Chapter Thirty
The stewardess left them in the suite with a dazzling smile that Singapore Airlines probably ran her through a six-week training programme for, and Colin turned on Diwa before the partition had even finished sliding shut.
“How much did this cost, Diwa?”
Diwa had been hoping to get at least as far as the welcome champagne before this conversation started.
He’d had a whole strategy mapped out: let the cabin ambience do the softening, let the hot towels and the slippers establish a baseline of luxury, and then, once Colin was settled and pliant and holding a glass of Dom Pérignon, introduce the cost as a fait accompli that wasn’t worth getting upset about.
“It’s a suite, Colin. It’s not a private jet.”
“How much, Diwa.”
Colin’s hands were moving across the desk built into the wall, his fingers trailing along the polished wood, assessing. He crossed the suite in three strides, lowered himself onto the edge of the made-up double bed, and bounced once, testing the mattress’s give.
Diwa’s brain, which had been primed over the course of seven months to respond to the sight of Colin against any horizontal surface, performed its usual catastrophic pivot.
His omega was on a bed. A very expensive bed, in a very enclosed space, wearing a white linen shirt that Diwa had bought him, and the shirt was pulling nicely across his shoulders where he’d braced his hands behind him on the mattress.
It triggered an onset of fond Best of Shags memories. The kitchen counter at Ledbury Road. The sofa. The wall beside the bedroom door, where Colin had wrapped his legs around Diwa’s waist and let Diwa hold his full weight while he came with his head tipped back against the plaster.
“Diwa. The number.”
Diwa told him.
Colin let out a gusty exhale. “You’re mad.” He ran his palm flat across the linen. “You’re absolutely fucking mad.”
“It’s a thirteen-hour flight, Colin. You’ve never flown before. I wanted your first time to be—”
“If you say ‘optimised,’ I’m getting off this plane.”
“—comfortable. I was going to say comfortable.”
Colin had been comfortable his entire adult life on bus seats held together with gaffer tape; he didn’t require a lie-flat bed at forty thousand feet to maintain the condition. His mouth was set in the thin line that meant he was furious, or at least trying to be.
The stewardess reappeared at the partition with two flutes of champagne on a tray. Colin glanced at the glasses, and took one without breaking eye contact with Diwa.
“Thank you ever so much,” he said to her, perfectly polite, and took a sip.
Diwa watched his omega drink champagne. Colin’s eyes closed on the second sip. His shoulders dropped a quarter of an inch. Somewhere in the last seven months, Colin had decided he was allowed to have nice things, and Diwa loved this character development for him.
He slid the amenity kit across the desk and watched Colin unzip the leather pouch. The first item out was a tube of moisturiser. Colin turned it over, found no price, and unscrewed the cap. He brought it to his nose, sniffed once, and his eyebrows lifted a fraction before he caught himself.
Diwa squeezed a pearl of it onto his own fingers, reached across, and took Colin’s hand before Colin could object.
Colin’s palm was dry and rough, the skin cracked across every knuckle from years of being immersed in bleach and cold water, and Diwa worked the cream into them slowly, pressing his thumb along the lines of Colin’s palm, into the webbing between each finger, and over the calluses at the base of his knuckles.
The moisturiser disappeared into Colin’s hands the way rain disappears into parched ground.
When Diwa had let go of his hand, Colin pulled out a silk-lined sleep mask next. He examined it and set it aside with the slippers in a drawstring pouch. Last out was a miniature bottle of something amber that Colin held up to the overhead light and squinted at.
“It’s pillow mist,” Diwa said.
“Pillow mist.”
“You spray it on your pillow. It helps you sleep.”
Colin rolled his eyes and set it down. Then he was up, moving through the suite, his fingertips trailing along the edge of the desk and the partition wall.
The window shade went down and back up under his thumb.
The wardrobe opened, revealing hangers. When he picked up the remote for the entertainment screen, he turned it over in his hand and set it back down without switching anything on.
Diwa sat on the bed with his champagne and said nothing.
Colin found the seat recline button. He lowered himself into the leather, located the controls on the armrest, and pressed the button.
The seat tilted backward in a smooth mechanical glide, and Colin’s body went with it, his shoulders settling into the leather, his feet coming up as the footrest extended.
His champagne was still in his hand, held perfectly level throughout the descent, not a drop spilled.
Diwa had his mobile out and the photo taken before the impulse to immortalise this moment had even fully formed.
Colin reclined in Singapore Airlines first-class, champagne in hand, his face slack with something so close to peace that Diwa’s chest ached looking at it.
He opened his messages, found Stephen’s name, attached the photo, and typed: Your father’s first flight.
The reply came in under a minute; a thumbs-up emoji, then three lines in rapid succession.
Take care of him.
Make sure he doesn’t drink the tap water. He won’t know not to.
Diwa pocketed his mobile, set his champagne down, and crossed the suite to where Colin was reclined in the seat.
He brought it back upright with a press of the button, ignoring Colin’s grunt of protest, and crouched between Colin’s knees to dig the seatbelt out of the side of the leather where it had retracted.
“Up you get. Belt on for take-off.”
“I was comfortable.”
“You can recline the second the seatbelt sign goes off.” Diwa fed the strap across Colin’s hips and pressed the buckle into his hand.
Colin clicked the buckle home with a sigh that was all theatre.
Diwa settled into the seat opposite, leaned across the small space between them, and pressed his face into the warm dip of Colin’s neck where the scent of him sat thickest. Colin’s hand came up and cupped the back of his head, fingers settling in his hair, and Diwa exhaled slowly into the cotton of Colin’s collar.
The stewardess reappeared at the partition with her tablet.
“So sorry to disturb, Mr de la Vega and Mr Huxley. We’ll be pushing back from the gate in just a moment. May I take your dining preferences? Once we’ve reached cruising altitude, we’ll bring your meals through whenever you’re ready.”
Diwa lifted his head. “Colin?”
She handed Colin the menu. He took it in both hands, opened it, and read with his brows furrowed. Diwa watched his omega’s eyes track across the page.
“Right,” Colin said. “I’ll have the satay to start. Then the lobster thermidor. The beef short rib after that. The cheese plate. And the chocolate fondant.”
The stewardess’s pen paused.
“All five courses,” Colin clarified. “In that order, please.”
“Of course, sir.” She made a note on her tablet. “And to drink, sir?”
“More of this.” Colin lifted the champagne flute. “Ta.”
She inclined her head and slid the partition shut behind her after Diwa provided his own order.
Diwa lifted his face out of Colin’s neck and grinned at him. “You comfy?”
Colin grunted.
“You can order anything off that menu, Colin. Any time. They’ll bring it through whenever you ask.”
Another grunt. Then, after a beat: “That’s only right, what with the price you paid.”
The cabin lights dimmed to a low amber. Somewhere beneath them the engines began to spool up, a slow building hum that travelled through the floor into the soles of Diwa’s feet.
Colin’s free hand reached for his across the small gap between their seats and gripped tight.
Diwa turned his palm up and laced their fingers together as the plane began to roll.
They gathered speed down the runway, the cabin shuddering faintly under them, and then the nose lifted and the whole plane left the ground in one long unhurried climb.
Colin’s grip on Diwa tightened. A pocket of air bumped them sideways.
The cabin gave a small lurch, and Colin let out a sound of distress.
He shifted in his seat, shoulder pressing into Diwa’s as his free hand fisted in the front of his shirt. Diwa kept his eyes on the cabin ceiling and his face very still. He hid his grin against the top of Colin’s head.
“Statistically,” he said, into the soft hair at Colin’s temple, “this is the safest part of the flight.”
“Mm.”
“Take-off only accounts for about fourteen per cent of fatal commercial incidents. Landing’s where it gets dicey; that’s forty-eight per cent. So you’ve got nothing to worry about for another twelve hours or so.”
Colin’s grip on his shirt tightened.
“And even then, the odds of anything actually happening to this plane are about one in eleven million. You’re more likely to be struck by lightning twice in the same year than be involved in a fatal plane crash.”
“Diwa.”
“Yeah?”
“Are you doing this on purpose?”
Diwa pressed his mouth to the top of Colin’s head and didn’t answer.