Page 9 of Karma's a Beach
I’m seriously going to have to ask her her name at some point, I realize.
“I don’t think so,” the woman says, and I snort. Loudly.
The line is completely stopped at our row and the flight attendant comes over to inquire about what’s going on.
“This woman is in my seat,” my seatmate girl says firmly, waving her boarding pass.
“Ma’am,” Darcy says to the older woman. “May I please see your boarding pass?”
“I threw it away.”
I snort again and I mentally question when snorting with derision became my thing.
Darcy looks sympathetic, but she’s clearly not buying the story. “Ma’am, you need to evacuate this seat.”
“I’m telling you; it’s mine! She’s the one who’s lying! Just look at her! Does she look like someone who should be sitting in first class?”
“That’s not really the point,” Darcy counters. “Now you’re holding up the boarding process, and if you don’t get up, I will have you removed from this flight.”
You could have heard a pin drop, and I keep taking turns looking at each of them to see who’s going to make the first move. But when the woman beside me still refuses to get up, I know have to say something.
“Excuse me,” I say, looking at Darcy before I point to my seatmate. “This woman and I were sitting together the entire time when we first boarded the plane hours ago. I don’t know who this woman is…” And yeah, I point directly at the older woman. “But she was not in this seat earlier.”
“Ma’am? I’m not going to ask again. You need to…”
“Fine!” she shouts, standing and aggressively climbing over me—her elbow cracking into my jaw. “But I am going to file a complaint with the airline and report you! I was promised an upgrade! Promised!”
“Here,” Darcy says gently to the rightful owner of the seat. “Let me put your bag up for you. Why don’t you take your seat?”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.”
Meanwhile, the old biddy is still ranting as she walks back to her actual seat.
“Are you okay?” I ask once she’s settled beside me.
She looks flustered and thoroughly annoyed, and I can’t really blame her.
“I just hate people sometimes,” she huffs. “That woman pulled the same stunt—or tried to—on my earlier flight, and it just pisses me off so much! It’s not my problem if you don’t get the seat you want and I shouldn’t have to sacrifice anything! Gah! It’s so freaking selfish!”
Darcy comes back and hands her a glass of wine, smiling. “I remembered you liked this earlier.”
“Thank you. You’re an angel.” After accepting the glass, she looks at me again. “This has just been a crappy day after a crappy week. I just want to get to Raleigh, see my friends, and just have this day be over already.”
“Wait, so she tried to take your seat once already?”
“Yup. And she’s not the only one. I had a whole family try to guilt me because they could only get four first class seats and needed five. It wasn’t a comparable trade, even though they offered to pay me the difference.” She takes a sip of her wine. “But it wasn’t the point. The point is, I picked this seat and paid for it. It’s not my problem that they couldn’t get what they wanted. I would never ask anyone to change their seats! Especially to go from first class to economy!”
“I wouldn’t either,” I murmur, watching her take another sip of her wine. “By the way, I’m Sebastian.”
As soon as it’s out of my mouth, I don’t know why I used my formal name. I rarely use it anymore.
“Oh, right. I’m Liv. It’s nice to meet you,” she says, still looking flustered.
She takes a couple of minutes to stop looking around as if she’s waiting for someone else to try to take her seat, but I stay twisted in my seat so anyone who might think about it would reconsider because it looks like we’re talking to each other.
So maybe I should be talking.
“The last time I flew,” I say, “I sat next to a guy who talked on his cell phone—loudly—the entire time we were boarding. And it wasn’t the kind of conversation you’d want anyone to hear.”
