This story is written by David, please send comments and appreciation to voondave@yahoo.co.uk

The Footsore Flight Attendants.

Ch. 1 of 3: Warren's world is rocked.


I was not in the best of moods in the first place.

I was short on sleep, had a nagging headache, and having to wait for nearly an hour now at the baggage carousel for my single piece of luggage wasn't helping - wasn't helping at all.

Come on ... come on! I silently implored as I stood and watched items of luggage from later flights arriving on the belt and wondered when in hell mine would show up.

My Flight from Alicante, in southern Spain, had landed at five a.m. and so I'd thought at least I would beat the rush-hour traffic. But in the state I was in, I'd quite forgotten about it being Sunday - the roads would be quiet for a
while yet anyway so at least that was something.

All of my mates had collected their luggage a good half-hour ago, and after saying our farewells and arranging to meet up in the pub next Saturday they had all gone their own ways, leaving me to wait for my missing suitcase.

But as miserable and annoying as things were, they were just about to get a whole lot worse ...

*


People seemed to think nothing of it these days, taking advantage of such cheap airfares.

Flying off to short-haul destinations in continental Europe or Scandinavia with EasyJet or Ryan Air or some other budget airline for their stag parties and hen parties - or even just for a party.

And so it was, that I had just arrived back at Gatwick Airport having returned from Steve's stag party in Benidorm.

Steve was my best mate; we went way back, right back to our earliest school days.

After work on Thursday, a bunch of us had piled over to the Spanish resort. And then on Friday, we'd certainly done justice to the time-honoured tradition in the time-honoured fashion.

Me and the lads had all mercilessly ribbed Steve about the proverbial 'Ball and Chain' he would soon be wearing. His lovely wife-to-be, Rachel, holding the key to the metaphorical husband-constraining device - which to be honest wasn't
the worst fate in the world.

We'd all enjoyed a great, Friday-night drinkathon, knocking back pints of lager as if there was no tomorrow.

Now though, the day after 'tomorrow' was here and I was still paying a price for my foolish Saturday-night hair-of-the-dog excesses.

*


With my belatedly arrived suitcase, I was just about to board the airport service bus to the Long Stay car park, when I felt a firm, staying hand grip my right shoulder.

What the ...? I wondered irritably. What now?

I turned around, to see a man of about forty wearing the dark green jacket and trousers uniform of his 'calling', that I instantly recognised. The badge on the front of his peaked cap read: Litterman.

"Just a moment, sir. Would these ... happen to be yours?"

In his hand, the Litterman was showing me five or six sweet wrappers of a sort I recognised: barley sugars.

I'd heard that they were good for settling the stomachs of travellers prone to airsickness and so I'd taken some along with me and tried them and yes, they seemed to work.

I doubted though that the stomach-settling sweets could do much about the sickly feeling that was settling in the pit of my gut now, as I realised that the wrappers I'd been meaning to bin must have inadvertently fallen from my pocket
when I'd been rummaging about looking for my Long Stay car parking ticket.

"Um ..."

The Litterman waved the bus driver on his way.

"I'm afraid, sir, that now you must come with me."

*


Prime Minister Caroline Flynt's Authoritarian Female Party government's 'Keep Britain Tidy' initiative - ostensibly to crack down on the nuisance problem and anti-social behaviour of litter louts in towns and cities' public places, but
in reality more so to find more males to man all of their so-called female-friendly programmes, projects and schemes - was from today being implemented at all UK airports too, the Litterman informed me.

My entreaties falling on deaf ears, the Litterman, not being persuaded or moved by my truthful excuses and earnest pleading, escorted me into the building where I would be formally brought to book for my offence.

Upon entering the drab building, with his firm, staying hand on my right shoulder the Litterman guided me down a narrow dismal corridor and past a number of doors to either side until we arrived at a white-painted office door at the end.

On the office door was a brass plaque which read: 'Gatwick Airport Authority Litter Department - Administrator: Mrs J Jepson'.

The Litterman knocked politely on the office door, and upon a no-nonsense sounding female voice calling to him to enter, he opened the door and gestured for me to go in first.

"I beg your pardon, Madam," said the Litterman respectfully to the woman dressed in a Litter Department-green short-sleeved blouse and above-the-knee skirt, who was sitting with her feet propped up on her desk with her ankles crossed as
she drank her cup of coffee; the heel of her dark pantyhosed uppermost foot repeatedly popping free from her well-worn black leather office pump.

The not unattractive woman whose name was engraved on the plaque on her office door was in her late twenties, had a curvy figure and shapely legs.

Her casual, laid-back demeanour though was deceptive, for she emanated an unsettling and in fact menacing air of natural authority.

But what lent her air of natural authority an added potency was that she wore her blonde hair in the adopted but AFP-adapted militarist-like concave bob style, that was a part of the AFP employee uniform but was also worn by many
affiliated personnel like herself as a visible outward sign of party loyalty and enthusiastic support.

But for that matter, in these still early months of Prime Minister Caroline Flynt's Authoritarian Female Party's governmental realm, the symbolic hairdo was becoming increasingly popular with ordinary civilian females, worn as a sort of
demonstrative wearing-their-heart-on-their-sleeve allegiance to the AFP and a declaration of wholehearted backing and solidarity for their female-friendly ideological values and ideals.

After looking me up and down appraisingly, the Administrator of the airport's newly opened Litter Department addressed the Litterman authoritatively. "Yes, Arnold? Are we up and running, then? What do we have here?"

"He dropped these, Madam ... there are six of them, in total." the Litterman informed his superior, in tones befitting the gravity of the situation as he displayed the damning evidence in the palm of his hand.

"I see. Well, that didn't take long, did it?" said Mrs Jepson, looking at her wristwatch. "Your first collar. Well done, Arnold. Good job!"

"Thank you, Madam. But really I was only obeying my orders to the letter. And if I might be permitted to speak in mitigation for the gentleman ... quite clearly he did not drop litter to the pavement intentionally, but inadvertently. I
could see that he was unaware of his having dropped the offending articles to the pavement."

"But as you know, Arnold, ignorance is no defence. And besides, and as you also know, the AFP are ever in need of more manpower for all of their female-friendly services. What on earth do you think we are here for?"

"Of course, Madam," said the Litterman, his face reddening at the mild rebuke. "I beg your pardon, Madam."

"Apology accepted. But perhaps this would be a very good time to remind you, Litterman, just so that we know with unambiguous, perfect clarity right from the get-go, where the two of us stand.

"This assignment is a very soft touch that you've landed on, Arnold, a very cushy number, for your One-year-Probation Government Support Worker conditional release from prison.

"But if I find your heart isn't in it, I shall have no qualms and no compunction about putting the wheels in motion for having you re-assigned to other female-friendly related duties - and duties, that I will make certain you will find
decidedly less agreeable.

"A more AFP-supportive, more sympathetic - more deserving - male, Arnold, shall have your cushy little number ... He dropped them 'inadvertently' - indeed!

"Now let me make myself clear: You will continue obeying your orders to the letter, and you will not presume upon yourself the leave to speak in mitigation on behalf of litter-dropping 'gentlemen' - or I'll make you sorry that you ever
crossed my path!

"Now here, make yourself useful: go and refill my coffee cup again from my cafetiere. Milk and two sugars, in case you've forgotten."

I felt embarrassed and somewhat sorry for the Litterman, receiving such a telling off and such a put-down - and such a disconcerting warning - right in front of me.

Mrs Jepson opened one of her desk drawers and took out a small, transparent polythene bag and wrote something on the label.

The chastised Litterman returned with his superior's refilled coffee cup and handed it to her. "Your coffee, Mrs Jepson, Madam. Milk and two sugars, just as you ordered," gushed the Litterman obsequiously. "And ... I won't forget."

Inclining her head towards the six offending articles he'd put down on her desk, she instructed her unfortunate underling, "Put them in here, please."

Handling the clear Cellophane air sickness sweet wrappers with exaggerated care, as though dealing with the most fragile and crucial exhibits of painstakingly recovered crime scene evidence, the Litterman did as instructed.

The Litterman's superior sealed the clear polyethene evidence bag, deposited it in another of her desk drawers and locked it.

Mrs Jepson then held out her hand to me expectantly. "Identification, please. Give me your passport."

Not wishing to make matters any worse than they already were, I handed the requested document over to Mrs Jepson without demur.

The airport's Litter Department Administrator recrossed her ankles, took another couple of sips from her freshly topped-up coffee cup and then put it down on her desk to free her hands.

Resuming repeatedly popping free the dark pantyhosed heel of her other, now uppermost foot from her black leather office pump, she opened my passport and gleaned my personal details.

"Litter louts - Mr Warren Williams, aged twenty-one, from Horsham in West Sussex - as you have just discovered to your cost, are no longer tolerated at Gatwick Airport. Those days are gone," Mrs Jepson told me.

My protestations of innocence - or, at least, of accidental and therefore 'mitigated' litter dropping, as the apparently fair-minded Litterman himself, had unfortunately self-detrimentally phrased it - fell upon deaf ears. Had no effect
whatsoever, on the uncompromising, stern-faced, absentmindedly heel-popping Mrs Jepson.

"Save it!" said Mrs Jepson, cutting me off.

"Look on it, Warren, as paying now, all in one go, for all of your many previously unpunished littering offences."

I felt outraged.

I was always (well, nearly always ...) so meticulous in disposing of my litter: considerately and correctly disposing of it in the receptacles provided for the purpose.

But now, just because of one, innocent little slip ...

But Mrs Jepson was just getting started.

Upon learning that I was currently unemployed and claiming Unemployment Benefit since being made redundant from my job, just last week, Mrs Jepson told me that my out-of-work circumstances made her penalty decision all the easier for her
since she had all the less to consider.

Under the AFP government's 'Keep Britain Tidy' initiative, Mrs Jepson, as Administrator of the Gatwick Airport Litter Department and empowered to penalise litter louts at her discretion, sentenced me to six weeks of Cabin Crew Comfort
Station Attendance.

"Probably as an air passenger yourself, you have never even given it so much as a moment's consideration before, Warren, have you, that after a hard, demanding shift of traipsing up and down an aircraft cabin catering to their
passengers' every needs and wants and demands and entitlements in their flight-duty pumps - pumps, very similar to mine ... the hardworking air hostesses' feet are tired and achy to distraction?"

"Er ..."

"Well, they are. As a former senior British Airways hostie myself of both extensive long-haul and short-haul experience, I can most certainly assure you.

"As I know myself, from again drawing from personal experience, after a long-haul flight, air hostesses can get quite distressingly footsore.

"But of course, because there's so little rest or respite, a work shift pattern of short-haul, quick turnaround fights can be just as and even more demanding and discomforting on their poor overworked feet.

"And so, Warren, every day for six weeks, from six a.m. to six p.m., attending in the Cabin Crew Comfort Station you - and you alone - will provide foot massages to any and all air hostesses who require them.

"Any and all, meaning foreign as well as British air hostesses, since the AFP are keen to extend this female-friendly airport facility as a welcoming courtesy."

Whatever I thought my penalty for littering might be, I never imagined this.

Being made to massage air hostesses' end-of-shift stinky pantyhosed feet!

"But, Mrs Jepson!" I protested, panic-stricken at being unable to think of a way of worming my way out of Mrs Jepson's penal single-provider Pedi-care predicament.

"I've never done that before! So I don't think I'd be any good, or be of any use-"

"You'll be plenty of use in the Comfort Station, Warren, don't worry about that.

"Because of the inevitable high demand on your services and the obvious time constraints, the air hostesses will be glad to instruct you in the art of performing a mini, minute-massage.

"You'll soon learn, as you become more experienced and your fingers more expert, that you can work a lot of wonders in just one minute.

"Often, it's really just a matter of compliantly applying firm but gentle circular kneading pressure with the pads of your fingers and thumbs to the particularly troubled areas of the soles of the feet as indicated to you.

"For instance, it may be the heels and the balls of the feet, the impact and weight-bearing areas of the feet, that some hosties may ask you to focus your attentions and ministrations.

"But having said that, and again as I know from long experience, post-flight foot massages are always extremely welcome, and some hosties will be happy enough to just simply let you do your own, mini-massage thing - a sort of amateurish
yet reasonably effective relieving, reviving and relaxing reflexology routine that gradually you yourself will develop and hone.

"I have no doubt at all, Warren, that with the post-flight, footsore flight attendants you will be a most welcome and very popular Comfort Station fixture.

"The times we are living in now! Oh - I wish we'd had attractive footboys like you in my day!"

And all of this was happening because of an offence that I hadn't even knowingly committed - and wouldn't commit!

Mrs Jepson again addressed the Litterman authoritatively.

"And just so you know, right from the get-go, Arnold: If you hope to keep your cushy little Litterman assignment, as well as making and serving my coffee and doing all of the attendant washing-up, that's another little job I'll be
expecting you to come and do for me in my office - frequent foot massages.

"Oh, and every day, before you go home you can clean and polish my pumps for me too - I'll leave them under my desk for you."

I didn't know if he was bowing in cowed, brought-to-heel obeisance before Mrs Jepson or just staring down at his shoes forlornly.

But I strongly suspected both.

Since I had never before seen a man's face burning so redly and so brightly with humiliation as the Litterman's.

Especially when the Litter Department Administrator Mrs Jepson then demonstrably lifted her feet from her desk and heel-popped and dangled from the tips of her dark pantyhosed toes, her footwear that I now believed were a pair of the
former British Airways air hostess's well-worn and comfy three-inch heeled black leather flight-duty pumps.

Mrs Jepson promptly confirmed it, heel-popping one pump and dangling her other from her dark nyloned toes as she told her hapless underling the Litterman, "I've got five or six pairs of these, Arnold. From my own days as a BA hostie.
They are just perfect for the office. As you can see, they are old and very well-worn, but so very supple and blissfully comfortable ..."

What were the odds, I wondered dubiously, of Arnold the Gatwick Airport Authority's Litterman successfully seeing out his One-Year-Probation Government Support Worker conditional release assignment's 'other' duties - as his subjugating
superior Mrs Jepson's respectful, obedient and compliant coffee-making, pump-polishing, frequently-attending foot masseur ...

The Cabin Crew Comfort Station, Mrs Jepson informed me, was sited at the bus stop right outside Concorde House, where many of the Gatwick-based airline's crew rooms were sited and where the airside buses dropped off non-Gatwick based air
crews.

The Comfort Station was a large, Portacabin-like carpeted and comfortably appointed shelter, with capacity for accommodating up to fifty just-landed, bus-catching air hostesses.

As the airport service buses were every fifteen minutes, there was little danger of overcrowding apart from when, due to delays, several flights came in clustered together.

Male air stewards were not allowed into the Comfort Station.

To enter it was a sackable offence - along with its attendant automatic sanction consequences: Immediate assignment as a community servant, to providing or helping to provide as part of a team, one of the AFP's female-friendly services.

Such as working in a Sock Room. Supervised by two female cane-wielding Community Service Officers (CSOs), detailed to monitor and inspect the hand-washing of his town's females' dirty socks.

Or, more likely, a six-month Placement of serving aboard passenger aircraft as a so-called Air Purification Technician. The demand for that particular female-friendly service was already very high and increasing rapidly, its novelty
showing no signs of wearing off but quite the opposite.

Possibly, though, should an affronted air hostess choose to demand it, even a 'short sharp shock' stay in one of the AFP's new purpose-built prisons, could precede his community servant assignment, or Placement.

In that case, an intensive course of daily doctrinal teachings and relentless female-friendly ideological inculcation at the feet of his compassionless, cane-happy and overzealous female prison officer instructors, could be the fate for
the foreseeable future of the egregiously trespassing male air steward.

Mrs Jepson said that I would see when I got there that the male air stewards had their own, conventional, windswept perspex-windowed bus shelter, just adjacent to their female colleagues' well-insulated luxury version 'waiting room'.

At the Cabin Crew Comfort Station, Mrs Jepson elucidated further, the air hostesses could sit in comfort as they awaited the arrival of the next airport services bus. And as they waited, avail themselves of the excellent and plentiful
refreshments provided for them - free of charge, fully funded from the proceeds of the Male Passenger Airport Tax.

The airport services buses took the flight crews to where they wanted to go after having completed their flight duty - and, where Gatwick-based crews were concerned, debriefing: staff car park, rail station, bus station, airport hotel
... as the bus meandered along its route via its designated drop-off points.

To my surprise and dismay, Mrs Jepson ordered that the sentence she'd decreed would begin tomorrow - Monday.

I still couldn't believe it:

Massaging air hostesses' post-flight stinky nyloned feet for twelve hours a day, seven days a week - for six weeks!

Mrs Jepson issued to me a large white carrier bag.

Printed on it in bold red letters was the singularly unglamorous legend: 'Gatwick Airport Authority Litter Department'.

Printed on the capacious white carrier bag also was the Litter Department's official stylised logo: a smiling, holding hands five-member family considerately and correctly disposing of their litter in a receptacle provided for the
purpose.

Contained within the voluminous bag were the following items:

A travel warrant, valid for both bus and rail travel for six weeks from tomorrow; a pair of heavy-duty knee pads; and a polyethene bag of a week's supply of seven community-servant style white shorts and white T-shirts - but the T-shirts
emblazoned not with a community servant's ID but with bright red capitalised letters the words 'LITTER LOUT' on the back and the word 'FOOTMAN' on the front.

What the ...? 'Footman'?

'FOOTMAN'?!

This couldn't be.

No ... no!

"Surely there's some other way, Mrs Jepson? Surely, there must be some other way, for me to-"

"No, there isn't - my mind is made up. And my decision is final."

"But-"

"Just shut up and listen, Warren - this is important," interjected Mrs Jepson, shrugging aside my protestations and complaints.

Mrs Jepson then enlarged upon the nature of my forthcoming 'attendance' duties.

Expanded, as to how I was expected to conduct myself in the Cabin Crew Comfort Station for the duration of my six-week sentence.

"At the end of your six-week sentence, I will perform my Final Assessment Test: I will read and evaluate all of the comments made by the footsore flight attendants you attend, as officially recorded on your Footman's Daily Record Sheet."

What the ...?

The 'Footman's Daily Record Sheet'?!

"To pass my Final Assessment Test, Warren, you must achieve a very high, overall air hostesses' Satisfaction of Conduct Rating: A minimum of eighty percent. Based upon their awards to you on a marks-out-of-ten system.

"Anything less than eighty percent, and ..."

Mrs Jepson paused a moment to let me imagine what the consequences of falling short of an overall air hostesses' Satisfaction of Conduct Rating of eighty percent might be.

"In addition to your foot massage duties, you will be responsible for keeping the Cabin Crew Comfort Station clean and tidy - spick and span. You will have to make a start on that, the moment a bus departs, and crack on with it until
your services are again required by more newly arriving air hostesses.

"You must always - and I mean always - address the air hostesses as 'Miss' ... Got it?"

"Yes, Mrs Jepson," I said.

"But, above all, you must - and I mean must - accord the air hostesses the highest respect, compliance and obedience at all times.

"This is crucial, Warren, if you are to complete your six-week Cabin Crew Comfort Station Attendance sentence satisfactorily: If you are to achieve the minimum, eighty percent 'Satisfaction of Conduct Rate', as awarded to you by the air
hostesses.

"Anything less, Warren, than eighty percent, and ..."

Again, Mrs Jepson left her unspoken, implied threat hanging in the air.

But Mrs Jepson didn't need to spell it out for me.

Implicit in her threat was that score an overall average air hostesses' satisfaction rating of less than eight out of ten, and I'd fail. And then she would sentence me again - and to a longer term.

"You may go now. Arnold will see you out," said Mrs Jepson in dismissal.

"Don't forget, Warren: Six a.m. tomorrow, at the Cabin Crew Comfort Station - and don't be late!"

***


Concerned that I might still be over the limit, I abandoned the idea of retrieving my car from the Long Stay car park and driving myself home.

I would pick it up tomorrow evening, after my first 'attendance' shift in the Cabin Crew Comfort Station.

Anyway, quite apart from the blood-alcohol level aspect, I had no business getting behind the wheel of a car in my present condition.

How was I supposed to concentrate on what was happening on the road?

Thinking about, worrying about - stressing about - my six-week Cabin Crew Comfort Station Attendance sentence, starting tomorrow at Gatwick Airport?

*


When I got home, I fibbed to Mum and Dad (who I still lived with) that tomorrow and every day for the foreseeable future including Saturdays and Sundays I would be out of the house bright and early in the search for a new job, and that
they weren't likely to see me back home until about seven p.m.

Apart from raising their eyebrows in surprise at my apparent sudden zealous enthusiasm for job-seeking, they made no other comment other than smiling and nodding their heads in approval.

*


Fortunately, living in Horsham was handy for catching the Gatwick Express train, and from where I lived it was less than a ten-minute walk to the station.

Nonetheless, I had to get up early to be on the train I wanted that would get me to Gatwick Airport shortly before six a.m.

But when my radio alarm clock woke me at a much earlier than accustomed five a.m. and in coming awake I remembered the adjuring tone of Gatwick Airport Authority Litter Department Administrator Mrs Jepson's admonishment - "And don't be
late, Warren!" - I had no problem in scrambling out of bed and getting a move on.

*


Having followed Mrs Jepson's instructions, I looked at my wristwatch to see that I had arrived in good time: 05:50.

The airport services buses were every fifteen minutes, and so the next bus was due in ten minutes' time, on the hour at six a.m.

Through the perspex windows of their own, conventional bus shelter I could see that there were no male air stewards waiting for the six a.m. bus.

But looking through the glass entrance doors of the Cabin Crew Comfort Station, I saw a sleepy-eyed air hostess, who appeared to be the only occupant.

She was attired in the distinctive orange-liveried uniform of an EasyJet air hostess.

I was surprised. I could be wrong but I didn't think EasyJet flew any of their routes during the night time.

In fact, I'd more than half expected the Comfort Station to be full of air hostesses back from their overnight long-haul flights.

But then the airport services buses were every fifteen minutes. And so maybe the post-flight, end-of-shift air hostesses were coming and going all the time - and possibly a bus full of them had left just five minutes ago.

The EasyJet air hostess looked to be in her early twenties. And although she was obviously very tired and so not looking her best, it was clear that she was very attractive, with blue eyes and neck-length blonde hair.

She was sitting on one of the two padded red leather banquette-style benches, her black leather flight-duty pumps, lying on their sides nearby where apparently she had kicked them off.

Her right foot was resting on her left knee; her work-shift begrimed, apparently sweat-dampened tan pantyhosed sole facing towards me. She was flexing and scrunching her toes repeatedly, as though deriving much-needed relief and
reinvigoration from doing so.

Sipping from a cup of coffee, the EasyJet air hostess was staring ahead into the middle-distance as though lost in reflective thought.

Now that it had come right down to it, I was very nervous.

I didn't know if I was glad that there was just a single occupant in the Comfort Station or wished that the place was full of such obviously footsore post-flight, end-of-shift air hostesses.

This was all so very unsettlingly one-to-one.

Strictly speaking, I didn't have to go in there until six a.m.

I could wait until she'd boarded the bus ...

Instead, wanting to make a good first-impression (and hoping to score high marks-out-of-ten), before I lost my bottle and changed my mind again I pushed open the glass entrance doors of the Cabin Crew Comfort Station and said, "Good
morning, Miss - would you like a foot massage?"

Instantly, the EasyJet air hostess, whose nametag informed me that she was Pearl, came out of her coffee-sipping reverie and stared at me warily.

The now on her guard EasyJet air hostess Pearl said, "What are you ... some kind of perve?"

"I beg your pardon, Miss," I apologised. "I should have introduced myself," I said, unzipping my jacket to reveal, emblazoned in bold red capitalised letters on the front of my community-servant style white T-shirt uniform - FOOTMAN.

"Oh - of course! How could I forget!" exclaimed Pearl, at once recovering herself and relaxing again.

"Everyone was talking about it yesterday when we heard the news. You are the litter lout, aren't you? Sentenced by Mrs Jepson to be our footboy for the next six weeks?"

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I replied respectfully, feeling my face turning just as red as Arnold the Litterman's had back in Mrs Jepson's office, as I turned around to show her what was similarly redly emblazoned on the back of my uniform white
T-shirt - LITTER LOUT.

"Well, I'd better sign you in then," Pearl said, now nonchalantly taking all of this in her stride, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary.

But then, it wasn't - these were the 'female-friendly' days of the AFP.

"Thank you, Miss Pearl," I said respectfully.

Now I pulled off my trousers, underneath which I already wore my white uniform shorts and, velcro-fastened around my knees, the pair of heavy-duty knee pads that Mrs Jepson had issued to me in her office.

"Hmmm ... nice legs," commented Pearl.

Retrieving a red-plastic backed clipboard from the Comfort Station's cork bulletin board, Pearl the EasyJet air hostess formally signed me in on the Footman's Daily Record Sheet at 05:54.

The 'Footman's Daily Record Sheet' was the official document upon which the air hostesses would write their appraising remarks, along with their marks-out-of-ten awards, with regard to the respectfulness, compliance and obedience of my
conduct, and as to the satisfactory - or otherwise - application, quality and efficacy of my foot massage services.

As Mrs Jepson had explained to me in her office, the Footman's Daily Record Sheet would facilitate her Final Assessment Test of my overall Satisfaction of Conduct ratings at the completion of my six-week sentence ... ("Anything less,
Warren, than eighty percent, and ...")

"Well, come on then, Warren - you can start with me," said Pearl the EasyJet air hostess, her tone now turning rather bossy.

"The bus is due at six - I've got five minutes," Pearl said, returning to the red leather banquette, but this time propping her feet up on one of the many padded red leather footstools.

"Kneel just there, facing me."

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I said respectfully.

"Ah ... my feet are absolutely killing me," she told me, scrunching and flexing her tan pantyhosed toes.

"Um, I'm ... very sorry to hear that, Miss Pearl," I consoled respectfully.

Kneeling at her feet, I was pleasantly surprised at how much give there was to the Comfort Station's plush deep-pile carpeting. I'd been worried it was going to be hard on the knees - heavy-duty knee pads or not.

Pearl raised her right foot from the footstool and scrunched and flexed her toes at me. "Do this foot first, please, Warren."

'Please'?

'Warren'?

This EasyJet air hostess Pearl really wasn't a bad sort at all, I thought.

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I said compliantly.

I took hold of Pearl's proffered right foot in both hands, and I felt the increase in weight as now I was obliged to hold up and support her completely relaxed leg.

"Work your thumbs into my arch, please, Warren. Firmly, but not too hard. And then slowly work your way up to the ball of my foot and work your thumbs there, a bit harder, for a minute."

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I said obediently and began following her specific instructions to the letter.

In circular motion with the pads of my thumbs, not too firmly I kneaded her arch through the work-stained and slightly damp material of her tan pantyhose.

It was just like Mrs Jepson had said: Some air hostesses would tell me what to do; instruct me to focus my attentions and ministrations upon the particularly troubled areas of the soles of their post-flight, tired and achy feet as
indicated to me.

Pearl leant back on the red leather banquette, closed her eyes and sighed. "Ah ... this is heaven ... I can't tell you."

I didn't know if that was an invitation to speak, so I didn't take the liberty.

Mrs Jepson had made it plain that in the Cabin Crew Comfort Station I was not an equal, but a servant.

Holding it in my hands from barely a foot away, it was impossible to avoid smelling and inhaling the decidedly pungent fumes emanating from the sole of the EasyJet air hostess Pearl's work begrimed, slightly sweaty tan pantyhosed foot.
But I found that the rather strong cheesy scent wasn't bothering me in the slightest.

"I'm absolutely shattered," Pearl said. "I've been stuck in Geneva for most of the night - and that was after I'd already worked for ten hours.

"Geneva to Gatwick was to be the last leg of my pattern. But there was a technical fault with our aircraft. One of our engineers had to be flown out from Gatwick to come and fix it, along with two fresh pilots because the other two would
be out-of-hours."

Pearl scrunched her toes, and I noticed now through her tan pantyhose that her toes were painted red.

"I flew back with them in the empty plane. They don't like flying empty like that but the aircraft needed to be repositioned," resumed Pearl.

"The rest of the crew flew back earlier with Swiss Air, but there weren't enough spare seats for all of us and I drew the short straw."

If that long speech wasn't an invitation to speak myself, I didn't know what was.

"I'm sorry to hear that, Miss Pearl," I condoled respectfully. "But that explains it: I thought it was odd that a member of EasyJet cabin crew would be here at this time of day."

"Yes. But at least Crewing have stood me down from the ... oh, can you work your thumbs just a little bit more firmly there, please, Warren, right in the middle of the ball of my foot ... from the twelve-hour work shift pattern I was due
to operate today."

"I must say, Miss Pearl, it sounds like very hard work - and such long work shifts! Mrs Jepson, who used to be a senior British Airways air hostess, told me something of what it was like. But, hearing it from you, Miss Pearl ..."

"Oh, you have no idea, Warren - other foot now, please - just how hard it is on our feet. But at least now we've got a footboy!"

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I said respectfully.

I now took and held Pearl's expectantly proffered left, tan pantyhosed foot in both of my hands, and once she'd relaxed her leg and let me take the strain, I proceeded to work my thumbs exactly as per her previous specified instructions.

Again, this time with Pearl's left tan pantyhosed foot held in my hands and barely a foot from my face, the strong cheesy scent radiating from her sole and wafting more pungently from her repeatedly scrunching and luxuriating toes hit me
full force anew, but I didn't mind a bit.

Once again, Pearl relaxed back on the banquette and sighed. "Ah ... heaven. Absolute, perfect ... heaven."

I did not interpret this as an invitation to speak this time so I remained silent. So that Pearl could enjoy the rest of her "reviving, relieving and relaxing mini-massage" in peace and quiet.

"Ah, I can hear the bus coming," Pearl said, a minute or so later.

Pearl got up from the red leather banquette and went over to her kicked-off flight-duty pumps and slid her feet into them.

She then strode over to the Comfort Station's cork bulletin board and took down from its hook the red-plastic backed clipboard upon which she had signed me in at 05:54 - only a few minutes ago but the time had gone so fast.

Hurriedly writing something down on the clipboard with its attached ballpoint pen, Pearl said, her bossy tone returning, "When I've gone, have a tidy-up in here, Warren - just look at the state of the place!"

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I replied compliantly.

Standing in front of the bulletin board, with her right leg bent at the knee while pausing to consider what to write down next, Pearl eased her right foot from her flight-duty pump and rested her toes on the heel of her shoe. Exerting
repeated downward pressure, she caused the toe end to lift up and down as she pondered her next words.

Another quick burst of writing, and then finally Pearl returned the clipboard to its hook on the bulletin board.

"Well, at least now I know I've got something to look forward to when I get back from a long, demanding pattern."

"Yes, Miss Pearl, I said respectfully.

The six a.m. airport services bus was stopped outside, its front entrance door open.

Pearl then pulled up the handle of her wheeled 'dolly-trolley' carry-case and headed for the Comfort Station's entrance/exit double doors.

I got there first and politely held one of the glass doors open for her.

Pearl stepped through the door, pulling her wheeled case after her.

"Lift my case onto the bus for me and stow it, please, Warren. It's heavy - I've got a lot of Duty-Free in there."

"Of course, Miss Pearl," I said compliantly.

At seeing what was emblazoned in bold red capitalised letters upon my community-servant style uniform white T-shirt, the bus driver stared at me pityingly.

Pearl followed her ubiquitous piece of cabin crew luggage onto the bus.

The bus driver was about to set off with his single passenger when Pearl gestured for him to wait.

"Do you remember what I told you to do, Warren?"

"Yes, Miss Pearl: You told me to have a tidy-up."

"Yes - so get cracking!"

"Yes, Miss Pearl," I replied obediently.

Now, at Pearl's assenting nod to the smiling bus driver, he pushed a button to close the automatic doors.

Before I turned around to re-enter the Comfort Station, through the narrow vertical glass panes of the bus's folding automatic door, I saw Pearl laughing as she shared a joke with the greatly amused driver.

*


But now that I was alone in the Comfort Station, one thing was uppermost in my mind: What had Pearl the EasyJet air hostess written on my Footman's Daily Record Sheet?

I went over to the Comfort Station's cork bulletin board and retrieved from its hook the red-plastic backed clipboard.

Affixed to the clipboard were about twenty sheets of A4-sized white paper.

Printed at the top of each page was: 'Footman's Daily Record Sheet - Day 1 of 42.

Otherwise, all of the pages were blank, except the top sheet.

Suddenly I'd come over all jittery and my heart was almost in my mouth - here were Pearl's hastily handwritten words.

I read ...

My opinion of our new footboy, Warren, is of the highest.

He is respectful, compliant and obedient, and shows what I have no doubt is a genuine eagerness to please.

Not once, did he fail to address me as 'Miss'. Following my specified foot massage instructions to the letter, he was compliant in every regard. And his perfect obedience and obeisance to me throughout was nothing short of slavish.

True, it is quite obvious he doesn't have a clue what he's doing, but it is equally clear that he is giving his best - and yes, he did quite relieve and revive my poor, tired and achy hostie feet!

Most notably, he didn't flinch or evince the slightest distaste or unwillingness to massage my pantyhosed feet that, after at last finishing my shift after being delayed, were most definitely dirty, sweaty - and stinky!

And - almost equally important - without me having to tell him, Warren seemed to know when to remain silent and let me relax and enjoy his attentions and ministrations in peace.

It would be unfair of me to nitpick a fault with our new footboy Warren.

As I say, he is new, and I'm sure that with our guidance and instruction he will quickly improve.

Given all of these considerations, I award Warren 10/10.

Pearl - EasyJet.

It was impossible to describe the flood of emotions and sensations that shook me, rocked me, upon reading Pearl the EasyJet air hostess's comments.


The Footsore Flight Attendants continues in Ch. 2 - of 3.