Working for Diamond Airways sounded glamorous right up until my inaugural transatlantic flight from Heathrow to JFK. The luxury branding meant our dress code consisted of an unnecessarily stiff-collared midnight-blue uniform and a pair of glittering silver wings sharp enough to slice bread.
Lord Feckington pressed the call attendant button with the rhythmic urgency of a telegraph operator. When I arrived, I could see the catastrophic size of the disaster: a rogue piece of ice had melted, slightly diluting the amber single malt.
‘Miss Lucy, right?’ his voice boomed over the entire First Class cabin. ‘My dear girl, this drink has lost its brilliant lustre. I was promised diamonds, not melted tap water!’
He looked at me as though he had been carved out of pure disappointment.
Determined to maintain our five-star rating, I retreated to the galley where my colleague Mark was attempting to fix a rebellious coffee machine that was spitting espresso while making a gurgling sound like an annoyed llama. I explained the situation, grabbed a lead-free crystal tumbler, poured two fingers of scotch and added three perfectly cubical pieces of fresh ice. To appease the aristocracy, I placed the glass onto a velvet-lined tray usually reserved for duty-free jewellery.
‘Presenting your refreshed beverage, my Lord,’ I said, offering the tray with my best theatrical curtsy, ‘with the company’s sincere apologies for any previous inconvenience.’
Lord Feckington squinted through his upper-class tortoiseshell spectacles, leaned in close to inspect the cubes and took a deliberate, noisy sip.
‘Now that,’ he declared, nodding approvingly to the entire cabin, ‘is the polished clarity I expect from Diamond Airways.’
I smiled politely, backed away into the galley and immediately burst into quiet giggles with Mark. If our passengers were going to act like eccentric gems, at least the scotch was real.
Love it. That’s the service I expect when I fly. Only joking budget airlines all the way.