LA to The Bay

Chapter 7: Anaheim (2)

'Hey roomie.' I stare at the hand written note which has been left for my attention, placed neatly on the coffee table of my hotel room. 'Welcome to The OC baby! I can't wait to meet you, and I just know we're going to have a wicked time. I'm down at the pool so come meet me!'

Part of the deal for the trip, to try and keep the costs at a minimum, is that travellers pair up to share rooms. Same sex of course. Rumour has it that there are to be fifty of us, and so that means twenty four other girls. Twenty four other girls and I manage to get the only person whose handwriting I could possibly recognise on a trip full of otherwise strangers who have been dragged in from the world over. Every available continent and I get Lottie. A penguin from Antarctica would be better. And her handwriting is twirling and whirling perfectly, just like it always did, a cartoon heart doodled on the top of each letter i, like she hasn't been practising it for the past ten years. Oh wait, she has, and countless hours I have wasted watching the soporific motion of her drawing heart shapes over countless pencil cases and text books. 'Lottie ❤ Louis 4eva', it had said, until one day it changed to such and such and whatshisname, whoever it might be that she fancied that hour, and then Louis actually started fancying girls and decided it was, oh wait, me that he might actually want to go out with instead of her. Looking back, I guess that's when things started to go wrong with our friendship. Or maybe it was because I never cared to draw hearts above my i's the way she did?

Yet now we are here, all three of us somehow reunited awkwardly in Southern California like a gang of motley pirates from rival ships, and I can't think of anyone in the whole world who I would like to share a room with less than Lottie. Even the gorgeous Eurobots from reception would be better than Lottie. Olga the transsexual would be better than Lottie. Sheesh, even Harry would be better than Lottie.

I shudder at the horror, pushing the thought from my mind, instead letting myself drift off in to a fantasy of what it would be like if Louis and I were the ones to share a room. What bliss it would be to lounge about all day, entwined and watching infomercials for Xanax on repeat, whilst I let my hand run through the hair of his legs, and chest. I had noticed that too.

'Lottie. Are you there?'

A bang at the door startles me and I realise that my eyes are on stalks, wide and hypnotised, the fantasy and the jet lag finally catching up with me.

'Oh, it's you.' Harry is fidgeting in his pockets, pretending not to be interested, as I open the door.

'Yeah, and...?' I raise my eyes, totally faux annoyed, like Harry being at the door is the worst of all possibilities. He's already got the biggest ego ever; the last thing he needs is any sign of appreciation on my part.

'So is Lottie here?'

'Do I look like her keeper?'

'Ge'ez. Just tell her to meet us at the bar at seven o'clock okay?' Us? Oh yes, of couse he means him and Louis. How can I forget that they're joined at the hip now?

7pm. That is the hour at which we have been instructed to gather at the hotel bar so we can receive our induction talk and spend the next hour giving faux smiles and pretending that we will actually be able to remember each other's names come 7am the next morning when the coach departs, when the fact is we'll never be able to do that since we'll all be far too busy mentally categorising the hotness or notness of our fellow travellers, placing bets on who will vomit on the bus first, who will sleep with who first etc. Names are irrelevant.

The idea of such an event makes me woozy at the best of times, but 7pm means 3am UK time. Like the dead of the night and certainly not the hour for a perky get together of perky people. I'm beginning to wish I'd not drank so much of that Benylin since the combination of it and the jet lag are managing to suck away at the already thin veneer of perkiness I might ever have been able to muster.

I've never experienced jet lag before but I'm certain that's what's happening, for suddenly my senses are numbed and buffered by walls papered with cotton wool, my internal compass spinning out of control, like the magnets of the earth have been flipped right around and I have no sense of which direction I'm facing.

"Hey eager traveller's, it's Leah, your soon to be favourite courier here." I re-read the printed copy of the email sent to me just last week by our tour guide, Leah, to try and get my head into gear and focus on what is about to happen. "Can you believe that it's only three days until your trip of a life time begins? What are you excited to see the most? The glittering hills of Hollywood and its totally dazzling sign? Or the epic Golden Gate Bridge, icon of the hippest town in America, oh wait I meant to say the world! Or maybe you just can't wait to make your millions playing roulette in the gilded casinos of Vegas? And I know you guys are just bursting to know who each of your fellow travellers will be and where you're all from. Well I'll give you a clue, there will be a whole giant bus load and you'll be jetting in from every populated continent on the planet. I just can't wait to meet each and every one of you this coming Tuesday.

Have a fabulous weekend people. Don't party too hard! Love Leah. Xx"

Authors note: This chapter is dedicated to lonelyheart83 for all the votes and comments whilst I was writing this story.

Please be kind and remember to vote and comment. Love Ally xx