Proactive Man

Two hours later, I was freezing my everything off standing in a queue outside a bus station in downtown Chicago. The cold wasn’t the worst thing: I had this acidic feeling that I’d made a galactic mistake in leaving the airport. The kind of mistake that couldn’t be measured in being grounded.

There’d been a queue at BA customer services, the departure screens overflowing with red warnings of cancelled journeys. A voice said there would be no flights for twenty-four hours and all affected BA passengers would be put up in a hotel. The queue grumbled.

‘Are you kidding me?’ said a man with a massive beard.

I’d grab a burger. That’s what I’d do. As soon as my accommodation was sorted. America. They do things differently here. I mean that was already obvious. The toilet stall doors didn’t reach the floor for one thing.

It’ll be fiiine. Dad doesn’t even have to know, I told myself.

Eventually I got to the front of the airport queue and arrangements were arranged.

Maybe if, walking away from the desk, I hadn’t looked up, I wouldn’t have seen the huge sign saying TRANSPORTATION SOLUTIONS. But I did. I couldn’t check into my hotel for ages, so I joined another queue of moaning people, those waiting for solutions to their transportation problems, and I wondered whether I should call home.

Thoughts:

If I go to the Holiday Inn, I’ll sit in a tiny room until Snowmageddon ends. When I finally get to Hollywood I’ll have missed my scene and all I’ll have left to do is to jump back on a return flight home.

Or …

I could be PROACTIVE like …

PROACTIVE MAN. CAPTAIN PROACTIVE. THE PROACTIVATOR.

‘How much is a train to LA?’ I asked in my most self-assured voice, which didn’t sound too self-assured if I’m honest.

The transportation solutions woman wore a smile as fake as her fingernails.

‘Two hundred and eighty-five dollars.’

Right. I had a hundred.

‘Is there a bus?’

I heard a long sigh from the American woman queuing behind me.

‘There’s the Greyhound. That’d get you there. Express route. You wouldn’t even have to change. The roads are fine. It’s eighty-five dollars. And you’ll need another five to take the CTA to the bus station. Greyhound don’t leave from here.’

I handed over the hundred-dollar bill. It didn’t feel great. Especially as Mum was likely at some point to ask what I’d spent her money on.

‘How old are you, honey? You’ve got to be fifteen to travel unaccompanied.’

I cleared my throat. I’d never lied to a proper official before. Only once when I told a gardener that it wasn’t me who’d run across his lawn. And this official was American. What if she asked to see my passport? What if I got thrown in jail? American jail. With gangs and tattoos and orange jumpsuits.

‘Sixteen,’ I said. ‘And British.’

(Only half was untrue. A 50 per cent lie. Not even a full fib.)

And that was that. She didn’t even look up. She took my money. As I watched her quick fingernails I tried not to chunder. Because, as I told my stomach, I was sixteen in lots of ways. I mean, there were so going to be sixteen-year-olds less grown-up than me. For example, my legs were decently hairy.

‘How long does it take to get to California?’ I asked all innocently, which maybe I should have done before handing over the cash.

‘Two days,’ she said, slipping my money into an out-of-sight till and passing me ten dollars back. ‘You arrive at nine ten in the morning on Thursday. Sometimes they even arrive ahead of schedule. You’ll need to show photo ID and proof of age to your driver. Have a great journey.’

Two days! A double tap of bad news to the head. And on a bus too! There’d better be a socket for my phone.

Don’t cry, don’t cry.

Think: the schedule said that the scene was being shot midday on Thursday. Today was meant to be arrival and ‘settling in’. For tomorrow, Wednesday, the plan was shopping in Beverly Hills. And, I mean, I didn’t even like shopping. Or hills.

Thursday: they’d be able to pick me up from the Greyhound station in LA in the morning and get me to the studio in time. Easily. And I’d still have the studio tour to look forward to later on in the afternoon. It was fine. Really.

To try to ignore the weird turning of my insides, I remembered that time in Year Nine when Sean Williams was on TV. Bristol City were playing in the FA Cup and the camera showed the crowd. There he was. Looking moist in a bobble hat. But then the head teacher mentioned it in assembly. Sean’s picture was in the newsletter. Sixth-form girls spoke to him. For real. Imagine that. The dream.

What would happen when they saw me in a movie? It’d be on the school website and everything. Forget top grades or goals scored – I’d be a hero. I’d have an entourage, and I could pick out my table in the school canteen and they’d let me skip the queue and never again would I worry about detentions because of late homework. Even Amy would be obliged to acknowledge my awesomeness. I’d get a cool nickname like ‘Famous Jacob’. ‘FJ’. ‘Facob’. I mean, at the very least people would know my name.

The proof of age thing was a problem. But if the driver didn’t let me on the bus, I could just go back to the hotel, safe in the knowledge that at least I’d tried. And the weather would have to clear at some point. That’s what weather does. Unless you’re in northern England.

When I thanked the woman for the tickets her mouth said ‘you’re welcome’ and ‘have a nice day’, but her eyes said ‘not long until the end of my shift’.