Page 62 of Caught in a Storm

Lawson just kept smiling.

“Right. ’Ello, mate.”

“Cheers, love.”

“How do you do?”

“I am indeed.”

He took pictures with the crew and pilots and with anyone else who asked as he waited, boarded, flew, and finally deboarded. He has three signature smiles, developed over a couple of decades of professional smiling. He went with the friendliest one, occasionally adding a peace sign or a thumbs-up.

“Cheers, now.”

“Appreciate it.”

“Well, if you say so, mate.”

“Thanks for watching.”

During the flight, two teenagers kept filming him with their phones on the sly and then frantically typing with their thumbs, the cheeky buggers, as if he couldn’t tell. Truly relaxing is out of the question when every moment of a six-hour flight is likely being beamed to God knows who all over the sodding planet. On long hauls he usually pops an Ambien and wears a velvet sleeping mask that feels like kitten kisses against his skin. Not today, though. How would that look: Lawson Daniels half-zonked, dozing, mouth agape—snoring, God forbid? Pictures like that, even hypothetical ones, are enough to make him shudder. Consequently, he spent most of the flight rereading a Colson Whitehead novel that he’s trying to get adapted. It’s the kind of project he’s determined to do: actual dialogue, a plot that doesn’t hinge on things exploding around him.

The woman seated next to him on the flight seemed impressed. “I love that book,” she told him at some point over the vast middle of America. She’d spent the better part of two hours building up the courage to speak to him, he knew.

“Brilliant, yeah?” he said.

It’s exhausting to be constantly game for conversation, but that lady in her yoga pants and flip-flops will tell the story of this flight beside him for the rest of her life, so no harm in giving her a bit of a show. He held up his free bag of cheese crackers. “Care for my snack, love?”

“Really?” she said. “Are you…are you sure?”

He said that he was deadly sure. Then he warned her that if she fell asleep, he’d surely nick her wallet, and her sudden delighted laughter bounced through the plane like a cricket ball.

And now he’s walking through this strange, bigger-than-you’d-think airport, following signs that say Ground Transportation.

Often in the wild, Lawson holds his iPhone to his ear. It’s easier to ignore people if they think he’s on a call—an old celebrity trick. Now, though, he really is on a call, and the person he’s talking to, his manager, Rufus, is bloody furious.

“For the love of God, Lawson. We’re screwed.”

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic, mate. They could prop a sodding mannequin in the driver’s seat for that next bit. No one would notice.”

“That’s not the point,” says Rufus.

“I was upfront,” he says. “I told them I needed to sort some personal matters. Mental wellness check. Work-life balance. That’s all the rage now, right?”

“That doesn’t apply to people like you.”

“Well, that’s hurtful.” He passes a woman dragging a bag that’s big enough to transport dead bodies. “If you cut me, do I not bleed, Rufus? If you tickle me…”

“Right,” says Rufus. “You’re a real man of the people, Laws.”

“Okay, well, if you’re gonna be a cunt about it, I’d like to address the quality of material that’s been coming my way of late.”

Rufus goes quiet. A guy with a goatee is approaching Lawson from the left, holding out his mobile. “Dude, can you call my wife?” he asks. “She’ll absolutely shit herself.”

“Sorry, mate,” says Lawson. “Cheers to your missus, though. Rufus, you there?”

“I am. Lawson, I don’t want to keep having this conversation.”

“Perhaps I do.”