she walked past, carefully stowing her travel documents into a sleek little handbag that wouldn’t have held a quarter of Leonie’s cosmetic junk, Leonie noticed that the Saluki Woman had pink varnished nails which had been bitten down to the stubs. She looked resolutely ahead, as if she knew the entire queue had heard the argument and was terrified of making eye contact with anyone. Definitely not keen on holidaying with the parents, Leonie decided.
The queue shuffled forward and, with nobody interesting to gaze at, Leonie toyed with the idea of skipping off and driving home. Nobody would have to know: well, her mother would, because that would be her first port of call, to take her beloved Penny and the animals home. But nobody else had to know.
Meaning Anita. Safely on the way to West Cork, Anita wouldn’t be in Wicklow for another three weeks and would remain oblivious that her flamboyant, outwardly dauntless, divorced forty-two-year-old friend had cried off from her first single holiday ever because of fear of flying.
‘I’m going to the loo. I won’t be long,’ said a soft female voice behind her.
‘I’ll miss you,’ answered a male voice.
‘Oh,’ sighed the woman. ‘I love you.’
‘Love you too,’ answered the man.
Newlyweds, Leonie realized wistfully.
She pretended to look around her in boredom and got a glimpse of a young couple kissing gently before the woman, wearing a virginal pale pink short cotton dress that wasn’t exactly suitable for travelling in, hurried off in the direction of the toilets, looking back at her husband all the time, giving him sweet little waves and smiling with sheer joy.
He smiled back at her, one hand holding two suitcases on which some joker had written ‘Mr & Mrs Smith’ in sprawling white Tipp-Ex letters.
Had she ever been that happy and that much in love, Leonie wondered, turning back and gazing blankly at the rest of the queue. She didn’t think so. Surely she deserved it. Wasn’t there someone out there for her, someone who couldn’t bear to let her off to the loo without kissing her goodbye and telling her to be careful? There must be. And she wouldn’t find him sitting at home weeding the garden. She gave her trolley a determined shove along the slowly diminishing queue. Egypt here we come.
They’d put her in 56C, a window seat at the back of the plane. Leonie winced as she sat down in it and looked longingly at the two empty seats beside her. If only she could swap with one of the other people. But what if they didn’t want to move? Hating herself for being so nervous, Leonie peered down the aisle and looked for a stewardess she could accost and ask about changing seats. Instead, she saw a graceful woman striding towards her, confident and slim in jeans and a white T-shirt with a navy cotton cardigan slung casually over her shoulders.
She held her small holdall aloft so she wouldn’t bump into anything, but when she collided with a large man shoving a bag into the overhead locker, the woman gave him a dazzling smile, flicked back her long nutbrown hair, and strode on. The man’s eyes followed her, taking in the gentle sway of her slim hips and long, long legs. She was aware of his gaze, Leonie was sure of it, from the small smile that tilted up the corners of her full mouth as she progressed up the plane. She looked perfectly elegant and brimming with confidence, the sort of woman who was born to go on a Nile cruise, from the tips of her spotlessly clean deck shoes to the designer sunglasses perched on top of her head. When Leonie stuck her sunglasses on her head, they inevitably fell off.
The woman reached row 56 and smiled in a friendly manner at Leonie, who decided to take the bull by the horns.
‘I did ask not to get a window seat,’ she gasped up at the glamorous brunette, fear at having to look out the window overcoming her hatred of being a nuisance.
‘You can have mine,’ the woman said in a gentle voice with just a hint of a West of Ireland accent. ‘I hate the middle seat.’
They swapped and Leonie smelled a heady waft of Obsession perfume as the woman arranged herself in the window seat, put on a pair of tortoiseshell glasses, took a very serious-looking guide book from her small bag and settled back to read it. No wedding ring, Leonie noticed. Perhaps she was travelling alone too and they could team up. Leonie felt very grateful to be sitting beside this nice woman. Everything was going to work out.
She tried to relax and peered out of the window from the comfort of the middle seat. She could see the baggage handlers hoisting giant suitcases on to the conveyor belt to the plane’s hold.
Practically everyone was on board before anyone arrived at the seats in front of them. Leonie, by now bored looking at the baggage handlers because she could imagine them shaking all her clothes and make-up to bits, watched the late arrivals. The family she’d observed earlier were marching up the aisle towards her. The younger woman came first, her too-long fringe and her downcast eyes ensuring she didn’t meet anyone’s gaze as she shoved a small rucksack into the overhead bin and sank quickly into the window seat. Behind her came the other pair. Leonie grimaced. From the performance she’d seen at the check-in desk, she could imagine the fun and games they’d have on the flight with Mr Conviviality himself.
‘Number 55B,’ muttered the older woman. ‘There we are. Maybe I should sit on the window seat.’
Silently, the girl got up and let her mother into the seat. She appeared to be waiting to see if her father wanted to sit beside her mother.
‘Get in, Emma,’ snapped the big man impatiently.
‘Sorry,’ the girl murmured, ‘I just thought…’
‘Do you want me to put your bag up, Anne-Marie?’ he interrupted her rudely.
‘No, well, let me see,’ began the older woman, ‘I’ll want my glasses and my tablets and…’
Leonie looked out the window again. Family life, what a pain. When she was that age, she wouldn’t have gone on holiday with her mother and father for all the tea in China. That girl must be mad – or simple.
When the plane finally took off, Leonie closed her eyes with terror; Hannah closed her eyes and grinned at the memory of Jeff’s powerful lovemaking, which was certainly as uplifting as the thrust of a jumbo; and Emma sucked a mint, feeling calmer because of the half a Valium she’d taken in the loo beforehand. She tried to get comfortable but it was hard because her father was taking up a huge amount of space on purpose.
Half a Valium couldn’t harm the baby, she hoped, but her father was in a terrible mood and was determined to make everyone else suffer too. Emma had seen several people watching them in the queue when he’d argued furiously with the poor check-in girl over not being able to smoke his pipe on the flight. It was going to be a hellish holiday if he behaved like that the whole time. Why, oh why had she come?
Hannah sank gratefully on to a seat in the air-conditioned bus and decided that the only way she’d ever be cool in Luxor was if she went around naked with a bag of ice strapped to her body. It was half six in the evening and she was roasting after just fifteen minutes outside the airport. She’d have escaped to the cool of the Incredible Egypt tour bus more quickly had it not been for the two porters in Arab dress who fought volubly over who got to haul her suitcase over to the bus.
‘Great double act, guys,’ she grinned at them, giving them each a tip.
It must be
