Bill had been so caught up in his mission to Dhaka that on the rare occasions that he had time to think of anything but the death and destruction, his mind wandered back to the blissful afternoon spent with Mai. These fleeting memories became less and less the longer his mission had dragged on, and now felt completely bereft of any feelings as his body slumped into the hard seat in the Hercules transport plane as it sat on the tarmac at Dhaka airport. His exhaustion was complete as he fell asleep almost instantly the moment he sat down, which was more than surprising given the noise inside the aircraft as it continued to load its final cargo.
Bill woke with a start, his eyes adjusting to smiling face that loomed large in front of him as the Canadian loadmaster shook him awake and shouted something to him. Bill still half asleep didn't catch what he'd said, but assumed that they were about to land in Delhi as he could feel the plane slowly sinking toward to ground, and touching down a few minutes later with a slight bump.
As soon as the plane landed and the tail gate touched the tarmac the aircrew began unloading their cargo with breathtaking speed, Bill watched in fascination as the busy crew darted back and forth in clockwork precision quickly unloading and loading the new cargo with minutes of touching down and reading themselves for the flight back to Dhaka. "Good luck to them" Bill muttered under his breath as he walked away from the noisy plane.
A driver was on hand to greet Bill as he walked from the tarmac, smiling broadly he directed him to the car that was waiting for him and his short trip to the passenger terminal to catch his flight to Bangkok.
His eyes still sore from the short sleep that he'd been able to garner on the plane, all he could do to keep awake was drink black coffee and walk the terminal until his flight was ready for boarding. God how he hated black coffee he thought to himself, he'd only really become accustom to drinking coffee in Hanoi then he smiled as he remembered his morning routine with Phuong and the Star cafe and how he was looking forward to seeing his old friend again.
As he reminisced about seeing Phuong, he remembered the clandestine way Phuong had passed Mai's telephone number to him at the Star that morning and the strange manner in which he had told him about Mai on their walk around the lake. At the time he'd thought Phuong was just playing games with him, nothing like a little "cloak and dagger" he thought, but now on reflection Phuong had been more than serious about everything that had transpired. I suppose secrecy was just one of those things that came with living in Vietnam, after all the government was still far from being open and at times could be rather repressive.
Would life ever be normal again he wondered...
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