He stares at the gray carpeting, and — as the saying goes — the scales seem to fall from his eyes. His age and that of our heroine have no part in their affair’s failure. She knows nothing of his concerns, she cannot begin to imagine what it is to be fifty. He could be twenty years younger and it would change nothing. Our heroine may not allow herself to indulge her desire for him or grant him her tenderness, and this is because what she most wants to avoid is pain, what she refuses is heartache, and what she dreads is drama. It is so easy breaking away from him now. This is what our hero finally grasps. High time too. He now needs to become a promise of happiness for her, the very image of happiness. That, he thinks, is right up his street.
And now he is afraid that if she ever did give in to him, he would owe that to his perseverance, his doggedness. If she started loving him for the energy he put into conquering her, could she then learn to love him of her own free will? How can he now rekindle the carefree atmosphere of the early days? These are the new questions gnawing at our hero, quite pointlessly, when the flight attendant calls out his row.
The plane takes off on time. Through the porthole, our hero watches the runway scud past, then shrink in the distance. The sheep, them again, grow smaller. Seeing them finally disappearing, drowned out by the altitude and his myopia, is both a relief and a torment. There is, should he want one, panini on the menu. A group of young French kids on a language trip bawl throughout the flight. He tries to remember whether, at their age, he was such an asshole. He could well have been. He is in seat 16A. The young woman in 16B tries to start a conversation. Blond, pug-nosed, an eyebrow piercing that does not succeed in making her ugly. She is from Paris, a researcher, she works for a company that specializes in transgenic products. She offers him her name. He gives her his in return.
She reminds him that they both traveled on the same outbound flight, and so were held up for hours. She thought he looked very stressed, really. She asks him whether he had a pleasant stay in Scotland.
Our hero does not lie to her. He replies:
“The weather was nice.”
acknowledgments
Apple France
Avis Rental Inverness Airport
British Airways
British Telecom
Currabottle Inn
Great Southern Hotel Braemore
Glen Carron Park Hotel
Glen Carron Park Pub & Restaurant
Orange International
G7 Taxis