Sellevision - Augusten Burroughs [33]
Peggy Jean gasped. “My what?”
“Your kosher meal. We have it all ready for you,” He smiled. “If you like, we can serve it to you in courses, like the other passengers, or we can give it to you all at once.”
“I, I didn’t order a . . .” she lowered her voice and spat, “a kosher meal.”
The flight attendant looked at the notepad he was carrying. “You didn’t?” He ran the point of his pen down the list, stopped at a name, and circled it. “Peggy Jean Smythe, seat 12D.” Then he stood up and double-checked her seat number. “Yup, 12D, Peggy Jean Smythe, that’s you.”
“But I didn’t order it, I don’t want it,” she hissed. “I’m not . . .” she turned her head to the window, imagined every passenger on the plane glaring at her, then looked back at the flight attendant. “I’m not Jewish. Not that there’s anything wrong with being Jewish, it’s just that I’m not.”
The mere thought of a potential borscht stain made her anxious. After all, she was wearing a white silk pantsuit with palazzo pants and a sheer white chiffon blouse.
“Goodness, well, I’m terribly sorry,” the flight attendant said, brushing the crease out of his pants as he stood. “There must have been some sort of computer error. So have you had a chance to look at the menu?” he asked, pointing to the enormous leather bound volume that contained a single page.
“Yes, as a matter of fact I have,” she said simply.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Smythe, what can we get for you this evening?”
Regaining her composure, Peggy Jean touched the simple ribbed hoop white gold earring on her left earlobe and then gave a small, polite laugh. “Well, actually, I was thinking I might enjoy having the chicken Kiev.”
He smiled, his head cocked to the side. “The chicken Kiev it is, then.”
Then a look of concern spread across her face. “Where is Kiev, anyway?”
The flight attendant paused, placed the tip of the pen between his lips. He thought for a moment, brow furrowed in concentration. “Let me ask the captain,” he said finally. Then before turning away he added, “I’m sorry for the special-meal confusion.”
“It’s perfectly fine, I was just a little, you know, surprised. Because, I mean, I’m Christian.” Then, smiling, “Of course I don’t suppose a computer would have any way of knowing that.”
He smiled back at her. “No, I suppose not. We’re just not that sophisticated yet.”
To get the whole incident out of her mind, Peggy Jean took a Valium from the One-A-Day vitamin bottle she stored them in. The Valium pills, she had found, came in quite handy.
Hours later, after dinner and the in-flight movie, Peggy Jean decided to freshen up in the lavatory. She unfastened her seatbelt and stood in the aisle, enjoying the brief stretch. She opened the overhead compartment and retrieved her hard-shell American Tourister cosmetics case, then made her way down the narrow aisle to the lavatory door. But before she reached the lavatory, she noticed the flight attendant’s beverage cart parked in the little kitchenette nook behind the bulkhead. All three of the Connoisseur Class flight attendants were napping, as were most of the passengers.
Gently, she slid the metal drawer out and saw all the pretty little bottles; Grand Marnier, Drambuie, Crème de Menthe, and thought, Why not? Why not take a few of the little bottles home, as gifts? After all, it wasn’t like she was stealing. Lord, no. Beverages were complimentary in Connoisseur Class. Her ticket had cost Sellevision well over five thousand dollars and certainly for that amount of money, well . . .
Carefully, she lifted out a little bottle of Grand Marnier. As a young girl, she’d loved oranges.
Of course, the problem was she was still holding the cosmetics case in her other hand. So she glanced around, just to make sure she wasn’t creating a distraction. Then she set the case on the floor and snapped it open. She took the little bottle and plopped it inside, right next to her Aqua-Net. Then she reached for another little bottle. She started to close the case, but it occurred