Love at Christmas
As I planned this chapter out I noticed that it was going to be a longer chapter than I first thought, so I've split this one in two parts, its all focused on American President James Keats' visit to the UK and to meet Prime Minister Gene Hunt, as it goes in the film Love Actually he arrives at Downing Street for first talks with the PM and as the evening draws in James as his eyes set on Alex even despite the fact he's married.
Chapter 6 - Suspicious Minds - Part 1
On the following Tuesday, 12 days before Christmas, the American President's Air Force One Aeroplane touched down at Heathrow. Prime Minister Gene Hunt eagerly watched the live broadcast of it on Sky News with his fellow cabinet members within the Conference Room. As he reserved his notable silence, he creatively lost himself in unaffected thought, he couldn't shake off the expressive fact, he wasn't an immense admirer of the American President James Keats - some of the views he shared with the World's Media suggested he believed broken promises could amend the financial crisis across the World Trade Markets - the London Stock Exchange in London, Wall Street in New York and the Shanghai Stock Exchange in China. Basically he presumed his American counterpart wasn't precisely as clever minded as he appeared to be.
Gene switched the television off with the remote control, sighing annoyingly which deliberately suggested he wasn't particularly excited to be meeting him face to face for the first time, he suspected as normal the red carpet would be laid out for him "He can go back to Washington as far as I can care, all he's ever been about is making himself additionally well-liked"
"Hope you don't mind me asking you this, but it certainly looks like that everyone in this room aren't foolish and can clearly detect some obvious jealously from you Prime Minister over the President's visit. I mean he's only going to be staying here in the UK until tomorrow afternoon before flying out again to Paris to meet the French President" Jack Gilbert the foreign secretary asked out of curiousity, he'd observantly noticed the PM kept easily getting cheesed off everytime his name was mentioned.
"Of course I'm not envious of him at all, I'm simply wondering why he chosen to visit Europe especially since its Christmas in under 2 weeks time, I should be thinking of what presents to buy for my brother Robert, his wife and their children"
Jack felt a tad nervous as he read him the details from the email he printed off the machine a few hours earlier. honestly he felt a little confuised to think about the PM's reaction might be "Well we still ought to be treating the President's visit significantly, all he asked for, is to discuss the downtrun in the recession and also he wants to ask when you would like to visit the White House"
"For once he can stick the friendly invitation up his backside as far as I'm bothered, I've always desired to meet the Australian Prime Minister" Gene confidently answered, he stopped talking for a minute and noticed whilst looking around at his cabinet menbers, surprisingly he was soon enough met with numerous disappointed and infuriated reactions from them, he feared he was being frowned upon too harshly, to regain their trust all of a sudden this made him consider every word he'd commented on. "Alright I'll listen to what James has to say and we can affirm the two countries relationship then maybe I might change my thoughts on him" Gene lastly gave in to what the cabinet originally wanted.
xxxx
Ray soon gathered the knowing truth that he was rather liking this trip to Brussels, at the precise moment he was peacefully sitting amongst Marian's attractive friends, Camille and Evelyn, the girls instantly got his sense of humour and cleverness unlike British Girls who he believed found his jokes too damn right rude. "You know Marian, I'm glad you agreed to introduce me more to this wonderful city, also I forgot to ask, can you tell me where the nearest souvenir store as I was hoping to buy a souvenir for my friend Chris back at home in London" Ray smiled appreciatively, he soon smirked even more, when Evelyn unbuttoned her jacket, from the corner of her eye, the young brunette giggled.
"Are you like this all the time with women Ray?, especially on a Summer's day" Evelyn asked, she actually found rather adorable the impression he gave, the obvious shyness within his eyes particularly when he struggled with the accurate words to say to a single woman.
"Yeah I'm afriad I am, One Christmas back in Manchester, I was a little drunk I must admit but I soon found myself chatting up this gorgeous bird, I couldn't take my eyes off her puppies and felt straight away I was getting a hard on, well me balls rubbing against my trousers bloody painful it was, anyway we seemed to share a lot in common, supported the same football team Manchester United and that we preferred wonderful English meals. Oh Blimey" Ray stops for a minute, feeling embarassed and notably shy to admit this to his new female friends who all seemingly looked quite intrigued by his Christmas story. "I leaned over to kiss her but she pushed me away from her, what I didn't realize though until I got up was, when I fell I knocked one of the blokes over into the freshly prepared Christmas cake on the corner of the counter. Next thing I know I'm legging it as far as my legs can take me down one of the back alleys and over the nearby wall. Never been so scared of a huge mob of people before, of course I've never confessed this to Chris or any of my other old friends, I think all they would do is take the piss out of me" He blushed evidently in both cheeks, he was soon wishing he hadn't told them this now, he presumed they'd find this hilarious and post it on Facebook or Twitter.
"Aww Ray, Sounds like it wasn't your fault, that woman must have been horrible to push you over so hard" Camille sympathized with him.
His glittering eyes gazed up and towards the three female friends, he noticed Camille had placed her hand delicately on his shoulder, she reassuringly smiled at him, basically telling he shouldn't feel ashamed about it, he ought to teach himself to feel expressively self-assured and comfortable when telling anyone else previous stories.
"Wow I honestly thought you'd be laughing at me, saying how foolish I must have been to make a drunken pass at a woman I'd only known for five minutes" Ray said, revealing what he thought they would have told him in reply to his story.
"Ray would you like to visit a few more places around this city before its get dark outside?" Evelyn politely asked him, her hand tickling over his left hand on the table.
"Yeah sure if its no problem" Ray answered, feeling relieved and relaxed.
xxxx
The PM nervously waited on the steps of Number 10 for the American President, he wondered why he ought to be detecting such silly nerves within his thoughts, he wondered this constantly but he quickly recapped on what the Foreign Secretary Jack Gilbert had told him, that the most powerful World Leader was only visiting for 24 hours. Thoughts circulated in his mind on what the Press were going to say, were they going to criticize him and say he was rather envious of James Keats.
"Prime Minister, the President's car is arriving at the gates of Downing Street" One of his Aides informed him, he awkwardly moved his right foot off the step and then onto the graveled pavement. He observed closely as the car approached Number 10, all the attention and the camera were focused on the new arrival as he soon stepped out of the car, he smiled confidently and reassuringly at the cameras and waved, the media seemingly looked impressed by his royal blue jacket and matching trousers, his glasses reflecting the camera lense. Prime Minister Hunt stepped forward and greeted him with a hand shake.
"Good to meet you at last James" he murmured by his ear.
"And you too, Gene" James answered, smiling endlessly.
"Shall we go inside Number 10 and introduce you to my cabinet members, there very eager to meet you"
"Okay"
The two leaders turned to face the cameras and both waved before walking inside the most famous building in the World.
Alex had been standing motionless alongside the other dedicated backroom staff, she glanced over to see Gene and James chatting amongst themselves, for some reason that she wasn't precisely sure of, was that James seemed untruthful. She presumed this mainly because her and Molly had been watching the news quite a lot at the weekends - the only time when Alex wasn't working. Molly identified everytime when the American President gave news conferences at the White House, everytime she watched them she suspected he wasn't being honest with the American public, he made continous excuses and itched his forehead as if to suggest he didn't have a clue about anything.
"Alex dear, stand uprightly you'll get aching shoulders the more you slouch them" Phylis advised her.
"I'm sorry Phylis, just have thoughts on my mind at the moment" Alex sighed frustratingly.
"I understand dear but as the saying goes its best to leave your problems at home and not bring them to work" Phylis evidently sympathized with her as she recognized what family problems the young mother might have. Alex tried to explain it wasn't exactly family problems at all as everything at home was normal.
Gene walked James over to meet his team. "James I'd like you to meet Jack Gilbert, he's the Foreign Secretary for my cabinet and John Bishop he's the Work and Employment Secretary" Gene didn't exactly want to smile but ended up forcing an unwanted smile from his lips as James shook hands with both men.
Next they moved along the line of the enthusiastic cabinet members, Gene stopped by Alex and Phylis, Alex looked expressively surprised that Gene done this out of the blue"James I'd like you to meet Alex Drake and Phylis Dobbs, Phylis does all the house organizing in this house and Alex helps me with significant documentations, that I have to prepare and arrange before I give a speech to the British Press"
James sensitively smiled as he made eye contact with Alex, he gazed at her directly in the eye, to her surprise she soon realized he wasn't as taller than she assumed however he still came across as ambiguously in the eyes and in obvious appearance. "Nice to meet you Alex, you look wonderful on this fine afternoon, may I ask how long you've been working here"
"Nearly two weeks, why do you ask?" Alex looked far from impressed by his quizzical looks, she assumed he might be trying to flirt with her outrageously even though he was supposedly happily married to the First Lady, who unsurprisingly had chosen to stay back in Washington at the last minute.
"Oh just curious, nothing more really, Gene's actually just told me a lot about you, said you're the best and most hardworking backroom staff member in this building" James muttered, his eyes drifting downwards.
"Oh has he, been gossiping behind my back" Alex, folded her arms and purposely directed her unhappy comment at him. as Gene clearly gazed at her dazzling brown eyes, he soon took note of what she meant and shrugged his shoulders hesitantly, he avoided saying anything in reply so he gave her a 'what have I done now' reaction instead . This never particularly went unnoticed as Jaems instantly spotted the unmistakable signs of sizzling chemistry between the two of them.
"Its like me and wife Angelica when we attend a Christmas party with the in-laws, we disagree on ridiculous and silly matters but I guess in the end we always make up for it with a gentle and affectionate kiss" He reveals to them, acting very insecure.
Gene dryly coughed to acquire James' attention, for a brief second he had detected an heated exchange between him and Alex, of course he felt jealous yet he felt reassured as Alex gave the known impression she never wanted to flirt back "Well James shall we, introduce you to more of the offices downstairs and upstairs"
"Yes I think shall, will you be joining us later Alex?" James asked as he began to walk alongside Gene.
"Erm..maybe as I have some last minute job tasks to be completed" Alex replied, giving him a frosty look, the fact was although she never hated him, she just couldn't stand him as there was that vagueness about him, maybe he was someone who preferred to flirt too much.
As they walked away from the staff and towards the spiralling starcase, James pulled a face, still deep in considerate thought of what she'd said. "You know I believed for a minute there she was going to bite my head off , is Alex always like this?, not acting very welcome to newcomers"
"No she's not, think she might be rather shy of communicating with new arrivals yet I still reckon she must have been born at an Texan rodeo because trust me the woman has quite some fight and determination within her" Gene cracked a joke to impress him not that he would prefer to actually get in his good books and also he had to keep instinctively focused in order to keep the American and British friendship strengthened more than ever seeing as the war was still being fought in Afghanistan.
End of Chapter
All Reviews are welcome.