Fly, Phyllis, Fly!

Phyllis looked down the aisle at the faces. About fifty, she reckoned.

Good, not too many. I’ll soon get through that lot! And just as well because she’d forgotten to go to the toilet before she started and suddenly, it was “ARM DOORS AND CROSSCHECK.” Then they were up and off.

Thank the lord I don’t have to do that stupid arm waving any more, she mused as she listened to the recorded instructions that were generally being ignored. 'Pretending to blow into that life vest! It made me look so stupid. Anyway, I still think they should pack parachutes for everyone. Now that’s a lot more sense! Why don’t they do that? Givin’ them all floatation jackets is as bad as givin’ parachutes to sailors! Yeah! We betta hope the day we crash it’s not over land, like today, doing the Miami to Los Angeles route. All overland. Right lotta good them lifejackets gunna do us then! Ha! Some man thought of that.'

The flight levelled out and there was a general unclicking of seatbelts as the crew got ready bring out the first refreshments. Phyllis stacked the coffee jug on the trolley and started off down the aisle.

“What you want to drink, Honey?” she smiled at the first passengers. Time flew as she filled coffee and tea cups, poured Coca Cola, orange juice and wine.

“What you want, Honey? You want a wine?”

“Yes, I’ll have a red wine, thanks.”

Austrail’n, Phyllis thought. Everyone else would say, ‘red wine, please’. Still, she’s a nice lady. Polite. Polite costs nothing, but it’s sure worth plenty. “There you go Honey. Now you sir, what can I get you?” Phyllis smiled at the husband.

“What’ve you got?”

Phyllis’s smile disappeared and her eyebrows shot skywards. What, am I invisible, pushin’ this cart down the aisle? Don’t that man know what I’m here for? She flapped a menu onto his lap. “You go’ne look at that an’ I’ll be back in a moment!” She huffed over to the next passengers, “Yes Ma’am, what can I serve you?”

“You’ve been told,” the wife hissed at the husband. “And don’t you forget it!” He looked shocked but obediently scanned the menu.

“You chose yet?” Phyllis was back with her best attitude on display: head cocked, hand on hip, eyebrows raised.

“Yes, I’ll have a coffee.”

“How d’you want that?”

“Errrr?”

“Strong, black, white, half n half?” Phyllis’s immaculately manicured fingernails were tapping but she wore the indulgent look that she had used for her children, knowing that they’d come good one day. “Your wife, now she’s a lady what knows what she wants. Yes!”

“Half and half. That’s coffee that’s half coffee and half milk?”

“Yessir!” Phyllis rewarded him with a big bubble of a smile that overflowed her face and spread up into her hairline. She did a little twostep of delight and handed him his coffee. She moved on, “Hi Honey, can I get you a glass of wine?”

Everyone settled down to drink and nibble and search for the things that had automatically slipped and hidden down the bottom of bags now that the flight was underway and they would be needed.

“I know I packed it. I know I put it in here! I put it right near the top so’s I could use it on the flight!” the Australian woman was frantically looking through her handbag, piling bits and pieces onto her tray-table as she rummaged.

The husband stood, blocking the aisle handing down the next bag for her to delve through. Phyllis waited patiently; after all, she wasn’t going anywhere for the next few hours. “Oh, sorry,” he said and moved into the seat space for her to slip by. It was still a bit of a squeeze as they were both packing some extra weight.

“What are you looking for?” she heard him ask, but by the time the woman answered, Phyllis was back in the service area and took the opportunity to slip into the toilet.

“Oh, my good lord, will you look at my hair!” Phyllis wetted her hands and patted, smoothed and teased wiry strands of grey back into the tight bun that sat like a gun turret at the crown of her head. She left the toilet and bumped into Peggy who was unstacking dirty trays from the cart. “Honey, you have nice hair, what do you recommend?” Phyllis demanded of her friend.

“That you have parents with nice hair and make sure you get the gene!” Peggy laughed. “In the meantime, I rub a coconut oil onto my palms and smooth that on. Try that.”

“I tried it once. I jus’ smelled like a pina colada an’ looked like a coconut!” Phyllis moaned.

“Never mind. By the way, jus’ you keep a lookout for the Honeymooners in row fourteen. Man, is he impatient!”

“Whaaaa?”

“Listen. It’s warm in here, not cold. But they got the blankees out already! Don’ you tell me he’s all snuggled up outta consideration!” The two stewards peered around the curtain and down the aisle but couldn’t see anything. “Still, so long as those blankees don’ go humpety I’m gon’ mind my own biz-ness!” Peggy sniffed.

Terri pushed her trolley into position and joined the conversation.

“Honeymooners, huh? Lucky you. I’ll swap. In seat 26A – I have The Quee-een!” Terri did a mock curtsy as the others looked on in sympathy. Phyllis would have stretched Quee-ee-een to three syllables, added a flick of the wrist and a roll of the eyes, but Terri held herself back.

‘The Queen’, was code for a woman who treated her server like a servant.

“She was all, ‘I’ll have one of those and give me a drink and while you are there, can you take my meals order. I want to be sure I get the fish, not the meat’,” added Terri.

“Honey, jus’ you ignore her. There’s one of her on ev’ry flight. You say the word and I’ll curse her an’ her bags done end up in New Jersey!” Phyllis flung her head back and laughed; cheeks shining, feet stamping, she was the whole bagful of humor.

“No, don’t worry, I’ve got a plan. If there’s a flight problem, I’ll just direct her to the wrong exit! Not a good idea to be rude to your cabin crew, lady!”

“You go, girl!” Peggy encouraged her with a wink. Terri had just moved up from Seattle after her divorce and was having a hard time settling in. She tended to stay quietly on the edge of a conversation, so this was a welcome change and the other two enjoyed the opportunity to joke with her.

When she had first joined the crew, Phyllis and Peggy learned that Terri’s divorce had rocked her. Phyllis promptly offered her the loan of her own husband. “Not that he’s much good to me, mind. But you is sure welcome to borrow him.” And then she added, “Fifteen years and I still have to remind him to put the rubbish bins out ev’ry Wednesday. One day I’m gunna put him out with the rubbish bins, myself! Lordy lord, what a man…!” and she rolled her eyes in despair.

The Australian man appeared in the service section. “Excuse me, ladies?”

“Yes sir, what can I get you?” Phyllis drew herself up to her full imposing five feet one and a half inches and stared him down. Terri admired how Phyllis could make a question sound like a command and hoped that one day she’d be able to do it, too.

“Could I have another coffee? Half and half? Is that right?”

“Sure Honey, I’ll do that for you. How come you don’t know what half an’ half is? What you call that in Austrail’a?”

“Er, well, we have all sorts, but we don’t call it half and half.”

“I’ll get you that. You go back to your seat and I’ll be right down. I’m go'ne ask your wife. She knows stuff. I bet she heard of half an’ half.”

Stewart arrived. Stewart the steward. “Just letting you know, ladies, I’ve moved the nice man from 32B into 26B. He didn’t want to sit next to the toilets, bless him. I don’t blame him, either. Worst seat on the plane.”

“You put him in 26B?” queried Terri. “He’s gone from beside the throne to beside the queen! He might ask to be moved back, in a while.” Stewart didn’t answer. He was wary of queen jokes. He walked off to make sure everyone was settled and to collect any remaining rubbish. His aisle was always the cleanest aisle.

Phyllis carried the coffee to the Australian.

“Thank you.”

“Ooh! Could I have one of those? Four sugars for me.”

“Yes ma’am. Four sugars? That’s all?”

“Yes, I’m a sugaraholic!” the Australian woman replied in high humour. She’d obviously had this conversation before.

“Tell me, Honey. You don’ have half an’ half coffee in Austrail’a? So what do you have?” Phyllis was curious to find out how the natives coped without real coffee.

“Ummm, we have cappuccino, or latte…” the woman frowned with concentration.

“Macchiato, long black, short black, espresso…” the husband added.

“I usually have a latte. That means milky, so I guess that’s like your half and half.”

“Tell you what, next time you’re in Melbourne, give me a call and I’ll take you out for a coffee and you can find out for yourself,” the Australian man offered.

“I’ll do that fo’ sure!” Phyllis laughed and walked off to fetch the woman’s coffee. “I jus’ been invited out for coffee,” she told Peggy as she mechanically reached high on tiptoe for a cup.

“Noooo shit! You not goin’?”

“I don’ think so. It’s in Austrail’a so that’s not gone happen. Still… Whiles I’m makin’ coffee, do you want one?”

“Sure. Black. Long. Skinny. Jus’ like me!” Peggy joked.

The two women had been friends for as long as they could remember but were an odd couple. Phyllis was a ball of emotion and she rolled with humour but had ‘Don’t Mess With Me’ virtually tattooed across her forehead. Peggy was tall and thin; her idol since high school had been Naomi Campbell and she thought it unfair that Naomi wouldn’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 a day while Peggy had to get up at 4am most mornings to make the early flight and serve coffee.

There was a surprise waiting for Phyllis when she returned to the Australian couple.

“Here’s your sugar, Honey. I put some coffee with it.”

“Thanks,” the woman replied with a smile. Phyllis decided she liked her. In Phyllis’s world there were two sorts of people, Nice or Stupid. If you weren’t nice, you were jus’ plain stupid an’ weren’t worth bothering with. It had been a philosophy that had worked for her through life.

“Here, take this.” The woman offered up a business card. “It’s my card but he’s put his number on the back. You give us a call if you ever get to Australia and we’ll take you out for a coffee. No worries!”

That was nice. People seldom made good on their promises. Phyllis was sure she wasn’t going to go to Austrail’a for a cup of coffee, but it was nice to be asked. “Lookee here,” she told Peggy. “I did get invited out for real!” and she handed up the card as proof.

Peggy politely took the card and read it. “Hoo-eee! She’s a writer. Did you see?”

Phyllis snatched the card back and read it. “Do you think she’s someone famous? Do you think she might put me in a story?” Phyllis’s eyes danced at the thought. She charged back down the aisle with Peggy close behind.

“Is you a writer?” she demanded. The Australian woman nodded whilst sipping her syrupy coffee. “Can you write a story about me? Can you put me in a story?”

The woman was bemused. “Umm, yes. I can do that. Why not?” Phyllis did the whole puppy dance right there in the aisle. She was emotion in motion.

Peggy leaned over. “What about me? Can I be in it, too?”

“Absolutely,” the woman shrugged. The two stewards skipped back down the aisle to get ready for the landing. They were busy for the next half hour, clearing away the last cups, plates and rubbish. The Honeymooners relinquished their blanket. The lady in 26A was having a lively discussion with the man in 26B as they argued about the airline service.

“Please prepare for landing,” Terri advised them.

“Oh, I had better get back to my original seat,” the man muttered and shot back to belt himself into 32B.

“CABIN CREW, PREPARE FOR LANDING.”

Phyllis and Peggy sat opposite each other and belted up. Neither spoke. Phyllis looked out of the window as the early morning smog rose over L.A. Pink edged clouds settled into a dark grey streak across the silhouetted city skyline. Another lovely day in Paradise, she snorted. She deliberately didn’t think about the Austrail’n woman. Who could possibly think that she was important enough to have a story written about her? What was I thinking? she wondered as the thought intruded where it wasn’t welcome. Never mind. It ain’t gone happen an’ that’s that.

The plane landed with the tiniest bump onto the tarmac and the crew all lined up to thank everybody for flying American Airlines and Have a Safe Journey!

Bit late to wish them that, thought Phyllis as she waved and smiled. Oh, here come the Austrail’n couple. Embarrassment! Jus’ wave an’ smile, Phyllis, wave an’ smile.

The woman had her phone out. She took photos. “Check out the website. Give me two weeks.” She smiled, waved, stuffed her phone into her handbag and walked off to catch her flight home.

“Do you reckon she’ll do it?” hissed Peggy.

“Prob’ly not. Folks say all sortsa stuff! Don’ pay them no never mind.” Phyllis waved and smiled even harder to hide what she was sure would be disappointment. But deep down inside, a few brain cells below the gun-turret hair bun made a note to check out the website. Jus’ in case.