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Seven Sunny Days
By Chris Manby Ulverscroft Large Print
Copyright © 2006 Chris Manby
All right reserved. ISBN: 9780753174500
Why was it, Rachel Buckley wondered, that every time she passed a policeman she suddenly felt guilty? In her twenty-nine years on earth she had never so much as stolen a packet of chewing gum from a corner shop and yet, every time she saw that navy uniform, or heard the siren of a police car as it careered up to swoop past her Renault Clio in hot pursuit of a joyrider in a stolen BMW, Rachel froze, went as red as Santa's underpants and got a sudden urge to confess to every major robbery from the Great Train one to Brinks-Mat.
Customs officers were even worse.Now Rachel was actually sweating with anxiety as she waited in the queue to put her hand luggage through the X-ray machine at Gatwick's south terminal. She had read and reread the notice about passengers only being allowed to take one item of hand luggage on board the plane and felt a tickle of panic as she wondered whether the WH Smith carrier bag containing one magazine and a packet of Hula Hoops would count as a second item alongside her blue rucksack. In front of her, an altogether less considerate traveller had already jammed a huge trolley case through the X-ray machine and was attempting to fit a large cardboard box in after it. The customs officers didn't bat an eyelid.
"They'll find a goat when they X-ray that,'saidRachel's best friend and travelling companion, Yaslyn Stimpson. Yaslyn chewed gum nonchalantly and noisily as she tossed her own little black handbag on to the conveyor. When the metal detector arch beeped in alarm as Yaslyn sauntered through it, she merely grinned and said,'That'll be the hand grenade " before she stepped back out, unloaded her house keys and her gorgeous, real Cartier watch and passed through again to approving silence.
Rachel, on the other hand, removed her watch, her necklace and her earrings before she walked through. She was even momentarily convinced that her single mercury filling might cause some kind of reaction, though it never had before. But airport security was tighter than ever these days and she was ready to point out her occluded back molar.
"Hurry up " said her other fellow traveller, Carrie Ann Murphy.'We'll meet you over there in duty free."
And with that, Yaslyn and Carrie Ann were gone in search of two hundred Marlboro Lights and some tax-free tubs of Estée Lauder. They didn't notice Rachel being pulled aside and asked whether the rucksack was her bag. Had she packed it herself ? Had anybody asked her to carry anything for them since she arrived at the airport? And would she mind opening it up so the man behind the counter could take a proper look inside?
If Rachel had been blushing as she stepped up to the X-ray machine,she was emitting more radiation than the machine itself as she unzipped her rucksack now. Thank God it was the beginning of her holiday and not the end,she thought. Thank God the spare knickers she'd packed in her hand luggage — since she'd heard that checked-in luggage went astray more frequently than usual on package tours — were clean and plain black cotton and nothing to be embarrassed about. All the same, the customs officer peered into the dark interior of the rucksack and gave a worried frown.
"I can't see what's going on in there,'he said.'I'm afraid you'll have to empty the whole lot out on to this bench."
And so, with three officers looking on — the first guy must have tacitly summoned assistance — Rachel emptied out her bag. Spare knickers, sponge bag, leather wallet, spare 'mugging wallet' (containing five-pound note and a supermarket reward card). One carton of apple juice (sugar free). Two packets of M & Ms (definitely not sugar free). And holiday reading including the new Marian Keyes and Captain Corelli's Mandolin (this year, she vowed, she would actually finish it).
"Is that everything?" asked the first guy.
Rachel nodded.'Yes " Even her tampax holder was open for all to see.
"You're sure that's everything, madam?"
"Of course I am."
"Only we think we saw rather more when the bag came through the machine."
"That's everything I packed " Rachel assured him.
"Then you won't mind turning the bag inside out."
Rachel did.
And there was a loud clatter as the very last item in Rachel's rucksack bounced off the carpeted bench and on to the floor, breaking in two and relinquishing its battery as it did so.
"Forget we packed this, did we?" the customs officer asked as he picked the little vibrator up with diligently rubber-gloved hands.
"I…I…" Rachel could only stutter.
"S all right, love. You don't have to explain yourself to me."
"But I swear I've never seen it before in my life!"
"That's what they all say " he told her.'And believe me, darling, I have seen it all before."
"I don't even know what it is!"
"Yeah, yeah " He wasn't bothering to suppress his grin now. He placed the two halves back together carefully and twisted them until the hideous thing emitted an angry buzz. Then he dropped the vibrator, still buzzing, back into Rachel's cavernous rucksack where it was invisible once more — black, glittery plastic camouflaged against the rucksack's glittery waterproof interior.
"It isn't mine " she said feebly as the officer zipped the ruck-sack up again and wished her a pleasant holiday.
"Hope she's coming on our flight,'said the man standing behind Rachel in the queue.
"Watch it, you " said his wife as she swatted him with a handbag.
Rachel was still in shock when she found Yaslyn and Carrie Ann sitting in the terminal's Costa Coffee concession,main-lining double espressos and trying to get the cellophane off the new box of fags they were supposed to be exporting intact.
"What took you so long?" Yaslyn asked disingenuously.
"I got searched."
"Oh, no " said Carrie Ann.'I wonder why they picked you?" But the smile was already playing about her eyes.
It was seconds before realisation set in.'You bitches!'squealed Rachel.'You know exactly what they found because you put it there! I can't believe you'd do that to me. You let me walk through customs with a vibrator in my bag!"
"Happy hen week " the girls chorused.
"I had to come through carrying nipple clamps " said Carrie Ann.
Rachel's annoyance didn't last long. Three glasses of champagne at the terminal bar later, she found the whole incident almost as funny as her friends did.
Well,she had to.Ritual humiliation is part and parcel of any hen party. Rachel had no reason to expect that her friends would let her get away without it. At least they had insisted on doing something different to the usual London hen affair of a cheesy nightclub,pina coladas and excessively greasy male strip-pergrams. It had been Yaslyn's idea to send Rachel off in real style by turning the hen night into a 'hen week'. Carrie Ann lobbied hard in favour of anywhere but Ibiza.
They settled on Turkey. Bodrum. And the flagship resort of French all-inclusive holiday chain Club Aegee. The pictures in the brochure looked fantastic. And word on the South London singles circuit was that, if you picked the right resort, a night at Club Aegee made the goings-on at the court of Emperor Caligula look positively sedate.
"Not the kind of man you meet at Club 18-30 " Yaslyn observed.
"Especially if you don't qualify for 18-30 any more " the travel representative added as she tapped Carrie Ann's date of birth into the computer.
While the girls waited for their flight to begin boarding,they worked each other into a frenzy of excited expectation about the adventure that lay ahead.Yaslyn threatened Rachel with the prospect of mixed-sex Turkish bathing followed by a brisk rub-down from a eunuch. Carrie Ann, meanwhile, was scanning the luggage tags of every able man under fifty to see whether they were heading the same way and might be worth chatting up on the plane.
Continues...
Excerpted from Seven Sunny Days by Chris Manby Copyright © 2006 by Chris Manby. Excerpted by permission.
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