London Love - Writers Forum

speakerphone2 · 07-14-2007, 01:10 PM

[Wrote this for a project requirement a bit back. Not my best, but certainly better than the disatrous first-draft. Inspired by the song Clark Gable by The Postal Service.]

It was innocently enough that Jaeda had booked the trip with two of her friends—just a quick stop at the travel agency to reserve a hotel room, plane tickets, and have their passports put in order. In the month before their departure, they had tried to immerse themselves in the new city they were about to explore without physically being there, renting every movie that took place there from the video store.

Finally, the day of departure came. On the plane, the three women started chatting about love and romance while eating their miniature pretzels.

“I don’t think I’ll ever find anyone,” sighed Heather, popping a pretzel into her mouth and chasing it with some Coke.

“Don’t worry, destiny will work things out for everyone,” assured Kendra. “My psychic friend told me it was in the stars for everyone, they just have to look really hard.”

“Yeah, but what about those people who squint and squint all their lives but never find anyone out there?” mused Heather. She added softly, “You know, people like me…”

Jaeda added, “Guys, you never know. We might find love in London!”

The lyrics of Jaeda’s favourite song rang in her ears and for a brief second she imagined she heard it playing faintly from the in-flight intercom system.

“I was waiting for a cross-town train in the London Underground when it struck me / that I’ve been waiting since birth to find a love that would look and sound like a movie…”

Jaeda shook her head and joined her friends in watching the in-flight movie that was appropriately set in England, one of the few they hadn’t rented. Once their flight touched down, the girls hailed a cab to the hotel and checked in. They spent the rest of the evening in the room, as it was already quite late, and went to bed early in order to get the most out of tomorrow, their first day in London.

***

“Guys, I’m going out for a run, okay?” Jaeda called loudly to her half-sleeping roommates. One groaned and the other waved her hand in a “wake me up in nine minutes” sort of gesture. Jaeda jogged down the hall to the elevator and tapped her foot impatiently on the word OTIS that was branded into the floor. Once the lift dinged and the doors opened, she sped through the lobby, past the main desk and the ornate flower arrangements to the slick streets.

Here was something she hadn’t counted on: the London weather. The cars parked on both sides of the street were strung with beads of moisture and reflected her presence when she ran by. Jaeda passed ancient-looking buildings and statues of war heroes that had too many pigeons sitting on them to be counted before the birds flew away in a tangle of feathers.
She focused on her breathing, in out, in out. Her running shoes clapped a steady rhythm on the damp pavement. A light mist began to fall from the grey overcast skies and dampened the crown of Jaeda’s head. She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and continued to run aimlessly in the general direction of pretty buildings.

She closed her eyes for a moment, still running, listening to the rhythm of her footsteps on the ground. Suddenly, she felt a presence beside her and she opened her eyes. A guy was running along beside her. He stuck out his hand and said, “Hi. I’m Ben.”

Jaeda was a little bit nervous, but shook his hand, not missing one beat. He too continued to jog in pace along with her.

“So, um, listen,” he said with a curious British accent, “my friend and I are filming this movie, a film, really, and we were standing over there, and then we saw you coming around the corner and we thought that you would look great in this one scene, it’s the most important part of the film, actually, it’s about a guy and a girl in London—nice set design, don’t you think?—and anyways, they are together, and so...” He trailed off. “I’m sorry, I’m rambling. The thing is, you’d be perfect for the part, and I’d like to know if you’d be interested.”

Jaeda looked at him sideways, through the corner of her eye. On any other day, she would never have done anything remotely like this, but she decided to throw caution to the wind and accepted his invitation.

He directed her to a spot that was just ahead, and a white van rolled up. Ben introduced his friend Jeff, who busied himself getting the equipment out of the van.

Jaeda was unusually nervous. She hadn’t done any acting before, so it was understandable, but still, she usually wasn’t this nervous about something that didn’t really matter to her. Maybe she wanted to impress Ben with all of her fantastic acting skills, she figured, but chuckled at the thought.

“Okay, so he’s framed the shot, all we need is a bit of rain and we’ll be off,” Ben said.

They didn’t have to wait long. In less than half a minute, it was pouring. Jaeda, sopping wet, stared at Ben with her mouth gaping. “I’ll have to tell my friends I met a magician!”

Ben looked at her and said, “Okay, all you really need to do is whatever you feel comfortable with. Just follow my lead, and you’ll understand what type of shot we are looking for.”

Jaeda nodded, and from behind the camera, Jeff called “Action!”

Ben approached her, and cupped her face in his hands. He held her there for a moment, and they stared into one another’s eyes. Jaeda’s nerves had fled; somehow, despite being in this close proximity to a perfect stranger, she felt completely at ease.
He leaned close, and kissed her on the lips. At first, it was tentative and gentle, and before Jaeda knew what was happening, her lips were mirroring the movements of his.

The rain poured down from above, and Jaeda flung her arms around his neck. He picked her up around the waist and then spun wildly in the London rain.

Jeff called “Cut!” and switched off the camera. Jaeda felt a little squeeze at her waist, and Ben held onto her longer than was necessary, just to remember the feeling. He finally put her down, and an awkward silence drifted onto them.

Finally, he broke it. “So um, I don’t even know your name. But please, I have a few minutes while Jeff gets busy cutting our film together, so would you like to get coffee with me? There’s a little shop just around the corner that just screams tourist rest stop.”

Jaeda smiled. “Sure. I’d really like that.”

And when they sat down at the table in the coffee shop that screamed tourist rest stop, over the radio came lyrics from her favourite song, drifting lazily into her ears.

“I was waiting for a cross-town train in the London Underground when it struck me / that I’ve been waiting since birth to find a love that would look and sound like a movie…”

It was in that uncanny moment that Jaeda realized her wishful thinking had come true. London-style.

Olly Buckle · 07-14-2007, 03:15 PM

My experience of women is that they are much more cautious of strange men than this, still he was good looking and he wasn't on his own.

speakerphone2 · 07-15-2007, 01:07 PM

Cool, thanks for the feedback. What did you think of it, as a story, like how it was written?

Olly Buckle · 07-15-2007, 03:32 PM

It is a bit like an outline for a story, Take the second paragraph, just one line but it takes us from departure day arriving to being on the plane chatting, no getting to the airport, no worries about being late, no check in no departure hall and you want to go straight to their intimate conversation, I know nothing about these women, their age, their style, their occupations, how long they have known each other, nothing, not even where they got the pretzels from did they bring them? did they buy them in the airport? Were they off the inflight trolley, do you see what I mean? It is all a bit like that and it is the detail that makes things believable. There are other things, like cross town trains, that's on the New York subway I think, I never heard an underground train referred to that way, and if it's an important scene how come it's the only one she is in? But these are really just little niggles, mostly I want more detail.