As Far as the Stars. Virginia Macgregor

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      I check my phone again.

       No. Dulles. See you soon, sis.

      Though, in the grand-Blake scheme of things, his message doesn’t really mean much. I’ve lost count of the number of times he’s told me where he’s planning to go, only to find out that he’s ended up somewhere else altogether.

      Maybe his brain went into autopilot; maybe he thought he was coming home to DC, like he usually does. Or maybe his brain was tired or hungover or in its general state of Blake-like distraction and he texted Dulles because that was what he was used to texting.

      Maybe, at this exact moment, he’s standing at the arrivals gate of Nashville International Airport – like he was meant to all along.

      God, I shouldn’t have turned the car round. I should have gone to Nashville as planned, assumed that he was on the plane I’d booked for him, ignored his random text.

      If you made me drive all the way to Dulles for nothing, I’m not doing anything for you ever again, I say to him in my head. And this time, I mean it.

      Dulles. Nashville. Dulles. Nashville. The words crash around in my brain.

       Where the hell are you, Blake?

      He should have some kind of electronic tag.

      I take a breath.

      I’ve got to concentrate on one thing at a time. Assume he’s here. Then work out from there. A clear, logical method.

      I search the area around the arrivals gate. Blake’s hard to miss. He’s really tall and skinny and has this crazy black hair that stands up a mile with all the gel he puts in it – it’s longer than mine. It’s a bit of a family joke – how Blake’s hair is longer than mine, and how many products he has in the bathroom, and how long he takes grooming himself.

      When we tease him, he says it’s part of his brand.

      Blake’s been honing his brand since he was five years old when this music teacher at school told him he had a talent – and that he was cute, which, she explained, was a winning combination.

      When I can’t find him, I scan the arrivals screen for his flight. Within a few seconds, I’ve found it:

      10.15 UKFlyer0217 From London Heathrow:

      DELAYED.

Chapter Two

      12.40 EST

      I look back at the screen to make sure I’ve got it right.

      But the word’s still there:

      DELAYED.

      It doesn’t make any sense. Blake texted me before he got on the plane. If it had been delayed, he’d have known – and they wouldn’t have let passengers get onto the plane, not that early.

      Though sometimes they get everyone on and then pull everyone off again. If there’s a technical error or something. That could have happened.

      But who cares what happened? If we’re late for any of the wedding stuff, Mom’s going to kill me.

      I go up to a guy wearing what I recognise as a UKFlyer uniform:

      ‘Excuse me—’

      He spins round. His eyes are wide and kind of jumpy. UKFlyer officials have this way of looking totally calm. Like, even if the airport was on fire, every hair would stay in place. Mom says it’s a British thing. But this guy doesn’t look calm, not at all. Which is weird. Like it’s weird that everyone around me is acting so stressed out. It’s not like they’ve all got weddings to go to – or Moms like mine. Planes get delayed all the time.

      ‘The plane – the one that’s been delayed,’ I say to the UKFlyer guy. ‘I was meant to pick someone up.’ I pause. ‘Or I think I was. It’s complicated. Could you check the passenger list for me?’

      He stares at me and blinks like I’m not speaking English.

      I rephrase, trying to calm myself down enough to get the words out in the right order:

      ‘I need to check whether my brother was meant to be on the plane that’s been delayed.’

      ‘I’m afraid we can’t release that information.’

      ‘I’m his sister.’

      ‘We still can’t release that information. Not at this point.’

      ‘What point?’

      He looks at me like I’m about two years old – or totally crazy – or both. I mean, shouldn’t I know if the person I’ve come to collect was on the plane? And if I don’t, isn’t that weird?

      Yeah, it’s weird. But then he doesn’t know Blake. Infuriatingly unpredictable Blake.

      ‘I’m sorry I can’t help,’ the guy says, his eyes still darting around. ‘I’ve got to go.’

      My heart starts doing this weird arrhythmic pounding thing.

      This can’t be happening.

      If I screw up even the tiniest part of this wedding, Mom will never forgive me. She’s planned every last detail. It’s been her life for like a year.

      On the surface, my allocated job for the wedding is simple: Blake. Get Blake to Nashville. In good time. Get him to the family breakfast and then the rehearsal dinner and then, crucially, the wedding, wearing a morning suit: top hat, coat and waistcoat, like Jude wanted – and ready to sing.

      After Jude and Stephen have said their vows, during the eclipse, Blake is going to perform the song he’s written for their big day. The song that Jude – and Mom – and every guest at Mom’s perfectly choreographed wedding, would remember for the rest of their lives. I reckon most of Jude’s friends accepted the invitation just so they could drool over Blake Shaw’s big blue eyes and gravelly voice. Not that I’d tell her that.

      The only one who’s heard the song is me; I practised it with him over a million times before he left for London. And I made him promise to keep practising while he was away – This time, the charming-Blake-improv, won’t cut it, I told him.

      It’s my job to give Blake a hard time – to balance out the rest of the world that thinks the sun shines out of his butt.

      My body tenses up. If he messes up the song, I’m going to kill him, like properly kill him.

      I take a breath.

      Yeah, on the surface, getting Blake to the wedding was meant to be simple. But Blake’s never simple. Which is why I was given the job. Managing Blake is always my job. Besides working my butt off to get a higher Grade Point Average than the boys in my Advanced Physics class and looking at the night sky through a telescope, sorting out my big brother’s life is my primary occupation. When one СКАЧАТЬ