UP IN THE AIR
"November, 2005. While on business, Harry catches up with Hermione in Hong Kong for the first time in years."
x
For my brother, who taught me the ways of the road warrior.
x
The messy-haired, bespectacled man placed his carry-on in the overhead compartment and took his seat.
A steward appeared as if rubbed from a lamp. "It's a pleasure to see you again, Mr Potter. Would you like to enjoy a beverage before we depart for London?" enquired the steward. "I've water, juice and champagne today in Club."
"Champagne'd be perfect, thanks."
The beverage was served; the steward took Mr Potter's blazer to be hung.
Mr Potter sipped his champagne while gazing idly out the window, with the air of someone utterly unhurried; and when he had drained his glass and surrendered it to a passing stewardess, he unbuttoned his cuffs and rolled his sleeves.
The last door was closed; and shortly thereafter, he closed his eyes to savour the sensations of takeoff.
x
In the darkened cabin—the lights had been dimmed after dinner—Mr Potter nursed a hot chocolate as he reviewed his papers on the tray table under the overhead glare of the reading light. He read them with a slight scowl, pausing intermittently to jab the skip button on his iPod.
… The central objective for British representatives at the Hong Kong summit is to strengthen core relationships with key strategic partners…
Harry—for that was his first name—disliked attempting to read in the dark, mostly because it reminded him unpleasantly of his childhood. He was, however, relieved to be doing so while full of reasonably good inflight cuisine rather than while subsisting on stale birthday cake; but because he was so full, the buzzwords began to blur into each other, and so he quickly gave up the exercise as a bad job and filed the papers away.
He finished his hot chocolate, then nipped into the lavatory; he emerged in sleepwear with a large kangaroo motif on the front of the top and had a steward hang his day clothes before he returned to his seat and reclined it to fully flat.
He emptied his mind of all thoughts of work, switched off his iPod and took out his headphones, and vanished below the pillow and duvet.
He dreamt of hazy, half-remembered nights; of dark tresses and searing city lights.
x
Harry waited by the ticket machines on the station concourse, flicking idly through a freesheet. He paid no heed to the frantic commuters rushing past him as he listened to post-grunge, by some Canadian artist recommended by his cousin, on earphones, with the wires discreetly tucking into his blazer.
As he browsed the freesheet, a casually-dressed woman with wavy brown hair walked up to him and flicked it on the masthead.
He looked up to see a face he had not seen in years.
It took a whole second for his brain to process the person in front of him and update everything he remembered of her: but behind the more restrained hair and no-makeup makeup look and aviators perched on her head, he saw the same warm eyes brimming with the same humour.
"Hermione," he breathed after several seconds.
She grinned. "Took you long enough. I was starting to worry you'd forgotten what I look like."
"I take offence to the idea that you think so poorly of my memory."
"Frightfully sorry about that, then." She looked at her watch. "Right, enough of the formalities—you get an Exceeds Expectations. Are you hungry?"
"Famished."
"Let's roll."
They did so.
Hermione led him out of the station up to street level via the escalators; he tried not to dwell on how her hair draped over the collar of her white shirt, or how her shirt tucked neatly into her very tight, very short denim shorts, or how confident her sneaker-powered cadence was without the weight of a bookbag—Stop, he chided himself, feeling a twinge of guilt.
"Where're we going?" inquired Harry, focusing on the epaulettes of her motorcycle jacket.
"Oh, just an old favourite of mine."
"Ah, that seems—Oh, wow!"
Harry stopped in his tracks to take in the sights and sounds of Causeway Bay: the sun had set; neon signs lit up every shopfront, from hot snack vendors to entire department stores. People bustled about with an electrifying pulse to them; the whole place screamed sensory overload.
"Harry!"
He jerked back into following Hermione, still taking everything in; and shortly thereafter, he found himself seated in a booth in a tiny, overcrowded restaurant with the fluorescent lighting turned up to eleven, with Hermione ordering in rapid-fire Cantonese.
The aviators disappeared into her bag. "Before you ask, that's the absolute limit of my Cantonese."
"You speak Cantonese?"
"Debatable. I speak enough to get the basics sorted; everything else in Hong Kong can be done in English."
"I didn't know you spoke Cantonese."
Two tall glasses of bitterly cold milk tea arrived.
She looked at him mid-sip as if he had three heads. "It helps in every Chinatown in the world—from London to Sydney to San Francisco."
"How?"
"Perks of being a halfie. You've met my parents, right?"
He had.
"Mum's Singaporean, but while studying dentistry in London, which is where she met Dad, she was waitressing in Chinatown and learnt Cantonese to survive. I picked it up off her as a child."
This was news to Harry.
"So, how's life?"
Harry let out a sigh. "It's alright, I suppose. Ministry life is the same cycle of bollocks. You know how when you started out, you thought, 'Working life is great,' and 'Yay, salaried employment,' and even 'Wow, I am passionate and committed about this place'?"
"Mm-hmm."
"Yeah, after three years of this bullshit, I am a hundred and ten percent ready to sign up to the notion that everything is fucked, because douchebags like my Uncle Vernon are running this world into the ground."
On that bombshell, the food arrived and they began to dig into steaming bowls of fish congee and beef brisket noodles.
"This food looks fantastic!"
"Damn straight it is. Anyway, yes—I definitely started out with hopes and dreams that've since been crushed. How's the bureaucracy?"
"Don't even start me." Harry took a spoonful of congee and yelped as it scalded his tongue.
"Oh, I'm so sorry about that! You need to scoop from the edges where it's cooler."
They swapped war stories of drowning in bureaucracy—from the raft of occupational health and safety restrictions on Apparition while on work duty to the arduous process for getting the use of Legilimency on suspects signed off—before moving onto their personal lives.
"How's Ginny? The papers were up in arms when she turned up to a game with a new undercut on one side, which I have to say was both bold and gorgeous."
He felt a split-second panic flit over his face. "We broke up a few weeks ago."
Hermione's eyes went wide mid-bite. "Oh God, I'm so sorry." Her right arm twitched almost imperceptibly.
"Don't be. We've been on the rocks for a while. The Holyhead Harpies work her hard, and she's loving every game she plays, but… it's just that… we were burning each other out, basically."
"How so? If you don't mind me asking, that is."
"We're just… never there. I'm always flying around Europe, dealing with their magical governments in behalf of Her Majesty's. She's flying up and down the country playing national Quidditch. It was rough on us both, and… we were exhausted, and the fire just wasn't there in either of us anymore… so we agreed to call time."
"That's not unreasonable." She picked up some beef gingerly in her chopsticks. "I do apologise for asking."
"That's quite alright. How're things for you?"
"Bachelorette life in Sydney is great, actually. I've my own flat a short walk from the beach—Bronte is amazing—I swear you'll love it. Outside work, I answer to literally nobody, because my parents are living the semi-retired baby boomer life in Newcastle. I have a good mix of people I know, both local and from school—Anthony Goldstein moved down around the time I did, and has a bloody ridiculous mansion up Bellevue Hill—yeah, it's fantastic."
"Sounds like the dream."
x
They spent the rest of supper talking about less touchy matters; and then, with a three-day conference on international magical security ahead, returned to their respective hotels to call it a night.
"Well," said Harry nonchalantly as he piled into a red taxicab with Hermione, "that was painful."
"Every conference is like that." She gave the driver their destination and the taxicab lurched into action. "We did the thing, and all is well."
Harry was indeed relieved that the last day of the conference was over. He said nothing; he undid his tie and stowed it in his suit jacket. The three days of the conference had been exhausting, and he was looking forward to being able to unwind for a bit.
"What d'you fancy for dinner?"
"No idea. Literally anything that isn't generic conference catering out of a bain-marie."
"I don't blame you." She looked over at him slumped against the window. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking, B1?"
He stared blankly at the driver's headrest, not understanding who or what B1 was supposed to be. "Are you suggesting something?"
"I've an idea."
"When don't you?" He looked his watch—half past five. "Let's check me into your hotel first and go from there."
x
"Blimey."
He looked up to absorb the grand lobby: his eyes traced the balustrade of the mezzanine and the stairs leading up to it; he gasped softly at the milky marble and how utterly gorgeous the plants were.
Harry checked in—they were much more efficient and accommodating here than at his previous hotel—and found himself in a room so plush he felt almost guilty.
"This place—I love this place already!" he exclaimed, gasping at the view of the city skyline.
"I know. That's why I picked it."
"Food?"
"Food. It's a bit early, though, and we should probably shed the businesswear before we turn ourselves loose on this city. There's no way we're doing this in suits."
"I like your suit," Harry found himself saying.
"I know you do. I like yours too. That doesn't change the fact that suits are entirely unsuitable for tonight."
"Er, exactly how wild are you planning tonight to be?"
"The night is young. We should be dressed casually for it."
"Fine."
"Honestly, jeans are perfect for this occasion. The sort of khakis you wore the first night are just an invitation for sauce stains." She speared him with a look. "You have jeans, yeah?"
Harry hesitated. "Er, yes—but—"
"Wear them." It was not a suggestion.
"Fine." He unzipped his rollaboard and took out the one well-faded blue pair of jeans he had packed, along with a fresh pastel shirt. "I'll get changed."
"Don't you need—"
"No."
"No? Aren't you going to—"
"No."
"I see." She smirked from the lounger. "Carry on."
Some minutes later, he emerged from the bathroom a new man, with his flannel shirt tucking perfectly into his skin-tight jeans.
Hermione gave him a once-over. "Oh my God, I was not expecting that. Your jeans are so tight!"
"They fit perfectly!"
"These have got to be at least three sizes too small. Harry, turn around."
He did so.
"They are so tight! Looking at you from the back, from the waist down, you genuinely look like a girl."
He turned back around to face Hermione. "I'm going to take that as a compliment."
"They leave nothing to the imagination," she said mildly, scanning him again. I can see the shape of your—well, everything—it's all on display in all its vacuum-packed glory."
"Would you prefer it if I wore something else?"
"No."
"No?"
"No. As surprised as I am that the new fashionable Harry is daring enough to wear such sinfully tight jeans, I have to say that I am impressed. What motivated you?"
He sighed. "I just refuse to wear baggy clothes anymore. They make me feel like I'm wearing my cousin's hand-me-downs all over again, so I made the decision a while ago to spend my money on clothes that actually fit and look and feel good."
"That's entirely reasonable. Alright, come up to mine—I'll get changed and then we can get some food."
He put on his sneakers and followed Hermione out into the corridor.
x
Hermione's suite was much larger than Harry's room. Upon entry, he strode over to the living area window and threw open the curtains. "Oh, wow! You get to enjoy a really good view from where you are!"
"I do." She dropped her bag on the desk. "I also get a sweeping vista of the harbour."
Harry wheeled around. "I'm sorry, what?"
She smirked. "Sorry, that was a joke about looking at you from behind. Your tight jeans are definitely growing on me."
He felt a slight flush creep up his neck. "Very funny."
"Yes, I'm hilarious. I'm going to go get changed." She disappeared into the bedroom.
Expecting Hermione to take some time, Harry decided to occupy himself by exploring the suite. It was laid out with a generous lounge area by the window, complete with desk against the wall, a dining area set slightly further back, and a powder room off to one side. Everything was decorated tastefully. Harry found the space luxurious without being ostentatious, and settled in the lounger by the window.
The bedroom door slid open. "Harry."
He looked up. "That was fast."
"I'm efficient. What d'you think of my outfit?"
Harry scanned Hermione from head to toe. It was definitely a casual outfit: her hair was down, and she wore a dark grey T-shirt and slightly flared skin-tight jeans. "Very nice," he said breathlessly, his mouth suddenly dry.
"I'm glad you like them. I practically live in these in Sydney."
"They're fantastic! I'm actually jealous of how well they've faded."
"Thanks! Oh, let me show you something." She twirled dramatically on the spot, revealing that her jeans had no pockets at the back, creating smooth lines that accentuated her curves. "Business as usual in the front and party at the back," she concluded as she turned back to face him.
"They make your arse look great," blurted Harry. "Oh my God, I—"
"Aww, thank you! It's okay—I can see you like them." She smirked. "Let me put on my shoes so we can get going." She flounced off to the shoe rack by the door and, with her back towards Harry, bent over to put on her scarlet sneakers.
He was certain his face was starting to bear more than a passing resemblance to a tomato.
Laces tied, Hermione returned to the upright position and grinned over her shoulder. "Sorry, but I do love winding you up." She grabbed her motorcycle jacket. "Let's roll."
He exhaled loudly and followed her out into the corridor again, trying very hard to keep his eyes above her shoulders.
x
They arrived at Hermione's choice of restaurant to discover—after some back-and-forth with a captain in some more Cantonese, complete with arm-waving and barking into walkie-talkies—that it was completely full.
"He said there'll be at least an hour's wait."
"I'm prepared to wait if you are."
"I'm not."
"I thought you said the night was young."
"It is. I just don't intend to waste it waiting in line. We're getting take-away."
They did so, and laden with boxes of food—Harry knew no more than that they contained various roasted and barbecued meats—they retreated to Hermione's suite without undue delay.
"So," she began theatrically as she removed the lids from the take-away containers, "we have roast duck and barbecued pork with steamed rice and seasonal Asian greens. Oh, and we have some soup, and for some reason my welcome gift was a lovely bottle of pinot noir, which works, so we have that too."
"What exactly are seasonal Asian greens?"
"Whatever green vegetables looked good at the market, basically."
"Right."
"Let's eat."
They tucked into the food and wine, and Harry found himself particularly enjoying the barbecued pork, both for the flavour and because it involved no bones.
"So," said Hermione as she picked up a particularly large piece of gai lan, "what're your plans for the next few years?"
"No idea."
"Really?"
"None at all."
"Why not?"
Harry put his chopsticks down. "Because I'm stuck in a rut at the moment. Work is fine, but I find myself losing my will to live earlier and earlier in the day. Apart from a handful of people I happen to be reasonably good friends with, I basically have no life." He crunched savagely on some duck skin. "Maybe I should just bludge on the money my parents and Sirius left behind."
"You wanted to work so you could try to make magical Britain a better place than before. Honestly, we both chose to do what we felt was right, not what was easy."
"I know, but I just feel like I'm talking to a brick wall in the Ministry most of the time. We have well-meaning progressives and reformists in power, but the obstructions are huge. It's draining, and I come home to what sometimes feels like a rather empty experience."
"Oh, Harry—"
"It's fine. The travel really helps." He gulped down some pinot noir.
"Have you applied for anything?"
"I have! But we're trying very hard to make sure things don't look too much like jobs for the boys, so I'm up against some very, very capable people."
"That's entirely reasonable, although I suppose it does lead to going around in circles wondering what the hell is going on and what the point of all this is."
"I suppose I'll just roll around in the existential despair for a bit and then wing it as usual."
"You and winging it! Honestly, Harry—I don't know how you've had such a good run with making everything up as you go."
"Nor do I." He picked up his chopsticks again. "How about you? D'you have any plans?"
"When do I not?" Hermione lifted her glass in a mocking toast.
They nearly fell out their chairs howling with laughter, and Harry felt an invisible weight lift off his shoulders.
x
Harry jolted awake to the piercing warble of the bedside telephone. Without pausing to jam his spectacles on, he grabbed the handset and answered the call while still in bed: "Hello?" he slurred, inwardly cursing the previous night's pinot noir.
"Hey, Harry!"
He glared at the digital clock. "Hermione, it's—"
"How quickly can you be ready?"
"—a quarter to eight—"
"Get up, loser—we're going for dim sum."
"—on our off d—What?"
"Breakfast. You've half an hour. I'll be at your door." She hung up.
Heaving an enormous sigh, he threw off the duvet and staggered into the bathroom to freshen up. Precisely twenty minutes later, the doorbell rang; he opened the door as he was doing up his top button.
Hermione stood in the doorway. "Are you ready?"
"Just let me throw on a jumper and style my hair."
"You won't need a jumper."
"It's a quarter past eight."
"So? I had a swim at six forty-five. It's fine."
"It's a heated pool!"
"It's a heatedoutdoorpool. Anyway, you live in London; this is nothing. Go style your hair."
"Why are you wearing a leather jacket, then?"
"Because, in case you haven't noticed, I'm wearing an incredibly thin top."
He had—of course he had. "This shirt—"
"Go style your hair."
x
The restaurant roared with the noise of a hundred tables dining at once and the gaudy chandeliers clashed with the ghastly plaster ceiling, but Harry found it oddly charming.
"How does this place work?" asked Harry, as a heavy teapot landed on the table with athump.
"We fill in a form." Hermione did so with an expression he used to refer to as her Ancient Runes face. "Anything you're particularly enamoured by?"
"Surprise me."
"Cool." She made one last mark on the form before holding it aloft to be taken by a passing waiter.
"Do we need to wear hearing protection?"
"No."
"Why is everyone reading newspapers?"
"Because that's what they do here: they sip tea"—she poured him some, stopping short of the rim—"and read the paper and chat. Oh, and they have food. It's their form of relaxation, noise levels notwithstanding."
Round bamboo steaming baskets began landing on the table with wanton abandon; Harry suppressed his urge to describe them as unidentified flying objects bearing alien delectables.
"Eat."
He did so, tucking into succulent pork and prawn siu mai, glutinous rice wrapped in lotus leaves (that Hermione opened artfully with her chopsticks), crunchy Chiu Chow pork and turnip dumplings, and more.
"This food is fantastic!"
"It is, isn't it?" She sipped her tea. "The best food is often not the fanciest."
Harry nodded enthusiastically. "Absolutely." He chuckled as a memory surfaced. "I remember learning this on my first overseas work trip."
"The one to the south of France?"
"Yes, that one." He brushed some crumbs off his shirt. "We were in Marseille, and we were supposed to meet with magical transport officials from all around Europe about establishing an Apparition union."
"How European."
"We woke up on the morning of the conference to discover that the department's workers were on strike—"
"Of course."
"—so there was a picket line and we couldn't get an external venue at such short notice, so we decided it was all too difficult and went to find something for lunch. Some genius—may have been me—was terribly keen on going all out and making the most of our rather generous meal allowances."
"So someone saw sense and stopped you? That's a familiar feeling."
"Yes. My manager insisted on going to some hole in the wall which had direct line of sight to the expensive restaurant tourist me had googly eyes for."
"What did you have?"
"Bouillabaisse, and it was the best damn fish soup I've ever had in my life. I was hooked at the first spoonful."
"That's the way. Not enough people understand this. I was fortunate enough to have grown up with this thinking in my blood."
"Lucky you. I had to be taught as an adult—but at least there's a television programme for this sort of thing now."
"That show is great. This is how to enjoy life—it's about the experience right there in front of you. We need to do a longer trip, I think."
"I'd love to," he said without hesitation.
Hermione cast her eyes on a faraway tray of egg tarts. "D'you fancy some dessert?"
x
"The noodle bar would have to be my single favourite feature of this lounge." Hermione drew to a halt at a pair of available seats at the bar and collapsed the handle of her rollaboard.
Harry felt his eyebrow rise. "I thought you'd've preferred the other sort of bar," he said, eyes scanning the business class lounge, drinking in the tasteful decor and relaxed atmosphere.
"Honestly, Harry—noodles over booze, any day of the week."
"I find that hard to believe."
"You'll come around. Spicy or no?"
"Let's go with no."
"Sensible." She ventured over to order, then picked up two flutes of champagne before returning to Harry. "Cheers."
"Cheers." He took a sip, and let the buttery bubbles roll around his mouth.
"My flight boards in forty-five minutes—just so you know."
"Mine isn't 'til midnight."
"You'll have fun here."
"I'll try."
The food arrived, bowls steaming.
"Eat," said Hermione. "You'll feel better."
"That sounds familiar." He picked up his chopsticks and started on his wonton soup.
"It does, doesn't it?" Hermione took another sip. "Harry, when was the last time you took a holiday?"
"Er, right now?"
"I mean a real holiday—something more than just a day off here or a long weekend there."
He chewed somegai lanand swallowed. "Excluding Christmas shutdown?"
"Excluding Christmas shutdown. At least a week."
"Then it'd have to be the time Ginny and I went to New York for a week and a half—that was a couple of years back."
"You need a real holiday. You need a refresh."
He grunted his grudging agreement.
"Singapore'd be nice."
"Yeah?"
"Ya." She speared him with a look. "Take some leave in November—you'll've enough, surely."
"I'll think about it."
"Oh, come off it. You need a break, or you'll burn out. At the rate you're going, running yourself into the ground will only bring you to grief. I would know." Her expression softened. "I'll make my schedule work around your dates."
"I'll try."
"Oh, come on—it's a week with me."
"I'll do my best."
"Damn straight you will." Victorious, Hermione demolished her remaining noodles wordlessly.
x
"I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you too, Harry."
He cast his eyes warily at the lounge exit. "I can come down to the gate—"
"No, you don't have to." Hermione checked the departures board. "Final call," she pronounced tightly. "Take care, alright?" She embraced him in one last bone-crushing hug before she disappeared through the frosted glass doors.
He stood there, replaying her final swish of denim and leather, until a lounge attendant asked him if he needed any assistance.
x
Harry woke to the gentle clinking of cutlery and crockery that signalled that the breakfast service was being prepared. He sat up in the lie-flat seat and shook the cobwebs of slumber from his head. The cabin lights had not yet been switched on, but a quick check of the moving map indicated that they were about two hours from London, so it would not do to snooze. He swung his legs off into the aisle, stood up, and returned the seat to its upright position.
"Ah, Mr Potter," whispered the stewardess from behind him. "Shall I retrieve your things from the closet?"
"That'd be fantastic."
He followed her to collect his day clothes, and nipped into a lavatory to wash up, get changed and fix his hair. As he styled his hair, he had to look at his own reflection in the mirror; tired eyes stared back at him. He rinsed his hands and packed up his washbag.
He picked the full English breakfast, hoping it would comfort him; he found himself needing more tea, even after he had finished everything and had his tray table cleared.
x
"Cabin crew, please be seated for landing."
It was not yet first light in London, so Harry let his eyes gaze out into the darkness; with nothing left in the way, the thoughts he had suppressed for twelve hours came to the fore once more, and he let his mind run free.
There was the blur of runway lights, then athud, and then the dull roar of reverse thrust.
x
Harry stood on the Underground platform, tapping his fingers on the handle of his carry-on. His eyes scanned the dot-matrix indicator for the next train; it was in two minutes.
A little more than two minutes later, the train arrived. With a sigh, he rolled on board and sagged into a seat at the end of the saloon; but a second or so after sitting down, he sat up straight and took out his copy of the airline magazine, and flipped to the article on Singapore.
The doors slid shut and the train departed.