Looking for Someone
Thanks for your lovely reviews. Hugs MM! LM - I am wondering where I am going with this too! But in the meantime, here's the next bit.
Oh God, what was she doing? This was madness.
She needed space. She needed to get out.
Ignoring the seatbelt warning light and the protests of the cabin crew, and claiming an emergency in such a direct way that the blushing male steward let her past without delay she made her way to the toilet, locking the door behind her and then bracing herself between the walls of the small compartment as the aeroplane juddered.
The turbulence soon eased enough for her to run some cold water into the small sink, splashing it liberally over her face. She stared into the mirror; watched the droplets of water trace their way down her cheeks to drip slowly from her chin and took a few deep breaths.
The paper towel was coarse so she dabbed gently at her face and hands, screwing it up and disposing of it before reaching into her pocket to pull out a crumpled piece of paper, smoothing it out as she sat down carefully on the toilet lid to read the familiar list.
Reasons to Stay
Family
Friends
Lifestyle
Sunshine
Warmth
Known contact address
She glanced at the last one again. Had she stayed for so long so that she could be contactable?
Reasons to Leave
Future career prospects
Although she had admitted it to nobody, the job offer in Paris was a sideways step at best. There were always more prospects in a big European City but that was not the primary reason for being on this plane despite it being at the top of her list. She remained ambitious but as she got older, had tempered it with the knowledge that a nice job with friends around her and a comfortable standard of living in a beautiful place was important. Which made the reasons for being on the plane appear even more ludicrous.
Beneath her one reason for leaving was a great big question mark.
?
It sat glaring at her, filling the rest of the page.
Was this really the daftest idea she had ever had? This idea that had sat there in the back of her brain for so long that she could no longer tell whether she was functioning on gut instinct or a grand romantic ideal.
She had no idea where he was, had never been given any promises of happy ever after and was basing all of this on one snatched conversation. A conversation he should never have had, but had felt…
What had he felt?
Well enough to prepare her for what came such a short time later. Not soon enough to change the course of events though most likely that would have been impossible no matter how much warning she'd been given. She knew how these things worked.
She took another deep breath, flapping the paper around to stop her mind wandering to that awful day.
It wasn't strictly true to say that she was basing all of this, this total uprooting of her life on one snatched conversation. It was months - a year – two - of a slow building friendship, deep respect, mutual admiration, some fascination and a shared love of a healthy debate.
Argument some might say.
Camille had heard her Mother describe him as her daughters polar opposite. She didn't think the bar manager had meant it as any sort of criticism at the time although it was always possible. Catherine had an often strained friendship with the Englishman. No, it was more that she was trying to explain to someone why they appeared to function so well as a team.
Camille disagreed though. They were two halves of a coin in so many ways; he an introverted rule follower, slow to reach out for help if he needed it, she an extrovert who broke most of his rules and took risks which almost drove him to distraction. But they converged on so many things too. Their passionate desire to rid the planet of murderers and the like to the exclusion of all the normal trappings of life. Part of the reason she had never married had been her lack of commitment to the cause. Only now did she question lack of effort or simply never having met the right man. She also shared much less of herself than people at first realised. The really important stuff, painful moments in her life, undercover operations that hadn't gone as well as they should have, her father walking out when she was still so young, those times were not easily shared.
"You really don't you like her do you," he'd said directly, non-judgmentally during a murder case on a sugar plantation.
"No I don't, but that's not clouding my judgement."
"I never said it was."
"My father left home for a woman just like that. My mother watched ten years disappear as he turned from a husband and father into a babbling schoolboy."
"Sorry."
"Don't be. That was his loss! But I know how manipulative a woman like that can be."
What would he have made of her Father?
No doubt he would have been just as protective as Humphrey had been but she was quite sure he would have expressed himself in a completely different way. Which would have involved an argument or two before either she realised what he really meant, or he explained what he was trying to do.
Another jolt almost unseated her; no mean feat in the tiny bathroom, and she gathered her jumbled thoughts.
"But you don't have to anymore. You have me."
One step at a time Camille, she told herself, calming as the memory of that conversation pushed others aside. Land, sort yourself out, settle into the job and then the hard work begins.
As the plane once more settled, she stood, brushing down her clothes before flicking the locking mechanism on the door. Relief showed in the face of the young steward as she safely made her way back to her seat.