the ambassador.’
‘Whoa!’ Petra said, slapping a hand down on Becky’s sweaty forearm. ‘Is that your plane hook-up?’ She was gripping Becky tightly now, gaze trained on Elias’s form. He seemed to be having an animated discussion with the airline representative that involved using his hands, arms and sunglasses for gesturing purposes.
‘My what?’ Becky asked.
‘My plane hook-up was Marathon and he kissed like a viper… you know… light, playful tongue at first but then desperate to poke the point home.’ Petra sniffed. ‘He’s heading to Santorini. I’m going there, obvs, but in a few weeks, you know, after I’m completely done with Corfu.’
Becky swallowed. Petra made Corfu sound like a temporarily desirable dessert she intended to ingest until she felt sick. And as for Marathon… that couldn’t have been his real name, could it?
‘So, how does your guy kiss?’ Petra asked, simultaneously pushing the straps of Hazel’s bag further up Becky’s arm then linking their arms together like they were about to commence skipping to the next gate.
‘Oh… he’s not… I don’t know him… I mean… he’s an estate agent.’ Becky stopped talking before she said another word about her fake occupation. And although Hazel had mentioned single men on cruises, no one, not even Shelley, had mentioned ‘plane hook-ups’. Perhaps there would be a chapter on it in How to Find the Love of Your Life or Die Trying.
‘So, he’s single and you’re not interested?’ Petra began fiddling with the bottom of her Nobody’s Foo T-shirt.
‘I… don’t know that he’s single.’ She just knew that he was an estate agent, his name was Elias and he liked it cold. How pathetic must she seem? Almost four hours in a confined space and she only knew his name and occupation. Except everyone she had spoken to had warned her about sharing too much with strangers. ‘I just sat next to him on the plane.’
‘And you didn’t even think about joining the Mile-High Club?!’
Becky looked at Petra’s T-shirt. It was now tied in a knot at her navel, the fabric tighter across her boobs and the weave of the material flush against her perfect figure.
‘Well,’ Petra said pulling a ChapStick out of the pocket of her skinny jeans, ‘if you’re not interested and he’s on our next flight, I wouldn’t mind a few minutes in the toilet with him.’ She sighed, applying ChapStick to her eyebrows as well as her lips. ‘I’ve nearly mastered wedging my arse between the tap and the hand towel dispenser. Although I’m sure the cubicles on Jetstar Asia are a few inches smaller than any other plane manufactured.’
Becky had no words. And then Elias returned, the expression on his face telling her all she needed to know.
‘He is insisting we travel through the airport as a group,’ Elias said with a sigh of frustration.
‘Then we’re fucked,’ Petra announced. She stuck her hand out. ‘Hi. I’m Petra. Are you single?’
And, just like that, Becky realised she had much more to learn about world exploration than what was written in any Marco Polo guide.
Eleven
‘Does it say anything on your app?’
Becky was out of breath, but not too out of breath to ask Elias the same question she had been asking him intermittently since they had finally managed to get through passport control – snail-pace slow. Whenever a flight of stairs was encountered, the couple with walking sticks and the family with buggies all had to use lifts. This meant those not incapacitated rushed down the steps only to wait for the lift to deliver the remainder of their party an age afterwards. And no amount of trying to break ahead of the group seemed to be acceptable to their airline ambassador.
‘Nothing,’ Elias responded.
‘He didn’t look,’ Petra announced. ‘You didn’t look.’
‘There is no point in looking,’ Elias insisted. ‘We have to get through security first and then get to the gate.’
‘There is a point. It might say they are holding the plane until a certain time and then we will have something to work to.’ Petra readjusted her backpack. ‘This one time, in Bangladesh, the pilot was actually sat on the tarmac eating panta bhat when we rocked up. We got on the plane and he finished his lunch before he got back on and flew us.’