Miss South

by Kay Williams

  His manners didn’t scream money or privilege, somehow despite his likely expensive upbringing and the connections amongst the rich and famous that came hand in hand with his families own social, business and political manoeuvrings he had kept a casual demeanour and open nature

  Perhaps it was to do with the constant press intrusion in his life that made sure to keep him grounded, or the weight of responsibility that came with managing his company, or maybe he just had amazing parents; whatever the reason, Heronsgate was good company, and I wasn’t going to go looking for things to complicate our friendship or to throw up road blocks as to why we shouldn’t have gotten along as well as we did.

  We landed in another private terminal, there was a carousal but it was still and Heronsgate didn’t seem concerned about where his luggage was. Passport control was a private booth and the girl at the desk was so busy fluttering her eyelashes at Heronsgate I felt I could have given her my father’s passport, she wouldn’t have noticed and I could have been waved into America as a fifty-six-year-old man.

  There were signs for the public terminal just after and I hesitated by the door when Heronsgate would just have kept walking confidently along his usual route towards whatever private car was going to be waiting for him.

  “Something the matter?” He asked.

  “I think that I’m going to be able to get a cab easier out the main door.”

  “That is true, but I have a very nice car going the same place you are with more than enough room for you in it.”

  “The same place?” I frowned. “You mean you are staying at the same hotel you were keen for me to book a package for that didn’t come with an outbound flight so you could offer me a lift in your plane as well as your car when we landed? As well as offering to take me for dinner? You do realise how creepy this is all starting to make you sound?”

  “Until you put it like that, no, I didn’t.”Heronsgate winced and actually looked endearingly shame-faced. “I was actually just thinking about trying to get to know you a little better, the flight and dinner sounded like two very good opportunities.”

  “And you are used to taking advantage of those when they come along?”

  “I’ve come back to New York to see to the final preparations to a massive fund-raising event that Heronsgate Industries run every year in support of the emergency services. Today I am going to be relatively free, but once I get stuck into that I am going to be at the office long hours and may have very little time for anything else. I was going to text you and get to know you painfully slowly over the course of those messages, but then I saw you in the airport lounge. When you said your friend was sending you package options I told myself not to meddle, but you hadn’t taken your current press popularity into account and I was worried about you being put into the same kind of position as the one you were facing in London.”

  “And then there was the same hotel with no inbound flight and it was too good an opportunity to pass up,” I summed up, and then decided to be forgiving. “In your defence you did say I could get a later flight.”

  “In hindsight it shouldn’t have been a suggestion. I should have told you to book a later flight.”

  I watched his expression; he had the same semi-horrified wince I usually wore when I did something I hoped my mother never found out about. It wasn’t usually like me to trust anyone so quickly; perhaps it was just due to his almost over-whelming sense of self-confidence, or maybe it was because he was an active listener and conversation with him was as easy as if we had always known each other. Whatever the reason, the trust was there, and even though my common sense was screaming at me to tell him we would meet at the hotel, and issuing a good natured challenge over who could get there first, I found myself doing the stupid thing instead.

  “So this car of yours is it closer than the cab stand?”

  “Much,” Heronsgate smiled and we started walking again. “You really shouldn’t let me have my own way so often.”

  “I am beginning to notice that you have a habit of delaying telling me important things.”

  Heronsgate laughed as he opened a door and we stepped outside, the fresh, cold air made me shiver and I was glad I had grabbed my coat and hat before leaving home. There was no hanging about for Heronsgate, he didn’t even need to flag someone down to get noticed, the car simply glided up to meet him.

  Money really did open up a whole other world.

  This car wasn’t a limo like the one that had picked him up from The Pavilion, or the low slung sports car he had been driving last night. It was a saloon style car, longer then I would have been comfortable driving with a cream leather interior and a glass divide between the uniformed driver and the back seats. Heronsgate opened the door and I slipped inside, he followed and shut the door, he didn’t even need to say where he was going the car just pulled away and I tugged on my seat belt.

  “How far is the hotel?”

  “About an hour depending on traffic.”

  I dug my phone out of my bag, the time had self-adjusted now it was connected to an American network and I used it as reference to change the time on my watch.

  “We have landed just in time for lunch.”

  “You ate on the plane,” Heronsgate chuckled. “I’ve never met anyone who wears a watch.”

  “I’ve never met someone who buys a book instead of a digital download.”

  “Fair point,” he smiled taking my hand to investigate the old school time-keeper.

  Watches weren’t difficult to get hold of, but with almost everyone telling the time from their phones, tablets or desk computers there was little call for them to be the must have or expensive accessory they once were. I had always liked the ticking as it beat in a soft echo of the day winding by.

  “So tell me, what is the most extreme thing you have ever done in the name of your writing?” Heronsgate asked curiously, letting go of my hand and picking up on the conversation we had been having before landing.

  “Threatened to kiss someone to get out of a selfie,” I replied making Heronsgate laugh. “It didn’t work.”

  “I was being serious.”

  “So was I,” I teased. “I guess my crime scenes make me go to some pretty extreme lengths. Because the setting is out there I try to make my descriptions as accurate as possible when it comes to the crimes themselves. I was writing a piece about a body that was dumped in a warehouse and left for several years but was found after the building was demolished. The body was set on fire and they died of the burns.”

  “I’m not loving this story, Harriet,” Heronsgate winced.

  “You asked. Through public access and freedom of information I found old crime scene photos of burn victims and body dumps, but nothing about how those wounds would look several years after the corpse was tied up and left in an oil drum in a damp abandoned warehouse.”

  “That’s revolting,” he complained. “I would hate to see your internet search history.”

  “There was this body farm just outside of London and I wrote them an email and told them I was writing a university paper based on a hypothetical essay and asked them loads of questions about the degradation of the wounds and such.”

  “Did they come back to you?”

  “They told me I needed professional help. I thought they were going to give me the number of a morgue, or a retired detective or something. They gave me the number for a psychologist.”

  “I’m not surprised.” Heronsgate laughed. “What happened to the book?”

  “I plugged away with it for a while, but because I didn’t know what kind of forensic problems there would be, I didn’t know how to weave my story around the body and it eventually stalled.”

  “So you deleted it?”

  “No. Never.”

  “You never delete anything, even stuff that doesn’t pan out? How much storage is on your hard-drive?”

  “In total eighty-five terabytes, I’m using about sixty of it at the moment.”

  “Sixty? How is that
even possible? I know that the three or four hundred page reports that my company raises are only a couple of megabytes. How many documents do you have?”

  “Thousands. There are my stories both short and novel length, work in progress and unfinished pieces that I haven’t quite worked out yet. There are the documents I’ve dedicated to my galaxy building. Where worlds are in terms of distance between each other and ease of travel, the solar systems attached to them with general descriptions of the peoples that live there. Systems of commerce, business, religion, technology, world histories with the dates of significant wars and such. Character bios, time lining, very basic sketches and mapping just as memory jogs if I don’t touch the ideas for a while. It all adds up.”

  “I thought I was dedicated to my business.”

  “I’ve been working at mine longer then you have, which sounds really weird to say. The book you are currently reading I began writing as a Pre-Pause detective story as part of my creative writing coursework for the English equivalent of your high school diploma.”

  “Until the break in.”

  “Wow. You really were listening at my lecture.”

  “I was,” his grin was just smug enough to make me laugh.

  “It was rejected by my English teacher when I re-wrote it into science fiction as she said the exam board would never accept the submission.”

  “Oops.”

  “Nearly cost me my graduation and introduced me to the world of science-fiction snobbery all in one go.”

  “I did notice how the other authors at the lecture laughed at you.”

  “It never put me off, just made me careful about who I confessed my hobby to.”

  “And now everyone knows.”

  “Nothing to hide.”

  “Nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “You say that now, but you would have turned your nose up at it before the lecture.”

  “Shamefully, I would have,” he agreed, and became distracted when his phone rang.

  I turned my attention out of the window for the several minutes it took for us to reach the hotel. Heronsgate tied up his call as the car eased into a drop-off spot at the front of the building. His arrival caused a flurry of activity with employees of the hotel hurrying to unpack his cases from the back of the car, while his driver remained behind the wheel.

  Heronsgate was admitted to the hotel without question while I had to check in with my passport and the details of the package. The girl at the desk smiled at me and shyly before admitting that she had liked my book. I was given a hotel key card and as I didn’t have any luggage to struggle with I declined an escort. To access the secure level of the hotel I had to scan my room card before I could call one of the dedicated elevators. The corridors were plush and adorned with artwork and little tables set with freshly cut flowers.

  The room was larger than anything I had ever stayed in before, there was an open plan sitting-room with a writing desk, big television and sofa. A large bathroom had a bath and separate shower. The bedroom was equipped with more closet space than I had at home and large windows that led out on to a small balcony.

  Everything was stylish, contemporary and uncluttered.

  I opened the doors and stepped outside in the distance I could see the green square of Central Park, the iconic spires of the Apalidion; Earth’s premier school of magic that all calibres and classes of magic user aspired to attend, and the distant glow of the Nexus illuminating even the bright morning skyline with the nine colours of magic.

  I had never been so close to one of Waking Night’s Travel Hubs, London had a small one in Hyde Park; but that opened on to a Favlian coastline with only one small sea-side town in travelling distance.

  It was amazing to think that the glow would centre on a Portal and in several steps a person could walk from Earth to Favlas. A whole other planet, a celestial body independent of Earth or even our recognised space, scientists were still struggling with Favlian stars and trying to locate our sister world in the wider galaxy.

  Shivering I stepped back inside and shut the doors, I took the pictures Lucy had asked for and sat on the sofa scrolling through amenities local to the hotel. I didn’t want to go too far on my first day; especially if I was going to be carting a lot of essentials back to the hotel with me.

  I planned a route to several stores in tourist traps where I knew I would be able to get everything I needed. I checked the exchange rate, gave myself a budget and was just about ready to leave the hotel when there was a knock at my door.

  I let Heronsgate in noticing that he had changed clothes, weirdly he looked even more tailored than before. Something that I hadn’t thought possible after seeing him smartly dressed all the time. I would never have called myself a fashion mogul and I certainly didn’t know anything about trends, this seasons colours or what the top end brands and fashion houses were marketing, but something about the line of Heronsgate’s suit, the more precise knotting of his tie, the appearance of cufflinks and the fresh shine to his shoes was noticeable even to me.

  “Going to work?” I guessed.

  “Yes,” he smiled but looked bemused. “How did you know that?”

  “You look smart.”

  “I don’t usually?”

  “I thought so, then I saw you at the gallery event and you looked smarter than when we had cake, and now you look even more distinguished. Somehow you have managed to master several different levels of smartness.”

  “Thank you for noticing.”

  “You don’t own a polo shirt or a pair of jeans, do you?”

  “No,” he agreed.

  “I have to admit I have never met anyone able to relax in a full suit before, men I know see them as a chore and can’t wait to get them off and pull on a T-shirt.”

  “This is how I have always been comfortable.”

  “It shows,” I smiled, deciding not to tease given everything he had done for me I didn’t feel it fair to poke fun at his standards of dress. “So what level of smartness do I need to elevate myself to for dinner tonight?”

  “You have paid for the room, Harriet, you could wear jeans and they wouldn’t be able to stop you eating.”

  “But that wouldn’t be fun; I don’t get to dress up often.”

  “You don’t need a ball gown, if that’s what you are getting at,” he laughed.

  “That’s disappointing.”

  “Your idea of comfortable and smart is fine. I’ll pick you up at seven.”

  “I can meet you at the restaurant.”

  “I’m getting in an elevator, Harriet, not travelling across town,” he teased. “You’ll be careful today?”

  Was it sweet of him to worry? Or considering his manipulation to get me here was it another example of creepy? Maybe I should be less trustful of the man, it wasn’t as if my instincts hadn’t been wrong before.

  “There are a few tourist shopping arcades nearby. I’ll be fine.”

  We left the hotel together but his car had waited for him and we said our goodbyes on the kerb, the car pulled into traffic and I turned down the street.

  Having worked, lived and shopped in London for almost twenty years I was used to the pedestrian traffic, busy roads, street vendors and everything else that came with managing myself in a major city. I had never minded travelling alone, I enjoyed it more in some respects, being on my own clock and going where I wanted without an impatient friend who wanted to do something else on my heels.

  The tourist hotspots were signposted and I had no trouble in finding an arcade full of shops from unbranded cheap clothes through to designer labels. Shopping was one of those things I had to be in the right frame of mind for, otherwise I didn’t enjoy it. Nothing put me in the right mind for a shopping binge than needing something; and today I needed everything.

  Including the case to put it all in.

  I lost track of time as I wandered about, picking out several items both casual and office work worthy, but it wasn’t a relaxing experience. Every shop I went into I w
as watched by other shoppers and staff. Their whispers made me want to duck my head, hurry with my task and run back to hotel to hide. Instead I forced myself to focus on what I was doing, I had just as much right to be out shopping as anyone else and I couldn’t let myself be whispered and giggled into seclusion.

  It was difficult to do though, especially when a group of several schoolgirls in uniform began to follow me from shop to shop.

  Three even bought the same shoes as I did.

  Just when I wanted to turn on them and order them to cut it out and leave me alone, they approached me. They were more nervous than I was and that made them giggly and shy, they wanted to know if I was who they thought I was and could they get a selfie. They had obviously been all over Lemon Grove’s author board because when I agreed they all instantly made a pose or a face as if that was normal, after several photos they gushed out their thanks and left me alone.

  I was grabbing a drink from a vending machine when I remembered John’s warning from the signing we had run in London and I dug my phone out of a bag. Once those girls got back to school and spread the word, or even loaded the photo to my author page it wasn’t going to be long before other people were stopping me for a selfie or an autograph.

  ‘People know who I am out here, it’s a little creepy. I’ve just been stopped for a selfie and think it might be a good idea if I had postcards to sign just in case?’

  Rosemary’s response was quick in coming.

  ‘You are that noticeable?’

  ‘Apparently.’

  ‘Can you hit a copier place if I send you the image? It’ll be quicker than trying to post you some?”

  “No problem. How many should I get?’

  There was a self-service printer outlet in the arcade which should be just what I needed: if they weren’t any good then I could ask the hotel concierge if they knew where I could get a better service.

  ‘How many do you want to carry around? Keep the receipt, we’ll log it as expenses when you get back.’