‘It’s just as well that she’s coming to Dubai tonight, then, isn’t it?’ he smirks.
‘What?’ I say, looking up from my coffee.
‘That got your attention,’ Andy says triumphantly. ‘She’s coming with Rachel. Slightly unfortunate for you, but we’ll work around that.’
‘You’ve invited Rachel and Susan to Dubai?’
‘Yes!’ Andy can hardly contain himself, such is the joy at his match-making genius.
‘I’m not coming,’ I say.
‘Yes you bloody are,’ he says. ‘And so is she, and that’s the bloody end of it.’
‘You’re an evil little shit.’
‘I know.’ He grins. ‘Don’t you just love it?’
Andy and I sit in silence for a minute. I contemplate the hell that I am about to go through. The idea of spending an entire flight with a woman I think I’m in love with and a woman I really don’t like at all is a terrifying prospect. The palms of my hands are beginning to sweat. Or is that the effect of the coffee? Why has Andy put me in this position? He thinks that one day I will thank him for this. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Meanwhile he is blissfully pleased with himself, just sitting there, surveying the concourse, looking for talent.
‘Those two look rather tasty,’ he announces, watching two stewards walk past in their navy uniforms, trailing their suitcases behind them.
‘What about that blond bloke behind?’ I suggest, trying to join in.
‘Him?’ says Andy, shaking his head. ‘No, he’s not gay.’
‘How can you tell?’
‘He’s carrying his suitcase.’
‘Oh.’
‘Gay stewards wheel their suitcases like trolley dollies, straight stewards don’t.’
‘Right,’ I say.
‘D’you know, my mate who has just started at Stansted has had two stewards in a week,’ says Andy. ‘Mind you, he is gorgeous.’
‘Where?’ I ask, taking another sip of my coffee.
‘Disabled toilets,’ he says.
I am not at all surprised. For a supposedly transitory space, an awful lot of sex goes on in the toilets – a passenger with another passenger, or ground staff with another member of ground staff, or ground staff and a passenger, or ground staff with crew. A month ago we had some seventies band who did an impromptu performance at check-in for all the girls. After they were handed their boarding passes, one of my girls (who shall remain nameless) grabbed the guitarist, took him to the disabled toilets for ten minutes and wished him bon voyage. Andy’s track record is hardly scrupulously clean. I know for a fact that he’s had sex with a Middle Eastern prince in the toilets of the first-class lounge. Apparently, the young chap was moaning about having to go back home for the summer holidays from his university in the States. He kept on saying how boring it was going to be. Andy saw his way to cheering him up before he got on the flight.
Sometimes these relationships can get out of hand. There were two lesbians who were working for the BAA and one of them found out that the other was having an affair with another lesbian and they ended up having a huge fight outside Harrods. It was one of the funniest things I had seen in a while.
‘He says that Stansted’s much friendlier than here,’ continues Andy.
‘I’ve heard that,’ I say.
‘The BAA’s the biggest employer in the area so everyone who works there knows one another from school.’ He smiles. ‘Imagine the stories and the gossip. The girls from Accessorize have all snogged the boys at Prêt à Manger behind the bike sheds. It’s hilarious.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘And apparently Bishops Stortford is packed with cabin crew. They are mainly Spanish and Italian because the airlines can pay them Spanish wages and say they’re employed from Spain. Walk down the high street and there are loads of foreign-registered cars. Oh,’ he adds, grinning, ‘and put Bishops Stortford into Gaydar and it’s packed with cruising cabin crew.’
‘What the hell is Gaydar?’ I ask.
‘It’s a gay website,’ says Andy. ‘I can highly recommend it.’
‘I’ll be sure to give it a whirl.’
A family dressed in matching shorts and Burberry checked hats march past, trailing their suitcases behind them. The youngest child is in tears, the mother looks as if she is about cry and the father is red-faced. In fact, he looks on the verge of a coronary.
‘Have you heard they’re looking for volunteer hostages again?’ says Andy.
‘Is it that time of year already?’ I say.
‘Yeah,’ he replies, draining his cup. ‘Do you fancy it?’
‘I did it last year. It wasn’t the most comforting of experiences.’
In fact, it was terrifying. It wasn’t so much the exercise itself that was worrying but our seemingly inept response. It was enough to stop me sleeping at night. We do these exercises once a year where we simulate a hijack in the airport. The airport is closed and the police know that it’s about to happen, and still they take twenty bloody minutes to find the plane. They may carry guns but they’re fucking useless. They sure as hell don’t know how to get to a plane quickly, even when they have advance warning and no passengers to deal with. Anyway, last year it went from bad to worse. I was taken hostage in the cockpit with the ‘terrorists’, and we watched the police approach the plane. The whole thing was risible. They sneaked along an illuminated corridor, rolling against the walls, walking past the windows in such a way that had my ‘terrorist’ actually been armed he could have picked them off one by one, like ducks at the fair.
But that’s one of the things about working at an airport: it makes you realize how untrained we all are and how easy everything is. My mate Garry, who works in Baggage, always delights in telling me how easy it is to get a Semtex bomb through. Semtex apparently doesn’t show up on an X-ray machine, unless it has specifically been programmed to test for explosives. It smells of marzipan, so either you make a wedding cake out of the stuff or, so Garry says, you line a suitcase with it in a nice thin layer so that it looks like lining. The detonator and battery are easy. You can get a small detonator that looks like coins and an even smaller Polaroid battery. Together they’re tiny, the size of a sachet of tomato ketchup. He says it’s simple to do. I always rather hope that it’s a bit trickier than he pretends. But, he always adds, if someone is determined to hold up or blow up a plane, they’re determined, and there’s not much you can do about it. And on that front, I’m afraid, I have to agree.
‘I think I might just volunteer,’ says Andy. ‘It might be a laugh.’
‘It’s not,’ I warn him. ‘Trust me. I wouldn’t bother.’
‘Oh, OK, if you say so.’ He shrugs, obviously not that interested. ‘Do you think we should get back?’
‘Yeah, OK. I’ve got a whole load of admin to do before check-in hell begins.’
Andy and I get up to go, only to bump into Terry and Derek jogging past as fast as their doughnut-powered legs can carry them.
‘Where are you two going with such . . . um, speed?’ I ask.
‘A shagging cart crash,’ says Terry.
‘Ouch!’ says Andy.
‘I know,’ says Derek. ‘Some fucker has only gone and run over some old bird on her way to Tenerife.’
‘Apparently she’s a bit deaf, didn’t hear the loud bleeping thing on the cart and stepped right out in front of the guy, when he was transporting a whole load of fizzy drinks up to gate forty or something.’
‘Nightmare,’ says Andy.
‘You can fucking say that again,’ says Terry. ‘As if we haven’t had enough grief to deal with this morning.’
‘And we’re not even halfway through our shift,’ adds Derek, heading off towards gate 40.
Neither am I, I think, as I wave them on their way. We’ve still got the check-ins to come.
11 AM–12 PM
BUOYED UP BY our double espresso and skinny cappuccino with extra chocolate, Andy and I make our way back through the terminal toward
s the small back office. I’ve got a few rotas to check over and I think Andy wants to go through his emails. As a man who regularly makes use of his discount flying perks, he is sure to have a stack of birthday greetings from all over the world.
We walk past the smart Cathay Pacific desks where they are checking in for Singapore, and I notice that two of their staff have been taken to one side and are being breathalysed. This is a new thing brought in by the BAA: they can randomly test anyone with an airside pass, and threaten them with the sack if they fail.
‘See that?’ I say, digging Andy in the ribs and pointing to my left. ‘They’re out random testing again today.’
‘Shit,’ says Andy, turning pale under his orange tan. ‘They’d better not come near me. I’m sure I’d fail.’
‘Why, when did you last have a drink?’
‘God, I don’t know,’ he says, clearly remembering with slight delight the last vodka he slipped down before coming to work. ‘But I know it was certainly less than eight hours ago.’
‘I could really do without them coming anywhere near my check-in desks today,’ I say. ‘I know at least three of the girls went to the Flying Club in Luton last night.’
‘Jesus Christ,’ says Andy, stopping in his tracks. ‘Do you have any idea what goes on there?’
‘Drinking, dancing, drinking, stripping, drinking. Last time Cathy went she told me someone poured chocolate all over her tits and someone else licked it off.’
‘She the one who used to work for EasyJet?’
‘That’s right. Apparently the Flying Club is big with EasyJet hostesses and baggage handlers.’
‘What a combination,’ says Andy, shaking his head.
‘What, hosties and baggage handlers or chocolate tits?’
‘Both.’
‘I know.’ I nod, my imagination working overtime.
‘How many of them went last night?’
‘At least three,’ I say.
‘And you’re expecting them in for work?’
‘Well, it’s not an early start, is it? It’s not like any of them are doing the five a.m. shift.’
‘That’s true, but I am prepared to take a bet that we’ll be at least two down.’
‘Twenty quid says they all make it in.’
‘All of them?’
‘Why not?’ I smile, my hand out. ‘Think of it as an early birthday present if I lose.’
‘You’re on.’ Andy grins and shakes my hand. ‘I bet at least two of them call in with “plumbing problems”,’ he adds, doing the quotes thing, then shaking my hand again. His grip suddenly gets tighter. ‘Shit,’ he mutters under his breath. ‘Shit, shit, shit . . .’
‘What?’ I say, turning round.
‘Don’t turn around,’ he hisses.
‘What?’ I whisper, turning back, still shaking his hand.
‘The breath fuckers are coming this way,’ he says, his eyes round with fear. I can feel the palm of his hand start to sweat. He stops shaking my hand and stands there simply holding it. The colour is draining from his face as eight years in the business seem slowly to trickle down the pan.
‘I’ll get them to do just me,’ I say as they approach out of the corner of my eye. ‘I’ll send you off to do something. Don’t worry, I’ll look after you, I promise.’
‘Sh-ii-it,’ says Andy, closing his eyes, awaiting impact. He squeezes my hand tightly. ‘Here we go . . .’
I turn around to face the two BAA testers. I place myself in front of Andy so they pick on me first. I get my service-industry smile in place and they look straight through me. It’s as if we don’t exist. They stand right in front of us, check either side of us for more people to breathalyse, and then walk off left, in the direction of Boots.
‘What happened there?’ asks Andy, letting go of my hand.
‘Don’t know,’ I say. And then it dawns on me. ‘Oh my God!’ I start to laugh.
‘What?’
‘We don’t have our passes on!’
‘Shit!’ he says. ‘You’re right!’ He pats his chest.
‘No yellow jackets, no passes – we’re members of the public!’
‘And can be as pissed as we like!’
‘Although not too pissed to fly,’ I say, pretending to sound authoritative.
‘Of course,’ agrees Andy. ‘But how pissed is that exactly?’
‘How long is a piece of string?’
‘Thank you, God,’ says Andy, looking towards the heavens, his hands clasped together in prayer. ‘Thank you for that close shave.’
‘I think that was His birthday present.’
‘It was the best I have ever had. Now, let’s get the fuck out of here.’
On the way back to the office Andy is as high as a kite after his close shave and he can’t stop chatting. ‘They were there ... I was holding my breath . . . and then they . . .’ He tells me the whole story of what just happened to us as if I had not been standing right next to him at all. I smile. He always does that. I look forward to hearing the whole scenario again in a couple of hours’ time, after he has embellished it and given it more topspin. I wonder if my presence will even make the final cut.
We get back to the office and don our airside passes, and there’s a middle-aged bloke off the Sydney–Bangkok flight waiting to talk about lost luggage. It appears that he picked up someone else’s bag and only noticed his mistake when he went to put the bag into the boot of his car.
‘I’ve been to the long-term car park and back,’ he says, sounding exhausted. ‘Do you have any idea where my bag might be?’
This really is the sort of thing that Andy should handle, but seeing as he is in hiding from the breath testers and it’s his birthday I take pity on him and take over.
‘Well, it’s very kind of you to bring the bag back, sir,’ I say. ‘Most people take them home and then call up the airline to come and collect them, demanding that we find theirs and deliver it to their door.’
‘Oh,’ says the man as he slumps forward, sounding as if he really regrets his generosity. ‘I didn’t think of that.’
‘Next time,’ I say.
‘Yeah.’
‘Anyway,’ I say, picking up the suitcase, ‘if you’d like to follow me to Left Luggage, let’s see if we can sort this mess out.’
The man says nothing and trips along after me, dazed and confused like a small child. The long flight, the constipating food and the jet lag have clearly taken it out of him; what he really wants to do is curl up underneath his duvet at home. That makes two of us, I think, as I weave my way through the crowds. Thank God it’s not the school holidays or half term. Otherwise this place would be so packed we could hardly move. I mean, I’ve often seen the check-in queue snake right out into the drop-off area outside. It’s unbearable then. Tempers fray, fights start, children scream, and the bad language starts to fly about.
We pause for a minute as we go back through Customs. They check my pass, check the middle-aged man’s passport, ask to see his boarding card stub and eventually we are let through to Left Luggage. Standing behind the desk, looking grumpy and hassled, is Bill. In his late fifties, completely bald, with a red-raw face and skin like a crocodile handbag, Bill spent the best part of twenty years in Baggage but moved to Left Luggage two years ago after he did his back in.
‘All right, Bill?’ I ask, leaning on his counter.
‘No,’ he says, pointing to a load of bags piled up next to the office. ‘These came in Rush off some Virgin flight and now I’ve got to deal with them.’
‘Oh,’ I say. ‘That’s unfortunate.’
‘Telling me,’ he says, wiping his scarlet nose on the back of his red hand. ‘It’s the last thing I need.’
Airlines are notorious for sending Rush bags. It usually means that they are in danger of losing their take-off slot and have decided that it is better to fly the passengers without their bags than miss their take-off time by loading the plane up properly. The bags are only supposed to hang around for twenty-four ho
urs before they are loaded onto a plane, otherwise they have to be checked again by security before they are allowed to fly.
Some airports are infamous for losing bags or having bags tampered with. Heathrow used to have a right reputation. Thiefrow, they called it. The airport was practically porous. They have supposedly cleaned up their act quite a lot, after they employed private detectives to weed out some of the real chancers. But only the other day my mate Garry told me how a bag full of seventy mobile phones split open. ‘They presumed they must be moody,’ he said, ‘so everyone helped themselves.’
Heathrow also has a pretty poor reputation when it comes to losing bags. Most airports lose about two in every thousand bags, but Heathrow loses eighty per thousand, which means that for every five hundred people who check in to a jumbo, forty won’t get their bags at the other end. But that is mainly because the transport times between the terminals are so tight. When the place is busy, which it always is, there is so much luggage being transported between the terminals and so little time to do it in that a lot of the transferred luggage gets left behind. Most of the problems come from arrivals in Terminal 4. There is a tunnel that goes under the airport from the central terminal (i.e. 1, 2 and 3) to Terminal 4. It runs under a runway and the luggage travels along on a belt. All it takes is the belt to break down for the chaos to begin.
Left Luggage wasn’t squeaky clean either. A bag used to hang around for three months in a large holding area under the ramp, during which time every effort was supposedly made to track down its owner. If all else failed the bag was opened and its contents auctioned off. However, there always seemed to me to be a slight conflict here as their first priority had to be to find the owners of the bag. Was any effort really made to trace the owners when the luggage could be sold anyway? Needless to say the system is a bit different now . . .
‘So, Bill,’ I say, rubbing my hands together, trying to engender some sort of enthusiasm in the man. ‘We are rather hoping that you can help us.’
‘Oh yeah?’
‘This man here . . . sorry, what’s your name?’
‘Mr Hartley.’
‘Mr Hartley here has lost his bag.’
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