by Amy Muscat
She shakes her head at me, but lifts her hand and places the food into her mouth. I wait with baited breathe for her reaction.
She chews a couple of times, and then…
“Mmm…” She moans. “So good.”
“Told ya so,” I gloat, digging into my own food.
We’re at Exmouth market, about ten minutes from the London Eye (Hayley’s first place on her list to visit). And as I sit here eating good ol’ British food, I feel a pang of homesickness slice through me. I've missed this place. London, that is. But I'm also missing New York, and it’s only been a day since I left.
Or maybe it’s the man I left behind in New York that I miss the most…
I still haven’t heard from Blake, and it’s pissing me off big time. I have both called and texted him countless times, and the prick still hasn’t answered me. It was all a little too childish for my liking. I mean, I know people have arguments, but Jesus! Talk about being stubborn.
He hasn’t even texted me to ask if I landed okay. Anything could have happened to me by now: car accident hit by a bus, plane crash– okay, that’s a little too far-fetched, but you never know!
Well, fuck him. If he wants to carry on being a wanker, then that’s up to him. He doesn’t know how stubborn I can be.
“Hey, Lott's? Are you okay?”
I look up at Hayley’s question. “Yeah, I'm fine, why?” I say, shaking off the angry thoughts.
“You just looked, erm… you looked–”
“Pissed off? Angry?” I help her out.
“Yeah,” she whispers, tilting her head, and pushing her black-framed glasses back up her nose as they start to fall down.
“Sorry. I'm just thinking about some… things. Problems that I've left back in New York. I shouldn’t; today is meant to be a fun day. Today is not about me, it’s about you seeing London. So don’t worry about me, Hales, I'm fine. Let's eat up and go exploring.”
“Okay, if you're sure…”
“Definitely.” I nod.
She nods, too, and we hurry to eat our food before we go and see what London offers.
“WOW! THAT’S BUCKINGHAM Palace! I wonder if the Queen is home?” Hayley says in wonder.
“She is,” I tell her.
“How’d you know?” She asks curiously, her eyes sparkling.
“She’s up at the window, Hales,” I say pointing to the window with a massive smirk on my face.
“Oh. My. God! Where? Lottie where? I can’t see, what window?” She asks excitedly, flapping her arms around.
I'm literally going to pee my knickers. The sight of Hayley shooting her head side to side, looking at every window trying to see what isn’t there. She’s scanning the whole of the palace, waiting to see the Queen at the window. As I start laughing, it’s then that Hayley notices I was joking. I don’t think she finds it as funny as me, though.
“Lottie! That’s not funny; I really thought I was going to see her,” she pouts.
I grin. “Aw Hales, it was only a joke, I didn’t think you’d take it seriously. But seriously, she is in.”
“Really? How’d you know– and no joking this time.”
“The flags up.” I point out. At her confused look, I explain. “When the Royal Standard flag is flying; it means that the Queen is home, and when the Union Jack is flying, it means that she’s not home.”
“No way! That’s awesome. Come on; let’s go take some pictures. I want to see if I can get one of the guards to smile,” she grins.
I shake my head, chuckling at her. You can always spot a tourist.
We cross the street, almost getting run over by a black taxi in the process, and after sticking my middle finger up to him, we’re standing at the gates of Buckingham Palace.
“Whoa! It’s so big… so beautiful.”
“Yes, it is,” I say in agreement to her statement because it is. The whole thing is beautiful, from the flowers outside to the brickwork, the building, the significance of the palace, and even the guards pull off the Beauty.
Spectacular.
We end up doing a bunch of selfies, Hayley tried (and failed) to make one of the guards laugh.
Then Hayley thought it was a good idea to go and take a bus tour. Kill. Me. Now.
Four hours, and three thousand pictures, later we had done the bus tour, been to Selfridges, shopped, gawked at the prices of some things– £13.95 for a slice of cheesecake. We each bought a selfie stick, a couple of outfits, and then we had gone and gotten some pub lunch.
Now we were on our way back to the train station; Hayley had somehow persuaded me to take the tube today. Public transport and I were not friend’s… maybe that was why I never took the subway in New York.
We’re two minutes from Bond Street Station when my phone chimes. I pull it out from my blue Michael Kors bag and see that Peyton is FaceTiming me.
Happy, I press accept. My face appears on the screen and then I see Peyton's grin flash at me.
“Hi!” I chip.
“Hey.”
“What are you up too?” I ask her.
“Nothing, I just thought I’d call my bestie, and see how she was doing.” She says to me.
“Don’t lie, you wanted me to show you London, didn’t you?” I say narrowing my eyes at her.
She starts laughing and I know I'm right. The bitch, I think fondly. Still giggling, she states, “No I really did want to speak to you… but I would like you to show me a bit of London… you might as well as we’re on the phone. Where are you now?” She asks curiously.
“We’re on Bond Street. Hayley and I are just walking to the train station.”
Her shocked expression greets me on the screen. “You? You're going on public transport?” She asks, clearly flabbergasted.
Yeah, I know.
I just roll my eyes at her and she laughs. “Hi Hayley! Sorry I didn’t know you was there,” Peyton says, so I move the phone over so they can see each other. They both say hello, Hayley asks how the pregnancy is getting on, and Peyton asks Hayley how she’s finding London.
“It’s the best vacation ever. Well… it’s not a vacation because it’s for work, but Lottie is giving me a couple of days to explore.”
“She’s awesome, huh?”
“Yeah, she is,” Hayley says, smiling over at me. I grin back at her and do a small curtsey.
“Thank you, thank you.”
“Okay enough about Lottie's awesomeness, and show me some London!”
Chuckling at her, I take my phone from Hayley and tap on my screen, so the camera is facing away from me, and Peyton can see where we are.
“There’s nothing really here. We’re almost at the station, you should’ve face timed me about an hour ago, we just did the tour of London,” I tell her with a guilty look on my face.
“No!” She looks distraught. “Aw, that sucks big time.”
“Stop pouting.”
“I'm not,” she says with a pout.
Both Hayley and I laugh at her theatrics.
I'm still moving the camera around when suddenly Peyton exclaims, “Holy crap, British guys are hot!”
I quickly look at the screen and see what she’s seeing. Wow, okay. There's a group of five men, and as Peyton said; they are hot! With a capital, H-O-T!
“Whoa, they are sexy,” Hayley murmurs, jaw slack.
“Yes, they really are…” Peyton sighs dreamily.
“Hey!” I hear, and thinking it’s someone in the street, I look around. I can’t see anyone looking at us, and look confusedly at Hayley, but she just points to my phone, it’s then that I see Keller come onto the screen; scowling at Peyton.
I chuckle as I listen to Peyton tell Keller that they weren’t hotter than him though, and it seems to placate him.
“Hey Lott's, how’s London?” Keller asks me, and waves at Hayley.
“Hi love, yeah it’s been good, thanks. We’ve been exploring today, but we’re heading back to the hotel now.”
“Cool. Well, we miss you, girl.�
� Keller says sincerely.
“I miss you guys, too. Where my little Munchkin?”
“She’s with Peyton's parents; they’re taking her to the zoo,” says Keller. I notice him hesitate.
“What?”
“Nothing. It’s just… have you spoken to Blake yet?”
Once again my eyes narrow.
“No… should I have? What's going on, Kel?”
“No, nothings going on. He didn’t turn up for work yesterday, and I was just wondering if you had spoken to him. I've texted him and called him, but haven’t heard anything back yet.” His dark brown eyes looked worried, his eyebrows were furrowed, and his lips were pursed. “I can’t believe he hasn’t called you yet.”
“You can’t believe it?? I can’t fucking believe it. He’s acting like a petulant child, the wankstain. I'm so angry with him, I mean, yes we had an argument, but I really did think we could discuss this like adults. Apparently not.” I say raising my eyebrow at them.
Peyton and Keller are both on the screen now: Keller looks agitated, and Peyton looks sad. She was sad for me. Peyton's about to reply, but I hear a knock at their front door; Keller stands up to go get it. I look up and see that we’re at the train station, now.
“Hey Pey, we’re at the train station, and we’ll most probably lose connection. So I'll give you a call late–” I start to tell her, but I stop talking abruptly as I hear Keller greet the person at their door.
“Blake? Where have you been?” I can’t hear what he replies, but then I hear what Keller says to him next, and it has me rushing to get off the call. I don’t want to see Blake right now; I'm still pissed at him for ignoring me, and not picking up the phone to me. “Yeah come in… I have to tell you, we have Lottie on FaceTime.”
I hear the sound of quick feet, and hurriedly tell Peyton bye, when I hear his voice.
“Lottie! Lottie wait! Wait please…”
But before I get to see him, I press end call.
I look at my phone, tears building in my eyes before I look up and catch the look on Hayley's face.
“I couldn’t… I just couldn’t speak to him, Hales.” I explain. I didn’t want the first time to see or speak to him over FaceTime and where my friend was in earshot; it just wasn’t the way I wanted it to happen.
“Hey, you don’t have to explain yourself to me, Lottie. I understand,” she tells me giving my forearm a comforting squeeze.
I wipe at the lone tear that had sneakily escaped, and just nod to her. I didn’t really feel like talking at the moment. So we just make our way to the station and waited on the platform. After being shoved and pushed for five minutes, and me snapping at some man in a business suit to back the fuck off, we jumped on the packed-solid train and headed back to our hotel.
As we arrived, the over-friendly manager, Mr. Harrow, greets us.
“Good afternoon, Miss Carter, Miss White.” He says as we’re walking past the reception desk.
“Hello,” we reply back simultaneously.
“Did you have a good day?”
“Yes, we did, thank you,” I tell him.
“Excellent. Did you enjoy exploring London today, Miss White?” He asks Hayley.
She grins at him. “I really did, I'm in love with London, Mr. Harrow.”
He nods his balding head at us, smiles, straightens his black waistcoat, and bids us ado.
We walk to the elevator, discussing tomorrow. We were meeting Layla tomorrow at her house– I offered to take her out for lunch, but she refused; saying that she would prefer it if we could do everything in her home. I suppose it’s her comfort zone, and that’s where she wants to conduct business.
She didn’t live in the best of areas– Stratford– but it is where I grew up, so I knew it well. And it was only about a twenty-minute drive from Canary Wharf, so at least we didn’t have to travel too far.
When we get to our floor, Hayley and I make plans to meet up in a couple of hours for dinner. She tells me that she was going to go shopping in Jubilee Place. She asks if I wanted to join her, but I decline; right now, all I wanted to do was go into my room and have a long arse soak in the bath.
“Okay, I'll see you in a couple of hours, then. What time did you want to meet up for dinner?”
“Err, sevenish? Is that alright with you?”
She nods. This girl was easy to please, I think to myself, but as I start to feel the beginning of a headache coming on, I tell her I’d see her soon, and to have fun shopping.
Hayley waves, telling me she was just going to drop her stuff in her room before she ventures out. I take my card key out from my bag, and with a quick swipe, I'm through the door and walking to the bathroom for that bath.
The bathroom was an exquisite sight, just as the whole room was. The room was painted in white and light green, with silver accents dotted here, there, and everywhere. There was a King-size four-poster bed in the middle of the room. Two bedside tables on either side, at the end of the bed, was a Chester-draws where a 48-inch flat screen TV sat. A medium sized wardrobe near that, and a small mini bar, that had those miniature bottles of alcohol in, which every hotel had.
But it was the bathroom that I loved; in the centre of the room sat a cast iron Bateau bath, and the walls were painted in beautiful, calming blue hues. The colour reminded me of the sea… it reminded me of somewhere peaceful… it reminded me of eyes. Beautiful ocean coloured eyes. Blake's eyes…
I feel a tug in my heart.
I missed him desperately.
I felt lost without him near me.
Is this what real love was like? When you were away from the one you love, is this how everyone feels? Or is it just because of how we had left things?
I know I had confessed to Blake's family and Peyton that I loved him. And even though I knew I loved him, I didn’t know the extent of that love. Since the argument on Saturday, I had felt like there was a constant ache in my body– it was like my body knew that it was missing a piece of itself. That piece being Blake.
Sighing, I take off my clothes, turn the taps on, and take off my makeup while I was waiting for the bath to fill up. After I did my business, I added some jasmine bath salts in before I jumped in.
Oh, God… This feels so good, I think to myself.
“Mmm…” I murmur.
This feels lovely...
After an hour of soaking in the tub, I get out feeling boneless.
I'm just about to cream myself when my phone starts ringing.
‘Nan’ flashes on the screen, and with a smile, I answer.
“Hi, Nan!” I chirp.
“Don’t you ‘Hi Nan’ me, young lady!” My Nan’s stern voice comes over the line.
Oh, God.
“What?”
“You know what. You’ve been home for a couple of days now and you haven’t even come to see me, Charlotte.”
I groaned down the line. “I’m sorry, Nan, but I was going to come see you tomorrow night, I swear,” I tell her, trying to placate the old bird.
“Pfft. Don’t even try that with me, Charlotte Carter. And don’t swear, it’s not good for you…” she trails off, and I hear the mirth in her voice.
I started laughing. My Nan swore more than a sailor… and was proud of it, too.
“Now, now, Nan, don’t be a hypocrite.” I tut at her.
When she laughs, I join in with her.
“Okay, all jokes aside; I wanted to ask you if you wanted to come ‘round for dinner tonight?”
“Oh– erm, Nan that might be difficult…”
“Why?” She demanded. “I haven’t seen you in God only knows how long, and I miss my granddaughter.”
“I’ve brought my assistant over with me, this time, and we were meant to be going out for dinner later. That’s why.” I tell her before I plop down on the bed.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” she replies back to me. I can just imagine my Nan sitting in her back garden, cigarette in her hand, and waving at the air dismissively.
“What,
you want me to bring Hayley with me?”
“Yes, yes. Bring her with you, sweetheart, it’ll be fun. It has been far too long.” Now I could hear the smile in her voice like she knew that she had won. Which she had.
“You're a sneaky thing, aren’t you?”
“Sweetheart, I'm sixty-four; I've had a lot of years to perfect it. How’d you think I got away with so many things from your granddad?”
I thought of all the times when I was little, and my granddad would come home angry. All my Nan would have to do is whisper something in his ear and he’d brighten up straight away. Or when my Nan would give me too much chocolate, and my Dad or Mum would moan at her she just had this look, and you did not fuck with Nan when she gave you the look. I remember once when I was about fourteen, I’d fallen on my face in school, right in front of the boy I had fancied, and he had laughed at me along with his friend. I had been so embarrassed and upset, that I had run to my Nan’s house which was (conveniently) only around the corner. I had been a sobbing mess when she had opened the door, and instead of coddling me; she had swore, called him a stupid, pubescent little shit, and told me to forget about him. She had dried my eyes, told me to forget about the loser, and then she had pulled me into the kitchen where she grabbed a tub of ice cream out from the freezer. We had sat in the living room watching some reruns of Dales Supermarket Sweep– I had loved that programme when I was younger.
That was my Nan to a T, and I loved her for it; she was the best I could ever ask for.
Chuckling at my thoughts, I tell her I remember. “Okay, so what time do you want us to come ‘round?”
“About six? Six-thirty? Dinner should be getting started by then; we’re having a barbeque, you know making the most of the weather.”
“Alright, Nan, I'll see you then. Love you…”
“I love you too, Charlotte, bye.”
“Bye,” I say before I hang-up.
Shaking my head, I quickly dial Hayley’s number.
“Hey Lott's, everything okay?” She asks me as she answers.
“Hey, yeah everything’s good. I just wanted to ring and ask you something.”