For the next forty minutes, I kept looking over my shoulder. Every time the man moved, my stomach tightened in anticipation. A change in his breathing, a slight turn of his head, even the movement of his hand against his shirt was enough to make me wonder whether the discovery was about to happen. Diane had returned to her magazine, but she was reading very little. Whenever our eyes met, she glanced toward the painted foot, and both of us struggled to maintain ordinary expressions.
The cabin had settled into a peculiar stillness. Most of the overhead lights remained dim, while occasional reading lamps illuminated isolated faces. A flight attendant passed with a small tray of water cups. Someone farther back coughed. A child asked when the plane would land and received the familiar answer that it would not be much longer. Beneath all these small sounds, the steady engines continued their low, monotonous roar.
I had begun to regret my impulsiveness, although not quite enough to wish the prank undone. What had started as an amusing response to a rude passenger was now an unavoidable consequence waiting to happen. The man would wake eventually. He would notice the polish, the rings, or both. And he would undoubtedly know whom to blame.
Diane seemed to sense my growing uncertainty.
"You're thinking too much," she whispered.
"Possibly."
"You've already done it."
"That's exactly the problem."
She smiled, but her expression softened. "For what it's worth, he had several opportunities to be reasonable."
"I know. Still, I suspect he's going to be furious."
"Almost certainly."
Her straightforward answer made me laugh under my breath.
I stretched my legs as far as the limited space permitted and tried to relax. The remaining hours of travel suddenly seemed less exhausting than the possibility of explaining my behavior to an angry stranger. I had imagined him becoming embarrassed and quietly putting his shoes back on. Yet given his earlier attitude, quiet embarrassment seemed unlikely.
Behind me, the man made a rough sound in his throat.
Both Diane and I stopped moving.
He shifted in his seat.
His foot slid slightly along my armrest, and the purple ring flashed beneath the reading light.
Then he stretched his arms overhead.
I looked forward immediately.
Diane lifted her magazine in front of her face.
The man yawned loudly enough for both of us to hear. His headphones rustled as he pulled them off, and the seat behind mine creaked when he sat upright.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
I heard him searching for something, possibly his phone. A quiet clicking noise suggested that he was checking the screen. Then he muttered about needing the restroom.
The armrest suddenly became empty.
I glanced downward.
His foot had disappeared.
Before I could turn around, he stood in the aisle.
He was still barefoot.
I stared straight ahead, scarcely believing our luck. The man's shirt had become wrinkled during his sleep, but he appeared unconcerned. He adjusted his watch, rubbed his face, and stepped away from his seat without once examining his feet.
Diane leaned toward me so quickly that our shoulders touched.
"Rebecca," she whispered, "he doesn't know."
I pressed my lips together.
"I can see that."
"He actually doesn't know."
The excitement in her voice was almost impossible to ignore. I watched the man move slowly down the aisle, steadying himself against seatbacks whenever the aircraft shifted. His bare feet made soft contact with the carpet, and the two enormous toy jewels caught the overhead lights with every step.
At first, nobody seemed to notice.
Then a passenger sitting two rows ahead looked down.
The man glanced at the decorated toes, blinked, and turned to his companion. He whispered something. His companion leaned into the aisle, took one look, and immediately covered her mouth.
A quiet burst of laughter followed.
The barefoot passenger continued walking.
Another traveler noticed. Then another.
Within moments, a ripple of amusement was moving through the cabin. People who had been half-asleep straightened in their seats. A few exchanged bewildered looks, apparently wondering why a grown man was strolling toward the restroom with bright pink toenails and oversized children's jewelry.
He remained completely unaware.
I gripped the edge of my seat, struggling to control my expression.
Diane had abandoned her magazine entirely. Her eyes followed him down the aisle as though she were watching the climax of a particularly entertaining performance.
Near the middle of the cabin, a man began laughing openly.
The barefoot passenger stopped.
He looked toward the sound with an irritated frown.
"What exactly is so funny?"
The laughter became louder.
Several passengers glanced at one another, unsure whether to explain. A woman turned her face toward the window, but her shoulders were trembling. Even a flight attendant approaching from the opposite direction seemed to have difficulty keeping a neutral expression.
The man looked around suspiciously.
"Is there some kind of joke I'm missing?"
Nobody answered immediately.
Then he followed someone's gaze downward.
His eyes reached his feet.
For a long, extraordinary second, he stood completely motionless.
He lifted one foot slightly, staring at the sparkling purple heart. His gaze moved to the enormous pink gemstone on another toe, then across the brightly painted nails. He lowered his foot and raised it again, as if the decorations might somehow disappear when viewed from another angle.
They did not.
The expression on his face changed from confusion to disbelief, and then to a furious embarrassment that spread visibly from his neck to his forehead.
He spun around.
His eyes found me almost immediately.
I had known he would suspect me, but the speed with which he made the connection was impressive.
"You!" he shouted.
Several passengers turned.
I remained seated, my hands folded loosely in my lap.
"Yes?"
He marched back toward our row, his painted toenails flashing with every angry step. The plastic rings made the scene considerably more absurd than he seemed to realize.
"What have you done to my feet?"
I looked down with what I hoped was a convincingly innocent expression.
"Oh," I said. "You've discovered the colors."
His face darkened.
"Did you put this stuff on me while I was asleep?"
I could have pretended ignorance, but there was no point. Diane's expression would have exposed us even if I had tried.
"Yes," I replied.
He stared at me, apparently astonished that I would admit it so readily.
"Are you out of your mind?"
"I wouldn't go that far."
"You painted my toenails!"
"I did."
"And these ridiculous things?" He pointed toward the rings. "Did you put these on too?"
"Those are part of the same collection."
A woman across the aisle made a strangled sound as she tried not to laugh.
The man heard her and turned sharply. That only made the situation worse, because everyone nearby now had another opportunity to inspect the decorations.
"Stop laughing!" he snapped.
The woman lowered her eyes, but the corners of her mouth continued trembling.
I watched him with a mixture of irritation and unease. I had wanted him to understand how unpleasant it felt to have someone disregard his wishes. Yet seeing his anger so publicly exposed reminded me that the situation could quickly become more serious than I had intended.
He turned back toward me.
"You had no right to touch me!"
His words were forceful, and I did not pretend otherwise.
"You're right that I should not have done it without asking," I said. "But you also ignored me when I repeatedly asked you to keep your bare foot away from my arm."
He opened his mouth, then closed it.
For an instant, I thought he might acknowledge the point.
Instead, he raised his voice again.
"That's completely different!"
"Is it?"
"Of course it is!"
"You decided that your comfort mattered more than mine. I told you the foot was bothering me, and you refused to move it."
He gestured impatiently.
"You're still talking about that?"
"Yes. Because that's why we're having this conversation."
Diane straightened beside me.
"She asked you more than once," she said calmly. "I heard the entire exchange."
He glared at her.
"Nobody asked you to get involved."
"I became involved when I had to sit next to the smell."
Several passengers laughed again.
The man looked as though he could scarcely believe that people were siding against him. He had boarded the flight assuming that he could take whatever space he wanted, and now the same cabin had become an audience to his embarrassment.
He pointed toward the front of the aircraft.
"I want to speak to someone in authority. Right now."
His voice carried farther than he seemed to intend.
A flight attendant, who had already noticed the disturbance, approached our row. She was composed, with the practiced expression of someone accustomed to resolving uncomfortable situations in a confined space.
"Is everything all right here?" she asked.
"No," the man said sharply. "Everything is most certainly not all right."
He thrust one decorated foot forward as evidence.
"Look what this woman did while I was sleeping!"
The attendant lowered her gaze. Her expression remained professional, although I saw a brief flicker of surprise in her eyes.
She looked at the painted toenails, then at the oversized plastic rings.
Finally, she looked toward me.
"Ma'am, is that correct?"
I felt Diane become very still beside me.
Every face nearby seemed to be waiting for my answer.
"Yes," I said. "I painted his toenails while he was sleeping."
The attendant drew a careful breath.
The man folded his arms triumphantly, convinced that he had finally found someone who would condemn my behavior without examining his own.
But then the attendant asked a second question.
"Before that happened, was there a disagreement about where you were placing your feet, sir?"
His triumphant expression faltered.
For the first time since our confrontation began, he seemed uncertain how to answer.
