Field Notes on Love(31)

“I’m not fussed about where I sleep. Honestly. All I care about is getting a slice of that Chicago pizza I’ve heard so much about.”

“That we can do.”

Something about the we makes his heart race.

They push open the door and squelch their way into the lobby in wet shoes. At the front desk is a guy with blue hair and a painful-looking nose ring. He doesn’t move his eyes from the computer as they approach.

“Pardon me,” Hugo says after an uncomfortable silence. “I’m wondering if you have any beds available for the night?”

    “Forty-eight bucks for a dorm,” the guy says, sounding terrifically bored. “One thirty-eight for a single.”

Hugo drops his rucksack on the floor and stoops beside it to unzip the front pocket, fishing around for his wallet. “Right. I’ll take a dorm, then. How many beds in each?”

“Four to sixteen.” He finally looks up and registers Mae. “I can try to get you a shared bunk, if you want.”

“No, it’s just for me,” Hugo says quickly. He’s still feeling around inside his rucksack, aware of Mae standing above him. He opens the main part of the bag, pulling out a jumper and a couple of pairs of trousers and a book he hasn’t started yet, but it’s not until he feels his fingers brush the bottom that the worry starts to kick in.

“What are you looking for?” Mae asks, though she must have already guessed.

Hugo gives her a sheepish smile. “Just my wallet. I’m sure it’s in here somewhere….” He tries the front again and finds his passport, tucked inside the smart brown case, and he tugs it free with no small amount of relief. But the wallet isn’t there.

Maybe his mum was right.

Maybe they all were.

Worry starts to turn to panic as he stands up and feels around in the pockets of his jeans and his jacket; then he kneels to search the rucksack again. He knows the wallet isn’t there, but he’s not sure what else to do in the moment except to keep looking, and so he does, tossing the rest of his clothes onto the dirty floor as the blue-haired receptionist peers at him over the counter.

This goes on until Mae kneels beside him, resting a hand gently on his shoulder, and this tiniest of gestures sends a small shock through him. “Did you take it out on the train at all?” she asks in a low voice, and he realizes for the first time that they have an audience. The people in the lounge have mostly stopped what they’re doing to stare at the array of clothes fanned out on the grimy linoleum.

    Hugo closes his eyes, trying to remember. And then his stomach lurches. “Bollocks,” he says with a groan. “I took out twenty dollars to give Ludovic just before we got off.”

“We were supposed to tip him?” Mae asks, going pale.

“It was for both of us. But I must not have…” He glances down at the pile of clothes in despair. “I’m such an idiot.”

“We’ll figure it out,” she tells him. “We’ll call. Or go back to the station. Maybe they have a lost-and-found.”

Hugo feels suddenly exhausted, a spreading weariness that makes his bones ache. Two days. That’s all it took for him to prove he’s not up to this.

He sits back on the cold, wet floor and looks up at Mae. “I hate to ask,” he says miserably, “but do you think I could borrow a few quid—dollars—until this gets sorted?”

Mae looks at Hugo as if weighing something. His mind is whirring through all that will happen if the wallet is well and truly lost: the hassle of canceling credit cards, trying to sort new ones, having to ring his parents and tell them what happened. He’s so busy with his thoughts that he’s not fully listening when Mae finally says, “No.”

“No?” he repeats, confused. “I swear I’d pay you back….”

“No, I mean you should just come to the hotel with me. It seems silly for you to stay here, especially now, when we were fine sharing last night.” She flushes, realizing they still have an audience, and adds, “We can ask for a cot. It was your room to begin with, and you were just trying to be nice and make sure I felt comfortable, but…”

    Hugo raises his eyebrows, waiting. He can feel a smile building inside him, but he manages to hold it back.

“I already feel comfortable with you,” she says. “So let’s just go get some dinner, okay?”

“Okay,” he says, letting the smile surface. He gestures at the tangle of clothes on the floor all around them. “As long as it’s on you.”





Later, they wander the rain-slicked city, ducking into shops to stay dry. In one of them, which is full of Chicago-themed souvenirs, Hugo tries on a hat shaped like a football.

“Do I look like an American?” he asks with a grin.

“You look,” Mae says brightly, “like an idiot.”

She picks out a delicate snow globe with a jagged skyline for her dads. The spotty cell reception along the route had made phone calls tricky, so they’ve been texting her constantly instead:


Dad: My phone is broken.

Mae: Sorry. What happened?

Dad: Wait—never mind! There’s been a miracle!

Mae: Huh?

Dad: My phone—it’s working again!

Mae: Clearly.