Page 13 of I’m Dreaming of a New York Christmas

Will’s disembodied voice in my head made me shudder as we found an empty row of seats in the departure gate lounge and spread ourselves – and our ridiculous amount of luggage – across the entirety of it. There was no way we were going to be allowed on the plane with all this stuff.

Mum handed me my boarding pass, which I tucked into my passport. It was only through sheer luck that my ID was still in date – imagine if it had expired?

Imagine if it had expired.

I allowed myself to drowsily revel in the fantasy until a boarding announcement jolted me to attention.

I rose out of my seat but Mum yanked me back down.

‘But they’ve just called our row,’ I said, confused.

Mum replied conspiratorially through smiling, gritted teeth, as if she was a day-one trainee ventriloquist. ‘Izzzzz zzzzzooo zzzzzooon.’

‘Please speak normally, Mum.’

Mum sighed, leaning in close to whisper in my ear. ‘It’s too soon, Flo-go. We need to wait until the queue’s a bit longer so we can get in the middle of the line at the busiest moment and sneak our bags through while it’s busy.’

‘This is so stressful,’ I muttered under my breath.

‘Seriously, Flo, just relax,’ Anneka chimed in. ‘We’ve got this. Do whatever you need to do to calm yourself down. If you’re all tense they’ll only notice us more.’

I sat rigidly upright for about six minutes until the next batch of rows was called.

‘Okay, now!’ Mum instructed through an assertive whisper. She and Anneka casually heaved their holdalls onto their backs using the handles as makeshift shoulder straps, and carried their stuffed-to-the-brim backpacks by the top loops as if they were dainty handbags. They chatted to each other casually, not displaying any self-doubt whatsoever about the fact they were carrying many more dozens of kilograms of cabin luggage weight between them than was permitted. As they’d predicted, they were let straight through. And then it was my turn. With my huge rucksack on my back, as per its design, and my cabin-ish wheely suitcase tucked in as close to my legs as possible to disguise its presence, I was so nervous about the possibility of being told off I could have cried. But… I wasn’t. The staff on the gate didn’t say a word, the hubbub of passengers behind me acting as a wave of momentum pushing me through to my mum and sister, who were waiting for me at the mouth of the jetway.

‘See! Nothing to worry about! The woman on YouTube says they only question luggage allowance at the front and at the back of the queue!’ Anneka said.

‘I’d like to see the peer-reviewed paper that proves that theory,’ I replied, although I couldn’t help notice that the situation had flooded my system with a much-needed boost of adrenalin.

As we walked towards the aircraft through the concertina walkway, Mum and Anneka stood either side of me like brackets and, for the first time in many, many years, linked their spare arms through mine.

‘The stressful bit’s over and done with now, Flo. We promise you, from here on out it’ll be nothing but fun,’ Mum said.

We stepped over the threshold of the aeroplane as an interlinked trio, and were greeted warmly by a member of the cabin crew, his professionalism quickly overriding his initial surprise that we’d been permitted to board with so much baggage. Fortunately for us, this misdemeanour was above (or below) his paygrade.

‘Welcome, ladies,’ he said, directing us to the relevant row. We played a real-life game of Tetris with the overhead bins, before settling in for the eight-hour flight. I immediately clicked my seatbelt into place, causing Mum and Anneka to roll their eyes. Despite their mockery, I kept it fastened. Because, whatever the next week had in store for me, I knew I’d have to take every opportunity I could to strap in.

Chapter 5

Once we’d passed through the lengthy and highly inefficient passport check system at JFK, which the presence of two airport employees somehow worsened rather than improved, we emerged into the arrivals area at about midnight, local time.

I was immediately overwhelmed. I pulled my headphones up and over my ears and activated the noise-cancelling mode, my muscles untensing slightly at the shred of sonic relief… which was immediately interrupted by Mum pulling them back down.

‘Flo, I need you to be present. We’ve got to find the taxi rank. Okay?’

I nodded and cast my eyes upwards, trying to ignore all the fluorescent lights and digital tablets displaying scrolling names that various drivers were brandishing about. Anneka was busy taking selfies of herself in front of a giant poster that featured the Manhattan skyline, so it appeared to be down to me to extract us from these frankly ridiculous circumstances. Eventually, I found the relevant sign. ‘Right, it’s this way.’

‘Anneka, love! Taxis are out here!’ Mum called.

My sister pocketed her phone and the three of us pushed our overflowing luggage trolley out through the automatic doors. The coldness felt delicious against my stress-flushed cheeks. It was noticeably nippier here than it had been in the UK, and I even detected a few snowflakes in the air, although they weren’t sticking to the ground. We quickly spotted the lengthy caterpillar of custard-yellow cars that formed the taxi rank.

‘I’ll handle this,’ Anneka stated confidently, as she strode up to the first vehicle.

‘Hey, we’re from England! And we’d like to go to a hotel called The Earle Inn next to Washington Square Park, please! What’s your best price?’

The driver replied monotonously, without eye contact. ‘Seventy. Plus tolls.’

‘Can you do a little better than that?’ Anneka asked.