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Sick Bags

Lisa Gray

    “Maybe I should dump her and get a rich widow!”
    He pointed at the woman sitting beside him.
    I didn’t find him funny. And I couldn’t see the woman. Only her backside. In the aisle seat. Her head buried in a sick bag. Sandwiched between the back of the plane seat and her splayed legs. There was an unwholesome whoop and a pervading smell of vomit filled the void between the plane seats, trapped. I was about to throw up. But I didn’t worry. I was a seasoned traveller. Well prepared. I bent down, pulled my travel bag from under the seat in front and unzipped it. I pulled out the top sick bag from the neatly stacked pile that filled the bag. And handed it to him.
    He was surprised.
    “Do you always carry them?” he said.
    “Some people collect postcards. I collect sick bags,” I said. “You never know when you’ll need them.”
    “I know what you mean,” he said.
    He handed it to his wife who grabbed it and filled it obligingly.
    “It’s probably nerves,” he said, his handsome, suntanned face suddenly leering inches from mine. “She’s not been on a cruise before. Doesn’t swim. Has a fear of water.”
    I say handsome. I hadn’t really seen him before. I’d broken my hard contact lens the morning of the flight and was wearing my emergency glasses which were about as useless to see through as an irradiated smoky quartz.
    I looked out the plane window.
    “Plenty down there,” I said.
    I felt his body lean over my back.
    Coming on. While his wife was sick. What kind of man was he?
    I almost felt sorry for the woman.
    We’d had a brief conversation prior to coffee being served. The woman had been seated next to me at the start. It was only when I felt her doze off on my shoulder and tried to wake her that I’d known something was wrong. The man had patted her face, tried to bring her round and get her to her feet. But she hadn’t made it to the galley. Only to the aisle seat. Where she still was.
    I didn’t see them again. Until the end of my holiday. I was standing in the massive check-in queue when I saw someone waving at me. Was it the same guy? I wasn’t sure but I waved back, comforting myself with the knowledge I wouldn’t have to sit next to them again on the plane.
    Them.
    I looked at the woman beside him.
    It wasn’t his wife.
    I couldn’t see properly but I was almost sure it wasn’t the same woman that had been throwing up on the plane.
    So what? I reasoned. It might be his sister. Maybe his wife had decided to take an extended holiday.
    “Maybe I should dump her and get a rich widow!”
    His words resonated in my ear.
    “She’s not been on a cruise before. Doesn’t swim. Has a fear of water.”
    Why the hell would a woman who didn’t swim and had a fear of water take an extended holiday on a cruise boat?
    It’s not his wife.
    Even though the woman was seated several rows down from me on the plane in an aisle seat, I could tell by her posture.
    It’s not his wife, I said mentally to the flight attendant passing down the aisle.
    But I couldn’t bring myself to say it out loud.
    She’d think I was some sick old bag.
    That’s when I decided to follow him. You could almost say I stalked him.
    It wasn’t difficult. After all, I was a seasoned traveller.
    But then, so it appeared, was he.
    Six months after the headline “Unidentified Woman’s Body Washed up on Mediterranean Beach” appeared in the national newspaper, I was following him through an airport again.
    Him?
    Them.
    She was hanging on his arm staring up at him adoringly. The same girl I’d seen on his arm at the airport. I could see her clearly now.
    She wasn’t his wife.
    I bought a ticket for Las Vegas the same as them.
    I could see he was the marrying kind.
    I knew that as I stood outside the Marriage Licence Bureau downtown waiting for them to emerge.
    Should I tell her? Should I tell her he’d disposed of his wife? I knew she wouldn’t believe me. And what if she were in cahoots with him?
    The cops were the ones to tell. I knew. But I’d had experience with them. I knew what their reaction would be.
    “Sick old bag! Trying to get attention for herself! You’d think she could find better things to do at her age. Travel the world or something.”
    I had since those days. Thanks to them. I could play at their game. And more. You could almost say they’d handed me the idea.
    Stake-out, surveillance, evidence, proof.
    But it was the confrontation I was looking forward to.
    I’d get him in the end.
    Though I knew it would be a long haul.
    Seven months later, on a deserted Scottish country road, watching his Land-rover go up in flames with the body of the girl in it while he walked away, I wondered how he could do it.
    I had wanted to rush towards the vehicle and get the girl out. But I knew it was hopeless.
    He was a professional all right.
    But then so was I.
    I took out my camera and photographed the burning vehicle.
    It was six months later when I saw the announcement of his engagement to a Scottish girl in the paper that I knew I had to stop it. I couldn’t let that girl suffer the same fate. I’d have to confront him.
    I’ve never shied away from confrontation.
    “You’re engaged,” I said, when I met him in the bar of the hotel.
    “So?” he said after his initial surprise at seeing me had worn off.
    I pushed the large white envelope containing the photo of the burning vehicle across the table to him.
    He opened it and slid the photograph out.
    “Maybe you should dump her and get a rich widow,” I said.
    He looked me straight in the contact lens.
    “Do you know any?”
    “I’m one,” I said.
    “And what makes you think we’d have anything in common? Apart from?”
    His finger indicated the envelope into which he’d quietly slid the photo.
    “We both like travelling, we’re both professionals and we both like collecting,” I replied.
    “Silly sick bags!” he scoffed. “They can hardly be compared to my collecting!”
    I wondered how many other women he’d collected and disposed of.
    “You’d be surprised!” I said.
    “You omitted one thing,” he said.
    “What’s that?” I said.
    “You like to live dangerously!”
    “I like a challenge,” I said.
    “Are you sure you can trust me?” he said.
    “I can as long as I have that photograph safely locked away,” I said.
    His eyes drilled holes in my lenses.
    “I told you I’m a professional,” I said.
    We were married three months later. I knew what he thought. A wife couldn’t testify against her husband. I comforted myself with the knowledge I’d saved the girl.
    Now I just had to save myself.
    “How about Australia for the honeymoon?” he said.
    Inwardly I shuddered. All those spiders and snakes.
    There were a lot of predators out there.
    But I like to travel. It’s how I got rich. So I didn’t disagree.
    “Maybe I should dump him and get a rich widower!” I said to the flight attendant, pointing at the man sitting next to me on the plane.
    She couldn’t see him. Only his backside. In the aisle seat. His head buried in a sick bag. Sandwiched between the back of the plane seat and his splayed legs. There was an unwholesome whoop and a pervading smell of vomit filled the void between the plane seats, trapped. I was about to throw up. But I didn’t worry. I was a seasoned traveller. Well prepared. I bent down, pulled my travel bag from under the seat in front and unzipped it. I pulled out the top sick bag from the neatly stacked pile that filled the bag and handed it to him.
    The flight attendant was surprised.
    “Do you always carry them?” she said.
    “Some people collect postcards. I collect sick bags,” I said. “You never know when you’ll need them.”
    “I know what you mean,” she said, her eye on the illuminated call bell further up the aisle.
    I handed one to my husband who grabbed it and filled it obligingly.
    “It’s probably nerves. Hasn’t been to Australia before. Has a fear of spiders.”
    “We all have a fear of something,” she said.
    I knew what her fear was. The deepening furrows above her mouth, the dried papery skin.
    “Silly sick bags?” I whispered in his ear, as the flight attendant made her way down the aisle to answer the call bell. “They’re not the only thing I collect.”
    His head turned sideways and a look of fear flickered over his pallid skin.
    “I told you we had a lot in common. We both like to travel. We’re both professionals and we both collect. You collect women. I collect men. Rich men.”
    I didn’t see him again after the holiday. I was standing in the massive check-out queue when I saw someone waving at me. It was the flight attendant. She looked at the man beside me.
    It wasn’t my husband.
    I knew what she’d be reasoning.
    So what? It might be her brother. It might be her husband had decided to take an extended holiday.
    “Maybe I should dump him and get a rich widower!”
    My words would be resonating in her ears.
    “He’s not been to Australia before. Has a fear of spiders.”
    Why the hell would a man with a fear of spiders take an extended holiday in Australia?
    It’s not her husband.
    Even though he was several rows down from her, she’d know by his posture.
    It’s not her husband, she’d be saying mentally as she passed down the aisle of the plane.
    But I wasn’t worried.
    I knew she wouldn’t say it out loud.
    She wouldn’t want someone to say she was some sick old bag.

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