Chapter 3
Maya
Packing always feels like a challenge I set for myself.
How many shirts can I fit into one carry-on?
How few shoes can I bring without risking blisters, embarrassment, or freezing?
This time, it matters more than usual. I have two days packed with book signings, radio interviews, and even a spot on the BBC.
Everything will happen under the sharp eyes of the international publishing world.
I’ve already had a glass of wine too many to trust myself with eyebrow scissors.
Blair sits cross-legged on the bed, her bare feet painted a bright yellow.
She spins her wine glass by the stem and watches me with quiet patience.
She doesn’t help, just moves the pile of clothes away when it gets too close.
Her phone keeps buzzing with group texts, but she ignores them, focusing on my suitcase as if it’s her only job.
Blair asks, "Have you heard from Joel?" after I’ve folded and unfolded the same black wrap dress for the third time.
It takes me a moment to understand what she means.
Joel used to be just someone we both knew, but lately he’s become a ghost in my social life.
His dinner invite last week was so awkward that I’m still feeling the effects.
"He texted," I say, trying to sound casual.
"But I think he realized pretty quickly that it was doomed. "
Blair laughs into her wine. "You say doomed like it’s nothing. You’re supposed to let him down gently, not send him out into space," she jokes.
"We spent forty minutes talking about his cat’s gluten allergy," I reply. "If that’s not a sign from the universe, I don’t know what is."
She grins, showing the lipstick stain that always ends up on her canine teeth. "Universe or not, Maya, you’re not even trying. When was the last time you let someone surprise you?"
I ignore her challenge. Blair’s surprises usually mean we end up in random cities or, even worse, bump into her exes at yard sales.
I frown at a badly folded sweater and change the subject.
"I’m more interested in your date last week," I say.
"The hot one with the tattoo. Did you ever find out what it was? "
She holds up two fingers in a peace sign, then makes a face. "His mother’s initials. That would be fine, except he kept calling her from the bathroom. During dinner." Blair groans.
"Maybe he’s an only child."
"Maybe he’s a serial killer."
"Maybe you attract emotionally unavailable men, and that’s why we get along so well," I say, lowering my voice so she knows I’m being honest. "You could come with me. There’s probably still a seat. I can’t promise the hotel isn’t haunted, or that anyone will spell your name right."
Blair pretends to think about it, raising an eyebrow. "Tempting. But if I went with you, who would feed your plants? They need me." She picks up a stack of paperbacks she brought. "Besides, someone has to write the steamy stories while you’re gone."
I see the cover on top—her latest romance set in the Highlands, with a title full of suggestive puns. "I already have a copy," I say.
"Not this one," she says, pushing the stack into my hands. "Take it as reading material for the plane. Maybe if you read about people having sex, you’ll remember how it’s done."
I flip through the stack: Taken by the Clan, with a man in plaid looking up at the sky.
The Sheik’s Secret Baby, which I once edited for comma splices.
At the bottom is something she usually hides—Daddy Prime Minister, a glossy self-published book with Blair’s second, even more secret pen name. I hold it up. "Wasn’t this banned on ?"
"They reinstated it," Blair says, sounding serious, as if it took a lot of effort. "It’s got heart. And also bondage, but mostly heart."
She looks at me like she’s just solved a puzzle. She’s not wrong. I feel out of place, like a nun in a world where everyone is supposed to have several partners. I hug the books to my chest and let myself smile. That’s as close as I’ll get to agreeing with her.
Packing goes in bursts. I try on the wrap dress and two pairs of boots.
Blair judges each one seriously, like a Project Runway judge.
I refill our glasses and toss a small bottle of ibuprofen into my backpack.
The room smells like late fall and laundry detergent.
My anxiety grows as I realize I’m leaving New York for more than just a weekend.
When I finally close the suitcase, it’s almost eleven.
Outside, sirens bounce off the concrete like faraway applause.
Orange city light splits my room. I take a breath.
For a moment, I see myself as someone else might: a woman with two passports, no set beliefs, and a stack of romance novels as protection against loneliness.
I fall onto the bed next to Blair, almost spilling her wine.
We’ve spent so many hours like this: watching bad TV, reading tarot cards, and planning world domination with only takeout menus and stubbornness.
Sometimes I wonder if Blair knows she’s the center of my chosen family.
Sometimes I hope she doesn’t, because she’d never let me forget it.
She’s scrolling through her phone now, searching for something. She pauses, then looks up. "Tell me the real reason you’re going," Blair prompts.
I blink, caught off guard. "My editor thinks I’ll sell more in England, or at least drink better gin. I’ll get a chance to—"
"No," she interrupts. "Why now? Why this city? Italy sent you a lovely invitation, and you chose England instead? In November? That’s nuts.”
I don’t have an answer ready. I remember my mother’s tense voice on the phone last night.
I think of my father’s old postcards, always neat and formal, as if he used a ruler to write.
The quiet at Heathrow in the early morning clears my mind.
Every time I arrive in a new city, I let myself believe I’ll return changed.
But all I can say is, "It just feels right. Maybe something’s waiting for me, or maybe I just need more stories to tell. You understand," I say.
She thinks about it, lips pressed together like she’s holding in a joke. "If you meet a Scottish man in a kilt, you have to text me a picture. No, actually, send me his phone number," Blair says.
"I’ll do my best," I promise, and I mean it. I want her to be proud.
We pick up our glasses, wrappers, and the rest of our mess.
She helps me clean, humming as she gathers laundry and wipes mascara off the bathroom counter.
It seems small, but these are the last moments of normal life before I leave.
Soon, I’ll be a different version of myself, shaped by jet lag and being far from home.
When she leaves, I watch from my window as her hair catches the light and her shape stands out on the sidewalk.
I put her books in my bag, next to my boarding pass and the mints I’ll probably forget.
I close the window, let the quiet settle, and look for the clothes I’ll wear on the plane: black jeans, a big hoodie, and a scarf thick enough to use as a pillow.
After a shower and my usual bedtime routine, I get into bed.
My phone is on my chest, but I’m too awake to sleep.
On a whim, I open my notebook and write down the one image that stayed with me all day.
It’s something I didn’t want to say out loud: the stranger from Bemelman's Bar, the man with tired eyes and a voice that stayed in my mind, echoing.
He'd looked at me as though he already knew me.
Which was impossible. I’d remember a face like that.
I could ask Blair: Do you believe in past lives? In ghosts? In stories so deep they spill into the present, showing up as flashes and afterimages. What do you call it when you meet someone for the first time and the world seems to close in around you, like cellophane wrapping tight?
I close the notebook and get comfortable, waiting for sleep. Outside, I hear sirens and the quiet of late-night traffic. My phone buzzes with a final text from Blair: "Don’t forget to have fun, or at least fake it until you do. Love you."
I text back only a heart, but I mean it.
Six hours later, I’m in the security line at JFK, standing behind a woman with a falcon tattooed across her back.
She’s arguing with a TSA agent about whether taxidermied animal bones are allowed as carry-on.
The crowd of travelers feels like its own wild world.
I get lost in the routine: bright lights, the smell of Starbucks and old sweat, and the worry of keeping your shoes on too long.
I put on my headphones and tune out the world. In the first class lounge, I read Blair’s latest book in an hour, drawn in by her voice in the writing—bold, clever, and funnier than I’ll ever be. Her heroes are always a bit tragic, and her heroines always have secrets.
I want to text her about every absurd detail, but I know she’s asleep, or pretending to be.
The flight is quiet. I sleep in short bursts and wake up to the blue and gold light of morning above the clouds. My thoughts keep circling back to the same things: family, responsibility, and the strangers we imagine to keep ourselves company.
I land at Heathrow in the rain, the gray sky blending into the tarmac.
My driver, Marjorie, is in her sixties and talks excitedly about her three failed marriages and how men from Bristol can’t be trusted.
She reminds me of Blair, if Blair had raised three kids and learned to use disappointment as a weapon.
Marjorie drives fast, as if she’s trying out for a stunt team, and drops me at my publisher’s brownstone in Notting Hill with a quick, "Don’t let the bastards get you down, love. "
Inside, the house is quiet and cold, filled with the smell of unfamiliar cleaning products and something herbal, maybe sage. My publisher won’t be here for another two hours, so I go to the guest room, drop my suitcase, and take off my boots.
I find myself at a window, staring out at the wet garden and the silent, expectant street.
It’s too early for nerves, but I have them anyway.
I pour myself coffee in the shared kitchen and sit at the table, legs tucked under, trying to breathe through the heavy jet lag.
I open my book again, but the words fade in and out, replaced by memories from last night and the week before: Blair’s laughter, city lights blurring past a cab window, and the stranger at the bar who watched me like we were having a private conversation I couldn’t quite hear.
I close my eyes until the world swims and resolve to try harder, to say yes at least once.
And if a man with haunted eyes and a cold voice finds me at a party, in a bar, or even in an old Scottish ruin, I promise myself I’ll let the conversation happen, even if it only leads to another dream.