Departure(74)

“See you in 2014, Nick.”





PART III:

STRANGERS





41





It’s over. The greatest seven hours and eight minutes of travel in my thirty-one years on Planet Earth.

Over.

Jillian’s voice comes on the speaker, announcing the conclusion of this glorious flight (tear). Her tone’s brisk, slightly cheery, completely professional. She welcomes each and every passenger (especially Reward Miles members) to London Heathrow Airport, and hopes we had a pleasant flight (understatement) and that she will see us again soon, wherever our travel plans may take us (I would go anywhere in this chair).

I’ll never understand the race to get off the plane. It’s like a flash strain of flesh-eating bacteria just broke out in the tail section, and it’s a live-or-die mad dash to make it to the exits. Can this many people have tight connecting flights?

People swarm the aisles, jerking their carry-ons out of the overheads, hastily shoving tablets, e-readers, and snacks they squirreled away during the flight into their bags, barely bothering to zip them.

There’s a cacophony of voices. Excuse me— Sorry— Is that your bag? Do you mind?

I’ll be the last off. I dread going home. That’s where I’ll have to make The Decision.

God, just thinking about it puts me in a bad mood.

“You all right?”

The guy from 2A. Short dark hair, chiseled face, American accent. Like.

“Yeah,” I manage, barely audible over the game of Twister playing out in the aisles.

“Need some help?”

That’s an understatement.

He squints. “With your bag?”

“I—”

“Hey, some people have places to be, Casanova.” Grayson Shaw. Drunk. Very drunk.

Two A doesn’t budge. “Exactly. Why don’t you stand aside?”

Grayson mutters a cornucopia of curse words as he turns back, disembarking via the business section exit.

Two A pops the overhead open and fishes out my bag, its heft seeming inconsequential in his hands.

I cringe as he lowers my battered black bag to the aisle. It tilts slightly when he releases it—it’s missing one of its four wheels. I received the bag for Christmas one year at uni, and as I travel so seldom, I’ve never seen the need to fork out the cash to replace it. It teeters there like Her Majesty’s government’s Exhibit 1 of my impostorhood, my complete unworthiness to be here in the first-class section of Flight 305. The barrister would no doubt direct the jury’s attention to the fuzzy white remnants of a sticker that I unsuccessfully tried to peel off, the glue seeming to have melded with the bag’s canvas at the molecular level. The sticker was placed there by a drunken friend of mine almost a decade ago, in Spain. It read either “I heart guacamole” or “Viva la revolución”—I can’t recall which.

“Thanks,” I squeak.





Heathrow Express to Paddington Station, then the tube, all the while staring at my phone, still off, dreading what awaits.

At home, I hold the power button down.

Two voice mails. One from my agent, the other from Mum.

My agent’s voice barks in my ear. “Hi, Harp, hope you had a good flight. Ring me when you’re home. They’re pressing me to get your decision. If you’re out, they’re moving to their second choice. They don’t want to do that. I don’t want them to do that. Huge opportunity, Harp. Let’s sort it out, yeah?”

Mum, just making sure her only child hasn’t crashed into the Atlantic or the English countryside somewhere. It’s late, but I know she’s up, worrying, waiting for me to call.

The conversation is decidedly one-sided: hers. I sit on my sunken sofa with its cream slipcover, listening to updates about relatives young and old. I know what she’s working up to, and I mentally prepare myself. Ethan, my cousin, is headed off to Harrow, but how will my aunt and uncle ever afford it, and speaking of uncles, Clive has bought a horse, which Mum figures is his mid-life crisis, which is better than an affair, she supposes, and . . . speaking of dating—

I ring off after that, pace the flat for a while, ruminating on The Decision. I get the Alice Carter notebook out from under my mattress and lay it on the coffee table, eyeing it sympathetically, as you might a child before you break her heart. Summer vacation will have to wait another year, honey. Mummy has to work. And that’s what I think it will come down to. But then I’ll be free to finish Alice, give her the time she deserves.

That sounds like a rational, responsible adult decision.

Who am I kidding? I’m still teetering, like my shabby three-wheeled bag. Maybe I’ll use some of the money to replace it.

Only one thing to do, one thing that can help me decide.

I put my coat back on and ponder on my way down the stairs: vodka or wine?

Since I’m now making only practical, rational, adult decisions, I’ll choose vodka. More bang for the buck. More pure revelation-inducing, decision-solidifying power per pence. And less calories. Less calories is good. As Mum just reminded me, I don’t want to wind up a spinster with a beer gut, like Cousin Dolly.





42





“I knew your father, Nick.”