by Jen Malone
Okay, time to shake this. Who needed a movie star when I was living out my own fantasy? I leaned over to Mom and said, “Hey, do you think that’s the Tower of London?”
Mom smiled in response. “We sure aren’t in Kansas anymore, huh?”
“Or Georgia,” I told her, with a grin of my own.
When we arrived at our hotel, we were deposited at the back entrance, which seemed sort of unnecessary since we were three completely unrecognizable people. Being escorted through the laundry room felt even more excessive. Had Graham passed this way a few minutes ahead of us, and if so, was he lurking somewhere?
Settling into our room, Mom pulled out the schedule so she could see what our next call time was. We had two hours before we needed to leave for the first event: a department store appearance to launch Graham’s new line of body sprays. I had no idea what a body spray launch would consist of, but at least I knew what time I’d be seeing Graham next if he didn’t text. Oh, this was so not good. I should have been thinking about Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, and the Shard building. Not about a certain shaggy-haired, hazel-eyed, left-cheek-dimpled movie star.
And what was all that noise?
I yanked open the heavy silk curtains and peered out the window at the street below. Oh, holy wow! About three hundred screaming girls crammed every square inch of the sidewalk surrounding the hotel entrance and spilled over into the street. Four bellmen in fancy uniforms were maintaining a fragile velvet rope line to keep the actual door from being hammered in. The two bellmen whose faces I could see at that moment looked mere seconds away from a panic attack. About a dozen of the girls had signs of Graham’s face mounted on sticks that they could wave above everyone’s heads. There was another contingent wearing “Future Mrs. Cabot” T-shirts. One girl sat on someone’s shoulders in the skimpiest bikini top known to mankind. The third bellman was having trouble focusing his attention on anything else. Most of the girls were either chanting Graham’s name or screaming like they were at a rock concert instead of on a London sidewalk in the middle of a sunny afternoon.
Suddenly every face turned up to my window and the girls starting clutching at their hearts and screaming even louder, if that was possible. One fainted. What the—
Then I realized they weren’t looking at me, but above me. Watching their faces below clued me in to the likely action above, which was a glimpse of the one and only object of their—and more disturbingly, apparently my—affection.
“Mom, you gotta see this.”
She peeked over my shoulder and gasped at the sight below.
I yanked the window as far open as it would go, which was only a foot or so, but wide enough that I could hear the screams magnified and just make out a buttery, now-familiar voice above my head.
“Ladies, thank you so incredibly much for the warm London welcome! You are the best fans anywhere!”
Screams, heart clutches, another fainter.
“As much as I love your attention, I’m hearing that the neighbors and the other guests aren’t adoring it quite as much. Crazy, right?”
I could just picture the conspiratorial sideways grin and as much as I wanted to groan, I also secretly thrilled at the image of it in my head.
“So listen, let’s work together here. You ladies leave the sidewalk and instead we’ll meet up over at Harrods in a few hours’ time. I promise I’ll have a chance to see all of you there. Win-win for everyone. Okay, girls? Please? You’d do that for me, wouldn’t you?”
The guy had charm in buckets and I could see on the faces of the girls below that each and every one of them felt he was talking just to her. He was good. Too good.
And I needed to keep reminding myself of that.
I tossed my offensively quiet cell phone onto my bed and slid the window shut.
When Mom and I emerged from the lobby an hour and a half later, most of the crowd had cleared out. About thirty girls remained and each one turned breathlessly toward the door we pushed open. Their disappointment at seeing it was just us did wonders for the ego. Then again, I felt their pain. I was feeling the same churning anticipation they were, especially knowing I actually would be seeing Graham in a few minutes’ time. That emotion was coupled with total disgust that I would even let myself feel any of those things for freaking Graham Cabot. What the hell was happening to logical, practical, measured-response me?
Skimpy bikini girl had apparently relocated, so we were able to catch the bellman’s eye easily and he flagged down a fancy London taxi for us. We closed the shiny black door on the stalker brigade and headed through the city. Destination: Harrods.
But a few moments after our taxi driver informed us we were “Getting close, luvs” in his proper British accent, he suddenly slowed to a crawl to make way for masses of people swarming in the same direction we were headed. Correction, masses of girls.
“Blimey, they’ve lost the plot!” proclaimed the cab driver, grabbing his cell phone off the passenger’s seat, which was really the driver’s seat in my book. The whole driving on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car thing was too weird.
He talked into his cell for a second and then turned around and draped one arm over the back of the seat to talk to us.
“Sorry, but apparently there’s a one-off up ahead and it’s a bit dodgy from here.”
I glanced at Mom, who shrugged at me.
“Er, pardon?” Mom asked.
The driver looked at us for a second and then laughed. “Sorry. What I’m saying is there’s some kind of event up at Harrods and I’m going to have to get you all sorted back here and leave you out. It’s only two blocks up, but I can’t make my way through!”
Mom peered over the front seat to get a total due.
“Fifteen quid, please, luv,” he said.
Mom handed over a twenty and waited for change, while I joined the stream of girls on the sidewalk. Once Mom was out, we allowed ourselves to get swept along toward the massive department store, where everyone appeared to be headed.
I had a bad feeling about this.
If the building that housed Harrods was in any other city, it would be used for important government offices or maybe even double for royalty’s city residences or something, but in the middle of London, the ornate building that took up a whole city block was all about shopping, shopping, and more shopping. Only, today it seemed to be all about hosting the entire female population of the city.
We were supposed to have been dropped at the loading docks, with instructions to meet Graham by the door for a quick nose powder, and we had to stop multiple policemen to point us in the direction of the correct area as we approached Harrods. Naturally, we had to turn and push against the crowd to reach it. Which was pure madness. It felt like we were trying to get into a baseball stadium two minutes after the final out.
My suspicions were confirmed when I spotted the high concentration of Graham Cabot faces coming at me in T-shirt form. I know Britain spawned Beatlemania and all, but this kind of turnout to a stupid body spray launch was truly unbelievable.
When we finally discovered the loading dock, the police had it on such tight lockdown that only a chance spotting of Melba in the shadow of a parked delivery truck saved our afternoon. She rushed over to vouch for us.
“Thank God you made it! We’re still waiting on the people from Harrods to clear a path for us inside the store. We’ve let them know we’re outta here if they can’t guarantee Graham’s safety.”
Mom and I were just grateful to step from the elbow-jamming streets into the cavernous calm of the loading dock. I tried my best not to be obvious about peering around for a glimpse of Graham, but I didn’t spot him anywhere. That mystery was solved when he stepped out of a plain black sedan that was partly obscured behind the delivery truck.
I had wondered which version of Graham I would get this afternoon—flirty or subdu
ed—but what I didn’t expect was majorly rude Graham. He sent the most cursory of looks in my direction, coupled with a grim attempt at a smile, and turned his back on me. Like, completely.
Had I totally made up the entire scene from the plane? The one where he held my hand and my eyes as we made our descent? That Graham rubbed circles in my palm and called me Pickles. This Graham just made a face when he saw me as if he’d bitten into one of those pickles.
Okay, Annie, it’s on, I told myself. Two could most definitely play at this game. I made myself unusually busy getting out hair product to hand to Mom and when she motioned Graham over, I acted as if I had something extremely engaging to look at on my phone. He and Mom exchanged niceties, but not once did he offer a word or a glance in my direction. Fine by me. I reminded myself what I was really tagging along for—well, aside from the fact that Mom would never have left me back home—and that was architecture. Immediately following this estrogen fest, I was heading out to explore the city. With the majority of its female population here, I should have London mostly to myself.
Before long, an older man and three younger women in clearly expensive business suits emerged from inside the store and powwowed with Melba and the studio executive. There was lots of nodding before Melba came over to us and spoke to Graham.
“They’re ready for you now. There’s a rope line pathway to the fragrance department and they’ve lined it with constables as well as the store’s security unit. That said, Graham, if it’s anything like what happened in Tokyo, we’re gonna have you out of there as fast as possible. I need you to tell me you’re okay with this.”
Er, what the hell happened in Tokyo? Graham, or at least the part of him I could see from the very corner of my eye since I refused to look at him, shook out his shoulders and arms like a prizefighter getting ready to enter the ring and said “No sweat” to Melba. Roddy took his place at Graham’s side and the Harrods people formed the front of the line.
Mom and I hung back, unsure whether to go along or stay, until Melba gestured us toward the caboose position. Guess she was anticipating a shiny-face emergency or something. We filed through the door and into the most chaos I’ve ever witnessed up close. A store employee in a bright green Harrods coat held a megaphone and was using it to speak over the screaming masses. “Make way, ladies. Make way, please.”
The aisle the store had cleared was wide enough for two people to walk side by side to start, but narrowed by pushing bodies as we moved slowly through the store. Every few feet, Roddy had to shield Graham from a line jumper.
Something I now knew firsthand? High-pitched screams in contained spaces = supremely irritating. In addition to demanding hazard pay for jet lag from middle-of-the-night flight times, I was now adding hearing damage to that list.
Plus, I was getting petted as I trailed the line. Like I was a pony or something. People’s arms were coming at me from all directions, grabbing at my shirt or just stroking my back, simply because I was part of the whole entourage. It was the weirdest thing ever.
I was freaking out a little, but Graham looked one hundred percent in his element. He was calm, relaxed, and oozed charm. He smiled and waved and even blew kisses as he walked, and his clingy navy cashmere sweater and rolled-up khakis made him look more charmingly British schoolboy than friggin’ Harry Potter.
Asswaffle.
It was like he had some on/off switch, and I was all too aware of how easily the off switch flipped.
It took us five solid minutes to make our way from the loading dock to the fragrance department. Fortunately it was on the ground floor because I really couldn’t imagine squeezing our traveling circus onto an escalator or into an elevator. When we reached the center, Graham stopped in front of a stacked display of hundreds of bottles of his body spray, Teen Spirit. I snorted. I bet half the girls in here had never heard of Nirvana and their Smells Like Teen Spirit album. I only knew it because Dad had the CD on repeat in his car. I shuddered. I didn’t want to think about Dad right now. Much easier to make fun of Graham.
He was making it easy too, posing with a cardboard cutout of himself. I could only imagine the catfight that was going to erupt over who got to cart that thing home on the Tube with them.
I backed a little too close to the edge of the cordoned-off area, and before I knew it, a girl was grabbing my arm.
“Oh my God, are you with Graham?” she asked me, bouncing in place as she spoke.
“In a manner of speaking,” I answered. She did not pick up on my sarcasm.
“I fancy him so much my heart hurts,” she told me earnestly. “We’re meant to be. I was born at 7:07 p.m. on March eighth and he was born at 8:08 p.m. on April ninth. I camped outside last night with my mum just to get inside the store. Please, you have to give this to him.”
I paused to give her a puzzled look while untangling my arm from her grip and accepting the painting she passed over the rope line to me. She was probably only a few years younger than me, with shiny hair and a friendly smile. And she was really pretty. Why wasn’t she out getting to know a real guy? I pushed down the thought that followed, which was Why wasn’t I? Was I no better than this fangirl, getting all dewy over some guy who only existed the way she wanted him to in her head?
I couldn’t believe anyone would waste a beautiful afternoon (especially when I was told they were in short supply in London), much less give up a warm bed and then fight insane crowds, all to stare at some guy across a wall of policemen. Constables. Whatever they were called here.
I looked down at the painting in my hand. It was good. It was a portrait of Graham and she’d captured his lazy grin perfectly. I was opening my mouth to tell her so when, all of a sudden and out of nowhere, something—actually a bunch of somethings—came sailing through the air and clocked me on the head.
Others were getting hit too and screams rang through the store.
Oh my God, was this a terrorist attack? Was it shrapnel? What was happening right now?!
I shoved the painting back at the girl, who was also screaming, covered my head with my hands, and crouched down, right as an avalanche of something hit like an explosion. I moved my elbows to the side of my head just enough so I could peer at the spent projectiles on the ground.
Pistachios? What the—
Someone who has never been ambushed with tiny nuts might not believe me, but it hurt a surprising amount. And actually . . . it was scary. What was scarier was the surge of the crowd pushing against the flimsy velvet ropes as panic set in all around us. The girls who had been screaming Graham’s name were now screaming in terror and the fun, kind of campy atmosphere of the event before now turned chilling. I could see this situation turning very bad, very fast.
Still in my crouch and laying claim to the tiny strip of a path still left, I moved along the aisle, trying to get to Mom, while still protecting my face with my arms. I caught a glimpse ahead of policemen/constables/whatever-they-were-called sheltering Graham with actual shields. Or maybe they had a different name for the riot gear things they were holding out in front of him. In a scene out of one of Graham’s action movies, everyone started moving at once in the direction of the doors.
With little regard for anything in their path, the wave of people crashed directly into the towering stack of body sprays, which crashed to the ground in an alarming smash that left the whole first floor bathed in something that gave a whole new meaning to “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” It could have been funny, would maybe even be funny by the time I told the story to Wynn later, but that meant getting out of here safe and sound and I wasn’t entirely sure that was going to happen. I pulled my shirt over my nose as a new shower of pistachios arced across the heads of the crowd and new screams erupted. This was the crazy stuff soccer matches made the news for and I was positive I didn’t want to be killed in the Great Perfumed Pistachio Trample of London.
Someone—I don’t even know who because
I didn’t dare raise my head at this point—wrapped strong arms around me from behind and gently lifted me to my feet, before tucking me under their shoulder and racing us along the route we’d just taken from the loading dock. We were moving against the crowd’s surge and for a while everything was just a blur of body parts pushing at my torso, pistachios pelting my head, and Teen Spirit watering my eyes.
And then it was quiet. Blissfully, jarringly quiet.
We’d pushed through the exit and onto the loading dock, the muscled arm around my shoulders moving me quickly through the doorway to make way for the others racing behind us. I spun back in time to see Roddy shove through behind us and slam the door closed on a crowd of girls. He planted his full weight into keeping it secured. It wasn’t until then that I collected myself enough to take stock of my protector.
Graham Cabot.
He kept his hands on my shoulders as he studied my face. His eyes locked on mine and oozed concern as he asked, “Are you okay?” through erratic breaths.
Adrenaline surged through my bloodstream and my pulse refused to slow. Still out of breath myself, I asked, “What just happened?”
He grimaced and dropped his hands from my shoulders to my hips. “Hold on, I’ll explain in one sec.”
For a moment he ignored me as he followed along with Melba’s head count to make sure everyone was accounted for. I frantically searched the faces to make sure Mom was with us. She was.
As soon as Graham turned back to me, I asked again, “What the hell was that about?”
He gave me the tiniest of grins, almost bashful, before shrugging and answering, “Haven’t you seen any of my movies?”
“Uh . . . ,” I started. I had. I’d seen them all with Wynn, right up to Triton. She would have divorced me as a best friend if I hadn’t.
“My famous line? Surely you know it,” Graham prodded.