A Gift From The Gods

Terence has thrown up in the aisle.

A flight attendant comes running.

Stay in your seats everyone! I'll clean it up right away.

Can I look at it first? asks Terence.

Only from your seat, says the flight attendant. And only till I come back with rubber gloves, a scoop and a sick bag. 

She hurries off.

Did the watermelon seeds come up with it? asks Gaius.

One, two, three, four, counts Terence. Hey! But I swallowed three! 

One is the mollusc, says Roo-kai, from the seat opposite. It's a different colour.

Mollusc? says Gaius. Don't tell me Terence swallowed a mollusc!

I thought it was a gift from the gods, says Terence. Maybe it wasn't.

Let me see, says Gaius.

He leans across Terence.

It's a common garden snail, says Gaius. Cornu aspersum. Of the family Helicidae.

The flight attendant comes back, with the fore-mentioned items.

She kneels.

We'll soon have this cleared up, says the flight attendant.

Excuse me, says Terence.

That's all right, says the flight attendant. These things happen. Especially with infants. No need to be sorry.

I'm not saying sorry, says Terence. I want my snail back.

Snail? says the flight attendant. 

She looks down at the apple-rich puddle, the three watermelon seeds and the mollusc.

Yes, there is a small snail here. But I can't let you have it.

Why not? asks Terence.

It's now airline property, says the flight attendant.

Is it moving? asks Gaius.

She looks again. It has shifted slightly.

Possibly.

Then surely it is still Terence's property, says Gaius. 

It's my property, says Terence.

Actually, my property, says Roo-kai. It came on my salad.

The flight attendant freezes. On the salad. Ai! Not again!

She now has the gloves on. She picks up the garden snail and returns it to Terence.

Yay! says Terence. You ARE a gift from the gods!

The garden snail wonders how its long journey from a market garden to cold storage to a salad bowl and down a dark tunnel filled with churning apple and pointy black seeds then suddenly up again and spilling into a brightly lit puddle makes it a gift from the gods.