I head into the lounge and stand there, feeling like an addict waiting for their next hit. But I have nothing of Joe. Just his photos, and a few videos online. Nothing new. Nothing real. I know every image by heart. I’ve projected myself into all of them. I’m desperate. I’m tired of waiting. I drink more prosecco.
And then I pick up my phone and open the Skyscanner app and search for flights to Vienna. I fantasize about wandering around those old, cobbled streets with Joe, hand in hand, ducking into little wine bars for a quick drink before the concert. I quickly google Vienna for more accuracy and find that it is more wide streets and bold, handsome buildings than dinky and cobbled streets and wonky roofs, like England. Still, we could walk down those wide streets of the first district, taking in music and art and architecture. I look down at my chic cherry-red blouse with its Peter Pan collar and little cap sleeves and think,I’m ready. I know I’m ready.
I have to see him, and I cannot wait another three weeks for him to decide if he’s going to show or not.
I find two flights. One that leaves Stansted in three hours, and the other that leaves at 5 a.m. I click on the outbound 5 a.m. flight. I don’t even bother with a return; I just buy it. Then I go into my room, throw some clothes into a bag, and my new silk pajamas, and I head out the front door, clutching my prosecco, and make my way to catch the train to London.
27
After two trainsand a very expensive minicab, I enter through the gates at Stansted Airport. It’s 3 a.m. I begin to feel queasy. Why am I doing this? What am I doing?
I clutch my heart and lick my dry lips.
I don’t want to go. I want to go home to my flat. To Ash.
But Ash is out with Kate.
I stand there as a family behind me inch closer to me, passive-aggressively telling me to move forward and close the gap.
Am I doing this? Could I check my star sign quickly to help decide?
I still haven’t moved, and it’s getting dangerously close to my turn to heave my roller suitcase up onto the conveyor belt and walk through the body scan.
I don’t know if I’ll see Joe, of course. I could just be taking a spontaneous weekend holiday to Austria for fun. And it would be fun. I could clear my head. Get some perspective on Charlie. Decidehow to move forward with Ash. And if it’s right, if fate and destiny really are working on this, I might just bump into Joe.
I could come back on Sunday evening and just slide back into work, saying,Oh, this weekend? I took a spur-of-the-moment trip to Vienna.
Fuck it. Live, Mara.Live.
28
Before Sunrisecameout when I was five years old, around 1995, but I didn’t watch it until ten years later, after I rented the sequel,Before Sunset. I immediately went back to the store and picked up the original so I could watch them in order.Before Sunsetis set here in Vienna, in high summer. I imagine Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy falling in love as they wander these streets, and it feels completely fitting that this is where Joe is now. The question is, will I find him? Will destiny bring us together outside a store, or across from each other at a bar, or reaching for the same gloves in a department store?
It is a strange thing to know a place through film. I expect I would feel the same if my feet ever touched the ground in New York and I gazed up at the towering skyscrapers, ready to take on the world, like so many small-town movie heroines.
Despite my hangover and exhaustion, I feel childlike leaning out of the taxi through the open window, watching the grandyellow buildings roll past me. There is a daring in my heart that wasn’t there in Budapest. I am ready for adventure.
My last-minute room reservation is not ready when I arrive, as it’s still early—11 a.m.—and so I hit the nearby boutiques, picking up a polka-dot tea dress that I know Samira will love from a woman who speaks very loudly and slowly to me in German despite me waving my hands and explaining, “No Deutch!” what felt like a dozen times.
When I go to the hotel, the man at reception takes one look at me and says, “Please fill in this form,” in perfect English.
“Thanks for speaking in English,” I say.
“Most people in Vienna speak some English,” he replies, smiling. “Third floor, on the far end of the corridor. Breakfast is between six and eleven, and you’ve paid for a single room, so it’s just you, then?”
“Yes, it’s just me,” I say, putting on a very brave face. “Alone. Party of one. And I’m okay with it.”
My room is deep red with gold fittings on the door handles, the lamps, and the frames on the wall. The bed has crisp white sheets under one of those old-fashioned and very well-loved bedspreads. It is tiny but perfectly situated, with a view over the restaurant-lined streets below. I stretch myself out across the bed, exhausted from a night’s sleep on an airport floor, and check to see if there’s been anything new posted on Joe’s Instagram.
Nothing.
I feel that same wave of tiredness again and decide that the very best next step for me is a luxurious hotel bed afternoon nap, and so I roll over and within a few moments I’m fast asleep.
When I wake up it’s nearly 4 p.m.
I have a quick shower, pull on my dress and my sandals, slidemy little leather cross-body on, and tie a denim jacket around my waist. I blow-dry my hair using a hair dryer so small it takes about fifteen minutes just to do the fringe. I toss the rest of it loosely up and look in the long mirror by the hand-painted floral wardrobe. I look good.
I step out onto the street and pause for a moment, taking in everything. I decide to catch the sun slicing in between the tall terraced buildings and have a drink.
