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I’m standing in a stagnant queue at Heathrow Customs with twenty-odd people in front of me and God knows how many behind me. I yawn and check my watch. 3.37am. A Friday. The 13th. We must have caught a tailwind because I could have sworn our red-eye from New York was due in at 6am.
I can’t recall much of the flight—except maybe for some turbulence mid-flight, when I may have asked the flight attendant to pour me a double bourbon and to keep them coming. I must have then dozed off, because the next thing I knew, I’m standing in this queue with a parched throat and a thumping headache.
Look, I’m a tolerant guy most of the time, but some things wander over my tranquillity line and make me snap. You know, like the micro fonts used for payment reference numbers on invoices, or climate change fearmongers who snap up prime waterfront properties, or empty nesters who bang on about the plight of the homeless, only to go home every night to their four-bedroom mansions and snuggle under their duvets with a smooth nightcap, a good book and a clear conscience. But what really makes me snap is standing in a stagnant queue. No, that’s not quite true, for what makes me snap the most is a queue-jumper. You know, those pricks that push in while bleating on their phones about their stock portfolios, or those chicks who go for the sympathy vote and squeeze their bulging pregnant bellies into the gap while you, ever chivalrous, step back, only for them to pull their handbags from under their coats and direct innocent, aimless and flat-bellied stares into the distance, oblivious to your headshaking.
So you can imagine my annoyance, and surprise, when this camel, decked out in more bling than a 300-pound rapper, nonchalantly says to me, ‘Do you mind?’
She then pushes her way in in front of me.
‘What the?’ several queuers behind me say.
I give her rump a polite tap to get her attention so I can point her towards the end of the queue. She ignores my tap and swishes her turdy tail in my face. She then crushes my foot with two splayed camel toes. I clear my throat and beg her pardon. She turns her head and gives me the old Mick-Jagger-love-child pout and dromedary-doe-eyed look and suggests I go hump myself.
Lovely, I think.
The queue shuffles forward, so I let it be and cast my eyes about the airport. I’ve passed through Heathrow many times over the years but never really taken in its décor. Who does? Most people, me included, rush to the bar in the departures lounge when flying out and, too stuffed with jet lag, stand in the Customs queue upon arrival and sleepwalk with the rest of the horde. But now, despite the worst jet lag I’ve experienced, I look about. I’ll admit it’s not to my taste. Monochromatic, clinical and sparse, with cold tiles and translucent glass walls holding back the London night and cold. The only signage points arrows toward the exit. Behind me runs a long queue of disgruntled commuters that disappears into the white distance, and before me, the queue stagnates before a pair of large gates with a booth to their left. The gates stand twenty feet tall, and their pearly hue brings a little warmth to the place.
The camel shuffles a couple of steps, so I roll my suitcase forward.
‘Don’t you worry about that frightful camel,’ a frail voice whispers behind me.
I turn around and look down upon a tiny old woman wearing a lopsided jewelled crown and a sweeping regal gown with an outrageous ruffled collar. Her wig sits askew above a face frosted ghostly white.
‘Pardon?’ I say.
‘That impertinent beast that pushed in in front of you. She’s got Buckley’s chance of getting through those gates. I should know. I’ve been here before.’
‘Hey, aren’t you Dame Judi—’
‘Oh, no. I get that all the time, young man.’
‘But your outfit, your height, your enunciation.’
‘These rags? No, I’ve just come from a fancy-dress ball to raise funds for the Shropshire Amateur Players. Bit of a Shakespeare in Love theme this year. Anyway, don’t let that queue-jumper upset you. Mark my words, she’ll get her comeuppance, or my name’s not Judi D—I mean Harriet Hennipenny.’
I check my watch. It’s still 3.37am. Great, my watch battery is dead.
‘Say, Harriet, do you have the time?’
She raises a frilled sleeve and squints at her wristwatch.
‘It’s 3.37am. It shouldn’t be much longer now.’
‘I hope not.’
‘Don’t worry, young man. They’re most efficient once you get to the top of the queue. Mind you, you’ll want to have your paperwork ready. If not, they’ll send you back quick smart. Last time I was here, they said there’d been a mix-up with my passport. Well, I tell you, I nearly died of a heart attack, but this very nice young man—Peter, I think his name was—said I needed to go back, and that once my passport was in order, I could return. They were all so very kind. They even sent me back first-class, with a complimentary glass of champagne to boot. A few weeks later and here I am.’
‘Well, I hope you enjoy your stay.’
‘Thank you, I will. I’ve been waiting a lifetime for this.’
The camel shuffles a couple of steps, so I roll my suitcase forward.
A horn toots behind me, and a cart approaches. An orange light swirls, and a thin man—with a face whiter than Harriet’s and wearing shiny red shoes—lies supine on a stretcher. A black-robed priest administers the last rites while kneeling beside the body, and a grim-faced security detail of six jogs beside the cart.
The cart whizzes past, and Harriet tuts and mumbles something about celebrities and preferential treatment and who does he think he is, the Pope? As the cart nears the head of the queue, the crowd parts like the Red Sea. The stiff rises from the dead and places a tall, wide, white mitre on his head. He then walks unaided past the booth and through the gates. And I think, bloody hell, it is the Pope.
I near the front of the queue and see the Customs official manning the booth—some old fart with a long, grey beard, stooping over a huge ledger whilst wielding a flourishing quill in his left hand. The computers must be down, hence the stagnant queue. Bloody technology, I lament.
It must be a novelty dress-up day—no doubt for some faux, not-for-profit charity where half the funds raised pay for tatty, foreign-sourced merchandise and the other half is blown on overpaid administrators and piss-ups for celebrity ‘ambassadors’—for old greybeard wears a flowing white robe, leather sandals and a pathetic pair of kiddy angel wings. He seems a model of employee contentment, for he grins from ear to ear.
The camel shuffles a couple of steps, and now only she and the grinning official separate me from the exit. Up close, the gates tower over me, tall and impenetrable. Two security staff guard the gates. One is a short, dark-haired Asian dude wearing a pair of Persol Ratti sunglasses and a yellow jumpsuit. He holds a set of nunchucks in his right hand. The other guard is a giant of a man with huge sideburns and wearing a black one-piece wrestling singlet with his nipples exposed. There ain’t any deplorables getting past that barrier, I think.
With my face level with the camel’s arse, it’s like I’m staring into the eye of a needle. Her pin-pricked anus expands and contracts as if she’s hyperventilating through her ring. My head tingles. My eyes fixate. I feel my whole being drawn forward, and I fear her oscillating sphincter will suck me right in, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. Then I hear a gurgle, wet and prolonged, and I snap back to reality, only to break into a cold sweat because I just know—what with the way that ring’s dealing with those bowel spasms—that I’m in for the biggest dumping since Sheena Weston left me in Grade 5.
The Customs official calls the camel forward.
‘Hi, I’m Peter,’ the old man says. ‘Welcome to Paradise, madam. May I see your passport, please?’
Hey, I think, London’s way better than Dhaka, but hardly Paradise.
The camel raises her front leg with her passport wedged between her toes. Her hump sweats, and she shifts about on her feet. Her doe eyes, white and wide, flitter about everywhere except at Peter.
Peter frowns as he slowly scans down the ledger. He flips a page and runs his finger down the next page. The camel’s mouth froths, and she looks like she’ll liquefy on the spot, and I reckon the contents of my bladder, courtesy of God knows how many double bourbons on the plane, may join her if Peter doesn’t shift his robed arse into gear.
Peter turns back a page, shakes his head and says, ‘Sorry, madam, you’re not on the manifest. I can’t let you through.’
‘But you must,’ the camel says.
‘No, I’m sorry. You can only pass through the gates if you have the proper paperwork.’
The camel’s legs shake. She steps around Peter and heads toward the exit gate. Peter looks at the two security guards and nods. The shorter guard takes two quick steps and launches into the air with a crane kick. He releases a ‘hi-yah’ mid-air, drives his leading foot down upon the camel’s right shoulder and follows up with a quick one-two with the nunchucks. The camel’s knees buckle, and as she collapses to the ground, her bowels explode. I am wrong. Sheena Weston had nothing compared to the shitstorm before me.
The giant guard steps forward and says, ‘I’ll take it from here, Bruce.’ He grabs the unconscious camel by the tail and drags her towards a door off to the right. As camel and guard disappear into the dark within, Peter straightens his wings, gives a sweet smile and says, ‘Next.’
I grip my passport and take a timid step forward.
Peter raises a hand and says, ‘Halt.’
My palms sweat and my mouth dries. I try to recall if my passport is invalid or if my unwashed underpants crammed in my suitcase represent a biochemical threat.
Peter places a walkie-talkie to his lips and says, ‘Cleaning detail to Sector 7. A Code 122. I repeat, a Code 122.’
He turns and points one of those laser thingies at the big screen above the booth. The screen display changes from a tranquil blue Welcome to Paradise to a stormy red This facility is temporarily closed. Services will resume in 10 minutes.
I go to vent customer dissatisfaction, but Peter disappears through a door at the back of the booth. Bastard, I think.
The cleaning detail arrives, armed with shovels, masks and biohazard suits. Fifteen minutes pass as they dump shovel load after shovel load into the waste bins. Ten minutes of mopping follow. Harriet pulls out her knitting. The queuers behind become restless. Another five minutes and I reckon they’ll storm the Bastille.
After the cleaning detail packs up and disappears, the screen display changes to a viridescent Processing.
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