I’d be wanting

The flight is full, full and full. We have just handed out our 747th special vegetarian meal, and my patience is beyond shot: it is shot, buried and already has its headstone covered in overgrowth.

I feel a tug on my uniform. I have felt hundreds of tugs on my uniform. Most tugs, I simply ignore; some tugs, I manage to pull away from, sufficiently enough to break their grip; a few tugs, however, I cannot shake off no matter how hard I try, for they hang on for their dear life.

‘I’d be wanting another Scotch.’ The tug grows more impatient.

I try really hard to not give in to the temptation to grab this man by the scruff of his neck and scream, ‘I’d be wanting to take your fingers, which are so rudely pulling at the seams of my dress, and place them on a George Foreman grill!’

I grimace, and then flash him a half-smile, displaying acting skills that should win me an Academy Award, or at the least a nomination. I tell him I will bring him a Scotch soon. I have not even finished my sentence when another tug interrupts me. ‘I’d be wanting …’ another man yells.

By the end of it, I have promised to serve passengers twenty-four Scotches, fifteen wines, twelve packets of peanuts and a partridge in a pear tree. I hide in the galley, take a deep breath and make myself a cup of tea.

I just can’t go back out there. Not now. Not yet.

As I sip my tea and contemplate the horror of stepping back into those fires of hell, the unthinkable occurs: I get my period.

I am not due for several more days, but this job messes with every possible body function. I am not even sure I know what my actual menstrual cycle is anymore – or if I even have a menstrual cycle anymore. What I do know is I need to get to a bathroom. Now.

It feels as if Mohammed Ali and Joe Frazier are fighting inside my stomach, using my uterus as a punching bag. As I sprint to that elusive available toilet, several hands reach out to block my path and to grab my uniform, but I dodge them all with the precision of a professional footballer. One hand almost grabs my arm, but I roll my wrists and follow up with a karate chop that would have made Bruce Lee proud. Ahead of me, a large man is standing in the aisle and although the laws of physics might dictate it impossible for me to pass him, I contort my body around him, passing him without breaking stride. A steely look in my eyes, I make it to the toilet area.

Thank God! There is a toilet free here. I push open the toilet door with the urgency of a fireman.

‘Stay dry. Stay confident’ claim a popular tampon brand. I’m now dry, yes. But confident? The only thing I am confident about is that the next six hours are going to be the longest of my life.

Flying at 35,000 feet, cramping and sleep-deprived, with craters on my face from falling asleep on peanuts, I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus. Don’t kill someone, don’t kill someone, I keep repeating to myself.

I was sure that jails and detention centres around the world were full of women that suffered from severe menstrual pain, lack of sleep and jetlag.

God help the next passenger who gets on my wrong side.

As I slink back toward the galley, someone grabs me by the arm. ‘I’d be wanting some potato crisps.’

‘Don’t kill him, don’t kill him,’ I tell myself again, although I am ready to scratch out his eyes and force them down his own throat.

He lets go of my arm.

I take a deep breath and reply, ‘We don’t have crisps, only peanuts.’

He doesn’t give up. ‘Do you have crackers?’

‘No. Peanuts,’ I repeat myself. I’m convinced that he is the subject of some sort of experiment for Artificial Stupidity.

‘Cashews? Do you have cashews?’ he persists.

‘No. Peanuts!’

‘Are they roasted?’

At this point I could do one of two things. I could attack this man with a verbal machete, and risk losing my job, or I could do the smart thing and get even with him.

‘Of course, we have roasted peanuts. I’ll roast you a fresh batch now. It might take a while though.’

He nods, smiling. I go back to the galley, fill a foil tray with peanuts and then place them in the oven: I roast the nuts on high. Only when I am sure that they have been burnt to a crisp do I take them out of the oven.

When I serve the piping hot peanuts to the man, he immediately attempts to grab a few nuts eagerly, only to immediately drop them back, his fingers burnt. I walk away with a satisfied grin on my face.

I hide myself in the galley again, but only moments later find the same passenger standing before me; he has opened the curtains to the galley and is looking inside, at me. ‘Oh God, what does he want now,’ I groan to myself.

However, he takes my hand in his own and shakes it, repeatedly.

‘Those are the nicest peanuts I have ever had.’

I feel terrible. All the poor man had wanted was a little attention, and all I had done was screw with him.

I sit down in the galley with the curtains closed and have an attack of hormone-induced cry.