‘What is it about you and the word family?’ he asks softly after a long pause where all I can hear is the background roar of engines. ‘I’ve been wondering ever since I first met you, mystery lady. Because every single time I ask you, you just completely clam up. But I’m hoping that now that we’ve got a seven-hour flight ahead of us without the handicap of my kid brother and all his shenanigans distracting us, well, I’m sort of a captive audience really.’
And this time I do tell him. Absolutely everything there is to tell. About Mum, about what the poor woman suffered through, about losing her on that improbably sunny, mild Christmas Day, two long years ago now. About how she really was the only family I ever had and how I miss her so much this time of year, it physically aches.
He doesn’t interrupt me, doesn’t patronize me with that sympathetic headshake that most people automatically do whenever they hear the full story, he doesn’t say a single word. He just sits there calmly and quietly, listening.
And because it just feels right, I talk on, telling him about how wise Mum was, how even-tempered and kind. Describing how brave she was those last, agonizingly truncated years. How she bore her illness with dignity and even humour. But if I thought it would be difficult and that I’d end up choking back my words like I normally do, then it turns out I’m quite wrong.
Because spilling it out to Mike is one of the easiest things I’ve ever done. And when I’ve finished, he slips his arm around me and I bury myself deep in his chest, loving the warm, tight, comforting feel of him. Barely able to remember the last time I felt this secure and at peace with myself.
‘I’m so, so sorry,’ he eventually says, so gently that I almost have to strain to hear him. ‘You know that goes without saying.’
‘I know,’ I whisper back. Then up surfaces something else, something I’ve wanted to get off my chest for a good while now.
‘So you see, in a roundabout way …’ I mumble into Mike’s chest more than anywhere else.
‘In a roundabout way … what?’
‘Well, I’ve given it a lot of thought and, you know, I think that was a lot of the reason why I got sucked into the whole online dating thing as easily as I did. And why someone like me was a sitting target for Harry and all his catfish antics.’
‘I’m not quite sure that I follow,’ Mike says, cradling my hand now and playing distractedly with it.
Deep breath. You can do it, you can get this out. You’ve waited long enough and now it’s time.
‘When you lose your mum,’ I try to explain, surprising myself at how easy it is once I get started. ‘It’s like the worst thing that could possibly happen to you has already happened. And it affects people in all sorts of different ways.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘With some people, a loss like that makes them almost fearless. Like they’ve already lost the most precious thing in their lives anyway, so what is there left to be afraid of? But with me, you see, it was the exact polar opposite.’
‘Meaning …’
‘Meaning I became someone who constantly put up barriers all around me, I suppose, petrified that I could ever be hurt that much. Because I just couldn’t go through all that pain again, Mike, I wouldn’t have it in me. That much I know for certain.’
He pulls me back into him now, bending down to lightly kiss me on the forehead. It feels warm and comforting, and although I appreciate it, I’m still not quite finished yet. Not now that I’ve got this far in spilling it all out.
‘So you see, I think that’s why a long-distance, arm’s-length relationship was what I was after the whole time really,’ I say, pulling back a little so I can really see his face now. ‘At the back of my mind, I figured I was lengthening the odds of ever getting hurt again.’
There’s a long pause while we both just look at each other, to the background drone of an air steward apologizing about chicken dinner being unavailable.
Could this – whatever it is – between us possibly turn into a fledgling relationship is what I’m thinking now. And is that really what I want?
‘Well, maybe you won’t get hurt again,’ Mike eventually says, looking down at me, eyes soft and sincere. ‘Maybe it’s time to take that chance.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Just remember it’s all behind you now. And it’s a brand New Year ahead.’
‘I know … and thanks.’
‘For what?’
‘Oh, you know, for listening, for understanding. For being here.’
‘Tell you what,’ he says, leaning down to cup my face in his hands, not seeming to be bothered that the passengers opposite us probably think we’re about to join the mile-high club any minute.
‘What?’ I ask, smiling back at him, noses lightly brushing off each other.
‘Now that Christmas is over, what do you say to making this the single best New Year you’ve ever had?’
‘Now that is something I can drink to,’ I smile as he leans in to kiss me again. A long, sexy, tantalizing kiss this time, the kind that makes me wish we were all alone, just the two of us.
Hours into the flight, Mike dozes off and I just look out the window, staring at the clouds and somehow feeling closer to Mum than I have done in ages.
‘Thanks, Mum,’ I whisper. ‘For my miracle at Christmas.’
*
We touch down in JFK just after 6.30 p.m. and having collapsed into an exhausted snooze on the flight, Mike now seems perkier and back to himself. As we’re walking through baggage reclaim and customs he lightly slips his arm around me, full of chat about all the plans he’s made for us over the next few days.
‘So I thought we’d take a trip out to Brooklyn one day,’ he’s saying, just as we’re about to walk through customs and into the arrivals hall. ‘And of course, you’ve got to do the Staten Island ferry too; it gives you the most fantastic 360 degree view of the Statue of Liberty—’
‘That sounds fabulous!’ I smile happily, then trail off as soon as I realize that Mike has just spotted something or someone in the crowd waiting behind the barriers for new arrivals.
‘What is it, what’s up?’ I ask him, following his eyes to scan the sea of faces waiting on their loved ones beside private drivers all holding up signs with passengers’ names neatly printed on them.
Mike rolls his eyes in pretend annoyance then a warm, slow smile spreads across his face. And that’s when I first spot them too. Dorothy waiting patiently behind a barrier and beside her Harry, wearing a beanie and a fleece and carrying a home-made sign that reads, ‘WELCOME BACK TO NYC, HOLLY!’
Gut reaction? I honestly don’t know whether to burst into tears or else roar laughing. Instead though, I just run towards the pair of them and hug Dorothy so tightly I think there’s a fair chance I might snap the poor woman in two.
‘So now you see?’ she says, pulling back slightly and giving me that assessing look she has with the twinkly cornflower blue eyes. ‘I knew you’d be back to us, Holly. I’m never wrong about these things!’
We pile into a cab and go back to the McGillis’ apartment in the very same brownstone that I’ve been Googling and seeing plastered all over YouTube for the past agonizing few days. Astonishingly though, now that the family’s troubles seem to be all over bar the shouting, the atmosphere here is about as different as you could possibly imagine from when I was last here, barely one short week ago.
Dorothy seems almost completely back to her old feisty self again, bustling about, fussing over us all and rustling up the most delicious lamb chops for dinner. I’m in the kitchen under the guise of ‘helping’, though truth be told, really having a good old gossipy catch-up with her, while she serves me a gorgeous crisp glass of Sauvignon Blanc.
‘Darn nightmare while we were going through it, I don’t mind telling you, Holly,’ she says, working some kind of magic with dauphinoise potatoes that smell tantalizingly good from where I’m standing. ‘Do you realize there were photographers and cameras right outside the building some days? T
hank God for the good neighbours I got here though; they really rallied around and even brought in groceries for us, while Harry and I were cooped up here in our own home. Like prisoners, we were. It was unbelievable.’
‘I’m so sorry, that really is horrendous,’ I nod sympathetically.
‘You said it, honey. Although I will say this much, my buddy Doris from down the hallway here has started treating me like some kind a local celebrity. Apparently, I even got a little mention in the National Enquirer, can you believe it? Me? On a gossip page? Jeez, I thought, now I have an inkling of what it feels like to be Angelina Jolie.’
Even Harry, King of the Catfish himself, as he was labelled in countless press reports I read online, seems a little more like his old cheeky self now that the worst appears to have blown over.
‘So how does it feel to be arguably the most famous sixteen-year-old in the Tri-state area?’ I ask him over dinner. He flushes bright red, shoves a clumpful of thick black hair out of his eyes, folds his arms and shrugs.
‘Tell you one good thing that’s come out of it, if nothing else,’ he tells me with just a hint of a smirk.
‘Careful of what you say next, kiddo,’ Mike says, shooting him a warning look and waving a fork at him. ‘Bear in mind, after this episode, you’re under curfew till you turn forty—’
‘And until then, every woman that crosses the threshold of this apartment will be related to you,’ Dorothy smoothly finishes the sentence for him.
‘What I was about to say before I was so rudely interrupted,’ says Harry, mock offended, ‘is that ever since this whole thing first broke, now I got another three hundred new friend requests on Facebook and an extra two thousand followers on Twitter. It seems like I’m suddenly Mr Popular. Three girls in my school have all asked me what I’m doing next weekend, which can’t be bad. All I’m saying is that every cloud has a silver lining.’
It’s a gorgeously relaxing dinner where the family certainly seem to be well on their way to normality; you can tell by all the banter and joshing and teasing that’s as good as pinging around the table. My only slight concern is Mike, given that he’s just done two transatlantic flights back to back, the poor guy is disguising discreet yawns and almost swaying on his feet with exhaustion by now.
As soon as this surprise trip was sprung on me and after the initial shock had worn off, I made the gesture of pre-booking a room at the Roosevelt Hotel online; so after dinner, Mike offers to drop me back there in a cab. God love the guy, as we sit side by side in the back seat, his eyes actually have turned raw red from sheer knackeredness at this stage, though he’s not for one second letting on.
We’re holding hands, neither of us saying anything, but all I can think is, is this really it now? Crunch time? Is this really going to be our first night together? Because I want nothing more than for it to be magical and memorable and special … so is it better to maybe hold off till Mike’s had a chance to rest up a bit?
Turns out to be a stupid question really. We’re just about to turn off onto Madison Avenue where the hotel is, when he leans across to me in the back seat of the cab.
‘You know, Holly, if it’s not too cheeky to ask …’ he says, nuzzling against my neck in a way that makes me wish we were absolutely anywhere except stuck in the back of a cab.
‘Yes?’ I say hopefully, thinking askmeaskmeaskmeanything …
‘… Now of course it goes without saying, only if you wanted to …’
Whatever he comes out with next, the answer is already yes. Absolutely. I’m one hundred per cent up for it. Only wish I’d had a chance to get a leg wax in before I knew I was coming away, but sure what the hell, you can’t have everything.
‘… Yes …?’ I ask, trying to sound coy, and not like if I don’t get to leap on this fella inside the next three minutes, I swear, something inside me will actually implode. He’s still nuzzling up to my neck now, lightly kissing the tips of my earlobes, and it’s all I can do not to reach over and pull him down on top of me.
‘Well, it’s just that you’ve never seen my apartment,’ he smiles, pulling back a little. ‘And I’d love to show it to you. Purely from an architectural point of view, that is, you understand.’
He leans back now and starts playing absent-mindedly with the tail end of a tassel on the scarf that’s wrapped around my neck, all of a sudden acting all nonchalant and cool as you like.
‘Oh really?’ I ask teasingly, wishing to hell that he’d stop talking and just go back to kissing me instead.
‘It’s a 1930s art-deco building, you see,’ he says, mock seriously, the black eyes dancing across at me. ‘And I know how fascinating that particular period in architecture is to you. You’re always on about it.’
‘Oh am I now?’
‘There’s a particular piece of wall coving that might just interest you. And of course the rose plasterwork in the centre of the ceiling is well worth a look.’
‘Rose plasterwork sounds … ermm … fascinating.’
‘So what do you say? Maybe a little detour?’
‘I would have thought you might be exhausted? You were falling asleep over dinner after doing that awful flight back to back. I bet you practically feel like a flight attendant at this stage!’
‘Oh, Holly Johnson,’ he says, leaning down to really kiss me properly now. A hungry kiss too, deep and warm and getting more intense by the second. A kiss that I’m unlikely to forget, not for a very long time.
‘Not that tired. Never, ever that tired.’
Chapter Thirty-Eight
My last night in New York. Or as not just Mike, but all the McGillises keep reiterating, ‘my last night – for the moment’.
And a brief summation of the whole trip to date?
Trips to Liberty Island: 1. Which was incredible and an awful lot more moving than I could ever have possibly imagined. I was touched to tears when Mike drew my attention to an appeal for funds to help restore the Statue of Liberty.
‘This Grand Old Lady, who for over a hundred years has welcomed millions to America, now needs a little help herself.’
We both donated, generously too. Feck it, Lady Liberty needs it far more than we do.
Visits to the famous Magnolia Bakery in downtown Soho: 5. Sorry, but I just couldn’t help going back, and nor could Mike. True, he and I may disagree on the relative merits of the hummingbird pecan cupcake versus the red velvet one, but there’s precious little else that we haven’t seen eye to eye on during this trip.
Excursions to art galleries: 3. We even revisited the Guggenheim, the Met and MoMA. Anxious that I cram in as much as possible though, Mike insisted on taking me to the Whitney, the Frick and the famous New York Earth Room, which, I’m not joking, is a treasure trove of Damien Hirst and Andy Warhol gems, all housed in what looks like a regular Soho loft apartment. Where else but in New York?
Laughy, jokey, squabbly family meals with Dorothy and Harry all sitting around their big, oversized kitchen table: 4. OK, so not as many as we’d been asked to but, well … let’s just say Mike and I got sidetracked back at his apartment and leave the rest to the – ahem – imagination.
Number of nights that I ended up spending in my hotel: zero.
Enough said.
Romantic meals out, just the two of us: 1. I know, laughably pathetic considering how coupled up he and I have been this whole trip, but just to explain, back in Mike’s gorgeous ‘bachelor pad’, as he insists on referring to it, time after time we’d end up lying side by side together in bed, limbs and sheets all tangled up in one big lazy, huddled mess and the conversation would go thusly:
Mike: ‘Dinner. That’s what you and I should do. We’re the only couple I know who never seem to go out to dinner together. An ordinary, normal dinner somewhere relaxed and informal downtown, that’s exactly what we need.’
Me: ‘Hmm. Sounds … interesting.’
Then just as I’d be about to haul myself out of bed and head for the shower, he’d lazily pull me back by the wai
st, lightly kiss me just on the back of my neck, and murmur something like, ‘But then, on second thoughts, it is well below freezing outside—’
Me: ‘It’s certainly cold, alright—’
Mike: ‘So maybe we could order in and stay just where we are?’
Need I say any more?
And now, it’s really over. My wonderful week of sex and talking and the odd touristy thing and snatched, blissful time with Dorothy and Harry really is properly over. I’m flying home tomorrow, back to my brand new job at Channel Six, back to my flat, to life with Joy, Dermot and all the gang, back to reality.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m beside myself with excitement about the future and all that it holds. It’s just that there’s a tug at my heart at the thought of leaving New York behind, at leaving the McGillises behind, and of course there’s the small matter of Mike himself – but now that it’s finally come to crunch time, I barely find myself even able to articulate the end of that sentence.
We’ve arranged to have brunch tomorrow with Dorothy and Harry, so I can say goodbye properly, or as Mike keeps insisting, ‘goodbye, for now’. So tonight we’ve got all to ourselves.
He’s highly secretive about where we’re going though. All I know is that he’s spent scarily long periods of time out on the balcony of his apartment on his cell phone all day, completely clamming up whenever I ask him what the feck is going on.
Anyway, wherever it is, I’m all dressed up like a kipper for the night, in a figure-hugging black number courtesy of Cos that I borrowed from Joy, with my good black lacy underwear on underneath, just in case things get hot and heavy in the cab on our way home. Well, it’s happened to us before and there’s no harm in being prepared, is there?
I automatically assume we’re going out to dinner, though Mike is still giving absolutely nothing away, and I only get suspicious when we’re just about to get into our taxi and he says that he’s got something unusual to ask me.
‘What’s that?’ I ask, puzzled, as I clamber into the back of the cab.
Mike winks at the taxi driver, then produces a long, silk scarf from the pocket of his coat. A goodbye gift? I’m wondering. And if it is, isn’t it a bit odd that it’s not wrapped?
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