Ice Creams at Carrington’s (19 page)
‘Good. Call me back when you’ve opened it. And happy birthday!’ And the screen goes blank. Tears sting as I rip open the envelope.
It’s a ticket.
I scrub at my eyes with the back of my hand in an attempt to focus. Las Vegas. I scan again. Departure date – today! Departure time – six hours ago! Oh no. Oh God. It’s too late. I missed the flight. I push the ticket back inside the envelope and see there’s a card too, handwritten in Tom’s writing.
Happy birthday Georgie,
If you managed to hold out on opening the envelope, then I can’t wait to see you tomorrow!
Let’s fly – we’re spending the weekend in Vegas starting with a birthday picnic via helicopter over the Grand Canyon.
All my love
Tom, aka Mr Carrington xoxoxox
PS. I’ve squared it with Gaspard for you to have the weekend off and he’s sworn to secrecy so as not to spoil the surprise!
Noooooo! No, no, no, no, noooooo! I’m trembling. I feel like the lottery winner who lost their ticket. And oh my God, no wonder he was short with me – never mind Gaspard, I’m the one who has ruined the surprise. I don’t believe it. Vegas! The Grand Canyon – so epic. Why the hell didn’t I open the envelope? Because I was too blooming busy jumping into rooftop pools with all my clothes on, followed by gadding around town and generally having the time of my life with Eddie, that’s why!
And now the man I love is going to hate me. I’ve ruined everything. I inhale sharply and let out a long breath before pressing to FaceTime Tom back. It rings for ages. And ages.
And ages
. I hang up and redial, just a normal voice call in case FaceTime isn’t working now, given that we’re at opposite sides of a foreign country. And it rings, again for ages, before tripping through to what must be the most infuriating voicemail message in the whole world: ‘The person you are calling is not available to take your call.’
No flaming shit, Sherlock
.
‘G
et the car. We’re going to Vegas!’ I’m back inside the coffee shop.
‘Don’t be silly, sweetie, we can’t just drive to Vegas,’ Eddie says, flashing Ciaran a look. ‘Why don’t you sit down, you look like you’ve seen a ghost, or … are, oh my God, are you actually OK?’ He pulls a face. ‘Only you’re doing stary-serial-killer eyes … Eep, I’m petrified.’ Eddie pushes a chair out for me and I slam it right back into the table.
‘Is everything a joke to you?’ I bellow, eyes flashing as I dig my nails into the palms of my hands to stem the tears that are going to splash onto my face any second now. I bite my bottom lip too, just to be sure, as my handbag slides off my shoulder and lands with a miserable thud on the floor next to my left foot.
‘OK, why don’t we all calm down?’ Ciaran stands up and touches my arm. ‘What’s going on?’ he asks in a way that makes holding back the tears impossible. I hand him the card from Tom.
Eddie is up on his feet too now, and Ciaran holds the card in front of them. After speed-reading it, they glance at each other and then stare at me. Silence follows, apart from the plinky-tinkly music coming from the speakers mingled with the muffled sniff of my nose after Ciaran hands me a napkin and tells me to ‘blow hard’.
‘Here. Sorry, I’m a ridiculous idiot sometimes, I know.’ Eddie gently loops the strap of my handbag back over my shoulder. ‘Ready?’ he nods firmly, and I manage a weak grimace. ‘If ever there was a moment that calls for action, then that time is now. Follow me.’ And, after grabbing my hand, he runs us from the coffee shop with Ciaran close behind.
*
I’ve just stepped off an aeroplane at Las Vegas airport. Eddie’s driver got me to JFK in record time and then I was lucky enough to get a flight here almost right away. Thank God I had a modicum of sense to keep my passport on me at all times. And with the time difference it’s only early evening here – sixish, I think. I’m not even sure, but who cares, I’m here to celebrate my birthday weekend with Tom. I switch on my mobile, he’s going to be super-surprised, hopefully, that I made it here after all. There was no time to call before – I literally had to run to the departure gate and was strapped into my seat with the ‘trays in the upright position and mobile phones switched off’ message ringing in my ears all ready for takeoff, before I could even call him to say I had managed to find a flight. He answers on the fourth ring, but before I can speak he says,
‘Georgie, I’m too angry to talk to you right now.’ And the line goes dead. I stare at the phone in disbelief, my hands shaking. For a few seconds, I have no idea what to do, so I just stand clutching my phone and holding my breath while my cheeks smart from his dismissal. I feel utterly crushed. Just like he did, I guess, when I ruined his surprise. But I can fix it now.
Some time later, I will myself to get a grip and put one foot in front of the other, slinging the strap of my handbag over my head, crossbody style. I proceed to make my way along the glass-walled walkway towards Arrivals, figuring I can call Tom again once I get outside. I’ll just be sure to talk right away before he even has a chance to hang up, I’ll say I’m here in Vegas, find out where he is and go to him. I have to put this right. Or, better still, I’ll text him – yes, good idea, then he’ll see that I’m here and …
Nooooo!
No, no, no, no, noooooo. The white wheel is spinning on the screen. I press all of the buttons in a desperate attempt to make the phone come back to life, if only for a second, but nothing, it’s no use, it dies.
And right now, that’s exactly what I want to do.
I feel sick.
Now what?
‘Fuck you, fuck, fuck, fuckity, fucking, fuck yooooooou,’ I mutter to myself, frantically stabbing the phone screen with my index finger over and over and over, then quickly apologise when an American family of four stare at me – the dad instinctively steering his two daughters away from the deranged English girl. Oh God.
Right. Think. I have to think. I rack my brains, searching for a solution to this hideous situation. I know, there’s bound to be someone with an iPhone charger, or somewhere to charge phones – this is Vegas, after all, haven’t they got everything here? There are fruit machines right in front of me, one-arm bandits at the actual airport, so a phone charger is probably considered a basic. My heart lifts, and with my mind made up, I run to the moving walkway, guessing it will be faster. I start jogging my way along it. I’m almost at the end. And that’s when I spot him in the crowd. Tall, dark curls, broad shoulders and long strides.
Tom
.
It’s my Tom.
And my heart soars.
He’s here, right in front of me. Well, on the other side of the glass, but still within touching distance and he’s walking in the opposite direction. To Departures. With his head down and a leather holdall thrown over his shoulder. But why? He can’t go. Not now. I have to get to him. Let him know that I’m here. It’s OK now, we can start again, go on the helicopter, have the picnic, I’ll make it up to him, I’ll get us tickets to the Cirque du Soleil, or whatever show he likes, we could go in the Gondolas, we could go to the sand park and drive big diggers around, it’ll be fun, I bet he’ll love it. It’ll be like nothing ever happened, that I didn’t mess up at all; besides, it’s not as if I meant to, and his wonderful surprise weekend can still go ahead.
I turn and start running the other way, keen to catch up with him. I run faster, banging on the glass as I go.
‘Hey, lady, look out,’ an all-American guy yells as I almost run right into his big beefcake chest.
‘Sorry, it’s just that, I, my—’ I apologise, but he’s off, keen to get away from me too. I keep running the wrong way along the moving walkway, apologising some more as people sidestep to dart out of my way. I’m almost there; Tom is practically adjacent to me now.
With his bastard big Bose headphones on
. For crying out loud, which is exactly what I do. ‘Tooooooom.
Tom
. Tom it’s me, Georgie, I’m here. Tooooooom!’ I bang harder, my right hand bunched into a fist. I slam it against the glass, but it’s no use. He can’t hear me. So with both hands, palms flat against the glass, I slap it as hard as I can, over and over and until eventually he turns. He turns his head sideways towards me, obviously catching sight of something in his peripheral vision. Thank you God. Thank you so so sooooo much. I’m full of relief as I jump up and down and slap some more, but it’s quickly followed by a wave of crashing devastation when he turns away, oblivious to me right here next to him in the crowd.
And then I skid and fall over. The side of my handbag caught around the wheel of someone’s suitcase and they’re pulling it away from me, tighter and tighter, unaware that any second now I’m going to be strangled to death. Jesus Christ. I fling my hands to my throat and manage to push my fingers under the strap to loosen it enough so I can breathe. Just about.
‘OK. That’s enough. On your feet, ma’am.’ Two men dressed in blue uniforms covered in badges arrive, manage to stop the wheelie suitcase from garrotting me, fling me into an upright position, flank me and practically frogmarch me away.
‘Hey, you can’t take me, Tom’s right there,’ I gasp immediately on being untangled. ‘My boyfriend. It’s Tom. I need to see him … I have to explain—’
‘Damn right you do. In the detention centre.’
Whaaaaaat?
‘No, please, you can’t.’
But it’s no use.
T
he rest of my birthday was ruined, obviously. I felt so rubbish after being so near yet so far from seeing Tom in Vegas, and then having to explain it all to the two very unamused men from Homeland Security who, after listening to me babble on like a fruitloop for what must have seemed like forever to them – and yes there were moments when they both just stared, speechless, no doubt wondering whether they should call for someone to certify me, or just let me go; I know, utterly cringy and certainly a new record low for me – I think they eventually came to the conclusion that I was harmless and best removed from their airport as quickly as possible, so I was allowed to get a flight back here to New York, but only after Eddie’s PA, Carly, had vouched for me and confirmed that I had a place to stay.
So I came straight back to the Manhattan mansion, via the liquor store and Don’s Diner, and climbed up into the big princess-and-the-pea bed with a bottle of Southern Comfort and an enormous cheeseburger with extra
everything
! And after watching back-to-back episodes of
Revenge
season 3 on Netflix, I must have fallen asleep, as I only woke up Sunday lunchtime when my car arrived and the driver with the crucifix came knocking on the lift door to take me to Gaspard’s studio. We spent the evening going over everything one last time – chatting about fluoro colour schemes, neon brights and realistic prices that an ‘ordinary woman’ would be prepared to pay for a truly gorgeous bag baby. Gaspard kept apologising profusely for not telling me about my birthday surprise – he says if the Georgie Girl collection (the name he’s chosen for the range) is a hit, then he’ll personally fly me across the Grand Canyon. I think he feels partly responsible – for bringing me out here in the first place and for distracting me. It’s ridiculous, and he was sworn to secrecy, so no, I’ve only myself to blame for missing out and making Tom hate me, which is exactly what I told him.
Anyway, it’s Monday now, the morning of my last day in New York – my flight leaves JFK in a few hours. And Ciaran and Eddie, with Pussy under his arm, wearing a Wonder Woman outfit complete with tiny red cape, have just emerged through the lift doors and into my hallway.
‘Oh sweetie, come here!’ Eddie swiftly thrusts Pussy into Ciaran’s arms, and pulls me in for a massive hug. ‘Will you be OK?’ He rubs my back and makes freaky cooing sounds – public displays of physical sympathy have always been a bit of an anathema to Eddie. He promptly drops his hands and steps away from me. ‘Right. Are you all set for the airport?’
‘No,’ I say, despondently. ‘I want to fly in a helicopter over the Grand Canyon with my boyfriend …’ I let my shoulders droop as I stick out my bottom lip for added petulance.
‘Well, you can’t.’ Eddie sighs. ‘Besides …’ he pauses to do an undercover sleuth left-then-right glance down the hallway, ‘it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.’ He purses his lips. ‘Ciaran and I did the helicopter thing after our wedding in Vegas, didn’t we lover?’
Ciaran nods, and then rolls his eyes.
‘Ed, come on … Georgie doesn’t want to hear all this, do you love?’ Ciaran smiles kindly and gives my arm a reassuring rub.
‘Yes she does,’ Eddie quips. ‘I just meant that once you’ve seen one lot of red rock with a river running through it, well, it gets a bit samey after the first ten minutes. By the end of our helicopter ride, I was struggling to keep my eyes open …
Thelma and Louise
, darling, the cliff scene at the end, that’s all you need to see!’ he finishes with a flourish, while Ciaran and I exchange exasperated looks.
‘I think it’s the spoiling-the-surprise bit, the not-getting-to-see-Tom bit, that Georgie is most upset about,’ Ciaran adds, tactfully.
‘But you’ll see him very soon. Come on, let’s get you flight-ready. I’m picturing a romantic reunion at Heathrow Airport. I wonder if he’ll bring flowers … will you run into his arms?’
‘Stop it!’ I snap. ‘He’s not coming to Heathrow.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry – just trying to lighten the mood, honeypie. But why on earth not?’
‘Because when my flight lands, he’ll be in an all-day meeting which he can’t get out of. Something to do with the new store,’ I say dejectedly, remembering him telling me a few days ago, before my birthday, when everything was still good between us, which seems like a lifetime ago now. I’ve tried calling him since I got my phone charged back up in Vegas (the security men had to let me so I could call Eddie, who called Carly, a US citizen – Eddie figured it best that she speak to them), but Tom’s phone has been off. I guess he was on the flight home or maybe he just wants to cool off before talking to me.