Welcome to My World

‘Um . . . listen, Harri, this probably isn’t as bad as it looks right now. I mean . . . um . . . OK, it does look pretty bad, actually, but if you just come out I’m sure we can discuss this calmly and rationally with everyone . . . um . . . well, with the people who haven’t left yet or . . . um . . . gone to hospital . . .’

Another pause. Then a large sigh.

‘Well, OK, I’ll . . . I’ll leave you to think about it, hon.’

The ladies’ loo door opens and the kitten heels beat a hasty retreat.

Harri shakes her head.

Stella Smith was Harri’s oldest and dearest friend.

They met on Harri’s first day at school, in the small playground at the front of Stone Yardley Village Primary. Harri was five and a half, and was beginning her schooling there six months later than most of her classmates, having recently moved to the area from her birthplace in Yorkshire.

Her first memory of Stella was of a tall, dark-blonde-haired girl in a red polo-neck jumper – which appeared both to accentuate her long fingers and elongate her neck like a Masai tribeswoman – heading confidently towards her, clutching a large bag of crisps.

‘Shall we be friends?’ Stella asked (although it was more of a command than a question).

‘Yes,’ Harri replied.

Stella smiled at her new friend. ‘Good. Have a Monster Munch then.’

And that was it.

Twenty-two years later, their taste in refreshments had matured from Irn-Bru and Wagon Wheels to lattes and Starbucks’ Skinny Peach and Raspberry Muffins, but Stella and Harri’s friendship remained strong as ever.

To the casual observer, Harri and Stella’s friendship might have appeared to be a strange mix. Stella was well-known for commanding attention wherever she went (now being nearly six feet tall with long bottle-blonde hair, cheekbones to die for and practically no inhibitions makes that easy). Harri, on the other hand, was quietly confident and assured; barely five feet four with wavy auburn curls, big blue eyes and more than a healthy dose of common sense. But when they were together, something magical happened. In Stella’s company Harri found she could be herself, whilst Stella felt safe, accepted and loved. It was, in many ways, the perfect combination.

Harri chose one of their frequent coffee-shop visits to tell Stella about Viv’s Big Idea.

‘She wants you to do what?’ Stella spluttered, almost choking on her macchiato.

‘Hmm, that was pretty much my reaction,’ said Harri.

‘No flippin’ way on this earth!’ Stella’s shoulders rocked wildly as she let out a huge guffaw. It was a truth universally acknowledged that Stella’s laugh had the potential to stop traffic.

‘Oh. My. Life! I hope you said no?’

Harri looked down into the foam of her cappuccino. ‘I should have said no . . . But she had a point.’

‘Her point being?’

Harri sighed. ‘Alex is rubbish at dating. No, actually, he’s very good at dating, it’s just that he’s rubbish at finding the right sort of women to date.’

‘Or brilliant at finding weird and wonderful bunny-boilers,’ Stella suggested.

‘Yeah, absolutely.’

‘It’s quite a skill he has there. Maybe he could offer his services for rooting out strange women. He could make a fortune!’

Harri grinned. ‘Honestly, Stel, I love Al dearly, but I’ve seen him devastated by his nightmare love life so many times . . .’

‘Usually at three in the morning, by the sounds of it.’

‘Don’t worry, after the last time he did that I made it perfectly clear that my emergency heart-to-heart service was only available during daylight hours.’

‘All the same, H, most people would’ve called time on him by now.’

‘Probably. But the problem remains that he doesn’t ever seem to learn from his mistakes. So maybe this crazy idea is worth a try. At least if Viv and I are vetting the candidates we can make sure the oddballs don’t get through.’

Stella snorted. ‘Oh, Viv’s promised to help you, has she? Well, I’ll believe that when I see it.’

‘No, she will, it’s all sorted.’

‘Yeah, right. I think I just saw a pig in a Spitfire overhead . . .’

Harri giggled. ‘You’re so cruel. I believe her this time.’

‘Good for you. But what happens if Alex – your Official Best Male Friend in the Whole Wide World – disowns you for nominating him in the first place, eh? I would be livid if I found out my best friend had put me up for a magazine love auction.’

‘I know. But knowing Viv she’ll concoct an even dafter plan than this if I don’t stop her. At least if I’m there to steer her I can protect Al from the wild vagaries of his mother’s imagination.’

During the following week, Harri mulled the Big Idea over and over, as she sat behind her desk at Sun Lovers International Travel.

The scratched metal name plaque on her MDF desk read ‘Travel Advisor’, but a more truthful (if prohibitively longer) description might have been ‘Travel Advisor Who Tries in Vain to Get Stone Yardley People to Visit Amazing Places She Longs to Go to Herself’.

Sun Lovers International Travel was not as grand and corpor ate as its name suggested. In fact, SLIT (as it was affectionately known by its owner – and acknowledged with a whole different connotation by its staff) was a small, single-fronted shop in Stone Yardley High Street. In its only window, carefully placed posters promised exotic adventures across the globe: Australia, Thailand, India and the USA, by luxurious air travel; whilst the handwritten offer cards Blu-Tacked to the window suggested altogether homelier destinations: Blackpool, Weston-super-Mare and Rhyl – usually by coach.

Business had been slow all week, and by Friday morning, with all of Harri’s jobs ticked off her list, she took the opportunity to lose herself in a glossy brochure for Venice.

Venice. The place that had started it all . . . She smiled as familiar images of the city she’d loved from afar for so many years met her eyes. Grand palazzi, elegant buildings reflecting in the deep green-blue canals, brightly attired carnival-goers milling amongst tourists and city dwellers, as if being swathed head to toe in opulent velvet was as commonplace as buying your daily coffee . . . She could almost hear the sounds of the city wafting up from the brochure pages, almost taste the plates of delicious cicchetti snacks or the tangy limoncello . . . One day, she promised herself, as she had done a million times before, one day I’ll be standing there . . .

She was brought sharply back to reality by Tom, SLIT’s trainee travel advisor and cultivator of some of the most impressive acne ever seen in Stone Yardley, who let out an enormous, adolescent sigh and flopped down on the chair opposite Harri’s desk.

‘Bored, bored, bored,’ he chanted, Buddhist-style, staring wide-eyed through his mop of oily, blond curls.

Harri quickly closed the brochure and smiled at him. ‘Loving your work again, Tom?’

‘Oh, totally. “Come and work in the travel industry, Tom, you get to see the world!” Yeah, right.’

‘Welcome to Sun Lovers International Travel,’ Harri smiled, reaching across to pat his hand. ‘So tell me, what exciting destinations have you dealt with today?’

Tom groaned. ‘Barmouth. Isle of Wight. And I almost sold a flight to Dublin.’

‘Dublin? Wow! What stopped the sale?’

‘Mrs Wetton didn’t realise it was outside England. She doesn’t believe in travelling abroad.’

Harri laughed. ‘Hmm, well, Dublin, that’s almost another time zone. I mean, they have different money and everything.’ Tom shifted his lanky frame awkwardly in the chair. At six foot four, he was almost a foot taller than anyone else on the staff, so wherever he stood or sat he appeared to have outgrown his environment like Alice in her Wonderland.