The Last Minute

  Maggie thrusts her left leg higher up towards the ceiling. ‘ . . . and eight . . .’

  Noel Gilliard, annoyed by the thump of the bass from the exercise class and Mariam’s singing next door, pushes back his swivel chair.

  Matey’s story is changing gear: ‘Next morning, hung over . . .’

  Beside him, Anthony Dougall is trying to open the door of the white van. The policeman doesn’t seem interested in getting it out of the way; he’s totally absorbed in shepherding the hearse into the line of traffic. Maybe, if the keys are inside, Anthony will be able to move the van himself. If he’s quick, he can shift it into the space that’s just opened up. Whatever happens, he wants to get his own car on the move before the funeral procession pulls out in front of him. If he ends up stuck behind the hearse, there’s a risk that his carefully planned deception will start to unravel. For now, he still has high hopes of pulling it off.

  Just a few metres away, his wife is trying to balance his birthday cake on one arm, so that she can rub her eye, and maybe (discreetly) use her sleeve to mop up the wetness around her nose.

  ‘Right, mate,’ says Terry Potts, in his flat above the wedding shop, still trying to end his phone call, but to no effect.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen . . .’ The co-pilot’s calm voice fills the cabin, as flight attendants rush towards Daniel Donovan from both ends of the plane.

  Stuart, still on the ground, is now in no doubt that the brown sludge on the left leg of his trousers is more than just mud. He’s looking around for something to use to clean himself.

  ‘It was deliberate?’ asks Paul, engrossed in Lotte’s tale now, and wondering whether Isadora’s words about going to glory suggest that her death was suicide.

  TOCK

  20 seconds to go . . .

  ‘I’M SURE NOT,’ says Lotte, obviously about to launch into a full explanation. Paul realizes it was a mistake to ask, and resigns himself to staying put a little longer.

  Juliet takes a look at her computer screen. Twenty seconds left before she must press the button on her bid. She can see she’s got at least two rivals for the dress. She reaches for her mug of coffee.

  Maggie doesn’t give her class a chance to relax. ‘And one . . .’ she shouts, starting again. She’s keeping an eye on the sad new woman at the back, who’s already sweating after only a few stretches, and seems to have problems sorting out her left from her right. Maggie reckons she can knock her into shape within six months if she comes every week, and she’s thrilled by the idea. It’s what she loves about her job. But she can see that the woman is self-conscious, and not enjoying this session at all. She’ll have a word in the water break, and tell her a little of her own journey to fitness – to encourage her to believe that exercise might change her life.

  To think of it. Only a few years ago, Maggie didn’t know what ‘flex the foot’ meant. That had been almost enough to drive her away from her first aerobics session, where everyone else seemed super-fit. If you’d told her then that one day she’d be running a class, she would have collapsed . . . with laughter.

  She wants the new woman to look into the future and see this as the day that changed her life.

  The door of the white van is locked. The beggar shrugs sympathetically at Anthony, while continuing his recitation: ‘ . . . the dying man . . .’

  Kelly Viner is still waiting for her dad to answer the phone in his office. She ends the call, and instantly dials again, hoping that he’s got his mobile with him, and that he can tell her how to get out of this mess.

  Scan . . . Almost at the top of the hill now, Lorraine has to dodge to one side as a motorbike mounts the pavement alongside her, to bypass the queue of traffic. She’s lost her rhythm. She hasn’t enough breath to say what she thinks of the rider and his female passenger, whose leather trousers look ready to burst.

  The couple, Stan and Nina Krasinski, are on their way to their shifts as cleaners at the local hospital. They know that the agency they work for will cut their pay if they don’t clock in on time, and that’s why Stan is riding on the footpath. Too late, he catches sight of PC Lewis. In a split-second decision, he opts to speed up rather than stop.

  In the shoe shop, Lenny Gibbon’s mother is fed up with his wriggling, and gives him a quick slap.

  Upstairs, Noel Gilliard rises from his chair.

  ‘Please remain seated,’ says the co-pilot on flight GX413, in the tone of a routine announcement. Nevertheless, someone at the front of the aircraft screams.

  TICK

  19 seconds to go . . .

  STUART’S IN LUCK. There’s a large evergreen shrub to his left. It has wide leaves – perfect for the job. He rolls up onto his knees and reaches out to pluck one. Alas, it is just beyond his grasp.

  ‘ . . . and two . . .’

  Noel Gilliard stretches up into the air, and sighs.

  Matey’s story has become rather touching. The dying man is grateful for his special night of fun: ‘ . . . hugged his friend.’

  . . . ner. Lorraine has got back in step, but the pause in momentum has given the pain in her muscles a chance to break through. And she can taste the bitter exhaust fumes left behind by the motorbike, polluting her healthy lungs.

  Further up the road, Gillie Dougall darts out of the way of the motorcycle. Her sudden movement knocks the lid off her cake box and into the road.

  Sharon has reached Anthony Dougall’s car. She puts her head round the open door.

  Terry Potts is no longer paying full attention to his friend on the phone. He’s trying to plan what to say when he finally arrives at work. Looking down at the chaos in the street, he decides to use the traffic as an excuse, though the chances are that he could have got through on his pushbike if he had left earlier. This time he’s firmer about needing to go. ‘I’m sorry, mate . . .’ he starts.

  Behind the locked door of the cockpit, the flight crew know little of what is going on amongst their passengers. But when the cabin attendant rushed from the intercom to help restrain Daniel Donovan, she left the handset dangling, and it’s picking up the sound of the scuffle. The pilot faces a decision. Should he abort the landing, and re-route the plane over a less populated area in case something happens, or get on the ground as soon as he can? On the open line to air-traffic control, his voice stays steady as he says, simply, ‘We have a problem.’

  As fumes fill the launderette, the fart is spreading through the coach, to outraged hilarity. Vinny McAlpine has gone bright red.

  ‘Silent but deadly,’ shouts Liam Tracy, alongside him.

  TOCK

  18 seconds to go . . .

  STUART IS DOWN again, and now his knees are muddy, too. He still hasn’t done his shoe up, and the rip in his trousers feels longer than before. A golden career in journalism seems most unlikely now.

  The cyclist and Kate, the animal-rights girl, are still talking. He doubts whether posters are enough to achieve change.

  It looks as if Mrs Wilkins is going to come over to Bernie, so he stays put despite Ritzi’s determination to get to the park. In any case, Matey seems to be getting to the meat of his joke. ‘Choked up, he said . . .’

  Lucy is still waiting to get past the gamblers. She should be at her mother-in-law’s house by now, and she’s anxiously craning her neck in the hope of seeing the missing mitten in the aisle beyond them. Despite Stefano’s attempts to make Chloe smile, she is arching her back, trying to break free of her pushchair harness, and making an angry noise, just short of crying. She’s stretching out towards the chocolate Santas that are just out of reach.

  Lorraine’s phone gives a short buzz. Someone has left a message. Lorraine promises herself that she’ll stop to listen to it when she reaches the shops, and she needs all the motivation she can muster to get there. She focuses on the small group of people beyond the newsagent’s, pretending to herself that they are the welcoming crowd at the finishing line of the marathon. Scan-ner. Almost there.

  The architect is still taking pictures of t
he dance studio. Kayleigh Palmer’s mother is getting suspicious. She’s thinking of reporting him to the policeman over the road. Deanna wonders whether she should just push past him. She’s fascinated to know what Paul and the woman are talking about so earnestly.

  ‘ . . . something rather different.’ Lotte is explaining to Paul that Isadora Duncan’s friends changed her last words, to make them more respectable than they actually were. He’s at last spotted Deanna waving to him from outside the dance studio, and wants to hurry the tale along so he can run to meet her, but he can’t deny Lotte the chance to complete her revelation of the truth about Isadora Duncan’s death.

  ‘ . . . and three . . .’

  Noel Gilliard sits down again – bolt upright in his chair, ready for serious work.

  At the hat stand by the door of the coffee shop, the last mourner puts his arm into the sleeve of his overcoat. Juliet, glad that the mother who has ordered the chocolate cake is being served so slowly, sips her coffee and stares at her computer screen, watching the red timer count down.

  Parked alongside the fuel tanker, the taxi driver is watching his passenger. It should be his turn at the cash machine any second now.

  In the air, one of the crew has Daniel Donovan in a bear hug, pinning his arms to his sides. Daniel is still gripping the mobile phone, and shouting, ‘No! Him!’

  The man in seat 42A unbuckles his seat belt.

  Alongside him, Dorothy Long puts her hands over her eyes. This can’t be happening, surely? Perhaps she’ll never get to meet her new grandson after all.

  TICK

  17 seconds to go . . .

  ‘AND SHE REALLY said . . .?’ prompts Paul, hoping Lotte will give a quick reply. But Lotte is repositioning herself, and adjusting her imaginary scarf, ready to re-enact her mime from the moment Isadora Duncan entered the car. It’s like watching a film run backwards.

  Stefano has taken a cigarette from the packet, and is trying to squeeze past Lucy to get out of the shop and back to the launderette.

  There, Marco’s customer comments on the fumes. Marco just wishes he’d go, so he can look for the lost valve on the floor.

  Gillie dodges between the cars, trying to get her foot onto the box lid before the breeze blows it further away. With her eyes on the road, she still hasn’t noticed her husband, just a few metres to her left, or Sharon, who is now striding towards him from behind.

  Matey has taken on the character of the dying man again, but there’s a lilt in his Scottish voice now. He’s happy. The night of wine, women and song has done just what Jack intended. Pete is full of gratitude: ‘“How can I . . .”’

  Max, the little boy at the window of the coffee shop, notices the hearse turning into the road. Bemused by the flowers on its roof, he stops mimicking the digger, and calls out, ‘Mummy!’

  ‘Not me. Him!’ shouts Daniel Donovan at the crew who are trying to restrain him. He’s staring at the man in seat 42A, who suddenly springs up and lurches over the woman in seat 42C, towards the aisle.

  The child in seat 42D starts to cry.

  ‘ . . . and four . . .’

  Mariam tests the temperature of her bath water. It’s too hot.

  Through the wall, Noel Gilliard stretches and bends his fingers in the air over his computer keyboard, like a concert pianist limbering up for a performance at the Albert Hall.

  The school coach is in uproar, with real and pretend farting noises, and Kayleigh Palmer shouting ‘Miss! Miss!’ as her hair is tugged from behind.

  Miss Hunter is cursing herself for persuading Martin Knox, who should be the other teacher on the trip, to wait at his home by the ring road for the coach to pick him up. He was against the idea, but it seemed to her that it made perfect sense. On a normal day, it would have: their route takes them right past Martin’s house, and they’d have collected him within five minutes of leaving school. Miss Hunter’s plan meant that Martin could have some extra time to see to the needs of his disabled son, who has just come home after an operation, and she would be alone with the monsters of Year 8 for only a little while. Strictly speaking, it was against the rules, and Martin had been reluctant to stay at home, but Miss Hunter convinced him that no one would ever know. If only she hadn’t made it impossible for him to refuse the offer. This traffic jam is bringing out the worst in Year 8. She could do with another pair of hands, or at least someone to share the ordeal.

  TOCK

  16 seconds to go . . .

  THE WOMEN AT the lottery desk finish choosing their numbers. They stand up straight, pulling their bottoms out of the way of the door, and Stefano squeezes past.

  Outside, Anthony Dougall has not yet noticed Sharon closing on him. He’s calling out to the policeman again, annoyed that making way for the horses and the hearse is taking precedence over moving the white van. But his political instincts have not deserted him. He refrains from pointing out to the officer that the person in the coffin can’t be in a hurry.

  In the beggar’s story, Pete is almost weeping as he thanks Jack: ‘“ . . . show my gratitude?”’

  ‘ . . . and five . . .’

  Juliet stares at her screen. Sixteen seconds to go before her bid – an almost luxurious length of time. She tries to discipline herself not to click too soon.

  Sam redistributes some of the chairs the mourners used. He didn’t have the courage to tell them, but the manager doesn’t really like more than four people round each table.

  Alongside him, three-year-old Max, fascinated by the hearse, is still trying to get his mother to leave Lily, Polly and Nell, and join him at the window. ‘Mummy!’

  The florist is getting annoyed with Nick. He’s talking about homelessness. She’s sure she’s seen the same boy before, raising money for something else. She takes her scissors out of her apron pocket.

  Noel Gilliard breathes in, his hands hovering over his computer, ready to write something meaningful.

  Mariam turns on the cold tap. The shower hose is still attached, and it dances round like a snake, spraying icy water everywhere all over again.

  Dorothy Long, in seat 42C, surprises herself by punching her neighbour where it hurts.

  ‘Oh grow up!’ says Miss Hunter, reaching to open the window in the roof of the coach to let out some of the pong.

  TICK

  15 seconds to go . . .

  DOREEN, OF DOREEN’S Dreams, is well on her way to the sorting office to collect the parcel she missed yesterday. Today, the postman has a delivery for Mariam. That’s why he’s stopped by the dance studio, alongside the school coach. Mariam’s parcel is too big for her letter box. It’s oddly shaped and badly wrapped. Whoever sent it hasn’t paid enough postage, so he can’t hand it over without collecting the difference. He rings the doorbell. Upstairs, Mariam, hit by the new jet of cold water, shrieks.

  ‘If you ask me,’ says the cyclist, leaning against the lamppost with his arms crossed, as Kate Daintree bites off another strip of tape.

  Matey builds a tearful, drunken break into the voice he’s using for Pete: ‘“That was the perfect . . .”’

  ‘Mummy!’

  Concentrating on her laptop screen, Juliet can tell that she’s going to find the child at the window really irritating.

  As Stefano leaves the newsagent’s, the customers shuffle around to take advantage of the extra space. The rucksack man hands over his money at the till. The lottery women let Lucy squeeze past into the aisle.

  ‘ . . . and six . . .’

  The plane is filled with the sound of unbuckling seat belts, as passengers in the front of the cabin rise and turn to see what’s going on behind them.

  The man from 42A convulses in pain, collapsing across Dorothy’s lap. He reaches down into the aisle to grab his phone from Daniel Donovan’s hand.

  And Stuart is on his feet again, at last. He gets to work with a leaf. It’s not quite big enough to keep the muck off his hand.

  TOCK

  14 seconds to go . . .

  A STEWARD SLAMS the s
ide of his palm across the back of the man’s neck. His body slumps. Dorothy Long, in seat 42C, feels his full weight pinning her in place.

  The child across the aisle is shrieking now. Her mother says, ‘It’s OK, darling,’ so unconvincingly that her husband, alongside her, has to reach for the airsickness bag.

  The voice of the co-pilot comes, deadpan, over the speakers once more: ‘Ladies and gentlemen . . .’

  On the ground, Lotte Rabane has re-entered the imaginary limousine in 1920s Paris. She’s Isadora Duncan now, and is blowing kisses to either side.

  ‘ . . . and seven . . .’

  Noel’s train of thought has been interrupted by Mariam’s scream. He flops back into his chair, and wipes a non-existent bead of sweat from his forehead.

  Mariam hasn’t heard the doorbell.

  The cyclist draws closer to Kate, and lowers his voice: ‘There are times when . . .’

  In the road, Gillie has her foot on the stray box lid, but she can’t pick it up because her hands are full carrying the cake, which is simultaneously the source of complex worries and the repository of all her hopes. Gillie can do nothing about the pain in her streaming eye. If she drops the box now – or if she fails to retrieve the lid, and the cake gets covered in smuts from the roadworks, or rained on by the gathering clouds – her whole future might be threatened. Anthony’s career could be ruined; and all because of her.

  The optimism that had her singing in the shower just an hour ago is gone. Now her mind is staggering across a minefield of potential catastrophes – the worst disasters she can imagine, set off like toppling dominoes by her failures as a party planner: no one will turn up; there will be gatecrashers; not enough food to go round; far too much; Anthony teasing her in public about her red eye; whispered sneers in a corner about her shortcomings as a wife and hostess; the photographer taking unfortunate photos, and feeding stories about her hopelessness as a political spouse to the papers; electoral humiliation for dear, hard-working Anthony – just because he has a useless wife. Everything depends on the party working. That is why, now, the most important thing in the world is retrieving the square of white cardboard that is lying in the road.