Based on a true story, though some details have been changed for narrative purposes.
*****
The unexpected can provide a refreshing fillip, as a recent adventure illustrates. A tedious flight was transformed into something quite different.
Jo and I were enduring the final leg of a long plane journey. As you'd expect, we were both very tired and were running on the adrenaline the body produces in order to cope with such taxing situations. Well, not just adrenaline. We'd been drinking heartily too and the combination had been successful, creating a type of altered mental state: slightly dazed, almost manically cheerful and passably alert, but not too far from exhaustion.
I doubt if I am unusual in finding that this state makes me especially prone to lust. Being on a plane always feels a bit otherworldly and dreamlike, as if one is in the inter-zone, on the edge of being outside time and space. Well, that's how it seemed: slightly unreal, a twilight zone of sorts, neither here nor there. I felt this general sense of detachment: as if normal conventions and inhibitions no longer applied.
No doubt the fact that planes and airports are full of strangers contributes to this. Nobody knows who you are and they are unlikely to see you again. It could also have something to do with the background noise and how stingy they are with the fresh air circulation on planes. Lower oxygen levels are known to affect mood, especially when alcohol has been consumed.
When we reached our row after boarding, a well-built man was already seated in the right-hand window seat. Jo shuffled in next to him and I took the aisle seat. Once we had finally taken off, I sat back, closed my eyes and tried to rest, but after a while I noticed animated conversation to my right. Jo and the stranger were getting to know each other and seemed to be getting along famously, playing with their smartphones and discussing the merits of the gadgets one gets on modern planes. I was a bit surprised by how enthusiastically Jo was bonding with the fellow with the posh English accent. He had a confident demeanour, not quite arrogant, but self-assured.
I put Jo's exuberance down partly to the nervous energy people often get when tired or stressed. She's also been known to be a bit impulsive at times. My tinge of possessive jealousy wasn't completely unwarranted though as Jo is accurately described as a cute and pretty minx, sexy as fuck, very clever, petite and eminently fanciable. Not to mention her charm and cheekiness.
She may have been older than the man in the window-seat, but I could see that he rated her: she has that effect on men. I think it's got something to do with the way she can initially seem to have a girlish innocence, which on closer inspection is found to be sexily misleading. You just know she's got a wild side, a suggestion of hidden mysteries.
It is of course very difficult to pinpoint the exact nature of lust and sexual attraction: the so-called chemistry. It's not just driven by physical appearance, the mind behind it is what really counts. It can be seen in the eye banter, the teasing challenge of a daring stare - the challenge of conquest.
There is also the idea of risk, the possible danger: is the other person a bit bad, likely to lead you astray into unknown pleasures? Well, it's all that and more and whatever it was, they seemed to share it. He did seem just a little nervous though as Jo and I were clearly travelling together, but he was definitely becoming bolder.
This airline's headphones came with three variations of do not disturb stickers: adhesive labels bearing messages. Wake me at meals, never, in the event of a crash: that sort of thing. Jo cheekily asked him, suggestively and somewhat breathlessly I thought: "I wonder where one is supposed to stick these?" He laughed and leaning into her, whispered something I didn't catch.
Whatever he said, it made Jo giggle coyly. And did I catch her submissively lowering her eyes from his assertive gaze? That and her eager to please, receptive body language triggered in me a surge of the notoriously invigorating bedfellows of jealousy and arousal as I imagined the strength and filthiness of the crude innuendo he had no doubt uttered into my good wife's willing earhole.
Jo knew just what I was like though: inclined to a variety of perversions, including a tendency to get very turned on by this very scenario. I doubt that I'm unusual in this. My jealousy was fairly mild, but sufficient. After all, jealousy and arousal operate at a largely non-rational level and I suspect that if there was no jealousy at all, my excitement would have been diminished. I certainly wasn't bored, unlike most of the rest of the plane journey, when time had passed like chilled, low-grade sludge.
Once the meals and the many empty wine bottles had been cleared away, we all rested, though Jo and he chatted on and off, off and on. They were quite loud at times, as was their frequent laughter. Jo was rather tipsy by now and he'd had a few. I left them to it. I didn't catch all the conversation, but it generally seemed mild enough, though I did sense an undercurrent of ambiguity in places, as well as suggestive tones of voice.
To be honest, it smacked of flirting. It transpired that he was a musician, which is always a popular profession with the ladies. I wonder if that has something to do with their proximity to dancing. They talked about his band and that they were touring, Jo being delighted to find that they would be playing near our town. She also quizzed and teased him about the debauched rock 'n roll antics he must get up to, even asking him straight-out whether he was married.
Again I didn't hear all the answers properly, what with the aircraft noise and their soft, conspiratorial speaking volume. Disappointingly, they then moved onto a duller topic, though this time I could hear them clearly. Since his exploits were such a potentially sordid subject, I was really hoping that she would pump him harder. I didn't exactly expect Led Zeppelin style tales of mud sharks or whatever, but surely he could have come up with something salacious and titillating? Even if I wasn't able to hear all of it.
Little was said for the next half hour, maybe because Jo was afraid of coming across as too much of a groupie, though I couldn't neglect the possibility that he had told her something particularly intriguing and Jo was delightedly mulling over the implications. That incessant, hard to pin down plane hum of rushing wind, jet engines and air-conditioning droned on and I was left to marinade in my sexual thoughts.
At one point, the plane encountered turbulence and the resulting jolting caused her right leg to press against his left. Well, that was a possible cause, anyway. As I buckled my seat-belt, I noticed that neither of them moved away, both content with the bumpy contact. There was definite eye contact though, and eye feedback to boot, but neither overtly made the next move. I lay back, immersed myself in the plane's white noise and enjoyed the sensation of my cock hardening, the droning sound of speed somehow enhancing my excitement.
Since they had gone quiet, I eventually dozed briefly, still wishing that she had probed him more deeply about his band. Surely that was a ripe and promising subject eminently suited to flirting? I didn't see her flirting as infidelity; hell, I flirted myself sometimes, it's almost like an instinct sometimes, a form of sport. Yeah, I got it, the thrill of the chase, the flattery of it, the sexual kick, the excitement. It's much more intense with a stranger and when flirting right under the nose of one's spouse, there is the added taboo element, which is always a pleasure.
Yeah, I did understand the flirting kick. I also understood that my excitement needed to be piqued by at least the idea of a risk of infidelity, for without that, there would be much less of a thrill. Yeah, Jo had to flirt with him like that in front of me, she had to play the game: for my sake. As it was getting late, the plane's lights were dimmed and I had plenty of time to run over these thoughts in my mind. The more I contemplated it, the more excited and titillated I became.
Quite some time later, I gradually awoke. It took me a while to adjust back from the edge of reality, but sure enough, there were suggestively soft sounds on my right. Feigning sleep, I cracked open my eyes a sliver and peeked in their direction. The cabin lights had long been dim now and most people were attempting to sleep. Jo also seemed to be asleep but as my eyes adjusted to the light, it dawned on me that he was doing something to her hair.
Jo's hair had somehow become pinned to the seat's headrest by one of the stickers and he was gallantly freeing her; or just maybe, attaching her more securely. It was hard to tell, though I had a definite preference for the second option. She presumably had put the sticker there herself, since it was on his side of her head, much less visible to an attendant: deliberately invisible, no doubt. I surmised that she must have hoped that the sight of her head being fastened and restrained in some mild simulation of bondage would drive him wild. It worked on me, for I could feel my cock hardening at the very idea.