Chapter 44
The Adventure of a Lifetime


At 1:35 local time, Flight 19 from Chicago O’Hare touched down at Stockholm’s Arlanda Airport. Forty-five minutes later, Annie had collected her bags, cleared customs, and was walking through Terminal 5 on the way to the airport shuttle.





The sleek functional design and decor of the airport captivated her imagination and she began to get a feel for the eco-friendly and simple common sense approach to living over here.

Not even the thick blanket of clouds and temperature hovering near the freezing mark could dampen Annie Joy’s spirit as she greeted the driver. “Scandia Sergel Plaza, snälla,” she smiled brightly and he couldn’t resist returning her smile, of course her blond hair and blue eyes probably didn’t hurt, and then there were those dimples. “Welcome to Stockholm, Miss,” he said, giving her an appreciative look as he took her two bags and hefted them into the back. “Tack,” came her confident reply as she stepped up into the vehicle.

The bench seat in the back was empty so she schooched herself, her laptop, and her oversized purse all the way over to leave room for the other passengers. Finally, she breathed a sigh of relief and smiled to herself. ‘I’m here, I’m really here. Now why was I so worried about people understanding me? They’re the ones speaking English and I’m the one trying to speak Swedish. How cool is that? This is going to be a wonderful adventure. I can just tell.’

I’m sure it will be Annie Joy, but I wouldn’t count myself bilingual just yet seein’ as how you’ve used up 50% of your Swedish vocabulary already. I hope to heaven you don’t plan on confinin’ your wonderful adventures to situations where yes, no, please, and thank you are your only responses. If that’s the case, I’m gonna be bored outta my skull.

Well I don’t recall twisting your arm to get you here you know! The last time I bored you was when I was stuck in that awful rut with Dr. Doom, remember? This is a great opportunity for me you’ll see. We’ll have a wonderful adventure together…just as soon as I learn some more words./I]

A young couple climbed in and settled themselves down beside her. “Hej, jag är Annie Joy,” she smiled, sticking out her hand.

“Hello,” they responded in perfectly unaccented American English. The woman added, “We’re Ellie and Sam from New York. Are you Swedish?”

Annie Joy smiled a secret smile. You see she’d been reading and listening to her Teach Yourself Swedish Conversationbehind Great Minnie’s back and actually she was Swedish on her great grandmother’s side. Oh yes, she was certain this would be the adventure of a lifetime.

**********


“Hold that door please!” Urs called as he slipped into the elevator just as it closed. David checked his watch and gave Urs a puzzled look. Their meeting with Simon about the songs for the new album would begin in five minutes.

“We were doing the hurrying to not be late. We…we thought you would be already here,” Carlos sputtered in confusion.

“I’m here now,” Urs said calmly as the door opened on their floor.

“Yes, but you are always ze early bird, non?” pressed Seb catching up to Urs as he rounded the corner. Since when had Urs ever been less than ten minutes early for anything? Why he’d probably arranged to be born a few days early just to give himself a head start, Seb chuckled to himself.

The four of them entered the large outer office and turned to the right. “We’re fine on time, Seb,” Urs reassured him as he checked his watch. “We still have three minutes, no need to obsess.”

David was dumbfounded. Behind Urs’ back he mouthed, ‘no need to obsess’ to Carlos as they shrugged and watched in bemusement as Urs worked the room. To the casual observer it was the same old Urs, but to the Divos living in such close proximity for extended periods of time there were small but subtle differences.

His fluid stroll was the same yet more energetic. He may not have smiled more, but when he did it was with genuine openess rather than mere politeness.

“New outfit, Nicole?” Urs smiled and gave their pleasant looking 40-something personal assistant a thumbs up as they passed her desk.

Without breaking stride, Seb and David took Urs’ elbows to hurry him along but not before he half turned back to her, “Thanks in advance for forwarding our fan letters. You’re a treasure,” he blinky winked.

“Go on now you silly man, I’ve a mind to tell my Harry what a horrible flirt you are!” she fluttered with a smile.

“No fair recruiting fans from the hired help,” complained David as they walked.

“Do not be greedy, mon ami. With Nicole you must share. She has told me many times she loves us all.”

“Si, this is so. It is her job to service all of us, no?” added Carlos.

Urs snickered and the corners of Seb’s mouth twitched. “To BE of service, Carlos,” David said over his shoulder with rolling eyes.

“Si, this is what I said,” Carlos huffed a little indignantly. Why was he the one they kept correcting?

“You can go right in, they’re waiting,” nodded Simon’s secretary.

**********

On the way down to the lobby they had the elevator to themselves. “Well that went well,” Urs’ voice announced confidently as three heads swiveled to look at him.

“What? You didn’t think it did?” he asked incredulously.

“No, it’s just zhat…”

“Of course it did.”

“Si, it did but…”

How could they put this tactfully? They’d been through this hammering out of the short list, to-ing and fro-ing, bargaining, compromising, conceding and winning before and eventually they’d all come out feeling positive and ready to tackle each new project when it was all over. It was just that invariably Urs would be the one needing the most convincing, the skeptic of the group, at least at the onset. Of course in the end he would throw himself into the whatever had been decided upon 110% just as they all did, realizing that what's best for Il Divo is best for each of them. After all you couldn’t separate the one from the other. But surprisingly today he’d been the first to jump onboard. What was that all about?

Carlos felt sure he knew: Urs and Cecile’s Christmas together had been muy feliz. It was not until the next day on the way to the airport he learned it was muy alright…muy final.

“Sometimes you have to get to know someone really well to realize you're really strangers,” was the way Urs explained it to them. He sure was full of surprises lately…ever since that cruise he seemed less uptight and found it easier to let things roll off his back. Then there was the CD they’d signed for someone named Annie Joy who hadn’t believed he was a singer, and the break-up with Cecile, going home to Switzerland for Christmas, and finally he’d admitted writing again to this Annie Joy in hope of seeing her sometime. For Urs’ sake and theirs, they kept their fingers crossed that she’d answer his letter.

**********


The next afternoon, a Saturday, two strangers knocked on Annie Joy’s hotel door, Angie and Gabi. Both girls worked for the IKEA store in Skarholmen where Annie Joy would be based for the next eight weeks while she received her training and worked on her Homeland project.

Her first thought when she answered the door was: One of you must be an impostor. Petite dark-haired Angie with eyes black as night looked about as Swedish as a leprechaun thought Annie Joy…and it turned out she was right. Not about the leprechaun part but with a father from South America and a mother from Germany she didn’t have a drop of Swedish blood in her.

When Annie Joy casually mentioned she spoke some Spanish,
Angie squealed in delight. “It will be great to have someone to talk to besides my relatives,” she laughed.

“It sure comes in handy in south Texas. Heck we even have bilingual ballots.”

Gabi was much more in keeping with Annie Joy’s imaginary Swedish person: tall, willowy, with long medium blonde hair and boy could she cook, but that part came a little later. Come to think of it, even that first day Gabi had wowed Annie Joy when the girls had taken her around to see some of the sights. As they stood shivering, watching the Changing of the Guard, Gabi had pulled out some homemade cookies from her purse, thick crispy wafers oozing with a gooey honey filling, sweet and delicious. Exactly the way to a certain woman’s heart!

As the afternoon wore on the girls initiated Annie Joy into the pleasures of Korv Moja, where they sold special Swedish hot dogs with mashed potatoes, special bread and fries and giggled when she asked about pickled herring. That would be her next culinary adventure they promised.

Later they came back to the girls’ cozy apartment and visited like old friends drinking coffee and eating more of Gabi’s delicious cookies. So when they invited her to room with them Annie Joy wasted no time saying yes; after all aren’t strangers merely friends you haven’t met yet? One spoke Spanish and the other could cook. It was a match made in heaven.

Annie Joy moved in the next day.

**********

Nicole was a very efficient personal assistant. It was a Wednesday evening and Il Divo had been in Stockholm 11 days when the letter arrived. To Urs and the desk clerk who was quizzed daily it seemed like it took a very long time to arrive. To the mail service it seemed an average length of time considering it was an international letter mailed during the height of the Christmas rush and may have been held up slightly on someone’s desk before it was stamped, “RETURN TO SENDER: Addressee no longer at this address, No forwarding address.”

Urs was so shaken he barely managed a vague, “Thank you,” as he read the front of the envelope. A numb weariness came over him and he sank into a high-backed wing chair in the far corner of the lobby. He didn’t want to talk to anyone or be with anyone, yet he didn’t want to confront his hurt and disappointment alone in his room either. He told himself if he could look around and see people going about their business it wouldn’t seem so bad.

He studied the envelope again and found the San Antonio postmark partly hidden under several others, proof it had been delivered to her apartment but she was not there to open it.
He gently traced it with his fingertips. Where was she?

The desk clerk caught David’s eye as he came in from the side street entrance. He raised his brows and the man behind the desk shook his head and nodded toward where Urs was sitting. He’d been sitting with his eyes closed, his mind racing as he tried on different theories. Whatever it was had happened quickly. She hadn’t said anything in her thank you note. Had she been planning on moving then?

Could she have gone back to Dr. Doom? Surely not after what he’d done! Was she ill? But then why move? Had she been in an accident…or worse? His mind rejected that thought almost before it was formed.

His eyes flew open as David’s gently shook his shoulder. “Hey Urs are you OK?”

He looked up into worried blue eyes and a part of him wanted to shout, “Do I look OK? Go away and leave me alone!” but good manners and politeness both inbred and born of professional necessity tamped down his spontaneous outburst, especially in so public a place, so he simply handed David the letter. “She’s gone and I don’t know how to find her,” he said sadly as the pain of saying the words out loud twisted and knotted in his belly.

“The only thing I can think of is that she got a job offer and had to move right away. She wrote in her note that she had an interview the next week but she didn’t mention the name of the company. I don’t even know if it’s in Texas. Scheisse!” he said disgustedly.

David spread his hands and prepared to do some cheerleading. His mind scrabbled for some positives, “Maybe you wrote the wrong address!” he announced as if he’d solved the secret of the universe.

Urs gave him a blank stare. That was the first thing he’d checked.

David tried another approach. “She has your address. Just give her some time… to get settled, you know, uh, hang loose, buddy,” he ended lamely, wishing Seb and Carlos were here to help.

Urs stood up, “I think I’ll head to the gym for awhile and have an early night. Tomorrow’s my day to lay down tracks first.”

“Sure, Urs. I’ll be around if you…I’ll be here.”

“Thanks, night,” Urs voice trailed off as he headed slowly to the elevator.

**********

Urs had completed his circuit twice and was fifteen minutes into his run, focusing only on his body’s performance, visualizing the blood pumping through his heart and circulating throughout his body, hearing only the steady thump, thump of his shoes on the treadmill, feeling his heartbeat rise and fall as he adjusted the incline. But he had to stop sometime.

He adjusted the showerhead and turned to let the hot stream beat on his neck and shoulders. Nothing seemed to relieve the tension, to loosen his knotted muscles. Loosen, what had David said? Hang loose, that was it. Hang loose, on the back of Annie Joy’s sweats, hang loose, how he’d teased her at the bus in Boston, hang loose, his last words to her on the ship. How ironic. That was all he could do now.

Much later, as the picture of Annie Joy in her orange marshmallow slid from Urs’ hand, he fell asleep trying to solve the knotty problem of just when hanging loose ended and letting go began.