Back to the exact spot we came in way back in the day when it was the whole fam. St Pancras Station. London. Full circle. Now the reason we had come here. To say goodbye to Emma. Sob.
But we weren't sad yet.
Our hotel was right at Russel Square near Emma's school, and there were so many fire doors you had to go through about sixty doors in the hallway to get to our room. But our room faced a leafy park and all you could see were trees and each morning I threw out all our bread crusts to the birds out there.
This is the hotel I would come back to after leaving Emma at her dorm in Camden and then get in the bathtub and cry while Nathan did his Zoom grad school orientation. It was so sad to come back to the room where Emma wasn't, after she had always been there. And always mapping us.
When we left Emma we had to map ourselves and we were scared but actually it was easy and she's an asshole we coulda done it the whole time. Actually she woulda been glad if we had done it even SOME of the time but she was quicker at it and plus she likes controlling everything especially her emotions unless she spills nail polish remover into her new lap top.
(N and I on top of double decker bus)But we didn't start the last London adventure by leaving Emma, first we ate at Pizza Hut and they HAD AN ICE MACHINE. Sure the pizza was terrible but they had a ton of ice.
In the morning we dealt with Emma's phone getting it working for her four months she'd be staying, and found a grocery store that had fresh baguette (I won't say it again) and these chocolate twists they're called that are chocolate chips and bread and cream and I would be still eating those for every meal if I had discovered them sooner and was still there now.
We headed over to Camden to get Emma's big suitcase from Nick, my dad's friend who had kept it for her while we traveled, and we sat in the lobby while she slowly met some of the kids she'd be taking her classes with, 15 altogether.
Nathan I and were assessing them by levels of ass from afar, and the loudest one seemed to be named Gabby. ha
Everyone had just flown in that day, and here is Emma fresh from a hellish world european tour, having done EVERYTHING and seen a ton, and well rested, and these kids were all just freshly jetlagged and lost in a new place. I felt happy that she had a ton of experience coming in, so she could feel secure pretty much anywhere, and could map her way out of anything. This was the reason for the trip. We achieved something.
We ate across the street at the camden market yes steak and walked through the zoo that it is, and then we got Emma into her room and with her roommate and then I left notes all over the bookshelves in her lobby to find later (she only found three), and we did her laundry and people, if you are flying home the next day, DO YOUR LAUNDRY. It was so nice to come home and put clean laundry away without having to do one extra thing after that long trip.
Leaving Emma near the pastel house street, walking away and watching her getting smaller and smaller, this was crying.
Then getting on a bus without Emma, also crying.
Then getting to hotel. Bathtub crying.
After Nathan's orientation we decided to go out and see London one last time, and we found a Nando's, the place we'd been wanting to eat and it was AMAZING. Barbecued chicken and corn on the cob why didn't we find this place the whole time.
We jumped on the subway to see Big Ben and walked across the bridge and it was a beautiful milky dark blue sky, and Emma called us cause she missed us it's weird you're not here and we're not all together and we said want us to come back and say hi and she said yes
so we got on the subway and went alllll the way back to Camden. We were thinking about taking the subway all the way to Stratford to say hi to Shakespeare but I thought hmmm, nah I'd rather see the baby we will be missing.
We hung out with Emma and hugged her a bunch and talked about dumb stuff and then we left for reals, in the dark, and got to take our double decker ride in the dark at the top of the bus and head forward into this new life of missing Emma.
The next morning I had to go out to get one of those chocolate twist things and Nathan and I were gonna eat at Nando's, Niall's favorite restaurant again but they didn't open til 11. So we walked all the way with our luggage through Russell Square and to the Euston station and then caught a bus to Paddington to head home.
It was weird to be going home just two of us after it had been 6 of us. Retracing our steps with less and less of us. I did not enjoy feeling that I was moving farther and farther from Emma, and that I would be taking off in a plane and leaving her very very far from home, farthest from me she had ever been since the womb.
The airport we got into very early and there were no lines, and then we had to take out all those jelly jars that I got and they had to make sure they weren't bombs and the funniest part was they took my hydroflask and said there's ice in here
I said yeah
they said you have to eat it
I said all of it
they said or you can throw your hydroflask away
I said it's not even mine it's Dylan's. And Dylan shattered our window with a dart one time and it cost 600 dollars and I decided when he left his hydroflask that it was now my hydroflask and I don't even like it that much but
Nathan said no, we're not leaving it. It's the principle of the thing.
So we sat there not even allowed to THROW OUT the ice in the trash can right next to us. So Nathan and I stood there eating an entire hydroflask of ice after a trip through europe where there had not been even an ant's splinter of ice
We got silly, Nathan was dumping ice in his face and saying oops spilled
finally we were done with the ice, we got our bags and still had time to kill so we ate at a bar restaurant and then found out we had to take a shuttle to the terminal and far away, and on the wall by that shuttle was a painted sign that said next stop, your own bed and that made my heart fill up with the possibility of home
we bought some chocolate and souvenirs and there was our plane next to the biggest plane they make that Nathan thought was the coolest, the double decker kind but that wasn't ours.
We got on our plane and it was crowded but at least it wasn't spacious. No one came for the middle seat for so long we started holding our breath that no one would fill that seat and no one came and no one came and could we hope and then we got a FREE EMPTY SEAT and that made it the best. We had space, we had movies, we had ten hours. Nathan was dreading the 10 hours but I was so happy to get on that plane and get home, I couldn't wait to get home. When the plane moved though I cried because Emma wasn't on it, and would she be okay here and it is not right to not have her, I always have her she is never far.
I have to still not think about that.
We got home safe. All the American accents on the loudspeaker. This was funny. We sound so weird here.
Barry was there. We got in our van. We have a CAR. We were on a freeway. We couldn't believe how lucky we were to be in a car.
At home, the dogs, the mom, the brother, the life, all still a mess, all still alive. I decided this is just life, this mess. There is alot of love, and there is alot of ice.
