The Word Cloud

Guero blips the car open and climbs inside. Hiding behind dark glasses, his eyes gritty, his hair still wet from a hasty shower, he glances at the clock on the dash.

07.05 –

Sunday morning, Rioja still flowing guiltily through his veins, two a.m. indecently recent.

Still, a promise is a promise.

Today the Tourist arrives, expecting to be met at Gatwick airport. And he’d promised.

Guero turns the key in the ignition and points the car south-west.

The screen in Arrivals says BAGGAGE IN HALL –

            Damn, probably not enough time to grab a coffee.

            Sure enough, the Tourist appears within a couple of minutes. They greet each other, say their good to see yous, and set off for the car park. The Tourist pulls behind him a compact bag covered in a clear plastic security wrapping and wears a small backpack.

            As the morning sun rises higher on the open roads, Guero and the Tourist chat amiably on the journey back into South West London, renewing an acquaintance and asking after mutual friends. With traffic still light, the return trip passes quickly and soon they’re parked outside Guero’s house.

            Guero shows the Tourist inside and begins to make coffee.

‘Shit.’

            ‘What?’ Guero asks.

            ‘I can’t believe this.’

            ‘What?’

            ‘I’ve got the wrong bag.’

            ‘Are you sure?’

            ‘This bag isn’t mine,’ the Tourist says.

            He pulls away some more of the plastic wrapping and reveals a name tag that plainly isn’t his.

            The Tourist, now turning a shade of grey that can’t all be put down to a lack of sleep, begins to pace about Guero’s kitchen.

            Guero fetches his laptop –

            Guero googles Gatwick –

            Guero finds a phone number.

            The Tourist punches the number into the phone and stands listening to recorded messages. The bag looks accusingly at him.

            ‘Look, it’s ok,’ Guero says. ‘Let’s drink this coffee and head back to the airport.’

            ‘Shit, man, I’m so sorry,’ the Tourist says.

            ‘Hey, no problem. Ten minutes, we’ll be on our way.’

            Thinking bastard bag –

            Thinking you stupid –

Gatwick North Terminal looks just as it had when they’d left it an hour or so previously.

            The Tourist and Guero find an information desk, and the Tourist explains his mistake. He produces travel documents from his backpack to prove he’s who he says he is and gets given a number to call. Two minutes later, and his bag’s on its way back to him.

            Sighs of relief all round.

            Presumably except from the guy whose bag still glowers at the Tourist from behind its ripped plastic wrapping, but hey, shit happens and hopefully it’ll find its way back to its owner –

            Guero and the Tourist sit in a coffee shop to await the arrival of The Correct Luggage and slurp Americanos.

            Ten minutes pass and an airport security guy appears, checks the Tourist’s documentation and reunites him with his bag.

            That bag looks nothing like the one he took, Guero thinks. One’s blue, the other’s black and – oh, feck it, so what, let’s get home.

The citizens of South East England are now out in force and clear roads have now become busy ones. The journey takes longer and Guero and the Tourist make jokes about the bag swap to pass the time.

            Two thirds of the way home, a journey that’s now taken over forty-five minutes as opposed to the twenty-five that the same part of the drive had taken previously, the roads are at a standstill.

            And then –

            Guero: ‘Oh, well, drama over. You’ve got your other bag, though, right?’

            The Tourist: ‘Yes. I – um, yeah, I – ’

            The Tourist starts to look around in the clearly empty foot well of the car. Abandoning this obviously fruitless attempt, he looks wildly over his shoulder at the bare back seat.

            ‘Did you put it in the boot with the main bag?’ Guero asks.

            ‘Yeah. No. I don’t know.’

            Ahead, the lights turn red again. The Tourist opens the car door, asking ‘Is the boot unlocked?’

            Guero watches helplessly in the rear view as the boot lid rises and a frantic scrabbling is heard.

            The Tourist slides back into the passenger seat with the look of a man whose DNA’s just been found at a major crime scene.

            ‘Fuck.’

            Guero: ‘You are joking?’

            ‘It’s not there. Shit, it’s got my passport, my travel documents, my money, my credit card – ’

            ‘When did you last see it?’ Guero asks. ‘I mean, did you have it with you when we got back to the car park? Did you put it on top of the car when you put the other bag in the boot, or on the floor, or – ? ’

            ‘I don’t know, I don’t know,’ whispers the ghost. ‘I don’t know.’

            Guero checks in the rear view, flips the indicator and performs an illegal U-turn on the A23.

As Guero approaches car park 6 North Terminal for the third time in as many hours, he slows and tells the Tourist to go back to the information desk quickly. Guero will meet him there once he’s parked the car.

The Tourist leaps from the car, a man for whom adrenaline has become rocket fuel. Guero drives to the barrier, takes a ticket and begins to wonder whether suspicion of running an unlicensed taxi service carries a large penalty. He is beginning to build a collection of tickets from car park 6 and has noticed that the security system is sophisticated enough that each one has his registration number printed on it.

Car parked, Guero walks to the Arrivals hall. It occurs to him that a cigarette would be a good idea. It then occurs to him that he didn’t bring any with him.

In the hall, there’s no sign of the Tourist or any recalcitrant backpack. Guero waits for ten minutes, eleven, twelve, until at last the Tourist reappears.

He’s smiling.

‘They’ve got it,’ he says. ‘They found it in the coffee shop.’

‘Great,’ Guero replies, relieved, ‘where is it?’

‘At Lost Property. South Terminal.’

‘South Terminal.’

‘Yeah. Is that far?’

Guero and the Tourist walk.

            Staircases, walkways, travelators, down the plate glass corridors and across shiny floors, following signs that say ‘Shuttle.’

            They wait for the Shuttle –

            They board the Shuttle –

            The Shuttle shuttles.

            They leave the Shuttle and walk, more staircases, more walkways, more travelators, deep down into the basement offices of Gatwick Airport.

South bloody Terminal.

After a while they discover the lair of the Lost Property Mistress.

Thankfully she’s a cheery soul and amidst banter and an increasing air of amused sarcasm, she fetches the relevant forms. Paperwork completed, the Tourist is reunited with his backpack.

Back in car park 6 and Guero is insisting that the Tourist delve into his bag and retrieve the carton of Marlboro that had been a gift from the Tourist but are now rapidly becoming Medical Supplies.

            The Tourist obliges, and the two men move out of the confines of the car park and light cigarettes.

The Tourist had announced pre-trip that he’d Given Up –

The Tourist doesn’t look like he’s Stuck At It –

It’s been a stressful time.

 Back in South West London and the Tourist says he’s going to take a shower. Guero shows him where the bathroom and the spare room are and goes downstairs to cook something. He’s arranged a trip for the Tourist to The London Eye but first would like some breakfast. It now being 1.30.

            As he sips a coffee and waits for the grill to warm, Guero hears a muffled shout.

            ‘Shit.’

            Fuck, no, fuck, no. fuck, no –

            Not again, not again, not again –

            Guero calls up the stairs. ‘Is everything ok?’

            ‘I put my bag down on the floor and heard something smash.’

            Guero thinks you PUT your bag down. From a height?

            ‘It’s the whisky. It’s kind of everywhere.’

            It does that, Guero thinks, liquid. Once released, it travels. Everywhere.

            Guero climbs the stairs wearily. The Tourist is kneeling on the floor of the spare room, gingerly picking broken glass from his Scotch-sodden clothing. Every item of clothing. The (soft) bag lies on the (hard) slate-tiled hearth.

            Guero mentions washing machine –

            Guero mentions food –

            Guero offers beer.

            Guero silently prays to a god he doesn’t believe in that the Tourist has now exhausted all the disasters of what is planned to be a five week, Europe-wide trip.

The Tourist is staying in a central London hotel tonight. Guero left him there this afternoon, wishing him well and saying how much he’s looking forward to seeing him again mid-August when he returns to the UK before flying back to South Africa.

            Guero wonders just how far he’ll get.