The flight attendant arrived with Dustin’s drink. She placed it on a small paper napkin on the tray in front of him.
‘Are you going to see someone? In the States?’ Dustin said. He stirred the ice around his drink with a short plastic straw. ‘Family?’
‘My daughter,’ Frank said. ‘And my granddaughter.’
Dustin waited for Frank to ask him what it was that caused him to be travelling alone so that he could tell him about his life as a spy or an assassin. Frank would then have to return with something about arthritis or being cold. He watched the flight attendant walking down the aisle of the plane and remembered something.
‘She wanted to be an air hostess, stewardess, flight attendant,’ Frank said, correcting himself twice. ‘My daughter, that is. She used to put her school blazer on and do her tie up like a . . .’ he mimed something that was similar to Oliver Hardy playing with his tie. ‘Like one of those silk scarves they wear. She’d serve me and my wife tea from a wheelie trolley and show us where the exits were and how to put on a life jacket.’
Frank had forgotten about Beth wanting to be an air hostess. When she left school she was going to study modern languages and geography at college and apply for a job with one of the big airlines.
‘And what did she do? When she left school? Your daughter?’ Dustin said. ‘British Airways or Pan Am?’
Frank thought for a moment.
‘She worked in an office for the London Underground,’ he said, only now realizing the irony.
‘They grow up fast, don’t they?’ Dustin said. ‘I’ve got four. Girl twenty-two, boy nineteen, twin girls sixteen,’ he said as if he was reciting the deaths of the six wives of Henry VIII.
‘They do,’ Frank said, and, because they now had something in common as two family men travelling a long distance alone, he told Dustin about the first time that Beth had put on her school uniform and about how he was proud and also amused, because his tiny daughter looked so funny, but also how he’d had such a deep feeling of sadness.
‘I quite literally didn’t know whether to laugh or cry,’ Frank said.
Seeing his daughter standing in the kitchen in her brand new school uniform was a marker of the beginning of the end of their father-and-daughter trips to the zoo and the cinema for Frank. She would be too cool soon or too heavy to stand on his feet and hold on to his hands while he walked her around the room. He wouldn’t be able to follow Beth up the stairs any more, pretending to break into a run to chase her, making her scream and laugh in the same breath as she tried to escape. Because it would seem weird for both of them.
Frank looked at the TV screen to see the film credits scrolling down. He’d missed the ending. Somebody behind him was kicking his seat. He navigated back to the map to see how the tiny aeroplane was progressing. It had moved about an inch along the dotted line and was somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean heading towards Greenland. Although ordinarily being able to go for hours without needing to use the toilet was right up there with his appreciation of Abba, his long hair and grasp of new technology in making him the enigmatic eighty-two-year-old that he was, Frank really needed to go to the toilet.
10
The scale of the seat-back map was too large to show any further movement as the plane began its final descent into Los Angeles. Frank watched the lights from the cars on the highway far down below. He could see nondescript buildings, nothing that he recognized from any film or travel brochure, and what he presumed was the outskirts of Los Angeles – LAX’s Hounslow and Hillingdon, Uxbridge and Staines.
He appeared relaxed. He didn’t grip the armrest when the plane started to shake, or stare at the back of the seat in front to try and hypnotize himself into calmness when the plane touched the tarmac and the pilot slammed on the brakes so hard that Frank felt his false teeth move. And when they were taxiing towards the arrivals gate and the same passengers who couldn’t wait to get on the plane at Heathrow ignored the flight attendant’s instructions and unfastened their seat belts and switched their phones on, Frank followed Dustin’s lead. There was no hurry. Less haste more speed. Relax. While other passengers rushed to get their hand luggage out of the overhead lockers Frank looked positively Zen.
Inside he was having kittens.
What if he didn’t make it through customs?
What if his suitcase was lost?
What if Beth wasn’t waiting for him?
What if she’d forgotten that he was coming?
What if Beth was there but didn’t recognize him?
What if he didn’t recognize her?
What if during the flight there had been a coup in Fullwind-on-Sea and he wasn’t allowed to leave the airport, like Tom Hanks in Terminal?
The door at the front of the plane opened and everyone started to shuffle down the aisle towards it. Dustin stood up and Frank gathered his belongings together. He took the bag of complimentary items the flight attendant had given him at the start of the flight out of the seat pocket: the eye mask, earplugs, socks, toothpaste and toothbrush and a charity envelope (even at thirty thousand feet off the ground they’d managed to find him). He offered the toothbrush to Dustin.
‘I do mine in a glass of water,’ Frank said.
Dustin put the toothbrush in the top pocket of his suit jacket.
‘Have a good holiday,’ he said. ‘I hope it’s not too hot for you.’
Frank thanked him even though he hated always being asked whether he was hot or cold, tired or confused. He wished Dustin luck with his new media sales conference, because that was what he did; he wasn’t a hit man or a private eye. Frank stood up. He felt like he’d been folded in half in an airing cupboard for a month. He put a hand on each side of his waist and pressed his thumbs into his lower back and straightened himself out. He took his bag down from the overhead locker. He checked his passport was in the front pocket of his shirt and then made his way to the front of the plane, letting a couple of passengers get between him and Dustin to avoid awkwardly having to say hello again so soon after they’d said goodbye.
He walked through Premium and through Upper Class – which looked like the morning after a businessmen’s sleepover. There were newspapers, pillows, disposable eye masks and headphones left on the seats and thrown on the floor between the seats. You can’t buy class, Frank thought.
He said goodbye to the flight attendants and they wished him a pleasant stay. He stepped out of the plane and onto the walkway between the plane and the terminal building, which deprived him of the Beatles moment at the top of the aircraft steps that he’d been hoping for, and, after a lot of queuing and walking, he made it through immigration and into the United States of America where he collected his suitcase and carried it through customs.
He looked for Beth in the busy airport and suddenly felt overwhelmed. He was lost and alone in a way that he hadn’t been at Heathrow. He looked around the airport at the people arriving and leaving, meeting friends, hugging each other and sharing out the burden of their luggage. He hoped that he might see Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, who could at least show him how to use a pay phone if he couldn’t find Beth. He had her telephone number and address in his address book, which was in the front pocket of his overnight bag. He could always get a taxi. Or a bus. Could he even walk? He had no idea how far from the airport Beth lived or how big Los Angeles was. She could live a hundred miles away or just around the corner. If he called out her name she might have heard him from her kitchen or garden.
He thought for a moment that he saw Beth. But she was far too young. She waved. She was so Beth-like. It was Laura. It had to be Laura. Of course. She was so much like her mother. Even though Laura was obviously younger and her hair and clothes were no doubt different to her mother’s, the similarity and hence the familiarity for Frank was palpable. She was dressed in black jeans and T-shirt, with black Converse shoes and brown hair that was so dark that it was almost blacker than actual black. All the colour was in her eyes; one was blue and the other was green with a
swirl of brown and yellow like the inside of a marble or cream poured on coffee. Laura’s mismatched eyes were the result of a recent cycling accident; that was as much as Frank knew and although Beth had described them to Frank before, it hadn’t prepared him. It was like watching the Hollywood production of a radio play, filmed in glorious Technicolor. Frank tried not to stare or mouth the word ‘wow’.
They hugged. Frank’s shirt of many colours was a firework display on the night sky of Laura’s black T-shirt. His trousers, meanwhile, were quite literally a desert storm.
‘Mom’s sorry,’ Laura said in the midst of the hug. ‘She didn’t think she’d get away from work in time. So you’ve got me.’ They parted and Laura said, ‘Shall we go to the car?’
‘All right,’ Frank said, keeping his thought that she was still ten years old and too young to drive to himself.
‘Shall I get a trolley for your luggage?’ she said.
‘All right,’ Frank said, not sure that it was a question. Laura spoke with the same monotone voice that he knew from the telephone, only without the distance or the crackle of his old BT line. He was so used to the crackle that it had become part of her voice and hearing her now in person was like listening to a CD of a song that he’d only ever heard on a scratched vinyl record. He was surprised how nervous he felt seeing Laura in person after all their email exchanges. It was like meeting a lifelong pen pal for the first time.
Laura came back with a trolley and together they lifted Frank’s suitcase onto it. He put the overnight bag on top.
‘I need to go to the cargo building,’ he said.
‘Okay,’ Laura said.
‘I’ve got to pick something up.’
‘Uh huh.’
‘It was going to be a surprise for your mother.’
‘Will it fit in the car?’ Laura asked, seemingly unconcerned or uninterested in what ‘it’ was.
‘Oh yes,’ Frank said. ‘Do you know where to go?’ He showed her a piece of paper with the address on.
‘I think we need to drive there,’ she said.
With Laura pushing the trolley they started walking to the car lot.
‘I didn’t realize Beth was back at work?’ Frank said.
‘Yep.’
In the car lot Laura pressed a key fob and the headlights of a black (naturally) car flashed. The car was so small and close to the ground that Frank wondered whether they’d even fit his overnight bag into it.
‘I’ll pop the trunk,’ Laura said. It was the most American thing that Frank had ever heard outside of a film.
Laura put the suitcase in the small boot space and they both climbed into the front seat of the car. When Frank moved his head his hair brushed the roof. It was a sports car or a coupé. There was a rear seat but it was more of a parcel shelf and Frank couldn’t imagine anyone larger than a box of tissues sitting there.
‘It’s less like a Tardis than I was expecting,’ he said.
‘What’s that?’ Laura asked.
‘Your car. It’s small on the inside too.’
‘It’s Jimmy’s,’ Laura said. ‘He left it behind.’ She typed the cargo building address into the sat nav and they drove out of the parking lot and into heavy airport traffic. The roads widened with every turn or fork and then the traffic cleared. Laura switched the radio on.
‘Is that too loud?’ she said.
Frank said that it was fine, even though he had to practically shout it.
‘Is this a song you like?’ he said.
‘This?’ Laura said. ‘It’s okay.’
‘What sort of music do you like?’ Frank said.
‘Good music.’ She named a few bands and singers that Frank had never heard of.
‘I don’t think I know any of those,’ he said. ‘But I like good music as well, so maybe I’d like them too.’
‘They’re all pretty loud,’ Laura said.
‘I’m going a bit deaf. They’d probably sound a lot quieter to me.’ The radio DJ back-announced the previous two songs and introduced the next one. Frank didn’t recognize any of those bands either. ‘I suppose everything can be a bit loud if you turn it up,’ Frank said.
‘It can be really loud.’ Laura’s emphasis of the word ‘really’ was an uncharacteristic break from her almost hypnotic monotone. She seemed keen to defend the high volume of the music that she liked.
It was around two miles to the cargo building and all the way there Frank had to stop himself from shouting Billboard! Cop car! Yellow school bus! Chevy! Cadillac! Stars and Stripes flag! U-Haul truck! They drove along the widest roads that he’d ever seen: he counted eight lanes on one. Some of the roads were lined by the tallest palm trees and then there were the names on the road signs and the interchanges, the boulevards, the hotels, the huge metal LAX sign, the music on the radio, the disc jockeys, the side of the road they were driving on and his granddaughter – everything was so American.
‘I think this is the place,’ Laura said. The sat nav confirmed it and she turned off the road and parked outside the cargo building. The trucks outside the building were big and long; they were trucks that would form convoys. The drivers would spit tobacco out of the window and warn other truck drivers of speed traps and cop cars over their CB radios.
They went inside the building and found the correct place. Frank showed his documents to a woman who was made up like Joan or Jackie Collins. She was standing behind a counter almost as high as her hair. She called Frank ‘honey’. The woman went through an open door at the back of the office and, after a minute or so, she returned carrying a plastic box. She put the box on the counter and asked Frank for his passport. While she filled out a form, Frank looked through the grille in the door on the front of the plastic box and he saw the same inscrutable, impenetrable, unchangeable but recognizable face looking back at him:
And where the bloody hell do you think you’ve been?
11
Laura seemed to be completely unfazed by Frank flying halfway across the world with a cat. While the woman with the Joan or Jackie hair completed some paperwork, Laura looked in through the grille at the front of the cat box.
‘Is that Bill?’ she said. ‘You brought Bill. Do you want any candy?’
She walked across the room to a vending machine and made her selection. Her phone rang. Frank recognized the ringtone from a Disney cartoon. He would have expected a loud rock guitar riff.
‘Hi, Mom. Yes. We’re just collecting something. No, we’re still at the airport. No, it was on time. Do you want to speak to him? Okay. We shouldn’t be too long now. Bye.’
Laura ended the phone call and threaded another dollar bill into the vending machine.
‘What shall I get you, Frank?’ she called out.
He looked over at the machine and he chose a Milky Way as it was the only thing that he thought he recognized. Joan or Jackie Collins handed him both his and Bill’s passports. Laura came over and gave Frank a Milky Way.
‘That was Mom,’ she said. ‘She can’t wait to see you. She didn’t want to speak to you on the phone because it would spoil the moment.’ She rolled her eyes as if to show how soppy she thought her mother was.
‘How is she today?’ Frank said.
Laura thought for a moment. ‘Sandra Bullock,’ she said.
‘Which is good, isn’t it?’ Frank said.
Laura nodded. She looked at the two passports Frank was holding – one human and one pet.
‘Does Bill have a photograph?’ she said.
Frank showed her the blank space on the pet passport where the photograph would have been. Laura seemed disappointed. The pet passport photograph had been optional and Frank had left it blank. Getting Bill to sit high enough and still enough on the stool in the photo booth at the big Sainsbury’s probably would have proved impossible. Getting him to pull the correct neutral expression, however, would have been a lot easier. Bill had a face for passports.
Flying a cat to America wasn’t cheap, but Frank didn’t want to leave Bill
behind and he couldn’t put him in a cattery. Not again. He wasn’t sure that Bill had ever fully forgiven him for the last time. When Frank had found out that Kelly Christmas – who brought in the light and the motivation to put his teeth in – was allergic to cats, he was terrified that she might sneeze and not come to see him any more. And so Frank had put Bill into a cat’s home for a month. It was an act of betrayal towards his friend that Frank didn’t want to repeat.
To get Bill on the flight Frank had to have him micro-chipped, vaccinated against rabies and certified as fit to travel by a vet who must surely have been one of the richest men in Fullwind. Bill’s plane ticket was more expensive than Frank’s and he’d needed to be in a plastic travel box that was ventilated, lockable and large enough for Bill to be able to stand up, turn around and lie down in. Bill had more legroom on the plane than Frank.
Frank thanked the woman behind the counter and he walked back to the car with Laura who carried the cat box. At the car Frank held the box while Laura tipped the front seat forward and squeezed the box onto the backseat.
‘Will he be okay back there?’ Laura said.
‘As long as we don’t try to swing him.’
‘Mom says that about our house. Why would anyone swing a cat?’
‘I think it’s a Navy saying.’
‘Were you in the Navy?’
‘No.’ Frank expected Laura to start asking questions about the war and his role in it but they never came. At last, a generation that wasn’t interested.
They climbed into the car. Laura selected the ‘home’ preset on the sat nav and they pulled out of the parking lot. They didn’t speak all that much on the drive to Santa Monica. Frank was suddenly very tired. He looked out of the window. More boulevards, highways and freeways, liquor stores, gun shops and drive-thrus and barely a single pedestrian apart from an old homeless man pushing a shopping trolley full of old TV sets past a KFC. He was hungry. He tore open the wrapper of the Milky Way and bit into it.
‘Oh,’ he said. He put his hand to his jaw. ‘This Milky Way is a Mars bar.’ He removed the chocolate bar from his mouth and looked at the layer of chewy caramel that had almost torn the dentures from his mouth.
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