Page 34 of Come Fly with Me

One of the great things about being named captain is that I get to pick my lines, and since I’m moving up on the seniority list, I generally get what I ask for. I set my lines up about a month ago, giving myself a few days at home each week and allowing myself to travel to some of my favorite places too. But while I love the travel end of it, my favorite place to be is where I’m heading today.

I hop in the shower, making things quick because I have to be at the flight school in an hour. You’d think since I spend my days flying planes that I wouldn’t want to look at another plane until my next flight, but this is different.

When I finish getting ready, I grab my phone and see a text from Jake, and instinctively, my lips pull up into a smile.

Jake: Good morning. Hope you slept well in your own bed.

He’s either really thoughtful or a complete jerk, going out of his way to text me, and I think back to our time together in Sydney. The way it felt to throw caution to the wind and trust him, to let him take me around and show me a good time without showing me a good time. My heart flutters a little at the thought, the smile that he brought to my face seems to remain and without giving it much more thought, I text him back.

Me: Good morning to you too. Guessing you and your right hand had a fabulous night together.

The response bubbles pop up immediately and I stand waiting to see what he has to say.

Jake: Always witty, and taking the piss, cheeky girl. What are you up to today?

Me: I was just about to ask you the same thing. You have plans?

Jake: Not unless they’re with you.

Me: Can you meet me at the Santa Monica Airport in an hour?

Jake: Haven’t you done enough flying??

Me: Fine, don’t meet me there, but you’ll be missing out.

Jake: You know I’m coming… Because the idea of you in a cockpit… Ohhhhhh….

Me: Stop being dirty!

I might have told him to stop, but fuck me, if it doesn’t turn me on too. His filthy mouth and all his harmless flirting are sexy as hell, and I’d be lying if I said I haven’t thought about touching myself to thoughts of his body and his dirty mouth.

Jake: You love it. I’ll see you in an hour, which gives me plenty of time to rub one out in the shower.

Me: JAKE!!!

I arrive at the airport and slip in through the back entrance, heading toward the offices where I find Charlie at his desk, typing away on his keyboard. I met Charlie when we were in flight school together, and while I went on to fly commercial planes, Charlie took a different path and opened a flight school. He flew commercial for a while, but after getting married and having a couple of kids, he settled down on a more family-friendly path.

He’s one of the good ones, which is the reason we’ve remained friends for so long, and why I approached him with my idea. I knew he would be in support of it, and I’ve had my program running through his flight school and with his help and support for the last five years.

Trent thought the idea was stupid and told me it would never take off. He even at one point told me it was sexist, and I was discriminating against men. This should’ve been the nail in the coffin, but I stuck around in the hopes that he had more respect for me than that. Obviously, I was wrong.

During our first year with the Girls in the Sky program, we amassed more than two hundred girls from the greater Los Angeles area who registered to take part. We had to form a waitlist and open more than one program. I thought it would be something I could do once or twice a month while I was on break, but it blew up into so much more.

I wanted to bring awareness to the fact that being a pilot is a male-dominated profession, but not just that, I wanted all girls to be able to experience something that brought me so much joy and a sense of accomplishment. Knowing that something like flying lessons can be extremely costly, we developed a program that gathered donations from wealthy business owners and local celebrities that allow us to offer the program free of cost to low-income families in the area. It lets us reach a wide range of kids and exposes them to something they may have never had the opportunity to experience.

Charlie looks up from his computer and beams; jumping up from his chair, he embraces me in a warm and welcoming hug.

“So good to see you,” he says. “Some of your girls are already here and going on a quick tour of a new Cessna we just got in. Carrie’s out there with them.”

He motions out over to the hangars, and we both begin to head out in search of them. Carrie is Charlie’s wife; she’s a petite thing with a sharp wit and a loud mouth, and while she’s never flown a plane in her life, she knows enough about them to train even some of the most advanced pilots.

I can hear Carrie’s loud voice echoing in the cavernous hangar as she fills the girls in on the controls for the new plane.

“It has your basic six-pack, and no ladies, I don’t mean the abs on some hot, shirtless model. This six-pack is far more advanced and will give you a much better return than a shirtless guy.”

I hear my students chuckle a little, and I can’t help but laugh at her cheesy joke too.

Carrie looks out through the windshield of the plane and catches my eye. “It looks like your instructor is here,” she says, hopping down and walking over to where Charlie and I are standing. The small group of girls follows behind her, and we all convene where we normally meet for the start of our class.

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