Easy to Like by Edward Riche Page B

make a movie about him.
Didn’t you just hear your girlfriend say —”
    â€œI think he will see a difference
between network television and an independent documentary. And he was a boy
then, you don’t ‘get a job’ for a little boy. He’s a man now.”
    â€œMaybe. Listen, Lucy, when you’re
speaking to him, please put in a good word. I’d like to talk.”
    â€œI tell him every time I visit.”
    â€œThank you. That cheque is dated for
next week. Some stuff has to clear.”

    The quickest route to the South of
France was swift indeed and via, of all places, Toronto, Canada. Everything
direct out of LAX or San Francisco or via Atlanta or New York was booked for the
next several days. Elliot thought this was impossible, believing it a lie that
was part of some sort of price-fixing conspiracy, the mechanics of which he
couldn’t yet comprehend. He explained to Bonnie that many of the seats offered
online were mere phantoms, posted to give consumers an illusion of choice. You
could search and click and call until your head fell off, but you would never
get that cheap fare. Besides, on a long flight, anything over three hours,
Elliot clung to a demand, stated in a rider in the nether regions of his
contracts, that he travel in the front of the bus.
    He was on Air Canada to Toronto with a
change to another Air Canada flight on to Paris and then a quick regional flyer
to Nîmes. One way. It was a rush to make it, but at least it was with a
top-drawer airline. It had been years since Elliot had flown his native
country’s national carrier, but he remembered it as having excellent service.
    At the gate at LAX an Air Canada
representative informed Elliot that there had been some mistake, that although
he had purchased a business-class ticket, he was seated in row 23.
    â€œIs business class oversold?” Elliot
asked.
    But the ticket agent looked past Elliot
as though he were no longer there. Elliot asked again.
    â€œSir, please, there are other customers
in line.” The agent was a woman in her late forties, early fifties, mannish. Her
hair was up in a bun, drawn masochistically tight.
    â€œI don’t care,” said Elliot. “You
haven’t finished serving me.”
    â€œYes, I have.” She was almost a
baritone.
    â€œBut I’ve booked and paid for a
business-class ticket. I want to know why I am being assigned another seat.”
    â€œThen I recommend you call
1-888-247-2262.”
    â€œWhat? Now?”
    â€œWhenever you like. If you try now,
though, you will miss your flight. You have to turn off the cellphone once you
board.”
    â€œWhy should I call an 888 number when
you are standing right in front of me? There’s a computer terminal right there.
You’re perfectly situated to sort this out.”
    â€œYou’re not a terrorist, by any chance,
are you, sir? I’m not going to have to call security, am I?”
    The whole point of taking this flight
was how soon it was leaving Los Angeles. Vowing he would write a letter, to
which no one would pay any heed, Elliot stomped off to the plane.
    Business class was almost
empty. There were a couple of sleepy-looking Air Canada pilots in one row and a
nattily dressed black man of at least seven feet in another — that was it.
    The plane was old. The shape of the
cabin, the particular curve of the tubular enclosure, was familiar, but in
distant memory. Seat 23B was threadbare and stained — with coffee, Elliot hoped.
When he sat, his knees were against the seat in front of him. He would shortly
explain the mix-up to a flight attendant and move forward to where he belonged.
He searched the seatback pocket for one of the illustrated escape manuals to
determine in what model of — jet? surely it was a jet — he was to be riding. The
pouch hadn’t been cleaned since the inbound flight and contained several plastic
wrappers, a couple of sections of the