“Okay, but we still need to get him.”
Priya kept driving. “Fine. I’ll just ditch my truck here in this pedestrian crossing.”
The door opened and Liz stumbled out, realising slightly too late that slow for a motorised vehicle was unreasonably fast for a human being. “Come on.” She made a beckoning noise to James Royce-Royce who was unbuckling Baby J’s car seat.
“Be very careful,” he admonished us as he scooted across the truck and passed Baby J to Mel, who had joined us in the walk-slowly-next-to-a-truck-a-thon. “James would have kittens if he knew I’d passed our little boy out of a moving vehicle.”
After Baby J was safely transferred and then, once James Royce-Royce was on the pavement, safely transferred back, we dashed up the station steps to follow Bridge. Or at least Mel and I dashed. James Royce-Royce followed as quickly as he could, given his embabyment, and Liz kept a vicarly pace beside him.
Inside, we’d just hit rush-hour crowds, and I could barely tell where one face began and another ended. But then I wasn’t Bridge and hadn’t developed her highly attuned Tom senses. She saw him swiping his way through a ticket barrier and dashed after him, scrambling over the gates rather than stopping to find her card—and drawing the attention of a Transport for London guard who immediately set off after her. Which left me with two choices: either hang back with an air of supportive dignity or kick off a ludicrous Benny Hill chase through a crowded Tube station.
Benny won.
Tom was just ducking behind a pillar, talking urgently into his phone while Bridge—minus both shoes now—was sprinting to catch up with him and the guard was sprinting to catch up with her and the rest of us were, well, honestly, most of us weren’t in the mood to sprint but we were at least jogging lightly to keep pace.
“Tom!” said Bridge.
“Bridge?” said Tom.
“Gotcha!” said the Transport for London guard.
Bridget turned around. “You haven’t got me. I haven’t done anything.”
“You jumped the barrier, miss.”
She gave him a defiant look. “Yes, but I’m not getting on the train.”
“That doesn’t make a difference.”
Maybe having a barrister boyfriend had gone to my head. “I think it does,” I panted. “The crime is fare dodging, but if you don’t go anywhere, there’s no fare to dodge.”
This did not endear me to the Transport for London guard. “Who works here, me or you?”
By now, Bridge’s army of wedding guests had arrived and surrounded Tom, wearing expressions of varying betrayal and exhaustion. Except for Baby J who was, y’know, a baby which meant he looked like all babies always look: grumpy and a bit squashed.
Apparently resigned to being caught, Tom put his phone down and said, “Sorry. She’s my fiancée—”
“Oh, am I? ” asked Bridget.
Which, if he’d needed one, was Tom’s big clue that maybe not everything was in a perfect state of totally fineness. “And as you can see,” he continued, “we’ve got a lot to talk about, so would it be okay if we just left and pretended none of this ever happened?”
The guard looked uncertain. Then again, he’d been looking uncertain since we showed up. “I’m not sure I can do that. I think I’m supposed to issue an on-the-spot fine.”
“I am really sorry,” offered Bridge, “and I really wouldn’t have jumped the barrier except it was a romantic emergency.”
“Wait, what romantic emergency?” Tom’s unflappable demeanour flapped very slightly.
“Yeah, what romantic emergency?” asked the Transport for London guard, suddenly getting interested.
Bridge adopted a posture of supreme indignance. “We’re getting married in a week, and he’s running around with other women.”
“I am bloody not,” protested Tom.
“I have proof,” Bridge told the Transport for London guard.
The Transport for London guard gave Tom a disappointed look.
“Mate, if you’re running around on your bird, be a man and admit it.”
“I’m not,” protested Tom again.
“Look at this.” Bridge brandished her phone in Transport for London guy’s face. “What’s that if it’s not running around on his bird?”
The guard assessed the evidence dispassionately. “I agree it don’t look great. But there could be an explanation.”
“I’ve been trying to get him to explain himself for days,” Bridge wailed. “He ghosted me.”