13 Little Blue Envelopes(4)

bought myself a cup of burned, stale coffee from

the closest deli for 89 cents, just like I did every

other time I went for a temp job.

That day I was going to a job in an office in

the Empire State Building. I have to confess,



Gin . . . I get a little romantic about the old

Empire State. Just looking at it makes me want

to play some Frank Sinatra tunes and sway a

little. I have a crush on a building. I’d been in

there several times but never to work. I always

knew there were offices in there, but that fact

never penetrated, really. You don’t work in the

Empire State Building. You propose in the Empire

State Building. You sneak a flask up there and

raise a toast to the whole city of New York.

And as I walked up to it and realized that I

was about to enter that beautiful building to file

or make copies—I stopped. Too quickly, actually. The

guy behind me walked right into me.

Something had seriously gone wrong if I was

going into the Empire State for that.

That was how it all started, Gin. It was right

there on the 33rd Street sidewalk. I never went to

work that day. I turned around, got back on the 6,

and went home. As much as I loved my apartment,

something in me was saying . . . it’s time! Time to

go! Like that rabbit in Alice in Wonderland who

runs past saying, “I’m late!”

Late for what, I couldn’t really tell you. But

this feeling was so intense, I couldn’t shake it. I

called in sick. I wandered around my apartment in



circles. Something wasn’t right about what I was

doing. I’d been comfortable in my apartment for too

long. I was doing boring jobs.

I thought about all the artists I’d admired.

What did they do? Where did they live? Well, for

the most part, they lived in Europe.

What if I just went to Europe? Right then? The

people I admired had sometimes starved and scraped

their way along, but it had helped them create. I

wanted to create.

By that night, I had purchased my ticket to

London. I borrowed $500 from a friend to do it. I

gave myself three days to get everything settled. I

picked up the phone to call you a few times, but I

didn’t know what to say. Where I was going . . .

why . . . I had no answers. And I didn’t know how

long I’d be gone.

This is the position you are in right now. You

are about to go to England with no idea of what’s

in store for you. Your path, your instructions, are

in these envelopes. Here’s the catch: You may only

open them one at a time and only once you’ve

completed the task in each letter. I am relying on

your honesty—you could open them all now, and I’d

certainly never know. But I’m serious, Gin. It won’t

work unless you open them exactly as I’ve said.



On landing, your first task is to get from the

airport to where you’ll be staying. To do this,

you’ll need to take the underground, otherwise

known as the tube (in American, the subway). I’ve

enclosed a ￡10 note for this. It’s the purple thing

with the queen on it.

You need to get to the stop called Angel, which

is on the Northern Line. You’ll be in a part of

London called Islington. When you get out, you’ll

be on Essex Road. Go right. Walk for about a minute

until you reach Pennington Street. Hang left and

look for 54a.

Knock. Wait for someone to open door. Rinse and

repeat as necessary until door opens.

Love,

Your Runaway Aunt

P.S.

You will notice that an ATM card for Barclays

Bank is also in this envelope. Of course, it

wouldn’t be safe to write the PIN number down.

When you get to 54a, ask the person who lives

there, “What did you sell to the queen?” The answer

to that question is the PIN. When you’ve solved

that, you may open #3.





54a Pennington Street, London

She was standing somewhere in Heathrow Airport. She’d been shuffled off the plane, had pulled the notorious backpack from the luggage carousel, waited in an hour-long line to get her passport stamped, and been ignored by some customs officers.

Now she was staring at a London tube map.

It looked like a nursery school poster designed to attract the eyes of toddlers. It was stark white, with bright primary-colored lines snaking around it. The stops had solid-sounding names, like Old Street and London Bridge. Royal sounding: Earl’s Court, Queensway, Knightsbridge. Entertaining: Elephant & Castle, Oxford Circus, Marylebone. And there were names she recognized: Victoria Station, Paddington (where the bear lived), Waterloo. And there was Angel. To get there, she’d have to change at a place called Kings Cross.

She pulled out her ￡10 note, found a ticket machine, and

followed the instructions. She walked up to one of the entrance 23