First-Class Smugglers

Refreshments and Rethinking

     Jase and Wendy certainly weren't bothered when the knocking stopped. Wendy sat in Freddie's seat, pushed back as far as it would so that she could have her long wooden box at her feet. It was open, and inside were small instruments neatly organized and arranged in wooden molds. There was a glass container resembling an hourglass with the top cut off and a wooden ring around its throat, a small metal funnel, a small, blue tin box, and a square piece of paper. Wendy took the items out as she spoke, and put them on the box's lid on her lap.

     "I wonder how many commercial airline laws I'm breaking bringing this stuff in here." She said thoughtfully.

     "I never really took the time to learn our airline laws to be honest." Jase replied, "There can't be that many. So long as we get where we need to go and don't upset the client, anything goes...You ok?" he glanced at her, "You said you've never worked one of these before."

     Wendy shrugged. She held up the hourglass and carefully arranged the paper inside, then opened the blue tin box. A deep, husky smell filled the air, and using her finger to control how much fell out, she poured some of the brown substance into the paper inside the hourglass. "I'm fine. I was just," she laughed, "every time I think this job has a stable set of...something, maybe not rules but just things to expect, something like this happens, and I have to change the way I think."

     There was a sudden, loud beeping from the control panel, but neither of them started, and Jase simply raised the nose of the plane a bit, so that they entered some thick clouds. Wendy looked beneath them and saw a commercial airplane cruising below. Jase hit a few buttons and turned the wheel so that they angled away from the other plane, slowly, under the cover of the clouds. "Well the job may ask you to think differently about...whatever moral turbulence you're experiencing." Jase said, "But right now you're asking me to think differently about coffee. The instruments you're using look like they serve archaic purposes."

     Wendy rolled her eyes, and pulled out a small stainless-steel kettle with a long, curved spout from behind her, where it had been keeping warm near the vent.

     She poured it slowly and deliberately over the fine grounds in the filter, saying, "There might be a bit of magic involved. With a steady hand that is...hopefully some of that rubs off on you and you learn how to keep the plane from swinging up and down."

     "I had to clear the sightlines of that plane below us." Jase said defensively, "Our scanners keep them from seeing us electronically, but they still have eyes."

     "I know I know..." Wendy sighed and moved the grounds a bit with a long, delicate spoon, then poured the water over them again, watching the coffee drip down into the belly of the hourglass, "first we have scanners that keep them from finding us. Then we have to make sure we're not in anyone's sightlines. Then we can't say our names to clients because if they ever get caught we cut all connection. They have to be driven out to the base with blindfolds to hide our location. Then I find out there are big clients who get priority and we treat oh so nicely and little clients who get whatever hunk of junk flies and pilots like, well like you," Jase winked, "and then we get clients like this, who's status changes in an instant, and all of a sudden we have a new objective. Just—" she laughed humourlessly, "love the predictability of this job. The only thing I know for sure is that I don't know anything. And that my coffee-making skills are about to be mocked by a guy I've worked with for three years and don't even know his real name."

     She took out the coffee filter and tossed it in the trash across the room, and handed Jase the hourglass by it's wooden middle. Jase blew on it and took a sip, and his eyebrows flew up.

     "Well in my defence I don't know your real name either." He said, "And for reasons previously stated it's better if we keep it that way, but this coffee is great! How low of an opinion do you have of me to think I'd be stupid enough not to like it?"