By Åsa Montpaz
“Lo siento pero I have to check,” she was gazing at the screen. “I’m
not sure you can go on the flight with three kids all by yourself,” she said.
“But we had this conversation when
we left Chile less than a week ago, I already traveled with them alone to come
here.”
“Un momento por favor, I have to check.”
How damn difficult can it be? Un momento por favor, that’s what she
said 20 minutes ago. Maggie turned around to see what the kids were up to.
“Oh shit.” Olivia was crawling on
the floor, pretending to be a dog on her way into the bathroom.
“Leo!” Maggie exclaimed and got
everybody’s attention except Leo who was busy playing with an empty plastic
bottle, kicking it around.
“Leo, get Olivia and bring her
back to me!” Maggie shouted.
Leo looked up and ran after his
little sister who now had entered the toilets.
“Perdon Señora,” she looked up from the screen “Do you have the
booking number?” She said.
“No I don’t, you are holding our
tickets in your hands.” ´What is wrong
with her, do they actually pay her for being rude to passengers?!´
“Can I have our boarding passes
now please?”
“No, espere Señora. You can’t board alone with three kids,” she
said.
“Can you call your boss?” Maggie
hit her hand on the counter. “This is ridiculous! Who’s in charge?”
Maggie heard Olivia screaming
behind her. She turned around and saw Leo hauling his sister by one of her
sleeves while Olivia was fighting to get lose from his demanding grip. Maggie
left their luggage and her sleeping baby by the counter and ran towards the
toilets. She took Olivia in her arms and commanded Leo to follow. Maggie tried
to calm Olivia, who was fighting to get down.
“Olivia do you want a lollypop?”
No reaction. She took a hard grip around her cheeks, forcing Olivia to look at
her.
“Do you want a lollypop?” Maggie
pulled out a bright red colored lollypop from her pocket and gave it to her.
Finally her daughter calmed down. ‘Good girl,’ she thought, and felt something
warm pouring down from her hip on her leg.
“Olivia, are you peeing? You know
you have to tell me when you want to go to the toilet.”
Olivia didn’t reply. She was
totally focused on getting the red colored paper off the lollypop with her
chubby little fingers while her eyes looked like as though they were going to
fall out of their eye sockets any minute.
“Señora, Señora!” The women at the counter was waving her boarding
passes high up in the air, as if she had just won the first prize at a lottery.
Bingo! “Here are your boarding passes and you can take the baby stroller to the
gate if you want to.”
“Gracias, that would be great!” Maggie said and opened one of the
suitcases to get some dry clothes.
“¿El es tuyo?” said an air stewardess who was wearing makeup as if
she was ready for the catwalk or shooting for Vogue magazine.
“What?”
“Is this boy your child?” she
repeated.
“Well yes, she is my daughter,
what happened?”
“We’re going to serve food soon
and he’s distracting us and the other passengers.” She gave her a typical air
stewardess smile, exposing all her teeth and gums. “Children are not allowed to
play in the airplane, you have to keep him in his seat,” she said and placed
Olivia in her seat.
“I’m sorry I was just
breastfeeding my baby and …”
“Ok take care of him,” she said
and walked away.
‘Yes I’ll take care of her. Why
did they always have to call Olivia a boy? Someone once told her that it was
because she didn’t wear any earrings. But why would someone put earrings on a
two year old girl?’
If only Jason had been able to
catch the same plane as they planned from the beginning, everything would have
been so much easier. Something came up last minute and he had to stay a few
more days in Buenos Aires for work. Maggie was used to sharing him with his
career but as their family had grown things had become more and more
complicated. Like now when she really needed him. Maggie wished that she could
snap her fingers and they would be home in a minute.
“Mommy I’m hungry,” Olivia said.
“Yes I know honey. They just told
me that they’ll be serving food soon.”
“No, I want food now,” she said
and crawled down on the floor again.
“Leo, can you please hold
Sebastian while I get Olivia?” She gave the baby to Leo and ran after Olivia.
Back at their seats, she placed
Olivia firmly on her lap to make sure that she couldn’t escape again. They
browsed through an airplane magazine together, pretending it was a storybook,
which was hard since they only showed pictures of half naked women and elegant
men drinking whisky.
“Excuse me, but can you please
tell your child to stop kicking my chair I’m trying to sleep and it’s really
disturbing!” Said a chubby middle-aged man dressed in a wrinkled suit.
“Sorry, I’ll tell her to stop,”
Maggie said.
‘I guess you don’t have any
children of your own and you are too miserly to travel in business class,
Idiot.’
“Mom, why don’t they show any
movies?” Leo asked.
“I don’t know honey.”
“Can you take Sebastian? My arms
are tired and he just pooped.”
“Buenos dias Señora, can I offer you something to drink? We have
juices, Coca Cola, Sprite, wine and water.” ´Give me a bloody Mary for God’s
sake.’
“I’ll have a Coke please, without
ice,” Maggie said.
They finally arrived at the
airport in Santiago de Chile. Sebastian was hanging in a carry harness while
Maggie carried Olivia on her hip and pushed the luggage trolley with her other
hand. Leo was dragging his feet.
“¿Usted tiene la declaracion de SAG?”
“¿Cómo? Mas despacio por favor,” Maggie said.
“Do you have the declaration
form?” A young woman asked holding a sniffing dog in his leash tight to her
body. Her nametag indicated that she was a SAG official.
“Yes, but we don’t have anything
to declare,” Maggie said.
“Left side please,” she said and
pointed towards the left queue.
Maggie was used to the procedure
at Santiago’s airport. It had been really irritating and complicated to
understand when they first moved to Chile a year ago. But she now knew how
important it was for the country to prevent the introduction of diseases that
may affect animals or plants and seriously damage their agricultural industry.
“La declaracion por favor,” said an old man holding a form in front
of her face.
“Si. Si,” she said as she pulled out the crumpled form from her
pocket.
Leo helped her to get their bags
on the scanning belt. The bags went through and she started to lift her luggage
back on the trolley.
“Señora, ¿podemos abrir esa bolsa? Can we open?” The old man said,
holding a piece of her hand luggage.
“Sure go ahead,” she said.
He opened the bag and pulled out
some diapers, toys, pacifiers, some extra clothes and all of a sudden he was
holding a red apple in his hand.
“¿Qué es esto?” he said.
She could feel how her face slowly
turned the same color as the apple. What was that apple doing in her bag? She
hadn’t brought any apples and was pretty sure she had gone through all their
packing.
“Usted sabe que es prohibido llevar fruta! No bring fruits into
Chile!” He glared at her.
“Perdón, I didn’t put it there I promise!” She said. “Leo did you
put the apple in our bag? You know it’s prohibited don’t you?”
He denied and she could feel how
her eyes and throat started to burn.
“Usted tiene que pagar multa,” he said.
“No entiendo, mas despacio por favor,” she said as tears rolled down
on her cheek.
“Usted. Pay Fine!” He repeated.
Maggie and her children left the
airport building after paying the fine. Her Spanish was too poor to clarify her
innocence and, with less pesos in her pocket, she had convinced herself that
money wasn’t everything after all.
A bunch of taxi drivers came
towards them. They were all eager to give her special prices and help out with
the luggage. She decided to go with one of the drivers who had a friendly
smile, curly hair and was wearing a leather jacket. He immediately took the
trolley with their luggage while Maggie took care of the children. The driver
kept walking and as they arrived at the end of the parking area he picked up
his cell phone to make a call.
Maggie didn’t see any car so she
asked the man, “¿Donde está tu taxi?”
He didn´t respond but within a few
minutes an old oxblood colored Mercedes drove towards them and stopped.
As they started putting in their
luggage in the trunk of the car, she realized that this was a private car and
not an official taxi. She didn’t have the strength to pull herself, the luggage
and the kids all the way back to the airport hall to find herself a new
licensed taxi.
A young man in his twenties jumped
out from the car and helped, fitting in the last pieces of luggage in the
trunk. Maggie sat down in the backseat holding her children close to her body
since she was wearing the only complete seatbelt.
The man with the leather jacket
told the young driver to drive safely and they left the airport. As they drove
away the young driver asked for her address and there was something about his
gaze through the rear-view mirror that she didn’t like. He fixed his dark
colored eyes on her and didn’t let go until she looked away like a shy girl.
The children soon fell asleep. Maggie was looking out through the car window and
had to force herself to stay awake.
Santiago was foggy and chilly,
nevertheless she saw the beautiful mountain tops all covered in white snow. The
driver’s gaze at her every now made her uncomfortable but she pretended that
she didn’t notice.
Finally they arrived home; the
kids still asleep in the car. She had to unlock the gate and the front door
before she could carry them into the house one by one. The young driver helped
her with the luggage.
Maggie made sure that she didn’t
leave anything in the car and took her purse to pay the driver, but soon
realized that she didn’t have enough to pay him. She told him to wait outside
the front door and went into the house to get some cash.
Walking through the house she felt
how comforting it was to be home again. It’s nice to go on vacation but even
better to come back home. Maggie entered the master bedroom, which was dark as
the curtains were closed. When opening the closet door she jumped back in
shock. All her clothes and accessories were thrown on the floor in total
disorder and chaos. Maggie had to climb over piles of clothes to get to the
security box where they kept all their valuables but the only thing left was a
big gaping hole in the wall.
Maggie collapsed down on the
floor. ‘This is not happening, this is not happening, please tell me I’m
dreaming.’
But she wasn’t.
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