Page 9 of The Trip of a Lifetime

And as they talked, they somehow gravitated towards each other. Their knees were touching, she was leaning towards him and he was gazing at her intently.

‘Do you know,’ he said. ‘I am, well, the thing is, I am…’

‘Lovely,’ she murmured. And then she leaned closer and without another thought she kissed him quickly on the lips.

She pulled back but he didn’t move. He looked surprised, though.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘That was, I mean, that was…’

‘Lovely,’ he murmured.

‘It’s the wine,’ she said. ‘Actually, it’s the altitude.’

‘We’re only on floor five,’ he said and they both laughed.

Then from that warm bubble came a moment of awkwardness which Erin tried to fill with inane chatter. He put his hand over hers which was flapping about in her lap like a dying fish.

‘I’m glad you did that,’ he said. ‘Not sure I’d have had the nerve.’

Then he got up and she hoped he wasn’t going to suggest more drinks because if he did, she’d have to decline and quit while it seemed she might be ahead.

‘Will you excuse me for just a moment,’ he said and disappeared back inside the hotel, no doubt to use the loo or maybe to get his phone, actually. Perhaps he didn’t want her to slip through his fingers. He’d want to make sure to have her number.

Erin sat back in a warm glow. She couldn’t believe she’d had the nerve to kiss a stranger. She’d never done anything like that before but Samuel didn’t seem to mind. In fact, quite the opposite. She gazed out over the city. It was hard to get her head around the fact that she was in Canada and about to embark on this epic adventure. And now she didn’t really want to because she’d much rather find out where Samuel was heading and follow him. Not follow, actually – that was a bit creepy – but she certainly wanted to swap numbers.

The terrace was busy with people relaxing, drinking and one man, she noticed, was doing a jigsaw puzzle on the table in front of him, which surprised her. His hands were flying around the pieces as if he were in a desperate hurry to get it finished. She noticed the timer on the table next to the puzzle and realised that was exactly what he was doing.

She was so transfixed by this jigsaw puzzler that she almost didn’t see Cally on the other side of the terrace. She had her phone pressed to her ear and was consulting a clipboard. Erin quickly shifted herself onto the opposite seat, so she would have her back to the producer. Cally had been quite explicit. They weren’t to talk to anyone and had to stay in the hotel room until she came to get them for the dinner.

Erin was torn. Her instinct was to get up and slink away before Cally saw her but she’d just met lovely Samuel and really wanted to spend more time getting to know him. She desperately wanted to swap numbers, to find out where in the world he lived and if he’d be up for making a plan to meet again. But this competition was incredibly important to Martha and Erin couldn’t jeopardise their involvement at this early stage. With a sigh of resignation, she placed her glass on the table and got up slowly. Then she moved, crab-like, back towards the bar, only looking over at Cally when she was safely at the door. Cally hadn’t seen her, thankfully. Erin ducked inside and walked around to the toilets to see if she could catch Samuel, but after waiting for longer than was decent outside the men’s loo, she scuttled back to the lift and up to their room before Cally could catch her.

5

MARTHA

I woke feeling as if I’d just had a twenty-minute power nap, but when I looked at my watch I could see I’d been asleep for two hours. This would usually leave me feeling groggy, but now I was refreshed and keen to get on with our trip. First I had to get through the welcome dinner and the thought of that wiped the smile from my face.

‘I was going to wake you in ten minutes,’ Erin said from her bed. She’d bunched up her pillows and was propped up with her book and guzzling water from a bottle.

‘Have you been reading all this time?’ I asked her.

‘Pretty much,’ she said, tucking her bookmark in the pages and stretching. ‘Do you want to get in the shower first or shall I? I didn’t want to wake you with the noise of the extractor fan otherwise I’d have showered already. Cally will be coming for us in just over an hour, so we’ve got plenty of time.’

‘You go,’ I said, getting up from the bed and walking over to the window. I watched a huge container ship being unloaded down in the harbour, its colourful boxes lifted gracefully off the water and down onto the awaiting trucks. ‘I can’t believe we’re in Canada.’

I turned to grin at Erin but she was just disappearing into the bathroom.

‘Whoop!’ she said from behind the door, but it did sound a little half-hearted and I wondered if she should have had a sleep too.

* * *

The dining room looked quite spectacular. There were chandeliers, lavish drapes and flower arrangements, and candlelight flickered from all of the tables. Everyone was looking smart for the occasion. The occasion being the last good meal we’d eat in comfort for a long while; the last time we could truly be ourselves without a camera in our faces.

I quickly scanned the room for Harrison but couldn’t see any lying-cheating-bastards. I smiled inwardly at my thought. Goodness, I could hold a grudge for fifty years. How would it really be when I saw him again? The thing was, I’d built this up so much in my head but the chances were, I’d feel nothing but indifference. I probably wouldn’t even be able to identify him; he was seventy-three now.

That was when I noticed Priya across the room. I thought I recognised her and then I felt immensely stupid because that wasn’t her at all, it was probably her daughter – a woman in her forties. Priya was the older woman standing next to her. Seeing Priya with her hair now grey and swept up in a bun stunned me for a moment. Not because I thought she looked particularly old but because it reminded me that we were both old women now. They were talking to who I had to assume was their producer so I didn’t go and interrupt. There would be plenty of time to catch up before the race began tomorrow.

It was a bit like a wedding with a seating plan, and the tables were quite intimate which wasn’t a huge surprise. Intimate would be the key word over the next few days and weeks.