By the time Karza came to his senses, he and the two other staffers from the local canteen had spent hours in this special waiting room on the plane.
The doorless room reeked of old moldy smell combined with recently applied disinfectant. There were two rows of old shelves separated by the red-carpeted corridor right down the middle, making the rectangular room feel even longer and narrower than it already was. The shelves were all identical – they had a metal frame with wooden planks.
One side of the shelves was just piles and piles of boardgames messily stacked together. The boxes seemed like they had been halfway biodegraded, so half the cards and loose pieces were just hopelessly mixed altogether.
The other side could probably be described as a snack shelve, although most of them were just sad-looking cheese and spam or cheese and ham sandwiches wrapped in cling wrap. No one knew how long they had been on the shelves, but Karza helped himself anyway to fill his hunger and anxiety from all the waiting. Surprisingly, the sandwiches tasted fairly good.
Meanwhile, the other two staffers, Edward and Gracey, were just sitting on the floor and waiting in silence. Karza vaguely remembered that the three of them had been invited by the US President to board the plane for a meeting, but he couldn’t recall any other details.
After endless waiting, the important people had finally arrived. While the plane was preparing to take off, Karza and the two were instructed to follow the people to the meeting room at the very end of the long and narrow corridor.
At this inconvenient moment, Karza really needed to relieve himself. He ran quickly down the opposite end of the corridor to get to the restroom. He even engaged the muscles to make it quicker. However, apparently he still wasn’t fast enough. By the time he came out of the restroom, the meeting room had already been locked with multiple locks.
Panicking, Karza walked up and down the corridor looking for help. Perhaps due to the limited cabin space on the plane, all spaces had to be as streamlined as possible, but that blood red hotel carpet really made the corridor feel exceptionally liminal and suffocating. Combined with Karza’s worry of missing out on something important, his breaths grew shallower and louder with each hasty step. All the rooms except the meeting room and the restroom were doorless, but his tunnel vision did not spot any hope.
Then.
In one of the rooms, Karza finally found someone who claimed to be the Secretary of the US President.
When he greeted Karza, his greeting smile appeared cold and soulless like most politicians, although the way that the outer corner of his eyes was squinting radiated a faint sense of femininity.
Karza explained his situation chaotically. Unfazed, the Secretary led him back to the meeting room door. He took out his staff card and tapped lightly on the scanner, expecting a blinking green light. However, the red light flashed instead. He knocked gently on the door hoping to get an answer, but to no avail. Still unbothered, he walked unhurriedly back to the room to his old-fashioned desk phone. He picked up the headset and waited silently for some good seconds, while Karza slowly came to realization of the worst scenario. At last, the Secretary put the headset down, and that dangling cord sank almost as fast as Karza’s heart.
All that effort and those long hours were in vain.
Karza let out a deep sigh in midst of his rhythmless panting, accepting his unfortunate defeat. The Secretary looked at him and gave him a sympathetic smile. It was only at this moment that Karza actually looked at him for the first time.
His tanned complexion, thick eyebrows, deep-set round eyes, straight nose and full red lips resembled the look of a South Asian, perhaps, Indian man. His facial hair was minimal, but mostly because he was aiming for a well-groomed look.
While Karza took notice of his appearance, he stared back at him deep in the soul behind his eyes. Karza finally understood the meaning behind his feminine gaze when they first greeted.
He is into me.
Warning: the next part of the story contains NSFW content. Proceed with caution even if you’re 18+.