Gone Bad (Nigerian Novel) -Editing

Chapter 20: Head in the Clouds

I roll my eyes at the man whose middle name might have as well been called Luxury. "Ah yes, only first-class for the best."

He snorts as we begin boarding and I keep looking around for the other first-class travelers.

Isren wouldn't actually rent an entire plane, would he...?

Turns out he did much worse.

My mouth hangs open as I see we're about to climb the stairs of a private jet.

I turn to look at the culprit who had was every bit unfazed.

He glances at me when I keep boring holes into his head and says, "Surprise."

My gaping mouth morphs into a 'seriously?' before I smile like it wasn't my first time.

You're always so mad about his money, it's about time you start getting used to it.

The private jet is every bit like in the movies, with nude leather furniture, fancy tech gadgets, and a nice polished everything.

We come to our seats and I peek down the hall to where the beds were located, before I sit opposite him.

A dark woman with vivacious ringlets, and a milky smile to match her immaculate uniform, comes to welcome us.

Her cheerfulness is infectious and I smile at her when she asks us what we would like for refreshments.

But I can't help the little envy that stems from my admiration as I watch her long legs glide across the runway with graceful movements as she went back with our order.

Isren is making a call once again so I'm forced to look out the window and observe the fluffy clouds as they alternated from white to silver whenever a ray of light would pass through them.

My mind drifts to my words from earlier and I feel stupid once again.

I had ordered champagne even though I very well knew it would be my first time drinking.

Isren seems to be thinking the same thing because when he ends his call he goes, "Okay done and dusted, no more work calls. But you made an interesting choice of drink."

I roll my eyes nonchalantly, even though I was surprised myself.

"Felt like celebrating a new age," I say and as if on cue the flight attendant is back with the bubbly liquids.

"Then I'll drink to that." he says pushing his glass so I can hit it with a satisfying 'clink'.

I slowly sip the liquid like I had learned in novels, to reduce my chances of being inebriated but he has no trouble finishing a glass and remaining clear-eyed.

However, he doesn't ask for another and chooses to recline further in his seat.

With his momentary distraction, I am able to check him out in his pair of grey sweats and a thin white tee.

Or maybe he was just so sculpted that his muscles bulged out of any shirt.

Either way, I downed another portion of champagne to stop myself from moving too fast.

"How long do we have till touch down," I ask him and he gives me a cryptic smile.

"Oh that will be a long time from now," he says putting emphasis on the long.

"Then what are we going to do?" I say scanning the room for possible entertainment.

"I know one thing..." Isren answers, waggling his brows suggestively at me.

............

Turns out he was a genius.

Because in a few hours we had watched three Disney movies, that ended with me falling asleep before Tiana could turn back into a human.

It was a blur but somewhere along the line, I was floating till I landed on a fluffy surface.

Instinctively I reached for a duvet to cover myself but it kept moving away.

Ignoring the oddly familiar grunt I hear, I have an ongoing tug of war with the resistant comforter.

The last jerk irritates me so much that I force my eyes open to see what was responsible for pulling me out of my drowsy limbo.

"Now that you're awake could you not strangle me?" Isren says, his head bent downwards at an awkward angle.

I scream in pure terror and let go of the tie for all but five seconds before my brain interprets what my eyes had seen.

"I-I thought you were a duvet," I stutter my cheeks rising in temperature.

He looks crossed between irritated and amused, as he moves his gaze from mine to the white blanket folded neatly on the tail of the bed.

"Catch some shut-eye, there's still a little bit of time before we land," Isren says, and I nod before he leaves the room.

I flop my head back on the pillow and use my barefoot to push the duvet even further away.

There was no way I was going back to bed after that embarrassing ordeal.

*******

I slip on my sandals at the pilot's announcement to be seated for landing.

Isren stops midway when he sees I'm already heading for my seat and goes back to obey the pilot.

Through the window, I see little structures that remind me of monopoly houses from the board game I used to play when I was younger.

As we get closer to the ground the once minuscule buildings magnify in size and I'm momentarily blinded by bright twinkles that resembled stars in the night sky.

Stars.

"Isren what time is it?" I ask and he turns to look at me from the flight dashboard.

"Uh, 7:30?" he says.

"How long have we been up here?" I ask wondering where in the world we could be.

So far I hadn't seen any famous landmarks to give me a clue of our location.

The voice from the intercom cuts through the silence and I hear the pilot speak.

"Welcome to Mozambique, thank you for flying with us."

He gives me another one of his dazzling smiles as he unbuckled his belt and lends me a helping hand.

I smooth the wrinkles on my dress and try to wrap my head around the unconventional getaway.

I half expected him to fly us to the Maldives, maybe even the Bahamas.

I notice my train of thoughts and stop myself.

Contrary to popular beliefs Africa had a lot to offer and this could be every bit a tropical paradise as the next island on a foreign continent.

"Shall we?" Isren says offering me his arm.

I flip down my sunshades even though it's evening and loop my arm through his.

"Yes, we shall."