Photo by Sohan Shingade on Unsplash
The flyer stepped up to the TSA kiosk, handed over their ID, and politely asked to opt-out of the facial recognition scan. To their mild surprise, they were motioned to the short line at the Pre-Check x-ray machine and body scanner. This was the third flight in a row where they hadn’t been “randomly selected” for additional screening, after seventeen consecutive Secondary Security Screening Selections. Those had ranged from a lackadaisical pat-down and wanding that would have missed a minor arsenal to an invasive search that might have identified any latent reproductive cancers. Most, though, were pretty benign, and they were in the habit of arriving early for flights, so no harm done. It was a relief to contemplate the notion that they might have fallen off whatever list was causing them to get the VIP treatment every damn time.
They detached the laptop bag from the handle of their rolling carry-on and placed both on the conveyor. They wore no belt and had long since transferred their pocket contents to the laptop bag. They passed through the body scanner without incident, retrieved their bags after a short wait, checked the nearest annunciator to be sure there hadn’t been a gate change, and proceeded to their gate.
The gate was busy but not yet crowded. There was still over an hour before boarding would begin. They walked to the nearest bar, also uncrowded, and moved toward an empty stool.
“Hey! There you are!” She was probably in her late forties, close-cropped blonde hair, purple pumps with a bit of a heel, pinstripe slacks and a dark blue blazer over a white blouse. She was thin, deliberately attractive but not showy. Marketing? Executive in a male-dominated business? They definitely didn’t know her, but then spied the look on face of the man who had been seated next to her. Lust and anger and scepticism. They decided to play along.
“Yo! I thought I’d missed you! Let’s grab a table.” They moved off toward an empty table, and they caught the eye of the host with a look that they hoped said “Do you mind? We’ll make it worth your trouble.” The host gave a slight nod.
They both sat. Facing the bar, they saw her former neighbor intrusively gesturing toward a woman half his age a few stools down. “Looks as though he’s already moved on.”
“Thanks for that,” the woman said, “I’m tired and didn’t have the energy. Marian.” and she held out a hand. They took it and shook. “Jo,” they said. Marian didn’t follow up with the expected “with or without an e?”
Small talk. She was an account executive for a Fortune 50 that they’d heard of but couldn’t otherwise identify. They were retired, visiting family around the mainland before returning to their homestead on Hawai’i Island. She looked too impressed, and he had to remind himself for the zillionth time that retiring young to an island estate sounds, to most folks, like far more money than they actually had. Their conversation was interrupted by the safety demonstration; Jo had spent too much time playing heartfelt ballads in bars while patrons chatted on oblivious to even consider not giving the hard-working flight attendants the attention they deserved.
About an hour from their destination, Jo put their e-reader in the seatback pocket, folded their tray table, and began to stand. Marian gently took Jo’s arm. “Don’t. Not today. Not this time. There are the three you figured out, but there are two more.”
“You?” Jo mouthed. Marian gave her head a tiny shake. Jo answered with a wry half-smile and went to the lav.
Marian visibly relaxed a bit when she saw Jo heading back to the seat. “Good choice. Now, I really need to sleep.” Eye mask, over-the-ear noise-canceling headphones, and she appeared dead to the world.
The flight arrived uneventfully. Jo helped Marian get her carry-on down from the overhead compartment. They smiled and nodded at one another companionably, and parted ways.
—2p