The Boarding Pass

"This way sir, proceed to Gate number 18 for boarding. Boarding starts in 90 minutes,” said the pretty lady from Air Arabia's ground staff at Sharjah Airport. I was travelling to Nairobi from Sharjah in July, 2014. Generally, I like stopovers as it allows me to roam around different airports, try out local cuisines, do some duty-free shopping and relax my muscles after long flights. But 15 minutes in that airport and I was already bored. So, finding an innovative way to kill time was the only thing on my mind. Just then I spotted a Costa Coffee outlet and decided to kill some time by trying their chocolate croissants and rating them on TripAdvisor.

I took my seat in a quiet corner after ordering a chocolate croissant and latte. The restaurant was mostly empty except for a couple trying hard to pacify their child who was getting cranky over something. Now that I was not finding anything interesting, I decided to immerse myself in my Stieg Larsson book. After about ten minutes, a lady came and sat at a table nearby. I gave her an absent-minded glance and returned to my book. "Why do you men want to read about abuse against women? There are better books than these." I turned around to see if somebody asked me something but nobody was looking at me so ignored it. "You didn't hear me or is ignoring the new way of listening carefully?" This time I was sure it was for me. I turned around to see the lady who walked in a short while back smiling at me.

"Oh! I am sorry; I didn't realize you were talking to me. Come again, what did you ask me?” She winked, smiled and said, “Your boarding pass is on the ground, I just alerted you in my style". It is not often that a pretty lady would start a conversation with you in a foreign land. I studied her with interest. She was indeed very tall and attractive, definitely Arabic, obviously smart and witty and incredibly sensuous. My subconscious mind urged me to forget the book I was reading and engage in a conversation with her. I picked up my boarding pass and started thinking about the first line I would use after saying thank you.

Trying to sound as stylish as possible, I said, “I bet you are a spy." She asked, “What makes you think so?"

"Otherwise why would a super attractive woman come to an average-looking man to start a friendly conversation with him?" I asked.

"You didn't look so smart while you were reading and eating that prawn-shaped dish. Did my presence bring so much change?"

 “See, I told you, you are a spy. You are trying to extract information from me.” As I said this, we both burst into laughter. “Join me, ma’am. Their coffee is tasteless, so you definitely need my company as a booster.” She got up as if she was waiting for me to ask. I will admit that it left me a bit confused. However, I decided to play along.

“So, what do you do apart from dropping boarding passes near gorgeous women to be able to trick them into a long conversation? Let me guess, you are a businessman,” she blurted.

 “How on earth did you make that guess? Did I make it obvious with my geeky looks and charming demeanour? I am indeed an entrepreneur. And what does the pretty lady do?” I asked.

“Plenty of reasons actually but I won’t tell any,” she replied with a wicked smile. “And don’t ask my name, the place I am from, where am I travelling, my profession and so on. The lesser we know, the more exciting it would be.”

The sadistic thrill of the mystery woman enticed me. In these few minutes, I realized I did not ask her name. She was around 30 and her beauty was breathtaking. She was definitely from an upper middle class background though mysterious, made great conversation.

There was an hour’s time left before I boarded the flight. My gut feeling asked me to go on.

“Ok, Miss Boarding Pass! I would have loved to ask you for a drink but liquor is banned here. This airport is too small to even take a stroll. There’s no other decent restaurant with nice ambience and good music where we could spend some time. So, let’s play a game. What say?” I asked.

“Do you think I will enjoy it? I would hate to say it was boring on your face,” she replied candidly.  

“I am an entrepreneur, my friend. I don’t let go of opportunities just like that. I always try even if I know there is no chance of success,” I said, confidently.

She was blushing. May be I had made a good start. But I didn’t have much time to ponder on that.

“What’s the game?” she asked.

“I ask you a question of my choice. Your reply would be a question which is both an answer to my question as well as a question for me. One who gets stuck for want of a question loses the game.”

“Okay!” she said. She didn’t have much of a choice too.

“Keeping aside your socio-cultural background, what do you think about co-habitation with opposite sex?” I quizzed.

“Why do we have to live together in a relationship?” she queried in reply.

“Don’t you think every couple in a relationship at some point reaches this level where they can live together? I asked.

“Wouldn’t that be limiting relationship under some pre-defined protocols?” she asked.

“If not, won’t relationship just become an object of convenience?” I replied.

“Can convenience ever be termed as objectionable or hindrance to one’s choices in life?” she asked.

“Can it be equated to convenience of hitting on a stranger with an excuse of returning the boarding pass?” I replied.

I gestured the waiter for another chocolate croissant (prawn-shaped dish according to her). That coffee shop would surely get five-star reviews from me for the complimentary affair it offered me that day.

She: “You mean the same way men never hide the merriness of opportunity when a woman makes the first move?”

Me: “What if men do not express themselves and sound pricey?”

There was a long pause after which she burst out into laughter. We both smiled at the audacity of the situation.

She: “That’s all. I can’t continue. I don’t want to lose. I can’t think of an answer or question or answer-question or whatever it is.”

Me: “Well, I would have preferred losing here. In that case, I could have easily asked you to give me one more chance and play again.”

She: “Shut up and listen. I like you. Let’s do something crazy. Same rules apply. You are not allowed to ask anything.”

She said so many things at one go that I could not do anything except nodding with a big smile. We got up and took the elevator to the second floor. We entered the lounge after she made a quick conversation with the receptionist in some Arabic language.

“We could have come here earlier,” I said.

“No, we couldn’t. You won 20 minutes with me in this cosy place after that silly game,” she replied.

Honestly, I had no idea what she was up to. She was way too ahead of me and I had to catch up with her. She ordered something without asking me. I was just trying to anticipate her next move. We moved to a couch in a cosy area with some serene music. The waiter came with two glasses of some drink. She paid for it instantly.

I started talking, “Drinks are served here...” when she stopped me by placing a finger on my lips.

“You wanted to drink with me and so here we are we drinking to the good time we had. Cheers!” she lifted her glass.

We kept quiet for a few minutes. I didn’t feel like saying anything. Even she seemed to be just enjoying the moment. I thought I should make the next move. I was the man after all and it was my job to make it easy for her. I tried to get closer to confuse her with my intent. She was unperturbed. Her eyes seemed to be asking me, “Why are you taking so much time?”

Okay, let’s go ahead, I told myself. There was hardly ten minutes left for boarding time. As I moved towards her, she suddenly got distracted by something at the door. I tried again but she was still looking at the door. Her body language had changed dramatically and she was behaving like a stranger. I didn’t know what happened suddenly. She continued to behave strangely.

She then suddenly excused herself and went to the washroom. I waited to seek an answer from her when she returned. After five minutes, she returned and to my surprise, walked up to another table to join a man. I was left totally confused. What was happening? I realized in a few seconds that the man she joined was the one who entered the lounge when she was looking at the door.

I waited for a couple of minutes for this feeling to sink in. Alarmingly, the man with her came to me and said, “Can you please pass on the bag? My wife was sitting here and she forgot it I, guess.” I gave him the bag, totally in shock.

It took a while for reality to sink in. My phone rang with boarding alarm and I decided to move. As I moved out, Miss Boarding Pass gave me the most amazing smile, which seemed to say, “I was just having a good time, mate!”