4. First impressions

CHAPTER FOUR
‘Bodies, who needs them’

It takes a second or two to recognize the vision in front of me. It’s sort of a blurry and stretchy sideways kind of thing. After rubbing the sleep out of my eyes I refocus. Still blurry! As I move in closer I see her. Not very clearly but I do see her. Her eyes are swollen like two boiled eggs. On further investigation so are her hands and ankles. Why am I trying to convince myself that this is happening to someone else? Flaming marvellous. Today of all days I’m having the worst bad everything day of my life. To top it all I didn’t bring any pills for elephant titus. I mean, who would have bloody guessed I was going to inflate overnight? Breathing at this point is a good idea so I sit down and take some deep breaths. Crying won’t help although I can feel tears welling up behind the slits. It won’t help the swelling so I decide to bank them until I have explored all measures to deflate myself.

Inspiration hits and I dived over to my suitcase and rummaged like a mad woman. I remember an article I had read about haemorrhoid cream being great in helping to reduce swelling. Models use the cream under their eyes amongst other places to reduce any swelling or fine lines, so it must work.

My cruise clothes are tossed around until I find my medicine bag. There it is, my savoir. I turn the little yellow and blue tube over in my hands, give it a quick kiss of premature gratitude before reading the instructions. It says to apply gently to the affected area with a clean finger. I run my finger under the tap and smear cream over all my affected areas. The shower is left running on tepid until I have built up enough courage to get in.

Forgetting about my appearance for a second I sit down gingerly on the bed. I try and focus on the clock by the bed. Stretching my eyes apart I can barely make out the little red lines. Taking my glasses from the side of the bed and putting them on, tells me it's five o'clock. Only, and only under these circumstances am I grateful for waking up this early. I need all the time I can get to make sure that today goes how I have imagined it to be since applying for this job.

Tears well up again as I lay back against my cushion. The mixture of no sleep, swollen corpse and anxiety about today is just too much. It starts as a kind of cough and then to help me get going I pull a couple of weird faces, and then it comes in floods. Perhaps all these tears count as swelling and if I cry hard enough I will be sucked back to normal? I usually find myself in front of a mirror when I'm crying. It’s weird to see all those real ugly faces that you pull. Sometimes I even forget why I was crying in the first place as I get so carried away watching myself, especially when the not-so-waterproof mascara starts dissolving down my face. It kind of makes you realize that whatever you’re crying about, it cannot be as bad as the way you look at that very moment! Must remind myself never to do that in front of anyone. I apply more of the cream before lying back and relaxing again.
Right now is an exception. No makeup to worry about just haemorrhoid cream. I lie on the bed a bit longer to give the cream some time to work and as I do so I manage inadvertently to conjure up every horrible scenario possible for this morning.

In less than four hours I could be meeting Mr. Right on the Gangway of the ship. As he sees me for the first time, his eyes will widen in recognition and a slow smile will spread across his wonderful chiselled face to reveal perfect pearly tombstones. He knows who I am. He pads slowly over to me like a jaguar. He stretches out his muscular arm and offers his hand to Vanessa, what? What the fuck is she doing here? I turn around to see the lovely Vanessa flouncing up the gangway behind me. Her long wavy blonde locks are bouncy around her perfect shoulders as she makes her way up the steps in slow motion and slips her delicate white hand into that of my future husband.

When is this flipping swelling going to come down? I don’t need any more time to feed my imagination. What if I'm having a breakdown? Perhaps I'll phone home? What time is it there? What time is it here? Oh, no time, I must get ready. It's already five thirty—shit.

The shower is freezing but I brace myself under its bite. Holding my head up to bury my face in the falling ice drops I pray that I will be restored to my previous self. Every hair on my body is standing on end but I don’t care. Even Inny nipple has come out it's so cold. Commonly Inny nipples are called ‘inverted nipples’ but not mine. I don’t call it inverted because it isn’t; well not all the time anyway. It's more of an Inny-Outty. When it’s cold or excited Inny comes out. Come to think of it, it hasn’t been out since Giles. Oh, what the hell am I thinking about him for as if I don’t have enough problems? I wonder if I will have trouble breast-feeding? Anyway, Inny had caused a few uncomfortable situations for me when she's been in the right circumstances to come out but didn’t. Hence, a lot of unnecessary tumbling around the bed to avoid under all circumstances Inny contact with my very private and embarrassing Inny-Outty. The good thing about sex is that twisting around in the bed to avoid Inny contact is easy to do without causing raised alarms or eyebrows. Most of the men (all eight or so of them) I have been with have never mentioned anything. But it’s those tender moments when he wants to trace his tongue from a deep passionate kiss on the lips down your hairless chin and neck (my weakness) and then finally down to suck hard on your rose bud NIPPLE (argh). Before he would reach it I would throw him over on to his back. This means that now I have to do all the work, riding low to avoid Inny contact. Amongst all the contriving the moment is lost and with it all hopes of a shuddering orgasm left and I have to revert to the fake orgasmic groan. Surely, if he can’t get Inny out in the first place then this is his entire fault anyway.

Turning the handle in the shower to the red sign and to a more decent temperature I lather myself all over with my favorite olive green body wash. After rinsing off I grab the thick warm towel from the radiator and wrap myself up. As I wipe away the steam from the mirror I almost burst with happiness. My eyes have shrunk dramatically and are almost back to normal and my hands and feet are moving so much easier.

I release the magic hair clip from my hair and, as predicted, it tumbles gloriously down my back and falls slightly round my face helping to disguise the rest of the swelling. I start to dress. I have chosen a pair of cream linen trousers and shirt with beige wedged sandals. I expertly put my make-up on. Looking at my reflection, I remember that I never got round to getting my blasted eyebrows tinted. I always have to pencil them in a bit so it doesn’t look like I just have this enormous forehead. Under the circumstance, I can't complain.
A knock comes on the door. It’s Vanessa.
‘Morning,’ she beams.
She's looking rather good this morning, obviously had a better night’s sleep than me. I still haven’t forgiven her for stealing my Mr. Pearly Tombstones from right under my nose on the gangway so I don’t bother to tell her she's looking fab. Okay, so I tell her, she deserves it. That colour really suits her and besides she didn’t really do anything wrong although I wouldn’t put anything past her.
‘Good morning, Vanessa, are the others up?’ I know I am sounding unusually bright for me at this time of morning.
‘Yeh, we’ve just finished breakfast and are down at reception. Are you okay, Ginny?’ asks Vanessa, looking at me suspiciously.
‘Yes, fine, why do you ask,’ I ask, wondering what she’s talking about.
‘Nothing, it’s just that well, you look like you’ve been crying or something.’
So the cream hasn’t completely worked its miracle but I can’t complain, if she’d seen me a few hours ago she would have called an ambulance. I reassure her that I am fine and tell her I will be down in two minutes.

With no time for breakfast we are bundled into the van for the next leg of the journey. Trevor tells us that he had been awake since midnight the night before and passed his time drinking in the hotel bar and got plastered.
‘I only had two beers but they were fairly big, I don’t usually get that drunk,’ he says. ‘Perhaps it was the jet lag and everything,’ he said, drearily. Whatever it was he looked like hell.

This time at Vancouver airport, we all checked in and sat together. The aeroplane was much smaller than the last one and we were all lucky enough to share window seats. Greg who had been rather full of himself the night before looked a little preoccupied. We all sat quietly in our own thoughts about our new lives and what was in store for us. I caught Vanessa looking at me during the flight and I could tell she was bursting to say something. Finally, she reached over and fingered the material of my trousers telling me that she had had an outfit just like mine, but that was years ago. I wasn’t sure what she actually meant and what the point in telling me this was other than that my clothes were dated. I didn’t get a chance to ask her as Allison started shrieking and jumping up and down in her seat like a three year old.
‘There it is, look,’ squealed Allison.
There it was, or at least there one of them was. As the airplane came in to land we saw two huge snow-white ships taking up the harbor. It's magnificent. Vanessa and I have our faces squashed together at the window. Trevor and Allison are at another and Greg sat calmly by his window chin in hand looking down at the view not giving any sign of his feelings. I on the other hand cannot believe I am here. Call centre employee flying into Vancouver to Luxury Cruise Ship employee. The thrill of it all is at a peak and as a result of having no breakfast, my stomach has all the feelings of a volcanic grumble.

The airplane glides through the air and comes into land. We gather our things together and go to collect our many bags. I have managed to diagnose the symptoms of my stomach and decide its heartburn that funnily enough is much lower than my heart. This diagnosis was partly made because of the inconvenience of a stomach ulcer at this time. My own diagnosis however would require just a couple of pills, which I conveniently have in my bag. No surgery necessary.

As in Seattle, there is a cruise ship representative there to meet us. He introduces himself as Keith and asks us to follow him. He walks us through the airport terminal and outside where there is a large sky blue painted bus waiting for us. I notice that Allison has even more luggage than I do while Trevor on the other hand has just a small holdall, is there something he knows that we don’t?

We eventually catch up with the representative while heaving our bags behind us. On reaching the bus, we realize that we are not the only people joining the ship today. There are at least thirty other people surrounded by bags waiting to get on the bus. Most of the people were Mexican or Philippine, a few American or Canadian and a handful of Europeans. Some people were chatting away like old friends while others greeted and waved across to each other. This was obviously not their first time working on the ship. As we gathered together the representative calls out our names. Mario Berchielli, Gianfranco Bottocelli, Jose Gonzales, Alfredo Romano, Dennis Nicoletti, and so it went on. One by one we were called to get on the bus. Some people were like Trevor and packed light but for the most part everyone had packed for six months.

As we all made our way forward to board the bus, I noticed the group of foreign looking men talking amongst themselves and looking over at us. We must have NEW plastered on our foreheads. No one attempted to say hello or make conversation. One of the young men turns and looks straight at me then turns back to the others and says something. The others all laugh. I know it's because we’re new that people are curious, but it is quite an uncomfortable feeeling. I know it has absolutely zero to do with the swelling because I’ve already checked and reapplied the cream a hundred times.

As we make our way past Allison and Trevor who are sitting together chatting away like old friends, I notice that Greg is sitting on his own. Without him having to say a word he has already set himself apart from the rest of our group. I feel sorry for Greg sitting in his dark blue brownie point business suit. I cannot understand people who elevate themselves above other people, surely that can only make the fall much harder.
‘He’s probably right,’ I say, turning to Vanessa. ‘We probably will be working under him given a couple of months.’
‘I wouldn’t say no,’ replies Vanessa, a huge grin embedded in her flushed cheeks. I'm just about to ask her if she is serious as she pushes my shoulder and laughs.
‘No, not Greg,’ she says, rolling her eyes like I am the thickest person she has ever met. Prodding me she points her finger in the direction of the group of men who have moved seats to sit right in front of us. It turns out from their accents that they are Italian. I pray that the hemorrhoid cream is still working and that my face is cooperating, why I don’t know. I really couldn’t care less what they think of me, especially since they were laughing.

Vanessa jabs her elbow in my ribs and dislodges the nervous gas that I have been storing since the flight from Seattle.
‘He's gorgeous,’ she whispers, loud enough for the entire bus to hear. My body is stiff and I pull myself up as best I can in my seat and concentrate really hard on not letting anything out. Why the hell did they come and sit here? Bastards! I never liked the Italians. Can't think why at this precise moment, but I'll think of something!
‘Err yes,’ I breathe. Beads of sweat are forming on my forehead. My whole body weight is pushed down into the tips of my shoes and fngers. My elbows are supporting the rest of my body weight until the last of the pain subsides and the last bead of sweat has fallen.
‘Are you alright?’ asks Vanessa, looking slightly puzzled.
‘Sorry, oh yes, fine thanks, just a few period pains,’ I confide.

The ride takes about an hour in which time I decide that I am in love with Vancouver. Without having actually set foot in the city, I know I am in Love. Not only is it architecturally impressive with great imposing buildings, it has character and the charm of the old too. The stores look bigger and more exciting than in England and the streets are so clean. I can't wait until I get to have some real time here to spend my tax-free earnings. We come here every Saturday with the ship so there will no end of opportunities to explore. The rest of the bus trip goes by with Vanessa talking constantly.
‘And the doctors thought at one point it might be M.E., you know, that illness where you have to sleep all the time?’
‘Yes I’ve heard of it,’ I reply, really not following what she is talking about. The only word I can hear is me, me and me repeated over and over again. Even the illness is ME. Why can’t she just sit back and enjoy the scenery. I wouldn’t mind if the conversation had actually been directed at me, but while she kept elbowing me for my response her eyes were always directed towards the handsome Italian on the opposite chair.

The bus comes to a stop and we stand up to collect our things and make our way to the front of the coach. The good-looking Italian, who Vanessa has been talking at the entire trip unbeknown to him, stands to the side to let us go first.
‘Tar luv,’ says Vanessa.
‘Prego,’ he replies.
Vanessa bursts with happiness at being spoken to in Italian.
Once outside the bus we go to find our luggage. Once everyone was armed with his or her belongings, Keith took us into a terminal building where we were told to stay together until we have clearance, and until the Crew Purser comes to take us onboard. This is all alien to us so we just stand and wait.

Inside the terminal there are hundreds of people. Mostly they are arranged in lines, but others are scattered all over the place. I see there are ship’s representatives along desks at the far end giving out information to people.
‘But when can we get on the ship?’ drawls a lady with a very scary face-lift and red lips.
‘Where's my luggage?’ shouts a man at the back. Everyone is bellowing questions before actually arriving at their turn.
‘Turn around day,’ offers Keith by way of explanation. ‘Always a nightmare. If only they would read their cruise packages. Everything is written quite clearly; even my three-year-old can understand it. But oh no, that would spoil their fun wouldn’t it, they love to have a good old moan,’ he goes on. ‘We just this second got the last passengers off the ship but these people expect their cabins to me magically transformed in half an hour, they’re never prepared to wait,’ he explains. Allison is nodding her head in agreement so I decide to join in. It's better to look like you know what he's talking about.

Just then a lady wearing what looks like tennis gear, a sun visor and saggy tanned knees comes over and interrupts Keith in mid sentence.
‘What time does the boat sail?’ she demands. She had the same accent as JR Ewing only her voice sounded like nana’s pet parrot. Keith carries on talking to us while the lady is waiting for a reply. ‘Excuse me,’ she spits, ‘do you work for this goddamn company or not?’ Still, Keith ignores her and carries on talking about nothing in particular. The rest of us look at each other wondering what he’s doing. The woman is furious and looks like she is not used to being ignored. Why he doesn’t answer her I have no idea.
Just as I thought she was going to tear open his face with her red talons, Keith turns abruptly to the woman. Smiling slightly and clutching his plastic clipboard to him he says in a friendly, but professional voice, ‘Now I am finished talking, madam, how may I help you?’
Her face drops just about as far as it can given the amount of money she has spent on lifting it, and she glares at Keith.
‘Excuse me, I asked you what time the boat sails. I haven’t got all day.’ By this time she is at boiling point but Keith doesn’t seem to notice.
‘Sorry, can't help you on that one, madam. You must be sailing with a different company,’ he says, smiling down on her. ‘I work for a cruise ‘ship’ and therefore don’t have any information regarding boats, sorry,’ he adds regretfully. Keith had made his point quite clear although I don’t know if it was quite necessary. The woman just stares at him, turns around and mutters something about speaking to her travel agent and storms off.
‘It's not that I want to be unhelpful,’ he explains later. ‘I think I'm actually being more helpful by making them realize that their ignorance won’t be tolerated. They can be so bloody rude you know, not all of them of course, but it's them that we remember isn’t it? Perhaps I've been doing this job too long,’ he murmurs to no one in particular as he waves over to someone in the crowd in a black and white uniform.

Introductions are made, well she introduces herself as Sue the Crew Purser. She is about forty or so with cropped brown hair. Sue has worked for this cruise line for nearly twenty years and is a senior officer. Although her attitude stinks and she is neither good with passengers or crew, she is the best in her job as Crew Purser. The company is too afraid to fire her with the risk of being sued. Sue has slept with everyone from the butcher to the commodore and she doesn’t care what you or anyone else thinks about that. She is originally from Australia but has been living in Portugal with her Portuguese boyfriend of three years who currently is sailing on another ship out of Southampton, England. It’s funny how much you can find out about one person without even knowing them. Keith was quite a gossip too.

Our group is organized into a line and we are asked to show our passports and work visa to the official. After an eternity and only twelve people done, it's my turn. He looks at my papers and examines every item like it could hold a clue to a murder investigation. I am suddenly worried. Why? I don’t know, I don’t have anything to hide. I start to sweat in my linen suit while standing to attention. I didn’t realize I had been standing like that until he told me that I could go and I promptly saluted him like in the movies. What the hell. As soon as my hand was there rigidly set at my forehead I dare not ‘eyeball him’. The official is staring at me, as is the crew purser, Sue. Okay, so everybody is looking at me. My arm is locked and I can’t move from embarrassment. No one else saluted, why the heck did I? Will someone take my bloody arm down for me please? The rest of the group are standing in silence wondering what’s going on. The official continues to stare at me and finally says, ‘I said you could go’. I fling my arm down and lock it in a vice grip in my pocket. With the Italian next in line behind me, for the first time he smiles. Obviously pissing himself about my salute. Well at least this time he did have a reason to laugh. I will have to re-invent my past and mention my military service or something.

I start to walk away and notice that Sue is glaring at me. Our eyes lock and I keep walking until it becomes impossible for me not to look where I am going as I might further make myself look like an idiot by slamming into something. So my eyes were forced away. What was her problem anyway?

I take the opportunity to stand away from the group for a minute and move over to where Trevor is standing alone. ‘Are you all right today, Trevor?’ I ask, while looking up to the ship. The sun is out so I unlock my hand out of my pocket and this time salute the sun to protect my eyes from it. Now I get a different view of the ship. It was difficult to see anything, it was so huge and I was too close, I couldn’t take it all in. It just seemed like a mass of gleaming white with hundreds of black holes that must be windows. There was a line of lifeboats a couple of floors above us and as I counted up the windows I worked out they were on the seventh floor. Must remember that.
‘Yes, fine thanks,’ replied Trevor. ‘You look very nice today, Ginny,’ he says, smiling down at me. ‘Nice salute by the way,’ he adds, grinning from ear to ear.
‘Thanks Trevor,’ I reply, sticking my elbow in his side. Trevor’s way of teasing was so non-offensive that I actually laughed with him. He was really a sweet guy.
‘I was just shielding the sun from my eyes,’ I say, realizing that if anyone asks that that is my perfect excuse.
‘Mmm,’ Trevor replied, still smiling down at me.
‘What about Greg then, dressed like a bloody accountant,’ Trevor says, whilst giving Greg the once-over.
He's right I have to say. Greg has really pushed the boat out and is even wearing cuff links.
‘What about you Trevor, nervous about starting the job?’
‘Na, not a bit,’ he replies. This isn't my first time away from home and anyway the job should be a breeze.’
‘I never asked you, what was it that you did before taking this job?’
‘I was in sales,’ says Trevor, ‘advertising actually. I never really liked it so I went off travelling around Europe and worked for Disney for a while in Paris and then decided to try this for a while.’
‘What about a girlfriend, do you have one?’ I ask, as I have a good look at him for the first time.
His hair and eyes are black. He is about six foot tall and slim. Rather hippie-like really.
‘You ask a lot of questions don’t you?’ he said, nudging me again.

Just then Allison and Vanessa bound over to us. Allison links her arm through Trevor’s and Vanessa and I stare at the ship in silence. This is real, I’m here. I turn to smile at the others.
‘I know, it's unbelievable,’ says Vanessa first. ‘This is it Ginny, our home for the next six months.’ I knew at this moment that we were as ready as we would ever be. The excitement was over. I wish we still had one day of that feeling I had about today, without the ulcer of course.
Vanessa giggles and links my arm too. I don’t know if I like to link arms with Vanessa, but I go along with it because she seems so excited.
We let out a quick squeal together when Sue comes over and taps Vanessa on the shoulder.
‘Excuse me,’ says Sue, in a less friendly tone. ‘Do you mind, we are with Canadian immigration here.’
‘Yes I know,’ Vanessa says, simply. ‘You told us to wait to the side until the others are finished.’
Sue glares at us before resuming her position next to the official. She picks up her officer’s hat and places it on her head. She is looking intently at the official when she notices out of the corner of her eye someone walking past. She jumps into his path, completely disregarding her own words and bellows in front of the ‘official’.
‘Oi you,’ she shouts, to the young man. ‘Where is your laminax?’
‘I'm just coming ashore to make a phone call, Mam,‘ replies the boy, backing away from her a little.
‘I don’t see your laminax,’ she says, pointing to the identification card that is clipped to her own jacket.
The boy produces an ID card that for some reason is not good enough.
‘Get back on the ship this instant and report to Security immediately,’ she snaps.
The young boy scurries off back in the direction he came.

Sue is standing even taller than before with a great look of satisfaction on her face. What a moment of glory.
I couldn’t really understand what had happened just now but it appeared that the boy shouldn’t have been off the ship for some reason. Perhaps he had the wrong pass or something?
‘What do you think that was all about Vanessa?’ I ask, puzzled by what was going on.
‘No idea, what a bitch eh?’ she says.
I am just about to agree with her when Sue yells for us to gather our things and to follow her onto the ship. As everyone is sighing with relief at not having to wait any longer the sighing is suddenly replaced with loud humping noises as suitcases are gathered and we slowly make our way down the corridor. I take a look over the side and spot a small gap between the ship and the harbour. There is a huge door in the side of the ship and forklifts are loading supplies onto the side of the ship. Even the forklift looks tiny from here.