Gayle King flew to Chicago just to have a glass of water with Oprah Winfrey.
The 64-year-old broadcaster – who has now-adult children Kirby and William with ex-husband Bill Bumpus – was concerned after a phone conversation with her best friend so insisted on taking the first flight she could to travel out of town and catch a glimpse of her pal, who was living in Laporte, Indiana.
Oprah said: "I was really down. I felt wounded by a betrayal."
Gayle continued: "I had been talking to her on the telephone. I could tell that she was very upset about something. And I literally, hung up the phone, and I said to the babysitter, ‘I’ve got to go. Is there any way you can spend the night?’ "
Oprah recalled to People magazine: "She showed up at my door and said, ‘I can’t stay but I just wanted to see your face.’
"Then she got a glass of water and said, ‘I’m going to go back and get on a plane.’ I was like, ‘What?’ She goes, ‘You said you felt wounded. I never heard you use the word wounded before.’ "
Years before that, Gayle was worried about spending New Year’s Eve alone for the first time as her kids were with their father, shortly after her divorce, but Oprah and her partner Stedman Graham made a surprise visit.
She said: "My ex was going to have the kids.
"I was talking to Oprah on the phone that morning. And I said, ‘What are you guys doing?’ And, she told me something.
"Four hours later, the doorbell rang and she and Stedman were at the door. She had been planning to come. I didn’t know that.
"We went grocery shopping — Stedman liked to cook spaghetti. We went grocery shopping, got all the stuff to make spaghetti. He cooked. I just kept saying, ‘I can’t believe you guys were here.’ That was something that I’ll never, ever, ever forget."
Loyal friends Gayle King and Oprah Winfrey
