Freddie said. “But she can’t leave all of us. That’s the whole point of this little trip.”
Nick and Freddie and I were joining Eleanor on the Royal Train to commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the armistice that ended World War I, which had been signed on a locomotive in France. The festivities began with a splashy exit out of London in the evening, after which we’d eat and sleep on the train, and disembark in Inverness at 10:00 a.m. to coincide with the exact time the war ended. Eleanor and Freddie would then attend a brunch with veterans while Nick and I unveiled a new exhibit of military art at the cathedral. This anniversary was a big deal, historically, but Eleanor also knew that any event featuring her and the three of us was going to get a ton of media coverage, and she was apparently in the mood for some splashy positive PR.
Nick and I had been enjoying our IVF vacation. We’d relaxed, had some cocktails, drank coffee instead of green juice, recklessly skipped our vitamins, and used the Buckingham Palace hot tub for the first time. But, as good as that freedom felt, we couldn’t completely brush aside the limbo we were in, like floating in a warm bath but knowing that the water will soon get cold. The idea of a train trip sounded romantic and pleasant. The British Royal Train had a posh reputation, but none of the three of us had ever seen it in person; it was expensive to run, so Eleanor was persnickety about using it. But the internet told me it had eight cars that served as rooms: one for dining, one for lounging, a kitchen, and then bedrooms (all of which came with their own en suite bathroom). It was a fancy condo on wheels, albeit one that forced its guests to sleep in twin beds whether they liked it or not.
“Boo. I never sleep well without you,” I said, peering over Nick’s shoulder at his laptop screen, which showed a caramel-wood-paneled sleeping car.
“It’s not like we’d be getting it on with Gran on the other side of the wall,” he said.
I flicked his ear. “I was talking about actually sleeping,” I said, laughing. “You perv.”
The train was even tinier inside than it looked on the computer—my bathroom was narrower than my wingspan—but twice as tactile. Everything that could be covered in velvet was, 85 percent of the wallpaper was flocked, and the furniture was a careworn collection of secondary antiques that had been well polished and tended but still bore the nicks and scrapes of a century of being exactly where they were. My sleeping car was a prim affair with a scratchy lacy comforter—the aura of the spare bedroom in which you’d stick the maiden aunt of whom you’re particularly fond. There was a small pile of books on the table next to it. They were all about God.
We’d seen Eleanor only briefly, for the photo at the station before we boarded and pushed off. She had declined what I termed the Bid Farewell to Your Wartime Sweetheart press opportunity, for which the three of us waved out the windows and Freddie blew a theatrical kiss, preferring instead to disappear into her own quarters. We didn’t cross paths with her again until dinner. It turns out it’s complicated to eat a formal meal on a swiftly moving train; we had to skip the soup course because no one wanted to risk spilling bisque on Eleanor, and I had to hold on to my glass of water with my nondominant hand the entire meal.
“We should have just gotten Burger King,” Freddie said as the empty teacup in front of his place rattled. “Much less perilous, and no need for the fine china.”
“It is a sign of breeding if you can navigate a full supper in less than ideal circumstances,” Eleanor said, and truly, somehow her crystal glass was the only one without a dribble of claret trickling down the side, as if the laws of physics didn’t exist in her bubble. In contrast, the cloth around mine was a dappled mess, and when we got up to adjourn to the sitting room for digestifs, it was obvious I’d spilled more on my lap.
“Strike one,” I said.
“At least,” Eleanor said as Freddie took her arm.
We carefully transferred into the adjacent car, which had plush booth-style seating along one set of windows and a series of sofas built in under the others.