和电影明星一起旅行 英文故事(9)

“O.K.”
He wrote the number on a page from the SkyMall catalogue and ripped it out and pressed it into my palm.
“This is my kids’ nanny’s personal line. The only people who call her on this line are her boyfriend and her son. So she’ll always answer it. You’ll always get through. And she’ll know where I am.”
I looked at the number.
“It’s missing a digit.”
“I know. I want you to just memorize the last number, O.K?”
“O.K.”
“It’s four.”
We turned our faces to the front of the plane, and Roy Spivey gently took my hand. I was still holding the paper with the number, so he held it with me. I felt warm and simple. Nothing bad could ever happen to me while I was holding hands with him, and when he let go I would have the number that ended in four. I’d wanted a number like this my whole life. The plane landed gracefully, like an easily drawn line. He helped me pull my carry-on bag down from the bin; it looked obscenely familiar.

“My people are going to be waiting for me out there, so I won’t be able to say goodbye properly.”
“I know. That’s all right.”
“No, it really isn’t. It’s a travesty.”