That One Year

Chapter 4

As I step off the plane and enter Heathrow Airport, I’m immediately aback.

Everything looks…

the same.

I was expecting strange European signs and confusing foreign gibberish everywhere, anything to prove I was nowhere near the U.S.

But even the people looked the same, the technology, the building-

My thoughts are lost as I am suddenly rammed from behind, my face gingerly smashing against the ground.

“Keep moving, sweetheart,” I hear a man snap and storm away. “Stupid Americans.” He mutters under his breath.

I never realized I had stopped right in the middle of the busy terminal, star struck at everything that lay ahead of me. How embarrassing.

I quickly get up and brush myself off, my cheeks burning. I sigh as I notice a rip in the knees of my new jeans.

“Asshole,” I curse, and nonchalantly walk over to the side of the hallway, trying to look as if nothing happened.

“I believe you mean, ‘twat’,” I hear a lady say behind me, and I snap around.

A lady in a black uniform who looks in her 40s walks up to me, and tips her hat, greeting me.

“Are you Beth Meyers?” She asks in a thick Irish accent.

“Um, yeah?” I responded, perhaps a bit too harshly.

“Your father sent me to pick you up,” She says, grabbing my bag. “Your luggage is already in the car.” She flashes a toothy smile at me.

“And by the way,” She starts, leaning in my ear, “no one says, ‘asshole’ much here.”

“Good to know.” I mumble, rubbing my cheek as it screams out in pain.

I should have known my father was too cowardly to come pick me up himself. I follow my chauffeur through the crowded airport like a lost puppy, staying about 2 steps behind.

She doesn’t say anything as she leads me to the posh taxis you see occasionally on ‘Super Nanny’. It takes me awhile to get used to the driver’s seat on the opposite side, a sight that I’m not used to.

Once we are driving for a bit, I ask the woman a question that had been swimming in my mind.

“Excuse me, ma’am? How did you know I was Beth?”

Her dull gray eyes snap to the rearview mirror.

“You look American.” She quickly says, and I immediately look down at my clothing. Really? I was wearing a beige trench coat and knee-high boots. I thought this was what people wore all the time-

“Not the way that you dress, miss. The way that you act.”

I blink a few times, and then look out the window at the passing trees. Great. So Brits can smell out an American by just looking at them.

“Plus, you look just like your father.” The woman mumbles, tightening her grip on the steering wheel.

I pretend not to hear her as we drive the rest of the way in silence.

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“Holy guacamole,” I breathe, as soon as I enter my father’s mansion.

It took me awhile to generate the courage to even come near the house, my heart racing a thousand miles per hour. My chauffer, whose name I learned is Louise, took many efforts to drag me out of the car, including threatening to have my father personally drag me.  Finally, after 20 minutes of pure anxiety overload, I agree to trudge up the steps of my father’s huge estate.