Something In The Air

by Penny Lee

I certainly don't plan to write my autobiography here, but I thought I'd share one small secret from my chequered past. I don't think I rationalised (and became comfortable with) my true feelings for a long time after this happened, but this episode certainly brought some difficult issues to the surface.

Some years ago (I'm not saying how long — work it out for yourselves!), I was a trolley dolly with a well-known airline, doing long-haul between Heathrow and the Far East. That suited me fine, allowing me to lead two almost separate lives, with family connections at each end. Back then, I was fluent in English and Cantonese, having been brought up in Hong Kong. My looks reflect my background — I have my Father's lankiness and dry English humour yet in most other respects I have inherited my Mother's oriental serenity. I was in my early twenties, comfortably paid and was into what we called 'Martini' sex — any time, any place, anywhere! In fact, with almost anyone, provided they interested me.

It was late June, I think, and I was riding the cushions back to HK. In other words, I was in uniform but not working, and taking a freebie trip using the spare crew seat — it was a useful perk. Actually, as the aircraft wasn't full, I didn't have to use the crew seat itself, instead I was able to move after take-off to enjoy a bit more room in the rear row of the standard cabin.

You need to know at this point that it was not uncommon for unaccompanied minors to travel with us, at the beginning and end of school holidays. They were mainly kids who attended boarding school in Europe, who were going back to stay with their families in Hong Kong, Singapore and other such destinations. A high proportion were Forces brats, but an increasing number of rich HK Chinese also sent their offspring for a Western education. It was well-organised — some airlines even provided 'Aunties', who escorted the kids across London and put them on the aircraft. We herded the little dears into the back rows, where the cabin crew could keep a closer eye on them.

And that was where I first saw her.

She was absolutely gorgeous and though it may be hackneyed to say so, I was totally smitten. She was no more than ten or eleven, ethnic Chinese and stunningly beautiful. I won't claim anything corny like she reminded me of myself, because she didn't. She was simply lovely. I on the other hand, was a gawky, gangly half-breed at that age. She had the window seat, I the aisle, and as I chatted with her, I became steadily enchanted with her high, sing- song voice, delicate mannerisms and innocent enthusiasm for everything. She was perhaps a bit cocky, and clearly spoilt to death by her moneyed folks. When she eventually dozed off, I found myself watching her, studying her tiny little body, her skinny legs curled up beneath her, that flat chest swelling and subsiding, the way her perfect mouth had fallen open, revealing an endearing little gap between her front teeth.

When I fly as a passenger I get easily bored and so I invariably pass the time drifting in and out of light sleep and just letting my mind wander.

Well, wander it did, but I wasn't prepared for the consequences this time: when I shifted in my seat, I discovered that my panties were damp. And all I had done was let my imagination have free rein. Too much, I suspect.

Sometimes my imagination gets carried away. It's not easy to shock yourself, I can tell you, but though I was open-minded and had never been choosy about bedding guys or girls, the thoroughly unwholesome daydreams I was having — involving a little girl, for Christ's sake — were profoundly unsettling and once I had sorted myself out in the lavatory, I resolved to behave and forget about the girl for the rest of the flight.

And I would probably have got away with it and lived my life a different way, had it not been for some fortuitous technical problem that made us put down in the Middle East for an extended stop-over.

To cut the story short, the girl went missing in the airport during the few hours the passengers were allowed to stretch their legs whilst the defect was fixed. The Captain was desperate to get going after the delay and although it was against procedures (and they'd never get away with it these days), I ended up volunteering to stay so that the flight could continue, the intention being to find her and we would both catch the next scheduled service.

Predictably, within minutes of my aircraft lifting off the runway, I was presented by a harassed customer service assistant with a small, tearful and eminently cuddlable Chinese girl, still indignantly protesting that she had not heard the many and increasingly impatient tannoys calling her to join the flight.

Ever the consummate professional, I whisked her away in a taxi before she could embarrass the airline any further. The next flight was the following day and so I instructed the taxi driver to find us a decent hotel for the night, as dusk was approaching.

I can't remember why, but everywhere was fully booked and we ended up in a small but adequate place some miles out, and there was only one room left — a double. We had no baggage of course — that had gone on ahead, to be held in quarantine until we caught up with it. I was still miffed at the loss of a day's precious holiday and so when I ushered her into it, the only thought I had was to give her a very stern talking to.

Her Western name was Emily although I resorted to Chinese to tell her off and in that I used her birth name, Lien Hua,

She was a little madam. Comes of being from the HK super-rich I suppose. I launched into a rant, really venting my pent-up anger on her. She was at first shocked, then stroppy and when she dared to answer back in a hurt, arrogant tone that really got my goat, I wanted to slap her cute little face. Thankfully I didn't, but I was so damned incensed that without thinking, I gripped her arms, spun her round and threw her over the end of the double bed. I was livid. She was wearing a short and thin summer dress and without hesitation, I shoved the hem up to her waist, revealing the full gorgeousness of her slim, firm bum, encased in tiny pink panties trimmed with lace flowers. I had already gone too far, but it was just so easy to wrench them down to her knees.

Lien Hua was so surprised: it was not until I had landed the second sturdy smack that she yelled out loud.

An indignant stream of invective, that owed more to her indignation than the pain of what were not very hard slaps. It just fuelled my determination and I pushed her down to the mattress and smacked her more. One to each hard little buttock, fascinating to see the skin reddening and the transient white imprint of my fingers.

For a moment I was confused. I couldn't understand it — I was on the veranda of familiar house in Kowloon — I could see the tops of the mountains in the distance. The wailing voice was familiar too — sounded a bit like my own but far away, feeble and child-like. There were faces too. The houseboy grinning round a door post — he was licking his lips — it made me shiver — I thought I'd erased him from my memory. I could hear other voices, just the tones, not the words: deep-pitched, laughing, mocking, smutty. My father and his business colleagues I think. My cheeks and ears were burning hot, and so was my backside. I was trying to cover my naked body but something stopped my arms moving. I could feel tears bubbling hotly in the corners of my eyes.

Lien Hua's contemporary English swear words snapped me out of my reverie. How dare she say that to me, the little minx? She had to be punished. She had to respect her elders.

My hand made contact, seemingly without any conscious effort on my part. I watched it arc downwards, felt the satisfying sting in my palm, followed immediately by the pleading whine of a chastened little girl. Then curiously, my anger became displaced by a much nicer feeling: like hunger but hugely exciting, right in the pit of my stomach. Her childish squealing only made me want to spank her more. Not hard — just enough to keep her there, under my control, unable to prevent me from doing it to her. The sight of her tiny bottom writhing under my hand, the flash of pussy. I couldn't believe it. I was so incredibly turned on. I paused. Ran my hand over her hot, smooth skin. She was just so small and helpless. I slapped her again, a bit harder, to see if it made her yell louder. It sure did, so I treated the other side to a similar smack. I remember being overwhelmingly randy and yet experiencing a very creepy feeling that as I scolded her, my words sounded just like those of my dear mother, when she disciplined me as a girl. What the heck was going on in my head?

Lien Hua's tears came about half way through her ordeal, angry howls that soon receded to a subdued and very sexy sobbing, long after I had landed the last slap and held her there, just watching her little pink arse, fighting a disconcerting and powerful urge to stroke and caress it.

Like mine had been. Back then in Kowloon. Stroked and... I instantly banished the memories and was back in the hotel room.

At least she had stopped protesting her innocence and there was no more answering back. And I was no longer quite so cross. Five minutes of madness.

Then the awful realisation of what I had just done hit me. Little Lien Hua was a fare-paying punter, after all, and I had just given a good hiding! That could so easily cost me my career. Although right at that moment, as she lay over the bed, snivelling, with her dress about her waist and knickers round her knees, showing off that fantastic little bum, half my brain couldn't have cared less. My mind was in a whirl of conflicting, confusing and very disturbing emotions.

As we girls do, I scurried off to the en-suite bathroom to regroup.

It was a great relief that when I eventually emerged, the small girl was still there. She was sitting cross-legged on the bed, watching the grainy picture on the cable TV. Her eyes were a bit red, but there were no more tears.

However, the atmosphere was distinctly frosty and strained and it took time to coax anything from the sulking brat. Thankfully, like any good Chinese, she was ruled by her stomach, and the prospect of my ordering room service earned a grudging, sullen response.

Now I needed to diffuse the situation. We ate in silence, perched on opposite sides of the bed, but she relaxed noticeably with some food inside her and I decided to try an icebreaker.

I made some comment which made her titter and pounced on her and tickled her ribs.

"Come on, you: we can't sit here like two jade bookends all night," I chuckled. "If you're going to try to sleep next to my snoring all night, we'd better become close friends pretty quick!"

It worked — she was very ticklish and collapsed into a giggling jelly between my fingers, rolling around on the mattress as I playfully bounced on top of her.

If the sound of her squeaky young voice in pain was deliciously erotic, the bubbling of her uncontrollable giggles was almost as much of a turn-on. As was the feel of her skinny young ribs and the way her eyes closed tight with laughter and her coarse black hair danced about her lovely round face. We rolled together across the huge mattress, my fingers just letting her catch her breath before searching out more sensitive places under her arms and down her sides and sending her back into helpless fits of giggles.

Now this bit sounds really corny, I know, but at some stage I stopped tickling and there was actually one of those silly movie moments — the kind when the hero and heroine suddenly look into each other's eyes and the violins start up.

OK, so there were no violins in our room, but believe me, our eyes really did meet in an inexplicable, knowing exchange, in which something electric passed between us, before we both looked away in our individual embarrassment. I felt a tremendous wave of joy deep within and there was a wonderfully ambiguous twinkle in her eyes, which I interpreted as something between innocent curiosity and guilty pleasure. She had ended up in my arms and neither of us seemed overly keen to move or end the moment.

I lay back on the pillow. This was not happening — it was downright ridiculous.

What if I had misread her expression, was making it up? Then I really could bugger up my career. Big time. Trying it on with an eleven-year-old passenger was not the smartest of moves to begin with, yet was quite possibly surpassed in dumbness if that very passenger were of the same sex!

And yet I was now yearning. I couldn't suppress my sub-conscious any longer. I wanted to have her.

I needed to be more sure.

So I thought through some litmus tests, each designed to see if she was likely to go along with it.

The room was fairly warm anyway, but I upped the aircon temperature surreptitiously and soon stripped to my underwear, claiming that I ought to hang up my uniform or else it would look terrible in the morning. I was pleased with the way she watched and I carefully positioned myself so that I could watch her reflection in a full-length mirror. To my delight, her eyes kept straying from the TV and checking me out.

We were the best of chums again, the spanking completely forgotten, by Lien Hua at least. Had she been only a year or two younger or older, she might have sulked and that would have been the end of it, but at her glorious stage of life, one lives just for the moment, and memories don't tend to linger.

I offered to hang up her dress and she readily peeled it over her head. Her white cotton vest rode up with it, giving me a brief foretaste of her trim, young tummy and neat belly button. That was too much for me and once I had closed the wardrobe, I sprang at her, fingers up inside her vest and over her ribs, tickling for sure, but in reality taking full advantage of the opportunity to explore, to take in more of her hot little body. This time I held on to her, wrapping my legs around hers and rolling over the sheet with her, our bodies pressed close, our laughing faces inches apart.

After the frolic, I kept hold of her, and we lay together, still, watching the incomprehensible television, and I lifted the hair from her face and smoothed it over her head and casually stroked her soft shoulders. My arm fell across her chest and we left it there. She seemed quite happy. Ludicrously, I was almost creaming myself.

Time for the next test.

I announced that I was going to have a bath, as we would soon need to turn in, if we were to be up in good time to get back to the airport.

Once the water was running, I called to her.

"Come and join me, Lien Hua — we can share a bath and do our bit to conserve water!"

To my delight, she was in the bathroom like a shot.

"Pop your knickers in the basin with mine — I'll rinse them out and they'll be dry by morning."

She was unable to hide her curiosity, staring quite blatantly at the trim black triangle between my legs, as I stepped into the bath. I intrigued her, for though I clearly shared her Chinese ancestry, I was at the same time considerably taller and perhaps a shade bustier than the norm for oriental women. She dropped her pants into soak with mine and laid her vest next to my bra on the tiled floor. Then she paused, and the merest hint of a glow lit her cheeks.

"What’s up?" I asked.

She studied the bathmat coyly, then turned to the WC.

"I, er, need to go."

I dismissed her embarrassment. "Well don't mind me — pee away!"

Such directness works with young girls, I have subsequently discovered. They need to be led and are grateful for no-nonsense guidance. She sat and performed without further hesitation. Another tick in the box: she was demonstrably comfortable in my company.

At last I could enjoy the rest of her tiny body. She clambered over the side and I took in her cute little breasts, hardly more than a pair of shallow, pointed cones of puppy fat, with as yet small, pale nipples that rose gently out from each tip. She was embarking on one of those horrid stages of puberty, when the growth outwards outpaces the gain in height, and beneath her trim, firm stomach, there was a slight bulge before you got down to her glorious little pussy. So lovely and neat at that age — utterly unspoilt by pubes, nothing out of place, just two halves of perfect tan flesh standing proud, with the cheeky hint of clitoral hood playing peek-a-boo as she lifted her leg.

I was businesslike, but my wide smiles were genuine enough.

I had hurriedly dunked my hair and had a proper wash whilst she used the lav, and so soaping myself was as much for effect as anything — a flirtatious display, I suppose. She averted her eyes quickly when I looked up from lathering my breasts, but I smiled, willing her to understand that I wanted her to look. In fact I wanted her to touch and kiss and lick, but...

Patience.

I washed and rinsed her hair. There: no problem. Except the distraction of her tiny, wet body just inches from mine.

"Turn around again — I'll wash your back, then you can do me," I suggested.

She knelt up clear of the suds and I immediately slid my soapy hands across her narrow back. It was Heaven! I knelt close behind her and when I tenderly soaped her wonderful little bottom, I whispered with a laugh, "Your bum's still in one piece, but don't you dare be naughty again, or I'll have to spank you again."

She giggled. No grudges there then. I frowned to myself — actually, spanking her would be fun... Stop! One step at a time. Where did that stray thought come from, anyway?

I took the opportunity to move a little closer, and slipped my hands around her waist, then ran them up and washed her tiny breasts. My own nipples were pressed to her shoulders. They were so sensitive; I had to squash them hard against her, to ease the ache. Somewhere in my lower stomach, a minor tremor sent me a note of caution. Easy now, Penny.

Handing her the soap, I said, breezily, "Your turn!" and promptly turned away from her.

The tremor threatened to become an earthquake almost at the first tantalising touch. Her hands were so small, and light and delicate and as they journeyed from my neck and down my spine, I closed my eyes and let every moment run the full course. As soon as she had worked her way down from my neck to my bottom, I stood up, gathering her hands and lifting her up too, and taking hold of the soap.

She watched me, bemused. I lathered my hands and knelt before her, washing her calves and knees, then I soaped up again and tackled her thighs, stopping just short of her crotch. A third time, I put suds on my palms and holding my hand between her legs, I looked at her, eyebrows raised, and a big grin across my chops. Lien Hua nodded and smiled too. My fingers curled over her pubic mound.

Oh the temptation! How I would have loved to linger, fondling, exploring.

But I was good. Functional, efficient, cleansing her nooks and crannies, and up between her cheeks. Shared intimacy, but no more. She laughed, claiming it tickled.

If she was expecting to reciprocate, she was disappointed. I couldn't have survived that, much as it would have been a wheeze. Once I had rinsed her down, I leaned for the towel and draped it over her shoulders. Although I did give her a subtle squeeze through it, a quick hug that did not go unnoticed by her, as she looked up at me with those fabulous almond eyes of hers and smiled. A very mature smile. Almost knowing.

And so to bed, as they say.

The two of us, our nakedness chastely covered by a single sheet up to our waists, separated by a decorous distance, both awake and staring up at the ceiling in the moonlight.

"Dad will be really cross with me — missing the plane like this," she whispered.

I rolled over and sought out her hand.

"No he won't — the airline has told your parents you were feeling queasy and so just needed to stop off for a rest. And he won't have to pay anything extra. So don't worry a bit. Let him believe what he has been told."

I squeezed her hand and when she turned to me, I slid over as quickly as I could without appearing unnatural, and pulled her against my body, holding her shoulders and pressing her head to my neck. And then, as I stroked her hair, I felt her arm reach out, slowly extending and curling over my ribs. I let my hand slide down her back, gentling her bottom towards me and brought my knees up until I was cradling her body right into mine.

I whispered conspiratorially, deliberately ambiguous, "We can keep a little secret can't we?"

Lien Hua made a chuckling sound. I kissed her forehead.

I spooned her closer. I kissed the end of her dainty nose. Her face was so beautiful — open, soft, with happy cheekbones and an impish mouth.

It was so quiet. My throat was dry. I studied her, checking she was fine. This was it. At last.

"This is actually rather fun, isn't it?"

Our faces were almost touching. In the half-light, her eyes had a mischievous twinkle as they narrowed in a smile of agreement.

I lay my lips over hers, at the same time drawing her right into my chest, and as the kiss formed, my fingers brushed her cheek.

She went so rigid, I thought I'd blown it — spooked her, misread the signs. I lifted my head, searching her face for reassurance. She was breathing more deeply, her arm pressed hard into my side. I tried a wink.

And to my enormous relief, her stiff lips broke into a huge grin, her oversized teeth glinting in the gloom. I hugged her and kissed her again. This time she was much more relaxed, her mouth soft and pliable beneath mine. My hands ranged up and down her tiny body.

Never had I experienced such unadulterated pleasure from a simple kiss.

I felt I had to be so gentle with her, lest I should in some way break the spell. Cradled against me, Lien Hua was just so petite, so fragile.

"OK?" I murmured, and then I realised she was holding her breath.

"You are allowed to breathe," I joked and kissed her happy giggle.

Having missed out on what I presumed was a 'normal' adolescence, I wonder if the emotions I felt that night were similar? The painful anticipation, the fear that at any moment the bubble would pop. The longing. My insides were in knots. And all for an eleven-year-old girl. Unbelievable then; even more so when I look back on that crazy night.

As she relaxed, and we beamed at each other, she planted her own first kisses on my face — the lightest, softest little pecks imaginable, and yet enchantingly unselfconscious. I pushed away the sheet and eased her over on to her back, lightly trailing my fingers over those miniscule breasts, tracing around her nipples. She responded, her stubby fingers running up and down my arm, up to the back of my neck, where they sent a cascade of effervescent goosebumps rippling down my spine.

I could even feel the staccato tap of her heart through the tip of my tongue, which followed my fingers' lead across the softness of her breasts. My lips teased her nipples gently, and my hand idly, casually, wandered beyond, over the cute swelling of her tummy, to caress the baby-smooth insides of her thighs.

Instinctively (I presume), she opened her legs, and I sought and found tacit approval in her wide, excited eyes, and my fingers danced lightly over her labia.

I parted both sets of Lien Hua's lips simultaneously, my tongue seeking out the serrations of her upper teeth and that delectable gap between them, my finger tips creeping up to brush over her clit. So small, so accessible. She closed her eyes and I loved her.

She gave herself completely, hardly daring to move, sometimes opening her eyes in wonder, and returning my smile, but mostly lying motionless, save for the rise and fall of her chest as her breathing deepened and the beguiling way her tongue would dart out and moisten her open lips. She had frozen and gasped at the first touch of my mouth over her pubis and I was terrified that I had rushed it, but no sooner had the tip of my tongue insinuated itself, and lifted her hood to flick around her immature clitoris, than she melted into the mattress and sighed a contented moan and her fingers played with the hair on the back of my head as I tasted her innocence.

She was wet. Such a subtle, natural essence that prompted me to dip into her vagina for more and made her wriggle with pleasure.

Yet all too soon I had to forego this matchless experience. She winced and I knew she was simply too sensitive for me to continue. I think I brought her to the brink of climax several times, maybe further, but her tender inexperience and oriental inscrutability made it hard to tell. It was a first time for me too.

But when I sat up, and wiped my mouth, she looked like the cat who'd got the cream. A great big, amazed, delighted, stupid grin from ear to ear.

It didn't matter that I was fit to explode, that my crotch was throbbing. In a perfect world, I might have persuaded her to return the favour, but this was an entirely new situation. I had seduced before, but never a partner who was an absolute beginner. Had I not already taken too much advantage of her naivety? Just watching her happiness was more than enough recompense.

I hugged her until she slept.

Now the story could well have ended there. It would have been neat and tidy. She would have something wicked to confess to her best friend in years to come, I would have tried a new and wonderful thing, but would be happy to get back to real boys and girls.

If we hadn't lost our knickers.

Before going to bed, I had rinsed and hung them over the balcony railing. I hadn't realised quite how strong the early morning breezes were, gusting in from the desert, and when I went to retrieve them at first light, they were gone. No sign at all.

And of course, it goes without saying that the chances of obtaining two pairs of panties, before breakfast, in an Arab city, when you're a lone woman in an airline uniform, are on a par with Concorde ever making a profit. Zilch, in other words.

Lien Hua thought it was hilarious.

Although once we were down in the lobby, under the creepy scrutiny of the leering locals and peering anxiously through the window for our taxi, she was feeling as exposed as I. In fact rather more so, for whereas my uniform skirt was a demure knee-length and I was acutely aware of my situation, her skimpy summer dress came half-way up her thighs, and was prone to ride up. In the back of the cab, her hands were thrust so hard in her lap that the knuckles turned white.

And that was the problem. Faced with such accessibility, I had no self- control.

We caught the flight and luckily bagged the same rear seat, and as she pretended to doze, my fingers were busy under the tartan rug, this time spending a leisurely half-hour to bring her to an indisputable climax. I knew that, not just due to the condition of my fingers, but because of the unabashed croak of amazed and spontaneous girlish ecstasy that had me scrambling to put my other hand over her mouth before she informed the entire cabin.

She was in fits of giggles, her cute face flushed with delight. My heart was pounding and I almost burst out laughing myself at her shocked little expression as I licked my fingers brazenly, one by one.

Me? I was so uncontrollably horny that I dragged her to the WC and against all my better judgement, stripped us both near-naked and gave her a crash course in how to pleasure another woman with her own hands. She was enthusiastic if rather ham-fisted but it didn't take very long at all, and I can still picture Lien Hua's look of surprise and concern when I hit my own high notes. The sweet kid thought she'd done me a mischief.

Such irony — no matter how many times I was propositioned on flights, I never once had the slightest inclination to do it in the air, especially in the lav, and yet I was inducted into the 'Mile High Club' by a sweet young Chinese schoolgirl less than half my age!

If my colleagues had any inkling of what went on, they never mentioned it.

And although I'm sure I could have found a way to continue our relationship, once we landed, I forced myself to face reality. We claimed our bags, restored our dignity with fresh undies and I handed her over to her parents before there was any chance to pause and make unwise arrangements to see each other again. Nope, I told myself, it was a crazy one-off, an aberrant surfacing of long-suppressed feelings that just had to remain locked away. There were memories I preferred not to recall.

I stood in Departures, watching the way her flimsy dress hugged her lovely slim bottom as she trotted out to the waiting limo, hand in hand with her expensively-dressed parents. They had hardly cast me a second glance when I handed her over.

It had been a breathtaking experience, yet it scared me. I thought that being so easily besotted with a very young girl was bad enough, but there was a dark side that I really wasn't ready to face, an underlying thrill that came not from attraction or even lust. It was the control: I had got such a buzz simply from manipulating Lien Hua for my own ends. Worse, when I had spanked her, some hidden demons had leapt from my past, threatening to take over, and I wasn't entirely sure I would be able to fight them off so effectively another time.

However, over the years, as I've grown older and wiser and whilst gravity wreaks havoc with my body, I have learned how to reconcile my past with my sexuality and make sense of it all. And I can manage the demons. Most of the time. Lien Hua was a beautiful surprise and a delightful first.

And by no means the last.