Chapter 10
‘For the next few years we were as happy as could be expected under the circumstances’ Suzie continued, still covered only in a fluffy bath towel, as we lay on the bed, touching – but not ’touching’ (just like the good old days she thought), ‘then he started to take his frustrations out on Whisky, not too seriously, but enough for me to start joining the real world, my ‘special’ love was finally on the wane, then you took on those blasted pirates, how on earth can anybody in their right mind fall in love with a flak jacket and tin helmet’ she said in exasperation.
‘Please, it was a very expensive Kevlar one’ I said, and we then had our first kiss – no messing about, straight on the lips’, then she continued.
‘Three years this November they struck Halcyons mast, stripped her of everything removable and motored her up to Wroxham, only running her aground once, as fully laden she draws almost four feet, which is getting close to the maximum for some parts of the river. A local boatyard then lifted her out and put her undercover, and then for the next six months they both nigh on lived on the damn thing, apparently she was not getting any younger and was in desperate need of a good seeing to – it would apparently put years on her - just like me’, then the towel slipped, again revealing her golden globes, but this time I did not stop staring. ‘It quickly became obvious that the restoration was to be a ‘man thing’ so we, Charlotte and I, continued to spend our spare time pooper scooping and following your antics on television - god how I hate that Sandra woman, and the rest of them come to think of it. Anyway in April they took her back down to Yarmouth, even managing to take the mast with them this time as she was now lighter, and the rains had arrived with a vengeance - so the water levels were high. They then re-fitted the mast and waited for a suitable day for a test-sail. They missed a few good days through their day jobs but finally, just before a prolonged period of stormy weather was due to arrive they took her out, apparently ‘they just couldn’t wait any longer’. That evening Charlotte and I both received phone calls from them saying that they had a small problem so were overnighting off Mundesley – about twenty nautical miles from Yarmouth, but didn’t go into any details as they both had weak signals on their mobiles. That was the last we ever heard from them, they just disappeared of the face of the earth’.
Now I understood the word ‘technically’.
‘What happened after that?’ I asked.
‘When they didn’t turn up the next day we started to get worried and that evening Charlotte rang the Coast Guard, and they started to get worried, but not a lot. Unfortunately there were several other boats in their area that were in ‘actual’ distress as the storm had now arrived with a vengeance, all they could offer at the moment were words of comfort and ‘please let us know when they make contact with you’.
‘The following day we drove down to the Maritime Rescue Co-Ordination Centre (MRCC) at Great Yarmouth in the driving rain and found out why their response the previous evening had seemed less than enthusiastic, they were in the midst of closing the place down. An Assistant District Officer (a two ringer), the duty officer, assured us that this was not the case, many calls come in from anxious family members when storms strike, and 99% of the vessels turned up safe and sound after a day or so, their crew tucked up in a marina somewhere off the beaten track, with their hands wrapped around a ‘hot toddy’.
‘Patronising prick’, I thought, and then Charlotte started to lose it, and finally, after a combination of tears and threats we were shown into an Inspectors (four rings) office and they then started to take out plight seriously, ‘thanks in no small part to you’.
‘Me?’ I said.
‘Yes you. They were not overly impressed when we told them who our husbands were, but as soon as I told them that the famous Andrew Michaels was my very good friend they seemed to put it up a notch – well it wasn’t really a lie was I?, we are, now – I was just a teensy bit premature’.
I let that one go, ‘then what happened?’
‘The storm was still too bad to start a search, even by air, all their aircraft were grounded because of the high winds, but they did start to do a phone search of all the marina’s, yacht clubs and landing points within a fifty mile radius, do a beach search, and contacted the local radio and television stations. Simon was home on one of his rare visits so he ‘Whisky watched’ whist we relocated temporarily into a local hotel – I don’t think either of them had been happier in their lives, SORRY that was an awful thing to say, but things really had deteriorated to that level’.
They had stayed at the hotel for ten days but finally accepted reality when nothing was found, not even a piece of wreckage, and then it became a police matter.
‘Police matter’ I said ‘they suspected foul play?’
‘No, they had to get involved as they were now classified as missing persons’.
‘And?’
‘A heavily pregnant detective, about to go forth and multiply was handed the routine task of making a report to be sent to the Coroner, so that they could eventually be pronounced dead, and we could then get on with our lives, BUT NO, out of boredom, or in a fit of pique at not being given a juicy murder, she went to town on it. She went through all the paperwork relating to the refit but found no inconsistencies, nothing that indicated that they had been ‘upgrading’ and planning to sail off into the wild blue yonder. There had been no mysterious financial transactions carried out in either of their bank accounts, both were in responsible jobs with not a hint of impropriety, she could find no hint of hidden mistresses (or others I thought) and everything unfortunately looked hunky dory UNTIL somebody THOUGH that they recognised them in a Supermarket on the day that they set sail, stocking up with vast amounts of provisions, far more than SHE thought was required for a couple of days bobbing about on the ‘oggin (her husband was in the Navy).’
‘That was it’ the detective’ess cried, ‘it’s a conspiracy (or something else equally as illegal)’ then her waters broke. Quickly grabbing a pen she wrote INCONCLUSIVE across the file and went off to pop her sprog (her husband was in the Navy too).
‘Inconclusive, what does that mean?’
‘It meant that there was the slightest hint that they may still be alive, so we could not get a court order directing the registrar to issue a death certificate, but all would not have been lost if we had all been living in Scotland, we could then wait seven years to have them declared legally dead, which incidentally is slightly better than in Italy, which is twenty years, but in England it is a nightmare, there is nothing ‘legal’ that we could do unless we come up with the bodies or can prove foul play, if you REALLY loved me you would go to the police and confess!!!’
I skipped that one. I had more important things on my mind; I knew that I had strong convictions about the sanctity of marriage, but this situation was testing them to distraction and I needed to get my head sorted out quickly, before another part of my anatomy overruled it.
Suzie realized that I was in a dilemma as I was starting to pull away from her, not traveling in the opposite direction, and she was mortified.
‘What is the matter Andrew’ she asked, tears starting to form in her eyes.
‘You are still married’ I quietly said.
‘But it was over, it never really started, I’m still a virgin: and for god’s sake I’ve even got you your own landing strip’.
‘Pardon’ I said.
‘When Alice told me that you were her father I knew that eventually you would end up here, and despite what I have said about you in public I just knew that deep down I was head over heels in love with you, it was way passed a crush. You are without a doubt the only person I want to be with physically, emotionally and carnally – especially carnally, so the next day I booked into to the most expensive health spa on the Country and let them loose, and it was worth every ache and pain of it. Three days ago, as I was having my final pamper and waxing session one of the girls asked me if I wanted my bikini line ‘adjusted’, apparently
I was now looking ‘divinely’ fit and bronzed after all their (and my) hard work, and sun bathing top and more lately bottom-less, did I have someone special that would appreciate a different ‘style’, perhaps a heart, European, Brazilian or even a landing strip. Up until the Brazilian I was at a loss at what she was talking about, and then the landing strip lost me again so she removed a plastic sheathed sheet of A4 from the shelf behind her, and on it there were a dozen photo’s of just the ‘private’ parts some very attractive ladies, each with a different style surrounding their ‘privates’ – or not, ranging from ‘Au-naturel’ to ‘the playboy strip’. For a second I thought that you were a bit of a playboy – but there again I was going to put a stop to that within the next few days, and then I thought ‘you are a bit of a pilot – perhaps you would appreciate your own landing strip’, and with that the towel was history and it was obvious that I was expected to go on my first solo.
‘A bit of a pilot’ I said, trying to find a way out of the situation, then I engaged mouth before brain and said ‘and I already have my own runways’, and that was nearly the end of a beautiful relationship.
She burst into full blown tears and slapped me hard on the side of my face, I well and truly deserved it, but it still hurt like hell.
She tried to roll away but in desperation I grabbed her and she almost fought me off but finally her tears subsided and her legs locked behind my back, but fortunately my aeroplane was as confused as I was and was refusing to take off.
‘What is matter’ she pleaded, ‘I so want you’.
‘And you will, but we have got to sort this out first’.
‘The marriage thing?’ she almost screamed.
‘Yes, I thought I was the luckiest man on the planet when I married Sheila, most people then and now would have thought it stupid for us to wait until after the ceremony, but she was a virgin until that first night, and we both remembered every second of it, and I want to be lucky enough to have the first ‘memories’ of my second wife to be the same, but that’s the only ‘boundary’, I promise.
An hour later Alice walked into my room, screamed, and fled – Sheila and I were constantly warning her about the consequences of not knocking first, and now she realised why, and if we were ever to let her in on our secret about the virgin bride thing, there was no way on Gods little green Earth that she would ever believe us.
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