Author's notes: This is what happens when you give me a cracky prompt during NaNoWriMo. This is dedicated to Ellethwen Celtica and her sister whose account name do not know, who pulled such a brilliant phrase out of a character box. Prompts from anybody are welcome (encouraged, in fact) throughout this month. And any other month. :D
This is set kind of during The Hounds of Baskerville.
Greg Lestrade was upset.
In fact, he was rather more than upset; he had just spent a couple of thousand pounds on a holiday with his wife in an attempt to fix their failing marriage and was currently sitting halfway up the aeroplane from his wife with his wedding ring in the suitcase. Sighing heavily, Greg settled down in his seat next to a tattooed twenty-something with a face full of piercings and dug out a book from his hand-luggage in an attempt to forget the shambles of the last week.
Greg squinted at the cover of his book and realised that the title was the wrong one. Clearly, in the last-minute rush to get out of the hotel he had picked up Margaret's book by accident and she hadn't deigned to speak to him for long enough to point out his error as she packed his book instead.
Greg's eyes trailed down the paperback, taking in the image of a flighty-looking fairy simpering up at him from the shoulder of a boy. Peter Pan. Scoffing slightly at the sickeningly twee picture, Greg wound down his tray and set the book aside on it, before taking out his mobile phone.
"Excuse me, sir?"
Greg turned to one side and saw the face of a strained-looking stewardess giving him a clearly-forced smile. Raising an eyebrow, Greg rolled his eyes.
"It's on aeroplane mode," he insisted, before her passive-aggressive gaze began to drill holes in the back of his skull, but she just shook her head and sighed almost inaudibly.
"I asked you what you wanted to drink," she said, giving the phone a look which suggested that it had personally offended her.
"Oh," Greg responded dully, stowing his phone in his breast pocket. "I suppose I'll have a coffee then."
The stewardess nodded, and was just about to pour a cup of the steaming, sludgy coffee, when a thought occurred to Greg.
"Actually, scrap that, I'll have a bottle of champagne, please."
The stewardess blinked, eyeing the tan-line on Greg's finger where his wedding ring had lived until this morning. "Celebrating something, sir?" she asked, before turning to rummage in her trolley.
"Um. Yes," Greg said, slowly. Well, no, but perhaps I can convince myself that I am, he thought. The stewardess' smile grew slightly to expose another couple of teeth, as though she had read his internal monologue.
"Of course. That'll be thirty pounds, please."
Greg shrugged and handed over two of the notes Margaret had split with him before they left. The stewardess handed over the bottle and a plastic cup with a forced smile, before shifting a couple of feet further up the aisle and turning to address the woman whose screaming brat had started kicking the back of Greg's chair.
Greg opened the bottle and poured himself a plastic cup of champagne. Ignoring the man sitting next to him, Greg downed the cup and sat back, staring out of the window and doing his best to ignore the crying boy behind him.
Two hours and many glasses of champagne later, Greg had finally reached the bottom of his bottle and told the bloke next to him his life story.
"So there y'have eh," Greg slurred to the clearly disinterested man. "My effor's ter make Margeret happy and try ter forgive 'er for cheating on me wiv the P.E. teacher have failed. Rather like, like, like, I failed P.E. a' school 'cause me teachers ha'ed me. And now, get this," he said, in a loud voice. "When I ge' back ter London ah've got the worl's only consulting detective wai'ing wiv a murder case! Can you believe it?"
The man next to him said nothing, opting instead to insert his earphones and drown Greg out with some death metal band or other. Greg picked up Margaret's discarded copy of Peter Pan and chuckled half-heartedly at the binding.
"Bu' look at this," Greg continued, addressing nobody in particular. "Fairies. I feel a bi' like a fairy. Fairies are always happy, righ'?" he declared, his voice rising. "I feel happy. I feel almos' as if I could fly!"
"We're all flying, mate, lay off the booze," called a voice from across the cabin.
"Mummy, what's booze?" said a small voice from behind Greg.
"Something you're not allowed until you're eighteen, dear," said the weary voice of the boy's mother.
Greg, however, was unaware of the nearby passengers tittering to each other about the drunk in seat 19-A, and continued talking to himself.
"I do believe in fairies, I do, I do," Greg giggled to himself, all other thoughts lost to a murky cloud of swirliness in his head. "I do believe in fairies, I do, I do..."
However, while he was chanting to himself, Greg's neighbour had hit the service button on the ceiling and before long the stewardess from earlier came running.
"I see, sir," she said to the man. She tapped Greg on the shoulder, bringing him out of his reverie. "I think you had better come with me, sir."
Greg stood up and allowed himself to be steered towards one of the toilets at the front of the aeroplane, giggling to himself all the way.
When the aeroplane had finally landed, Margaret rushed over to the toilet stall in which Greg had been temporarily incarcerated.
"Greg..." she fumed, opening the door and pulling her inebriated husband out. Turning to the stewardesses, she smiled apologetically. "I'm so sorry for my husband's unacceptable behaviour earlier. I'll be sure to make sure he goes straight to his room when we get home."
"You mean I get the living room to myself for the afternoon?" Greg asked blearily, oblivious to the daggers Margaret was staring at him. One of the stewardesses gave a slight giggle behind her hand.
"Come on, Greg," she said firmly, forcefully clamping a hand over his upper-arm and hauling him off the aeroplane.
"Goodbye," the stewardesses responded uncertainly as Greg was frogmarched from the cabin.