Minnie Chase Makes a Mistake (6 page)

Minnie felt exhausted when she finally sat down. Her adrenaline high was rapidly replaced with a numbing low. She clamped her eyes shut. It seemed to be getting hotter. She could feel herself overheating, in spite of the fact that she had carefully and practically selected her travel wardrobe. Wide, loose, linen trousers, flight socks to prevent deep-vein thrombosis, practical slip-on shoes and a huge, flapping, voluminous shirt and delicate lace shawl that was supposed to facilitate air flow. Her carelessly-cut hair was sticking to the back of her neck.

She eventually opened her eyes and fidgeted with the belt as she settled into her newly negotiated seat.

‘Did your boyfriend drop some Ambien for the flight?’ asked the bemused looking man to her right, nodding in the direction of the window. He had a laidback beach tan and sun-bleached hair. He was wearing an eye-poppingly bright shirt and board shorts accessorised with a beaded necklace, braided bracelets and a warm smile.

Minnie stared at him, bewildered, wondering why on earth this stranger was talking to her about James George. The question made her heart begin to race.

‘Sleeping pills,’ said the stranger, offering an explanation.

‘Oh, him!’ exclaimed Minnie, realising the mistake as she followed his gaze to her left. ‘
He’s
not my boyfriend. I don’t even know the man.’ She coughed to cover up the undertones of horror in her voice, thankful the man was out for the count and unable to take offence. 

The bright-shirted man with the smile now looked momentarily flummoxed as to why Minnie would want to switch a middle seat in one row for a middle seat in the next row. After a brief pause, he gave a relaxed shrug and let the obvious question go.

Minnie silently thanked her lucky stars that she didn’t need to explain an obsessive compulsive number disorder. She inhaled deeply:
breathe, Minnie, breathe
, she repeated the mantra. 

‘Snowflake Jackson,’ said the bright-shirted man with an even wider smile. He stuck out his right hand. ‘Pleased to meet you. Friends call me Snowflake, my sisters call me Jackson. My mother is still on first-name terms with me – she calls me Jay, which is short for Jason. No one calls me Jason except for my father. Jason is the son he wanted but never had – a respectable suit-wearing Harvard-educated lawyer. You decide.’

Snowflake, dear God
, thought Minnie, panicking slightly, as she shook his hand. This talkative man was one of those rare and exotic species that should be admired from a safe distance and preferably from behind armoured glass. It was going to be one of those Nothing In Common situations and probably a very long flight.

So much for Angie’s prediction about sensible and serious National Geographic Man. 

But her good manners couldn’t bring her to ignore Jackson, after all, he was merely a by-product of the successful resolution of her zero-fear situation and so, rather reluctantly, she began to introduce herself. Panic set in as soon as she tried to choose a suitable way to address the still-smiling stranger. Snowflake was surely too familiar; Jay too ‘meet-the-parents’; and Jason too ‘I-hate-the-parents’.

 ‘Pleased to meet you, um, Jackson. I’m…’ she then stumbled over her own name. She could hear A.A Jones’s voice bellowing across the ocean:
Responsible grown-ups who want to be taken seriously in life do not use frivolous retracted versions of their names
. ‘…it’s… er,’ continued Minnie, another pause, ‘Um, Miranda. I’m Miranda Chase.’

Jackson’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Fake passport?’

‘What…? Oh… I really am a Miranda but…’ She continued, flustered, lowering her voice just in case Jackson’s last remark was whispered around the cabin and she was arrested by a flight marshal. ‘I just… oh never mind.’

She seized the moment to defy her boss. ‘No! Call me Minnie.’

Jackson nodded, the corners of his mouth twitching. Minnie blushed. Not exactly a textbook introduction, thought Minnie as she quickly directed her attention to the back of seat 18B.

The flight departed on time at 11:45 and was scheduled to arrive in San Francisco at 14:35. Around two hours thirty five minutes once Minnie reset her watch. It was a reassuring compression of time because she didn’t have a moment to lose. She was determined to find Greene and try to contain the disaster.

Minnie quickly did the maths in her head. She had to endure 5,369 miles in a confined space. She did a quick mental calculation based on 497 mph or 432 knots and concluded she would be strapped into her seat for 11 hours and 14 minutes with re-conditioned air constantly circulating through the cabin. Even a change of seat couldn’t control Minnie’s mounting panic. Multiple numbers but just one word: interminable. 

‘I could be wrong but you don’t strike me as someone who’s going on vacation,’ said Jackson once the plane levelled out above the clouds. The seatbelt sign was off. 

‘It’s complicated,’ said Minnie, waiting for her ears to pop.

‘Running away from home?’

‘I’m 32 years old,’ replied Minnie tartly.

Jackson shrugged, he appeared happy to do the talking. He told Minnie he was a professional surfer returning home to San Francisco after fulfilling some promotional work in London for one of the latest surfer movies. 

Occasionally Minnie would sneak a peek at him. He had a deep Californian tan, longish sun-bleached hair and a polished photogenic smile. She noted hands the size of car wheels. He was broad, too, and constantly rubbed shoulders with her.
So much for personal space
, thought Minnie. She worried that transatlantic sleep would strike her down and she would wake up draped over on his shoulder, a Minnie epaulette. He seemed unrelentingly cheerful and this seemed to further highlight the dark cloud hanging over Minnie.

Jackson continued to talk – effortlessly relaxed chatter, perhaps as a result of picking up on her nervousness; a knee jerk reaction to keep her mind off the situation. Fear of flying.

Minnie tuned in and out of the conversation. She heard all about the surfers at Mavericks, apparently a world-renowned big wave break. It was half a mile off the coast of Half Moon Bay in California. He talked a lot about breaks and waves. A Lot. Gnarly ones, reef breaks, point breaks. She listened as he chatted about putting in countless hours in critical surf. 

Perhaps this was like learning a foreign language in one’s sleep
, thought Minnie, drowsily. The powers of passive listening knew no limits. Jackson was like one of those learning CDs that promised success within 12 hours. She would arrive in San Francisco none the wiser about Greene’s whereabouts but would be an overnight expert on surfing; able to describe and assess weather conditions, consider the relative merits of off-shore and on-shore winds and discuss pro-tour updates, waxing boards, wipeouts and catching a barrel. 

The man in the window seat was radiating heat like a freshly boiled egg. Minnie began to feel a little squeamish and rustled around until she found an official motion sickness paper bag. 

‘Are you gonna be sick?’ asked Jackson, pulling his shoulders back slightly. 

‘No. Just breathing control,’ replied Minnie in a muffled voice. She practically had her head inside the bag. ‘I’m a little anxious.’

‘Looks like you’re gonna be sick.’

‘I’m
not
going to be sick,’ shouted Minnie, coming up for air. 

Jackson raised his hands as way of apology.

When Minnie’s nausea attack appeared to have settled, Jackson picked up the conversation again.

‘I
am
a professional surfer,’ he repeated, laughing. Minnie had shown no interest when he had first told her and she was no more impressed when he listed his achievements to date. 

‘Sorry, I’ve never heard of you,’ said Minnie from behind her paw-print eye mask. She had been using this in an unsuccessful bid to indicate sleep and attempting to use the powers of darkness to shut out her immediate environment. ‘I wouldn’t take it personally; I’m more a bath-water person.’ 

‘I have sponsors. Rip Curl?’

Minnie shrugged. ‘I’m drawing a blank.’

‘Is everything okay?’

‘I’m still here,’ said Minnie. This was Angie’s favourite soundbite. The eternal optimist.

‘Let’s get a proper drink,’ suggested Jackson. 

Minnie agreed to this on the assumption that people are more likely to fall asleep on a plane after an alcoholic beverage. Something to do with restricted oxygen and high altitude. Crew were summoned, drinks were requested. Minnie was sure that Jackson hadn’t stopped talking since take off. 

‘Hey, it’s never as bad as you think,’ he said, raising a glass of Scotch.

Minnie whipped off her eye mask and glowered at him. 

He looked momentarily scared. ‘I mean…’

Minnie cut him off. ‘Actually,’ she checked her watch, ‘within the last 24 hours I have publicly humiliated a world-famous businessman. I scared off his fiancée, probably, like forever. In so doing I managed to sabotage a
major
business deal, and get myself fired as a result. As a bonus, not a financial one I hasten to add, I caught my husband-to-be in bed with another woman. It’s like a Jack Bauer movie but not even Kiefer Sutherland can save me. It’s as bad as you can imagine, in fact it’s probably worse.’

There was a stunned quietness within the cocoon of 19B and 19C. Then Jackson let out a whistle like he was rounding up livestock. ‘Hell, that sounds bad. I’m really sorry,’ he said.

When Minnie didn’t answer, Jackson reached over and rested an enormous hand on her arm. Minnie reacted by shaking him off violently as though his handprint was about to leave a scorch mark on her skin. 

He raised his hands. ‘Hey, I’m not trespassing. I
have
a girlfriend.’

‘She is probably cheating on you, too,’ snapped Minnie. The last 24 hours and cabin fever were definitely getting to her.

‘No,’ Jackson laughed with the confidence of an attractive man who possessed a great smile and a high sperm count, ‘she probably isn’t.’

‘
Yes
, she probably is.’

Jackson laughed some more, which irritated Minnie enormously.

‘Do you want me to hack into your girlfriend’s smartphone and access her cheating text messages?’

‘Yeah, right.’ But Jackson looked instantly curious. ‘You could do that?’

‘Yes. It is completely illegal and highly unethical but, hey, I’m down on cheaters at the moment.’

‘She’s not cheating on me.’

‘Lucky you,’ snapped Minnie.

‘Check if you like,’ encouraged Jackson.

‘No need. She’s faithful, like you said.’

‘It’s okay to get it wrong sometimes,’ teased Jackson.

Minnie sighed. She wished she’d never opened her mouth. No surprise there.

‘I need your cell phone number and hers. And, for the record, I would NEVER normally do this,’ said Minnie, ‘in a personal situation like this.’

It made Minnie realise how much she had loved and trusted James George. She had never once thought about snooping on his phone. 

‘You’re a hacker?’

‘You make me sound like a digital criminal,’ responded Minnie reprimanding him. ‘Hacking is all about building, exploring, testing, prototypes…oh, never mind.’ She could see that Jackson wasn’t interested in coding. He wanted to get to the heart of his girlfriend’s phone.

‘How does it work?’ he pestered. ‘Show me how it’s done.’

‘You don’t need to know how it’s done,’ snapped Minnie. ‘I’m protecting you from the authorities because I know someone like you would crack under interrogation.’ 

Jackson took this as a personal slight on his manliness. ‘I would not!’

‘Give me the number. I don’t need a signal transmission.’ 

As she tapped in numbers, face frowning in concentration, she set Jackson straight: ‘Your problem is that you
know
you’re attractive, which isn’t a very attractive quality in a person.’

Jackson chuckled. ‘You’re hilarious. I love it.’

Exactly 27 seconds later the smile was wiped off his face. 

Jackson looked shell-shocked. The revelation was a real blow. Minnie instantly regretted her actions. ‘Technically, I didn’t hack into your girlfriend’s phone. I hacked into her
deleted
messages using an algorithm between two correlating numbers. I didn’t go near her inbox. Most adulterers delete messages because no one wants to get caught. I just happen to know how to retrieve them.’ 

‘Is this how you finally caught your boyfriend at it?’

‘No. I just opened the bedroom door,’ said Minnie dryly.

‘My girlfriend has been seeing my coach for all this time and I didn’t know about it? How the hell?’ exclaimed Jackson. This was about the third time he had said this.

‘I’m sorry.’ Minnie cringed. The messages had been pretty explicit and stretched back over the last six months. With no satisfaction at all she realised that Jackson was no longer a Nothing In Common person. Unfortunately, their common denominator wasn’t a feel-good one.

Jackson sat up straight in his seat and bashed the side of his head with the heel of his hand. ‘This is the reason I’ve been dropped from the team.’

‘You’ve been dropped? You didn’t mention this a moment ago when you were telling me about sponsors, medals and trophies,’ said Minnie, puzzled. 

Jackson’s signature sunshine smile was replaced with a frown. ‘Well, not officially, but it’s on the cards and if I don’t go on tournaments with the team, the sponsors will turn their attention to the next best thing.’

‘I don’t think the coach sleeping with your girlfriend is the reason you got dropped,’ reasoned Minnie thoughtfully. She was trying to make him feel better.

‘It has to be.’

‘No, it doesn’t.’

‘There is no other reason. You’ve seen the text messages.’ He motioned to the flight attendant for another Scotch. 

‘Well, there is an
obvious
reason,’ said Minnie, ‘like perhaps you’re not good enough?’ She delivered this in her signature no-frills style. ‘People who want to be taken seriously as a professional athlete need to live like one.’ She eyed Jackson’s drink and continued. ‘You need to train and commit to the cause. We haven’t even touched on the fact that you just might not have enough natural talent or fearlessness, which, I imagine, is a prerequisite for a profession that can smash you against rocks, or even drown you on a bad day.’