Chapter 7
‘At bloody last, the wanderer returns!’
Mum was sitting at the desk, drying her bright copper chin-length hair, a damp towel on the floor next to her in a scrunched-up ball.
She’d been dyeing her hair the same shop-bought colour for as long as I’d been alive.
Her white roots glinted more vibrantly every time I saw her – I often forgot she was in her seventies since she still possessed way more physical energy than I ever had, or would.
‘I left a note on the loo,’ I shouted, trying to make myself heard over the retro hairdryer that was attached to the wall with a coiled cord.
‘You should’ve just woken us up!’ Mum shouted back, unfazed by the onslaught of decibels.
I flopped onto the bed, groaning with exhaustion, trying to convince myself that the relentless roar of the hairdryer was white – or pink – noise. I was barely through the door and I was already being pummelled with pandemonium.
Detecting my descent into the duvet, Mum switched off the hairdryer and dropped it on the desk with a clatter, causing me to wince. She swivelled to face me.
‘Oi! No lying down, lazybones! I know what you’re like: once you’re horizontal you’re a goner. Upright! More! There you go.’
I propped myself up against the headboard with a couple of pillows. ‘I’ve been up for hours already, thank you very much! But I’m jetlagged and… well, more than a little bit overwhelmed.’
I didn’t tell her that the only sleep I had managed to get last night – or this morning, or whenever the hell it was – was in the bath. I’d never hear the end of it.
‘Jetlagged, schmetlagged – you’re always tired. Even as a baby you couldn’t keep your eyes open. I had to pretend to be sleep-deprived to all the other mums. As if I didn’t already feel like the odd one out at all the toddler groups.’
She’d told me variations of this story so many times over the years – how her surprise pregnancy with me in her forties had meant she’d had to spend time with loads of women at playgroups who were closer to Anneka in age than her.
Her constant assumption that my limited energy levels were down to nothing more than laziness was one of my biggest bugbears; my need for sleep had nothing to do with deliberate inertia and everything to do with sensory overwhelm, shutdown and recovery.
‘You know what you need to perk you up?’ Mum continued, cracking her shoulders.
Oh, here we go.
‘I’m sure you’re going to tell me.’
‘Uh-huh – some fresh New York City air!’
‘Right. So, where exactly are we going?’ I asked.
She joined me on the bed, her bum bouncing on the mattress with excitement about whatever it was she was about to tell me. ‘We… are… going… foraging in Central Park!’
I groaned and put one of the pillows over my face.
The last time we’d been foraging I’d been home from uni in the summer holidays, and had ended up terrified about the prospect of being poisoned by our haul.
So petrified, in fact, that I’d secretly replaced all the foraged fungi with five packs of Waitrose mixed exotic mushrooms before Mum cooked what probably ended up as the most expensive risotto of all time later that evening.
Mum and Anneka still talked about that risotto to this day. I’d never told them the truth.
‘Is foraging in Central Park even legal?’
Mum removed the pillow from my face. ‘It’s all above board, don’t worry. There’s a chap who’s been running a tour there for years. He’s a bit of a legend in foraging circles.’
It didn’t surprise me in the slightest that Mum was aware of such circles. She was an active member of her local ‘freeganism’ Facebook group, which was probably teeming with boomer widows who’d be chomping at the bit to forage with a relative celebrity.
That said, the knowledge that we’d be joining an official tour settled my nerves somewhat. Plus, there was no denying it was a lovely day out there. Perhaps a walk away from the crowds and some more daylight would help my circadian rhythm settle back down.
‘Fine. When are we meeting him?’
‘The tour starts in…’ She grabbed my wrist and looked at my watch. ‘Twenty-seven minutes.’
I sat bolt upright. ‘Seriously? Is it even possible to get to Central Park in twenty-seven minutes?’
‘Don’t worry, Anneka’s sorting it all out. She’ll be back any second!’
As Mum stretched, I noticed she was wearing a pink T-shirt that said THE BELLS OF NEW YORK CITY! printed on it in brash, italicised red lettering.
She clocked the direction of my gaze and followed it, her head snapping back up when she realised what I’d been looking at.
‘That reminds me! Hang on, where did I…?’ Mum rummaged in her giant bag before producing another identical T-shirt.
‘Ta-da!’ she sang, as she balled up the T-shirt and threw it at me. It smelled like cellophane packaging and didn’t feel much softer.
‘Um, thanks – you didn’t have…’
‘Go on, then – put it on.’
‘Now? Today?’
‘Yes! We’ve got to get going! Anneka’s wearing hers, too – you’ll see when she gets back with our breakfast. Girls on tour!’
I opened my mouth to speak, but she’d already sat back down at the desk and switched the hairdryer back on. I took the T-shirt into the bathroom, noticing my note from earlier – now damp with goodness knows what – on the floor next to the loo.
I pulled down the straps of my teal dungarees, removed my soft, grey sweatshirt and put the massive T-shirt on over my long-sleeved thermal layer – at least that way the synthetic fabric of the novelty top wouldn’t come into direct contact with my skin.
I pulled my straps back up and looked at myself in the mirror.
My eyebags rivalled Mum and Anneka’s holdalls in terms of size.
There was no way that Ethan Carmichael – single Ethan Carmichael, no less – would have found me attractive earlier looking like this.
I looked like Casper the Friendly Ghost, only ghostlier and not in the slightest bit friendly.
I splashed my face with water and stuck some eyedrops in my eyes to try and make myself feel less phantom-like, although I was dissociating more by the second.
I emerged from the bathroom and, as if on cue, the door to our room clicked open with a beep. Anneka bounded in, clutching a couple of McDonald’s-branded brown paper bags.
‘Thank fuck you’re here. I’ve got a cab waiting for us outside – I flagged it down and everything like Carrie Bradshaw. We can eat breakfast on the way. Let’s go!’
I grabbed my fleece-lined bomber jacket and pulled on my Converse, gearing myself up for having to exist in a conscious state for goodness knows how long.
There was indeed a cab waiting for us outside, the meter already running.
‘103rd Street and Central Park West entrance please, driver!’ Anneka instructed the cabbie, before thrusting one of the McDonald’s bags in my direction.
I picked through its contents. I ignored the miraculously unspilled coffee for now, since I’d already consumed twice as much caffeine than I was used to in a twenty-four-hour period, and extracted a McMuffin-shaped bundle.
I gagged involuntarily. I hated egg, and Anneka knew this; it was part of my personality. Anneka noticed my reaction.
‘All good, Flo-no – I asked for no egg. Look.’
I unwrapped the parcel tentatively to reveal a burger-like entity, but the patty – presumably sausage – was sandwiched between two pancakes instead of a standard bun or muffin. Orange cheese oozed out of the sides. It looked filthy.
‘What even is this?’ I asked.
‘A McGriddle! They don’t sell them in the UK. I’ve been itching to try one for years ever since my agent told me about them.’
Anneka’s ‘agent’ was a woman in her sixties from Bedfordshire whom Anneka had got chatting to via Facebook Marketplace. As far as I was aware, they’d never met in real life.
Anneka and Mum took bites of their respective McGriddles, their eyes lighting up as the flavours transferred to their tongues.
I took a small nibble of mine, then a bigger bite. The combination of sweet maple, salty sausage and tangy processed cheese was undeniably delicious.
Anneka and Mum looked proudly at each other as I devoured the rest of the McGriddle, as if I was a toddler who’d just taken her first wee in a potty. By the time we’d all finished breakfast, the cab had pulled up opposite the park entrance.
While Anneka paid the fare, I got out and took a long stretch, along with a slurp of lukewarm coffee.
Like a typical tourist visiting New York for the first time – which, of course, I was – I couldn’t help but look up at the fire-escape-clad buildings towering above us, in total contrast to the greenery of the park that awaited us on the other side of the road.
Maybe it was because I was delirious, but I swear I’d never seen a bluer sky, the winter sun having succeeded in its mission to burn away the clouds – for now, at least.
Just within the boundaries of the park entrance, I noticed a tall, exceedingly lanky man about Mum’s age brandishing a clipboard.
He was dressed head-to-toe in khaki camo – presumably so the plants he was about to uproot wouldn’t see him coming – surrounded by a small throng of outdoorsy-looking people wearing sensible things like walking boots and insulated windbreakers.
I looked down at my tatty Converse, and then at Mum’s inadequate denim jacket and Anneka’s longline faux wool coat – complete with a fur collar – that was more water-absorbent than water-resistant.
And bright pink tartan. We were going to stick out like sore and extremely swollen thumbs.
Nothing unusual about that.
‘Right, I think I can see the guide over there,’ I said, starting to move towards the crossing, but Mum and Anneka held me back from either side.
‘Yeah, we haven’t actually booked onto the tour, Flo. We figured we’d just follow him from a distance and forage in the same spot once the group has moved on,’ said Mum.
My stomach flipped.
There it is – the inevitable catch.