by Marina Ford
“Okay, so I’m not subtle. But for all I knew, you had dozens of guys doing that for you.”
“What did Kieran do?”
“He pointed out, none too gently I might add, that I had the infuriating tendency—a weakness of character, I suppose—to focus too much on what others want, and what’s right and good and decent, and not enough on, well, on what I want. He didn’t put it that way. He used words like ‘pussy’ and ‘coward.’ We were arguing at the time, and it wasn’t pleasant to hear, but he hit the nail on the head. Repeatedly. That’s how I ended up deciding that, though you might not want me back, you deserved to know the truth. Boring old suit though I am, I could at least tell you how I feel.”
He must be joking. At this precise moment, he’s lying before me propped up on one elbow, in the pose of a young Roman, with his gorgeous body, his sexy stubble, his sex-mussed hair, having just returned from Australia, of all places, after rescuing a pair of incorrigible hippies from jail. Boring old suit my arse.
But he’s serious.
“So you think that Gabriella’s as deluded as you?”
He rolls his eyes. “I think that Gabriella was similarly swept away by a larger-than-life character. But their story went differently. She married him straight away. Probably because she was afraid of losing him. I mean, you did say that Vegas had been her idea, right? I can totally understand the impulse, though it was terribly silly of her to have done it. And then she never understood that Frank loved her for who she was and not for who she pretended to be. At least”—here he wavers—“I think he does. Does he?”
“Yes!” I cry. “Oh my God. Haven’t you seen him lately? He’s like a shadow of his former self.”
Harry shrugs helplessly. I digest his words, match them against my memories of Frank and Gabriella’s marriage. I remember how stressed she got about Frank’s birthdays. How convinced she had been she’d never live up to Frank’s expectations. I thought it was funny at the time, because of course none of those “wild adventures” Harry spoke of were planned—stupid stuff just happened to us. We liked the Harries and Gabriellas of this world because they made everything actually go to plan. Our chaos was contained by their forces of order. I remember Frank’s words. “She has a way of looking at me, and suddenly everything inside of me goes calm.”
In truth, Harry spent more time talking to her than I did. Maybe he does know. Maybe, though, he’s only projecting his own ridiculous hang-ups on her (I mean, really, a pirate?).
“We have to do something,” I say, at last.
Harry falls back onto his pillow. “Today?” he moans. “I thought we were staying in bed today.”
“I can’t believe you are saying this to me,” I say, crawling out and hunting for our clothes. “We have to find Frank, and you have to explain this to him.”
“We can do it tomorrow.”
“At least call him, then,” I say. “Tell him everything you told me, only leave the embarrassing bits out. And then he can find her and clear things up.”
He sighs, “We really shouldn’t meddle . . .”
I hand him his phone. Resigned, he finds Frank’s number.
After a lengthy conversation with a hungover Frank, Harry and I return to our extended wedding night. I order us ice cream and strawberries, which we have with champagne. We shower together, and then, tired once more, we snuggle up and fall asleep again.
In the middle of the night, we’re fast asleep, when Harry’s phone rings.
“Hrhghello?” Harry says, putting a protective hand over my ear, as I lie with my head on his chest. I do hear him, though, and look up.
“It’s Frank,” he says to me. “I don’t understand a word he’s saying.”
“Put him on speakerphone.”
Harry fiddles with his mobile. Frank’s voice comes through, sounding hoarse and panicked.
“. . . flying out tonight! I don’t know if I can get to her. Chloe’s driving, but we’re not even on the M25 yet and—”
“Frank?” I interrupt him. “Frank, it’s me, Joe. What’s going on?”
“Oh, Joe! I couldn’t reach Gabriella, so I called her parents, and they wouldn’t tell me where she was, so I called Rachel, and she told me that Gabriella was on her way to do mission work in Brazil. And she’s flying out tonight!”
“Tonight!” This wakes me right up. “Shit.”
“So Chloe and I are trying to get to the airport to catch her,” Frank says. “But time’s running out. Can you try and get hold of her or someone in that group and see if she could wait for me?”
“Yeah, sure,” I say at once, although I’ve no idea how I could possibly do that.
“Is her phone off?” Harry asks. “Or is she just not picking up?”
“It’s off,” Frank says. “Rachel gave me the number of one of the people going with her, but I probably wrote it down wrong. There’s no answer when I try.”
“Okay, I’ll find out,” I say.
While Harry talks to Frank, I call Rachel. She picks up, irate.
“What?” she says.
“I need a number to reach Gabriella.”
“Wha—”
“There’s no time, I need a number! Frank’s trying to get to her.”
“Oh,” she startles. “Is he? Okay, hang on a minute.”
I hear her shuffling around on the other side. Harry says, “They’re on the M4 now.”
“What’s the traffic like?”
“At this time of the night?” Harry lifts a shoulder. “Probably not too bad.” He stands up and goes to the desk where his laptop is. “I’ll check what time her flight is.” He brings the laptop to bed.
Rachel gets back to me with a number, which I jot down on the hotel notepad.
“Do you know the people she’s going with?” I ask her.
“No,” she says. “It’s a new group, I’m not familiar with them. The number is for her emergency contact, a girl called Katie. I tried to talk Gabriella out of this, by the way, but she wouldn’t listen.”
I thank her, ring off, and try the number. As I listen to the ringing, Harry tells Frank to avoid the stretch of the M4 past the Furnival Gardens, as they have building work going on. He navigates them to King’s Road. Katie’s phone isn’t picking up.
“Nothing,” I tell him. Harry relays the information to Frank.
“She’s probably already gone,” he cries, despairingly. “She’s on the other side of the world. I’ll never find her!”
“It’s not that bad,” Harry tries to calm him. “Even if she does fly off, in this day and age, you’ll be able to track her down, email her or something.”
“She’ll meet some holier-than-thou wanker and marry him and it will be too late!”
Frank is in the bouts of full-on hysteria.
“Listen to me!” I shout at him. “Get a grip! She’s not going to marry anybody else, because she loves you. Okay? She told me so herself. So hold it together. You don’t want to scare her when you get to her.”
“Did—did she say that?” he whimpers.
“Yes, so don’t lose your cool,” I tell him.
“Er, bad news,” Harry says, quietly. He’s on his laptop, looking at the Heathrow website.
“What?” I ask.
“Looks like her flight’s already boarding.”
“What!” Frank and I scream at the same time.
“Wait, wait,” I say, my brain feverishly at work. “Didn’t you say Kieran’s dating a flight attendant?”
Harry frowns. “Yeah, and?”
“Well, maybe that guy knows someone on this flight and maybe they can tell Gabriella . . . I don’t know, worth a shot?”
“You really want me to call Kieran at this time of night?” Harry asks wearily.
I take his phone and tell Frank, “We’re going to hang up now. Keep driving to the airport. We’ll get back to you shortly.”
In the middle of his wailing reply, I hang up and then find Kieran’s contact details.
�
�Do it,” I say, handing it to Harry. “For Frank.”
Harry, resigned, presses Kieran’s contact, muttering something about Frank and mental institutions. While he’s on the phone with Kieran, I ring Frank from my own phone and tell him about Kieran’s new lover.
“It’s too late!” Frank cries. “If they’re boarding already, then it’s too late. Even if you do reach him, there’s no way . . . AAAH!”
“Oh my God! Frank?”
“It’s all right,” he says. “It was an owl. It’s nothing. It’s nothing. I thought we were going to die, that’s all. Not that I wouldn’t welcome the sweet release of death right now . . .”
I can hear Chloe groaning in the background.
I say, “Okay, I’m glad you’re alive. Where are you right now?”
“We’re joining the M4 again. Quarter of an hour away from the airport, Chloe says. That’s unless she kills me before that, she says.”
I glance at Harry, who’s in muted conversation with Kieran.
“Well?” I ask him.
“He’s in the shower,” Harry says.
“Who is?”
“Ryan.”
“Who’s Ryan?”
“Kieran’s boyfriend.”
“The steward?”
“Yes, the steward,” Harry says. “What’s that?” this was to Kieran. “He’s out,” he says to me. “Okay, I’ll wait.”
Harry looks to me. “I can’t believe that after everything we’ve been through, we have to do an actual chase to the airport.”
“I tell you what!” Frank butts in. “When this all has failed, you’re coming with me to drink it all away! Why didn’t you tell me you saw her? Why didn’t you tell me what she said to you?”
“I didn’t know what to say!” It’s useless to defend myself. “I didn’t want to make you feel worse.”
Harry makes a sh gesture with his finger, so I take Frank off speakerphone.
“I’m sorry,” I tell Frank. “I should have told you. If I’d understood what she meant, I would’ve told you at once. But I didn’t. And I didn’t want you to rack your brain over it any more than you were already doing. It was a bad call. I’m sorry.”
“And now it’s too late! What’s the status of the flight?”
I check Harry’s laptop.
“Still boarding. Not yet taken off. There’s still time.”
“There isn’t. You know there isn’t. No way will I get a ticket in time, and then go through security and then find the right gate before they take off. It’s too late. It’s too late!”
I feel it too. It is too late. He’s right. I look to Harry, who’s nodding and saying okay to Kieran. He turns to me.
“Ryan’s trying a few of his friends.”
“He is?”
I can’t believe it. It seemed like such a desperate idea.
“Frank?”
“Yes?”
“Ryan’s making a few calls.”
“Who’s Ryan?”
“The air steward.”
“Huh?”
“Kieran’s boyfriend. The steward. Keep up.”
“Oh. And?”
“And?” I turn the question to Harry.
But Harry has already gone off the phone. He’s staring at the laptop. I, too, turn my attention to the laptop.
“I’m sorry,” Harry says. I stare at the screen. The Boarding has changed to Gate Closed. I focus my eyes to see if I was reading the right line, but there is no mistaking it.
“Frank,” I turn to my phone.
“Yeah?”
It breaks my heart to have to tell him.
“The flight’s gone. She’s gone.”
There’s silence on the other side.
“Frank?”
“It’s not like I expected any different,” he says in a low, subdued tone. “It’s my own damned fault. I deserve this. I made her feel that way. It’s on me.” His voice trembles. I look to Harry, who puts his hand on my arm.
“I’m sorry too, Frank,” he says into my phone. “It was a close one. But it’s not lost yet. You can still find her. It’s not the end of the world. We’ll help you.”
“He will,” I say to Frank. “He just tracked down my birth parents in Australia. After that, finding Gabriella will be an afternoon’s work. You’ll see.”
“That’s all right, guys,” Frank says after a deep sigh. “It’s all right. Turn us around, Chloe. We can go back home. I’ll speak to you later.”
He hangs up before I can say anything more. Harry and I stare at the phone, lost for words.
“Somehow,” Harry says at last, “I really thought we’d catch her in time.”
I did too. Now I feel silly. And at fault too. I should have told Frank about seeing Gabriella, and about what she said . . . I should have done something. But hindsight being what it is (perfectly bloody useless), all I can do now is lie back and wonder how to repair this mess.
Harry lies down next to me.
“It’s not your fault,” he says, as though reading my thoughts.
I hold his hand.
And then my phone rings.
“Who is it?” I ask.
Harry hands it to me. “Unknown number.”
I pick up. The voice on the other side is female and sounds timid. “Frank?”
“Gabriella?” I say, as recognition floods my brain.
“Joe?”
“Oh my God!” I cry.
“Oh my God!” cries Harry.
“Call Frank,” I instruct him. And then, to Gabriella, I say, “Aren’t you on a plane right now?”
“No,” she says. “I—I thought . . . Oh dear, I thought you were Frank.”
I can hear Harry telling Frank that I’ve got Gabriella on the line. It’s like the CIA headquarters here.
“Why would you think I was Frank?” I ask, for want of a better thing to say. I feel like I’m negotiating a hostage situation and it’s my role to not let her hang up.
“It’s just . . .” Her voice wobbles, and she sniffs loudly. “I was just going to get on the plane, when my friend showed me all these missed calls from an unknown number, and I imagined . . . but of course it wasn’t. It was you.”
“What? No! Are you kidding me? Frank’s on his way to the airport. He’s been trying to ring you, and then, when he couldn’t do it, I tried too. And then we called a Swedish flight attendant . . . well, he isn’t Swedish, actually, but he’s in Sweden now and . . . it’s a very long story. Where are you right now?”
“Heathrow.”
“Don’t move,” I say. “Frank is coming to get you.”
Harry tells Frank, “Did you hear that? Joe just told Gabriella you’re going to get her.”
“What did she say?” It’s Frank’s voice on speakerphone. “Does she want me to come?”
I have the brilliant idea of putting my phone on speaker too.
“Gabriella?” I say, loudly. “Gabriella, can you hear Frank? Frank, speak up.”
There’s a moment’s silence, as Harry and I stare at our phones.
“Gab?” says Frank’s voice on Harry’s phone.
“Frank?” says Gabriella on mine.
“I’m on my way to the airport,” Frank says, eagerly. “I can come and pick you up if you want to.”
“Oh, that’s— That sounds lovely,” she says. “I don’t want to inconvenience you. I can take a cab.”
“No! No, I’ll be there in ten minutes. Wait for me!”
“Okay,” she says. “I’ll wait.”
There’s a pause.
“Why didn’t you go on that plane, Gabriella?” I ask. “Why didn’t you board?”
“I don’t know what to say.” She laughs and sniffs at the same time. “I’m so embarrassed.”
“Don’t be!” Frank exclaims. “Don’t be embarrassed. I’m coming for you. I love you, lass!”
Gabriella is either laughing or crying; it’s hard to tell by the sounds she’s making. Harry says, “How about you call each other?”
&
nbsp; Both Frank and Gabriella agree to this, and so, reluctantly, Harry and I ring off. The room feels oddly quiet now that the storm has passed. I go to the window and open it wider. The stress of all this is now wearing off, and I feel relief and renewed exhilaration.
In the light of the streetlamp outside, I can see Harry sitting up in bed smiling at me and shaking his head.
“What?” I say, defensively. I know what he’s going to say.
Before he can, there’s a pounding on our door. I wrap a bedsheet around me and go open it. It’s Alan Yates, hotel manager and firm anti-Joe-ite, looking very disapproving.
“Hello, Mr. Kaminski,” he says, as though we were old enemies. “Do you know, by any chance, what time it is?”
I have been so wrapped up in the airport chase, I’m a little confused. But he’s right: it’s the middle of the night.
“Uh-oh,” I say. “Have we been loud?”
“Let us just say,” he says, magnanimously, “that our explanations to other guests that this is your wedding night are wearing exceedingly thin. Will I be able to convince you to keep it down?”
“Absolutely,” I say.
Harry, wrapped in another bedsheet, comes to my aid. “What’s the problem? Are we too noisy?”
“Ah, Mr. Byrne,” Alan says, sounding very disappointed—like a school principal who has found, to his dismay, that his star pupil has now befriended the school clown. “Yes, it just so happens that cries of ‘He’s in the shower!’ and ‘Aaah, it’s an owl!’ are growing somewhat tiresome to our other guests.”
“We understand,” says Harry. “We’re done now. We’ll be quiet, we promise. We’re really sorry. How about you treat everyone to a champagne breakfast tomorrow morning, on us?”
“That’s very gentlemanly of you,” he concedes, mollified.
Harry grins. “It’s settled, then. Good night.”
Alan sends me another reproachful look, as though to say I have my eye on you, and then retreats.
We close the door.
“I don’t know what his problem is,” I tell Harry, as we return to bed. “There are no dogs in the bathroom, nobody got sprayed with urine, and nothing’s on fire. And does he thank me? No!”
