Massive in Lapland

by Ian Edwards

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  Frankie stepped aside and pointed at the bed. Alan’s gaze followed Frankie’s pointed arm to the bed, back at Frankie before eventually settling on the bed.

  ‘Well, that’s something you don’t see every day,’ he said, trying not to shake.

  They both stood staring at the reindeer head carefully positioned on the pillow.

  ‘Remember what I told you yesterday?’ Frankie said.

  ‘About?’

  ‘Gangsters. The mob. The mafia.’

  Alan stared blankly back at him.

  ‘The horse’s head on the pillow. It’s a sign. They’re onto us. Well you actually, I’m in the clear.’

  Alan gingerly made his way over to the bed for a closer look. ‘It’s OK, I don’t think it’s real.’

  It doesn’t have to be real. It’s symbolic. They’re letting you know that they know.’

  Alan scratched his face, deep in thought. ‘It might not be what it looks like. Maybe the maid left it there.’

  ‘I’m sorry, what?’

  ‘The maid. Maybe she left it there when tidying the room.’

  ‘Of course,’ Frankie said. ‘Maids usually leave a chocolate on the pillow, but today of all days she thought, ‘hey it’s nearly Christmas, I’ll leave a reindeer head on the pillow instead of a chocolate.’ It’s obvious.’

  ‘That excursion’s looking quite appealing isn’t it?’

  Frankie nodded agreement. ‘I think in the circumstances, it makes a lot of sense.’

  *

  Sarah leaned against the hotel reception desk nodding attentively as she made small talk with Païvi. She suspected Païvi was only talking to her because it meant Alan wasn’t far away. Sarah was fine with that. From her vantage point she could keep an eye on anyone suspicious entering the hotel. From the corner of her eye she saw Alan enter through the large doors and make his way over.

  ‘Right, I’m ready. Let’s go and see some funny lights in the sky,’ he said as he zipped his coat up to his chin.

  ‘You’re suddenly very keen,’ Sarah said.

  ‘Let’s just say I’m ready to discover my inner octogenarian.’

  ‘They’re out there waiting for us,’ Sarah nodded towards the front of the hotel.

  Through the panoramic window, Alan could see a number of people milling about. A guide was hopping about appearing to tick names off a list in front of a large coach.

  ‘Have a nice trip,’ Païvi smiled at Alan, who grinned in return as he took Sarah’s elbow, guiding her quickly toward the coach party.

  ‘What’s the rush?’ Sarah said quietly as they moved around a sleigh filled with presents.

  ‘I’ll explain later,’ he whispered and steered her out of the hotel.

  *

  Alan stared glumly out of the coach window. Sarah chatted happily with an elderly couple sitting in the seats opposite. Ivy had introduced herself and her husband Noel within seconds of taking their seats and had barely stopped talking since. Alan managed to catch Noel’s eye when the conversation eventually moved on to Noel’s troublesome gout. The two men smiled at each other and went back to staring out of the window.

  ‘So, what does your husband do?’ Ivy asked, having finally exhausted her repertoire of grandchildren stories.

  ‘My husband? Oh, you mean him?’ she pointed at Alan. ‘No, he’s not my husband.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I just assumed…’

  Sarah grinned. ‘We’re just friends. We’re out here for work.’

  ‘Oh really?’ Ivy said, suddenly interested. ‘What line of business are you in?’

  ‘Alan’s a comedian. I’m his manager. He has a couple of gigs out here.’

  ‘A comedian you say. Is he funny?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Sarah said firmly. ‘Very funny.’

  Ivy patted her husband’s arm. ‘Noel here was in creosote for thirty seven years.’

  ‘That’ll explain why he looks so well preserved.’ Alan quipped.

  Noel laughed while Ivy stared blankly at Alan. ‘Funny, you say?’

  ‘He has his moments,’ Sarah glanced at Alan.

  ‘Noel was managing director of Philips Creosotes and Wood Treatments before retiring.’ Ivy clarified.

  ‘I treated my fences the other day,’ Alan said.

  ‘Did you use a Phillips product?’ Noel asked.

  ‘No, I took them to the zoo,’ Alan deadpanned.

  Noel and Sarah laughed while Ivy stared at Alan.

  ‘What have you seen since you’ve been here?’ Sarah asked, changing the subject.

  ‘We went to the Santa theme park yesterday,’ Ivy told her. ‘We saw the elves at work.’

  ‘Any good?’ Alan asked and then added, ‘I heard they came up a bit short.’

  Sarah groaned while Ivy sighed.

  ‘Where are you playing next?’ Noel asked. ‘We could come along and see you.’

  ‘I think we’re fully booked,’ Ivy said.

  Alan caught Noel’s eye again, smiled and went back to looking out the window.

  *

  The journey seemed to Alan to go on forever. If he wasn’t listening to Ivy going on about her arthritic hip, he had to endure the over excited tour guide droning on about the history of Lapland. He eventually dozed off, with his head resting against the window.

  He awoke with a jolt, his mobile phone buzzing in his pocket. Wiping drool from his mouth, he noticed that Sarah was no longer sitting alongside him. Ivy was reading a book, the title of which he couldn’t make out, but had a scared looking child on the cover, while Noel was asleep. Alan took his phone out of his pocket and swiped the screen. There was a text from Sarah;

  Meet me at the little kitchen at the back of coach

  Sarah X

  Still half asleep, Alan squeezed past the table that separated him from Ivy and Noel and headed towards the rear of the coach. The plush seating and mod cons were a far cry from the coaches of his youth. The last time he travelled by coach was during his school days when once a week the entire year was bussed down to playing fields several miles from the school to a large field where the boys would play football and rugby. At least, that was the theory. In reality it meant standing around on a wet, windswept playing field while trying (and failing) to not get a ball smacked in the groin.

  The coaches in those days had been provided by the local authority and were effectively rectangular steel boxes with enough seating for sixty children. The seats had not been designed with comfort or safety in mind, being as they were, made from steel and vinyl while the flooring was a grill that allowed the kmany litres of motion sickness produced on each journey to flow silently away.

  Alan reached the rear of the coach, took the two steps down and turned into a little kitchenette. Sarah stood in the corner drinking from a travel mug.

  ‘What are you doing back here?’ He asked.

  ‘I was going to the toilet and…’

  ‘There’s a toilet on board?’ Alan interrupted.

  Sarah frowned. ‘Of course there’s a toilet. How do you think passengers manage on long journeys?’

  Alan shrugged. ‘I’ve been filling a cup under the table. I thought that’s what everyone was doing.’

  Sarah eyed him up and down, unsure if he was joking. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘there’s an old man sitting half way down the coach…’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘He’s all bundled up so I can’t be certain, but I think it might be Pekka.’

  Alan glanced up over the steps and looked down the coach. ‘Where?’ He asked.

  ‘You can’t see him from here. You’ll have to go down the front and look back.’

  ‘That’s not going to look weird is it?’

  Sarah climbed the steps and stood alongside him. ‘Actually, if you swapped seats with Ivy you might be able to see him.’

  ‘Why don’t you swap seats? You two seem to be getting on like a house on fire.’

  ‘It’s best if you do i
t, she already thinks you’re weird.’

  ‘What do you mean, she thinks I’m weird?’

  Sarah sighed. ‘When you were asleep, she said she thought all comedians were weird.’

  ‘So not me specifically then?’ He asked.

  ‘No, I guess not,’ Sarah conceded. ‘Now will you get down there and see if you can see anything.’

  Alan sighed and walked slowly down the aisle, trying to disguise the fact that he was looking for someone. As he approached Ivy, he gave her what he considered to be his best smile.

  Ivy stared straight back at him, straight faced. Alan decided Ivy wouldn’t be willing to move seats no matter how charming he was, and carried on to the front of the coach. Reaching the front, Alan leant on the rail behind the driver.

  ‘You shouldn’t really be distracting the driver whilst he’s driving.’

  Alan turned around and found himself face to face with the guide.

  ‘OK, I’ll wait until he’s finished driving,’ Alan quipped

  ‘Sorry..?’

  ‘It’s OK,’ Alan said, deadpan.

  He turned to walk back down the aisle. As he did so he heard a voice.

  ‘Alan,’ the voice said.

  Alan turned to face the driver, who turned to face him.

  ‘It’s me,’ the driver said.

  Alan stared at the man. A large peaked cap resting on a mop of black curly hair, face obscured by large aviator sunglasses and a big bushy beard.

  ‘It’s me,’ the driver repeated, lifting the shades to reveal a strangely familiar pair of eyes.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ was all Alan could say.

  ‘You look surprised to see me,’ Pekka said turning back to look at the road. ‘I told you I was a master of disguise.’

  Alan stepped alongside the driver and crouched down. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I told you, I’m lying low until we’re ready to leave.’

  ‘But you’re driving a coach,’ Alan said, not unreasonably.

  ‘I know the owner of the company. He lets me drive the coaches sometimes,’ Pekka explained.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s very peaceful. I just focus on the road ahead and forget all my troubles. And no one recognises me when I’m in disguise.’

  ‘Oh right, I see,’ Alan said, not really understanding at all.

  ‘It works both ways. I always get him a ticket for my gigs. Plus, none of the other coach companies would let me drive their coaches, what with the blackouts.’

  ‘What blackouts?’ Alan asked.

  ‘I have these occasional blackouts. It’s nothing to worry about. I haven’t had one for months.’

  ‘Isn’t that dangerous? What if you blacked out whilst driving?’

  Pekka let out a loud guffaw and banged the armrest with his massive fist. ‘You’re a very funny guy. We’re going to have some real fun when we get back to England.’ Pekka slowed the vehicle and steered round a reindeer that had wandered onto the road. ‘This coach has auto-pilot, so even if I did have a blackout the coach would just carry on.’ He pointed at a switch on the dashboard which had AUTO – P stamped on the top of it.

  Alan nodded despite not entirely believing Pekka’s explanation.

  ‘Anyway what are you doing here?’ Pekka asked.

  Alan briefly considered telling him they were actually trying to avoid him and his gangster manager, but instead went for the still truthful, ‘We’re going to see the Northern Lights.’

  Pekka nodded. ‘Excellent. You’ll love it. Now, more importantly, is Sarah with you?’

  ‘She’s down at the kitchen thing.’

  ‘Did she mention my proposal?’ Pekka asked, still looking anywhere but the road in front of him.

  ‘She said she was giving it serious consideration,’ Alan lied.

  ‘Excellent. Could you do me a favour and pass me the hip flask from the bag down there,’ he poked a sports bag with his foot.

  Alan was prevented from answering by the reappearance of the guide who slipped back into her seat holding a large cup of coffee. ‘I thought I asked you not to distract the driver,’ she said.

  ‘That’s right, you did,’ Alan confirmed and sloped off back to his seat.

  *

  Sarah stood and moved aside as Alan squeezed past her and into his seat. Noel nodded a greeting whilst Ivy ignored him.

  ‘Well?’ Sarah whispered.

  ‘The good news is that the passenger you thought might be Pekka isn’t,’ he whispered back.

  ‘OK, so what’s the bad news?’

  ‘Very perceptive. The bad news is that Pekka is indeed on board.’

  ‘Oh great,’ she said, standing up to see where Pekka was sitting.

  Alan pulled her back to her seat. ‘Don’t you want the really bad news?’ He asked.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘He’s driving the coach.’

  She stood up again. Alan pulled her down again.

  ‘And he suffers blackouts,’ Alan whispered.

  ‘You’re not serious,’ she hissed.

  ‘Completely,’ Alan confirmed. ‘But on the plus side, the coach has an automatic – pilot so even if he does black out we’ll be safe. In fact if he did blackout, we could sneak out without him realising.’

  ‘Is everything OK?’ Ivy asked, looking up from her book.

  ‘Oh yes, everything’s fine. Alan was just telling me that this coach is fitted with an automatic –pilot.’

  Noel, his attention caught looked up. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yep. I was just down the front with the driver.’ Alan explained, as if a grown man wanting to sit up front the driver was a completely normal thing to do.

  ‘Did they give you a hat and a pretend steering wheel?’ Ivy asked.

  ‘Yes, but I had to leave them the front for the next person,’ he said with a smile. ‘Anyway, there was a button that said ‘Auto –P’ automatic pilot.’

  Noel laughed. ‘That’s not an Auto–Pilot.’

  ‘It’s not?’

  ‘No. It’s the auto park switch. Throw the switch and the coach reverses back into a suitable space.’

  Alan and Sarah stared at each other. ‘So…’ Alan began. ‘If the driver suffered a blackout there wouldn’t be an automatic–pilot to drive the coach?’

  ‘No. And I imagine it wouldn’t end very well if it did. Still it’s not likely to happen is it? There’s no chance one of these drivers would be allowed to drive a coach if they suffered blackouts.’

  Alan smiled weakly, leaned his head on the window and contemplated death by Pekka.

  *

  Alan stood ankle deep in snow and looked up at the sky. Despite the coat, hat and gloves that he had been assured by the man on the market stall were “polar approved” he was freezing cold.

  Sarah stood alongside him, snuggling in close for warmth. She also wore a thick padded coat, hat, gloves and scarf and also looked up at the sky.

  ‘I can’t see anything,’ Alan whispered so as not to be overheard by any of the several groups that standing close by.

  ‘We just have to wait for the clouds to blow over,’ Sarah explained.

  ‘But it’s not windy,’ Alan pointed out. ‘Anyway,’ he added, looking around. ‘This is a bit rubbish. I was expecting to be standing on the top of a mountain, you know? Touching the heavens. Instead I’m standing in snow in the middle of …’ he paused and had another look around, ‘what looks like a car park.’

  ‘It is a car park,’ Sarah said.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘It says so on the sign over there,’ Sarah pointed at a large yellow sign in the distance. ‘I saw it when we drove in.’

  ‘I didn’t see it.’

  ‘No, you had your eyes closed. You said - and I quote – “I’d sooner not know if Pekka lost control and drove us over a cliff.”’’

  Alan shrugged. He was prevented from replying by the guide who was busy calling everyone over.

  ‘Come on,’ Sarah said and stepped forw
ard.

  ‘Alan,’ a familiar voice called his name. Frankie stood several feet behind him, dressed in his usual green velvet jacket and frilly shirt, looking like he’d just walked off the stage rather than standing in an artic car park.

  ‘What’s up?’ He asked as Alan stepped back to join him.

  ‘Oh you know, the usual. We’ve travelled half way up the country to stand in a freezing car park and look at some pretty lights in the sky. Which we can’t see because it’s too cloudy.’

  ‘Oh right,’ Frankie nodded. He thrust his hands into his pockets and said, ‘Still, it was a good idea of Sarah’s. At least you’ve managed to avoid Pekka.’

  ‘Yes, it would have been a brilliant plan if Pekka hadn’t been driving our coach.’

  Frankie chuckled. ‘You really couldn’t make that up could you? Why is he driving your coach?’

  ‘It’s what he does, apparently.’

  ‘Why are you in a car park?’

  ‘No idea. Apparently you can see the sky clearly from here.’

  ‘Really?’

  Alan nodded. ‘That’s what they say.’

  ‘But this…’ Frankie looked around, ‘You may as well be in the middle of a car park in Leicester.’

  ‘Why Leicester?’ Alan asked.

  ‘I don’t know, it just came into my head.’ Frankie admitted.

  ‘They dug up an old King in Leicester a few years ago. That was in a car park.’

  ‘Out of the ground?’

  Alan frowned. ‘Where else can you dig something up from?’

  ‘Fair point. What King was it?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘What King did they dig up in Leicester?’

  Alan shrugged. ‘Not sure…one of the Richards, I think.’

  ‘What was he doing in the ground?’

  ‘Being dead I assume, or playing a very long game of hide and seek.’

  ‘I think he’s won then.’

  Alan looked up at the sky. ‘At least in Leicester we’d have the street lights to look at. Actually I think it was Richard III.’

  ‘So they dug up a Richard III in Leicester?’ Frankie grinned.

  Alan laughed out loud.

  Sarah listened as the guide finished an explanation of the phenomena of the Northern Lights, or as she now knew them, The Aurora Borealis.

  ‘Doesn’t look like we’ll see it tonight,’ Ivy said, looking up at the overcast sky. ‘Although Alan seems to be enjoying himself.’