Week two, and I've officially achieved ghost status.
The crew has developed a remarkable talent for talking around me, through me, but never actually to me. Marina sets the temperature—arctic—and everyone else bundles up accordingly.
They discuss flight schedules over my head. Swap stories about previous trips like I'm not standing three feet away. Coordinate tasks in a language of glances and nods that specifically excludes the new girl.
"We'll need extra champagne for the Singapore route," Derek, the pilot, tells Marina while I'm restocking glasses literally between them. "The usual preferences."
"Already handled," she replies. "Checked the inventory this morning."
Neither of them looks at me. I might as well be a particularly inconvenient piece of furniture, but I try my best to fill the silence anyway. Because silence and I have never been friends.
I hum while restocking the galley, narrate my own actions under my breath like a nature documentary—"And here we see the flight attendant in her natural habitat, folding napkins with aggressive enthusiasm"—and refuse to let the isolation win.
If they won't talk to me, I'll talk to myself.
I'm an excellent company. Mostly.
Charlotte, ‘the corporate lawyer fiancée’ from last week, is still here. Still trying. And I watch her campaign for Mr. Finley’s attention with the kind of morbid fascination usually reserved for nature documentaries about predators.
She repositions herself constantly in his eyeline, crossing and uncrossing her legs like she's conducting a symphony of silk stockings. She drops mentions of cases relevant to his industry, each one a carefully baited hook.
She even wears a different perfume every flight, probably cycling through an entire department store counter.
Still, he barely looks up.
His laptop might as well be welded to his hands and I find myself watching him more than Charlotte.
Cataloging the way his jaw tightens when she interrupts his work. How his fingers pause on the keyboard when something irritates him, the precise economy of his movements.
Every gesture is deliberate and controlled, nothing wasted.
I tell myself it's a professional observation. Learning to read my boss, understanding his moods so I can anticipate his needs.
That's all. Relly.
On the flight to Berlin, Charlotte requests coffee. Black, no sugar, which I immediately prepare with the precision of a machine. I bring her the coffee with my brightest smile, because smiling is free and I refuse to let anyone make me stop.
"Here you go! Beautiful day for flying, isn't it? Well, every day is beautiful for flying when you're above the clouds, I think. Have you been to Berlin before? I read somewhere that they have these amazing street markets where you can get—"
"I didn't ask for a stupid conversation." Charlotte's voice slices through my chatter like a blade. "Just coffee."
The words land like a slap—sharp, public, and designed to sting. The whole cabin goes silent and when Marina glances over from the galley doorway, I catch the satisfaction flickering across her face before she schools it into professional neutrality.
My cheeks burn as my hands tighten on the coffee tray until my knuckles go white.
"Of course," I manage, my voice somehow steady despite the humiliation crawling up my throat. "My apologies for the—"
"She's doing the job I pay her for."
Mr. Finley’s voice cuts through the cabin—cold, precise, and aimed directly at Charlotte. He still hasn't looked up from his laptop, but the temperature in the cabin drops another twenty degrees.
His fingers have stopped moving across the keyboard and Charlotte's perfectly composed face flushes an ugly red. "I was simply requesting…"
"If you have complaints about the service," he continues, each word landing like ice, "you can take them up with me. Not taking it out on my crew."
The silence is… deafening.
Charlotte opens her mouth, closes it, opens it again like a very expensive fish gasping for air. I stand frozen with the coffee tray, heart pounding for reasons I absolutely refuse to examine.
Then Mr. Finley’s eyes flick to mine—just for half a second, barely a glance—and I realize he's checking. Making sure I'm okay.
Something passes between us at that moment, though I couldn't name it even if I tried.
Then he returns to his laptop like nothing happened. Like he didn't just verbally eviscerate his own fiancée for snapping at the hired help. Like my existence doesn't register beyond a brief quality control check.
The rest of the flight passes in tense silence.
Charlotte stares out the window, jaw tight, arms crossed defensively over her designer blouse. Marina shoots me looks I can't quite read—surprise, maybe, or reassessment. And I can't stop replaying that moment.
His deliciously low voice, cold as arctic wind, defending… me.
He noticed. He actually noticed when someone hurt me.
I'd written him off completely. Cold, dismissive, another rich man who looked through the staff like we were furniture with a heartbeat. But he'd heard. He'd seen me, even when I thought I was invisible.
I find myself refilling his water glass before he asks. Adjusting the cabin temperature when I notice him roll his shoulders against the chill.
Small things. Professional things. Anticipating needs is literally my job description.
But when he glances up and catches me watching again, I look away too fast. Cheeks warm, heart doing something complicated in my chest that I refuse to acknowledge.
And the next flight, Charlotte is gone.
Her seat on the return flight sits empty, a void where designer perfume and desperate conversation used to be. And nobody seems to mention her absence.
It's like she evaporated overnight, leaving nothing but the memory of perfectly manicured nails and wounded pride. Another name crossed off whatever list Mr. Finley’s keeps.
While doing final cabin checks before departure, I find something wedged between the seat cushions—a silk scarf, obviously expensive. The kind of thing Charlotte would wear wrapped artfully around her graceful neck.
I bring it to Mr. Finley’s, holding it up like evidence at a crime scene. "I found this. I think it belongs to Miss Campbell? Should I have it sent to her, or…"
"Donate it." His voice is flat, final. As usual, he doesn't look up from his tablet. "She won't be back anyway."
"Oh." I clutch the scarf, feeling its softness against my fingers. "That's... I mean, are you okay? That seems like a big decision, and I don't mean to pry, but—"
"Is there something else, Miss Blossom?"
The dismissal is clear. I should retreat to the galley, donate the scarf, forget this conversation happened. Instead, I linger for a moment, looking at him—really looking.
The tension in his shoulders that never seems to ease. The exhaustion lurking beneath the ice. The way his jaw is set like he's bracing for impact, always bracing, never relaxing.
"No," I say finally, softly. "Nothing else."
I retreat to the galley, scarf still clutched in my hands, but when I look at him now, I don't just see the cold billionaire who cycles through women like disposable accessories.
I don't just see the ice or the distance or the deliberate cruelty of his indifference.
I see a man who stood up for me when no one else would. And that, I realize with a flutter of something dangerous in my chest, might be more trouble than anything else.