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After dinner the fat lady decided to use the facilities. Awkwardly performing the past-the-seats contortionist side-step, she made it to the aisle and to relief. Upon return she was not surprised to discover that the old lady had snaked the fat lady's window seat and was pretending to be asleep in it, all curled up on her side, with her head resting in the window sill, her face covered with a mask, and facing away from everyone. "Right!" snorted the fat lady to herself, knowing her mother had trouble sleeping in her own bed, let alone here. Still, she smiled, secretly pleased that she only had to perform the contortionist dance past one seat instead of 2, and pushing the fake-sleeping old lady's arm off their shared armrest. After remaining awake until past Newfoundland, the fat lady fell into a deep sleep. Despite her new, more spacious seat, the old lady ,of course, didn't sleep at all, but she did push the fat lady's arm back off the shared armrest.
A few hours later, the fat lady awoke, looked at her real-time flight map, then reached past the old lady and pushed up the windowshade. Ireland! There it was! Water and green islands and little roads! How nice to awaken and see Ireland! She pushed the old lady's arm back off the armrest. Some sort of breakfast was served: a kind of thin breakfast burrito with a filling more like egg mayonaise than scrambled egg. The fat lady was disappointed, having hoped for a real English breakfast, grilled tomatoes and all. Still, the tea was good.
Soon they were over southern England and slanted downward for approach. The old lady hooked her wine knapsack with her foot. "So much countryside still exists!" One knocked the other's arm off the armrest. "That must be one of the motorways! Not much traffic!" The other knocked the one's arm off the rest. "Look at all the traffic circles! Unlike us they seem to know how to use them!" "See the little villages!" Villages turned to suburbs turned to city and there was London. "Look! Is that Regent's Park?" The fat lady was amazed as they came in for the landing: "Mom, everything looks like it's fake, like a huge model of London. Everything is so clean from the rain, and all the cars are so little and brightly colored and new-looking, no dents, and they all move like clockwork. Plus there's no trash anywhere, all perfect little gardens, and no people or even dogs walking about. Again, these isles are as if out of a storybook! This place really can't be real!" Then there they were, back on the blessed, sacred (to them) English ground again, after a perfect landing. After an absence of 5 years once again back in rainy Heathrow with its eternal promise of more adventures to come.
"Now, what do we say if we can't think of anything?" reminded the old lady. "Riiight" answered the fat lady in her best Hugh Grant tone. She couldn't say it correctly until she remembered how Hugh Grant said it. "And 'Brilliant!' " That was from Harry Potter. And "'Lovely!'" That would be from any Briton anywhere, anytime. "That's correct," said the old lady, "We'll get along with everyone if we can remember those 3 words." "Riiiight" replied the fat lady.
"Brilliant!" replied the fat lady, standing on her toes to stretch her legs. "Yes, lovely" agreed the old lady, as she pushed herself ahead of the fat lady and they started slowly filing down the aisle, looking forward to the fresh air and freedom and yes, those bright-red double-decker buses somewhere close-by in the magical land outside!