Because I hadn't been able to sleep, I'd jumped out of my hotel bed and left for the airport at least an hour early, afraid I'd miss the plane. I talked to the cabdriver for thirty minutes straight. I couldn't stop myself from rambling. I looked everywhere and commented on everything: the color of a passing car, a pedestrian's skirt, the sign in front of a bar... My inhibitions were low. I was a sports car on nitrous, just before I'd either empty my tank or blow a gasket.
I arrived at the airport way too early. My sunglasses couldn't prevent the sunlight from hurting my eyes when I stepped out of the cab. I was worn out after six consecutive fourteen-hour days in the studio and hardly two hours sleep a night. My body and mind however were still stuck in overdrive. Too much adrenaline coursing around my system. And a bit of amphetamine.
As I trudged into the main entrance, I took off my sunglasses. All I wanted was to go home, plunge into my own bed and sleep, no: die for at least a week. I'd experienced this numerous times before after a tough job. By the time planes and taxicabs would deliver me to my front door, the adrenaline would have run out and I'd pass out in bed for at least twenty hours. After that, I'd be my normal self again.
I knew that around the corner at the end of the hallway I'd come into the large hall with the check-in counters and a sea of benches with waiting travelers. I'd pick a bench and wait there until check-in on my flight would start. Right on the corner however, I saw a little stand where a blonde was trying to sell something. It looked very much like an improvised lemonade stand. But the sign gave it away: the blonde was trying to hock memberships of one of the major credit cards. She wore a tight, blue business uniform. She had a nice, round ass bulging the back of her way too long skirt. It looked like a peach wrapped in blue paper. She was maybe just a little bit too big for my taste but she was by no means fat. Just nicely full figured. I could feel my morning wood returning. I didn't even mind that the color of those honey blonde curls that reached down to her lower back had so obviously come out of a bottle. She had 'Goldy Locks' quality. And together with that nice, round ass the package looked terribly inviting.
Facing the stand was a bench with just one guy in a business suit, reading a book. Yep, that was the plan: I would rest my weary bones there. In the meantime I could enjoy checking out the blonde with the inviting ass.
As I walked past the stand, the blonde glanced my way. Her dark chocolate colored skin took me completely by surprise. Damn, that girl was black!
I've never liked black girls. Somehow their features always seem far too crude for my taste. Broad noses, big lips and a skin color that seems like it's been painted on with a spray gun just don't do it for me. I've very rarely seen a black girl that I considered beautiful. I've never fantasized about fucking a black girl. Maybe that makes me a racist. I don't know. It's just a question of taste, I guess. You can keep your BeyoncΓ©s and Tyras. I might consider Lil' Kim. But she's the absolute exception to the rule. I'll take a nice Nordic girl any day of the week: blue eyes, blonde hair, a really light complexion and a Viking heart. Swedish Snow queens, if you like. Those are my absolute favorites.
Unfortunately, because of my job I usually wind up working with black girls. This whole week I'd worked with five very irritating specimens: a black girl group that was going to bring sixties soul music back. At least that was the brilliant concept the record company had come up with. Unfortunately those five black bitches had about as much talent between them as my next-door neighbor's Doberman. I'd had it with black girls this week. So I quickly looked the other way when I saw this blonde black girl smiling at me.
I was even a little pissed off. That blonde hair and round ass had looked so promising. There should be a law against black chicks dyeing their hair. It's not fair to mislead guys like that. I felt how heavy my eyelids were. So I still walked over to the bench and plunged down onto it. The guy in the business suit was reading some self-help crap entitled 'Fifty strategies to finding a new You'. I didn't know 'You' were lost, I thought to myself while I closed my eyes and tried to relax.
***
I'm not sure how long I'd been sitting there, listening to people walking by and speakers announcing delayed flights. Suddenly, through all the noises and echoes of the airport crowds I distinctly heard stiletto footsteps clippety-clopping closer. I opened my eyes and saw the girl from the stand wiggling her hips toward me. I started to feel my morning wood again. From the front that ass looked just as appetizing as from behind. What a shame the girl was black.
She sat down between the guy in the business suit and me. I looked at her face as she opened a lunchbox and got out a cheese sandwich. She glanced at me and smiled. That's when it hit me. Her eyes were blue: the deepest indigo I'd ever seen in my life. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't help staring. Her eyes looked like ocean waves on a summer's day framed by a chocolate sky.
"My God, your eyes are beautiful." The words came out before I realized I'd opened my mouth.
She smiled from ear to ear. "Thank you very much," she said.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare... it's just..." That's when I remembered Lil' Kim wearing blue contacts. This chick was obviously wearing blue contacts as well. I looked into her eyes very deeply, trying to spot the plastic edge of the contacts. But I couldn't see any edges or plastic. Her irises were pale white on the inner ring with white rays radiating outward in a sea of blue that got darker and darker until it hit that deep indigo on the outer ring. They looked like two precious aquamarine jewels. Surely that vibrant indigo couldn't be artificial?
"Are you wearing contacts?" That was the adrenaline talking. Normally I'd never be so forward.
"No," she said and burst out laughing. "Everything about me is real. Except for my hair color that is. I like blonde hair. I think it matches my eyes. I sometimes wish I had been born a blonde."
"Me too..." I could have kicked myself for blurting that out. I just couldn't stop myself saying anything that popped into my head. "Um, I mean... I didn't know it was possible for a black girl to have blue eyes."
"I've been told it's a mutation that happens only once in a hundred thousand. It's a family trait. My mother had it. And my grandfather as well."
"And they were white?"
"No. As far as I know I'm from an all black lineage. Look how dark my skin is."
She held out her hand. Her skin was the color of century old oak. Her pointy fingernails were long and had shiny pink nail polish that matched the color of her lips.
"There's no vanilla in me at all. They've traced my family tree back to Kenya. The blue eyes are just a rare mutation that sometimes happens."
"Right. Kenya..." I said. "Would you have liked to have been born with lighter skin?"
"Of course not, silly!" she answered with a surprised smile. "I'm black and I'm proud of it."
I was puzzled. "But you said you would have liked to have been born a blonde?"
"Yeah, sure," she said. "But I wouldn't have wanted to have been born white. Not that there's anything wrong with your skin color. You're a very handsome man." She touched my shoulder with her hand. "It's just... well, I just love the way the blonde hair and blue eyes go with my dark skin. Don't you think that combination looks beautiful?"
"Fishing for compliments are you?" I asked. "I think you look absolutely stunning. And coming from me, that is saying something."
She smiled from ear to ear again.
"Listen, I'm sorry for being so nosy," I said. "I didn't mean to start interrogating you like this. It's just that I was, well... those blue eyes and that dark skin... that's an amazing contrast... yes, it's an incredibly beautiful combination. I was blown over. I wasn't prepared for meeting such a unique beauty like you this morning." The moment I'd blurted it all out I wished the earth would open up and swallow me. It all sounded like a bunch of warmed up, phony pickup lines. Still it was word for word what I was thinking there and then. I just couldn't stop myself from rambling on and on.