The bass of you

Chapter 3

Driving into the Cardiff city centre now, it's hellish busy here, as usual. Lots of traffic, horns beeping in frustration, and people walking everywhere. I've always hated driving around Cardiff. It's not hard or anything like that, it's just always hectic here, and confusing if you don't know the area well - like me. Layla has the satnav app open on her phone and is telling me directions to the hotel because I know where it is, I just have no bloody idea how to get there.

Layla leans forward and points to the right, her eyes fixated on the view ahead. "Turn down that next road on your right." I do as Layla instructs me to do, turning the wheel quickly around the sharp turn. She looks to her left and points up ahead. "Not this turning by here, the next one, take that one." Doing as Layla says, I drive past the first left turning and take the next one after it. We're now down a road that has the back of many shops, it's still busy down here though. Down the bottom, I can see the first floor to a multi-story carpark and hope that that's the one for the hotel we're staying in. My hopes are being overshadowed by disappointment the closer we get and the silence from Layla. I'm about to drive past it when Layla suddenly lunges forward and point her finger to her side of the windscreen. "Shit! Sorry! Here! Take this one, quick!" she shouts hastily.

I quickly turn the wheel at the last second and make it into the drive-in part of the multi-story. As I get in there, it's really full and I'm struggling to find a place to park and considering driving to the ground floor, when I suddenly see a spot. Rushing to claim it before another car drives in and takes it, I slide the gearstick into gear one and slowly make my way into the parking bay. Now parked, I switch off the engine, pull up the handbrake, and sigh in relief that we're finally here. Layla is clapping her hands, biting down on her bottom lip and squealing. She excitedly opens the passenger door, grabs her handbag from the floor of the car and gets out the car. Taking my keys out the ignition, I slap my hands on my thighs and open my driver's door. Heading to the boot, Layla has already opened the boot door and is taking out everything - literally everything, even my stuff. She blows a strand of blonde hair that's falling over her eye and mouth, then looks up at me as she's bending down fiddling with the zip of her suitcase.

"Let's go to the hotel and get all ready to go out in a few hours," she says excitedly, followed by another squeal.

I reach for the boot door and pull it down to close it. I pull my keys from my pocket to press the lock button and lock my car. Grabbing my suitcase and carrying the plastic bag with my shoes in in the other hand, I laugh and shake my head as I follow Layla out the multi-story carpark. She's singing to herself loudly, her voice echoing through the multi-story carpark like a microphone. She's throwing her head frontwards in rhythm of the Black Dagger song she's singing and her legs are shaking : I can't tell whether that's because she's so excited or because they can't control themselves to the song she's singing.

As we round the corner of the street, we emerge onto a busy main street where loads of people are looking at us with our suitcases. Layla doesn't care, she's not even acknowledging that there's people around her, she's too busy looking ahead of the street in search for the hotel. I flash a few smiles at some people : some return the smile, while others just stare at me coldly. 

Okay then, moody bastards. 

Layla turns around to glance at me over her shoulder and has a huge grin that tells me she's found the hotel. She starts walking faster and I huff at the thought of knowing I need to walk faster now to keep up with her. With some people staring at me, Layla walking fast, and carrying a heavy suitcase I can feel the irritation growing inside me and I'm sure that if something happens to annoy me, I'm going to flip my shit.

I follow Layla through the glass door of a tall, three-floor building. Inside the reception area, there is dark wooden flooring, light-blue painted walls, flat circular lights on the ceiling above and a straight wooden reception desk with two receptionists sat behind there on the computers. The hotel isn't the best hotel, but we weren't really bothered about what hotel we'd be saying. Of course, we didn't want a really bad hotel either.