Free Standby by Kim Fielding

“I’M SORRY, sir,” said the gate agent, who didn’t look remotely sorry. “The flight is full. We have you on standby for the next flight.”
    Tom struggled to keep his voice even. “I was on standby for
this
flight.”
    â€œYes. But it’s full. We’ve put you on standby for the next one.”
    â€œWhich is when?”
    She click-clacked at her computer for several moments. “Five thirty-five tomorrow morning.” Her face and voice were so expressionless that Tom seriously wondered if she might be a robot.
    â€œTomorrow?”
    â€œI’m sorry, sir. We don’t have many flights to Cedar Rapids.” This time she did show emotion—disdain, because he didn’t live somewhere more exciting and better served by air traffic.
    He was still keeping a leash on his temper. “Then book me on another airline.”
    â€œThat’s against company policy.”
    â€œLook, miss. I’ve already been here since noon.” He checked his watch. “That’s almost eight hours. I don’t want to spend the night.” Especially since he’d spent the previous night crammed into a coach seat, first waiting forever on the tarmac in San Francisco, then bumping through the air to Minneapolis. He was never booking a red-eye again.
    â€œYou missed your connecting flight, sir.”
    She knew perfectly well that hadn’t been his fault. The first flight was delayed due to an equipment problem—he really didn’t want to know the details—and although he’d sprinted through the Minneapolis airport like an Olympic medalist once they’d landed, he’d still missed the flight home by ten minutes.
    He wanted to cry. Since the direct approach hadn’t worked with her, he tried sexy instead. He crooked his lips, tilted his head slightly, and gave her the eye. It was a look that used to work well for him in clubs and bars. “Please. I need to get home.”
    â€œWe have you on standby for the next flight,” she answered coldly. Either her gaydar had told her The Look was a ruse, or else he couldn’t pull off sexy after twenty-four hours of air travel.
    Pathetically trailing his wheeled carry-on, he trudged off in search of customer service. The desk near his gate was abandoned, which meant he had to wander all the way to the end of the concourse—where there was a line, of course. He took his place behind a young couple with a hyperactive toddler. An older couple stood behind him, arguing with each other in a foreign language. Russian, maybe.
    When it was finally Tom’s turn, he saw that the customer service rep was nearly the same model as the gate agent. Sure, this lady’s carefully styled hair was brunette instead of blonde, but she had an identical facial expression that said
I will never give a fuck about you and your problems
. Her greeting was strictly utilitarian. “Yes?”
    For probably the tenth time, he repeated his story: broken plane, late landing, missed flight, failed standby. She listened blankly before demanding his useless boarding pass and poked at her keyboard for at least three minutes. Her printer whirred and Tom’s hopes rose. She returned his boarding pass, along with a another ticket-sized paper.
    â€œWhat’s this?” he asked, squinting at the tiny print.
    â€œA meal voucher. You can use it anywhere in the airport.”
    She had a stupid little scarf around her neck, and he staunchly resisted the urge to strangle her with it. “I don’t want a meal voucher. I want a flight home.”
    â€œWe have you on standby for the five thirty-five flight, sir.”
    It wasn’t until he left the counter and took a more careful look at the voucher that he saw its value. $6.50. At airport prices, he could probably score a candy bar.
    He sat down in a nearby chair to consider his nonhomicidal options. His credit card was already screaming in pain, and his bank