Virtually Perfect (35 page)

It must have been the light streaming through the stained glass window; the sickly words; the love in the room.  He'd come over all 'glowy'.  All 'zen'.  Ben felt like an idiot.  It had worn off now.  He was angry again.

He'd been scheming all the way to the church - simmering with rage.  Plots and plans to get back at her.  It was all so juvenile, so petty.  Ben wasn't the bad guy.  How could coming off as one make it all better?  No.  Ben knew better than that.  Roger Blake was one of the biggest names in publishing.  Humiliating his daughter in public wouldn't be great planning on Ben's part. 

But he wasn't going to roll over either.  He wasn't done with her yet.  He'd be nice as pie, on the face of it.  He'd kill her with kindness instead.

Eve stood squinting at the seating plan.  One huge banquet table - like the Mad Hatter's tea party - most bizarre.  She found her name on the board; checked out who she was next to.  Her face dropped; stomach lurched. 

I am going to kill him...

Eve flinched as she felt his arms around her shoulders.  Ben stood behind her.  He leant down and pressed a kiss to her temple. 

She closed her eyes, half angry, half reassured.  The smell of his cologne made her giddy.

'I think I'm going to have to pass on that little chat...' he whispered.

Eve's eyes blinked open, rolled back towards him. 

'Don't worry.  I'm not going to make a scene.'

He feigned a smile for the passersby, stroked her shoulders, leant into her again.

'It's just that once we get out of here, I don't think we'll have very much left to say to each other.  I think the time for talking has passed.'

She stood in a daze as he slinked away.  He walked tall - slow, deliberate steps.  He stopped.  He turned back, a  false smile plastered all over his face. 

'Come on, darling!'

He held out his hand.

Roger Blake stood as his daughter approached.  His tawny skin crinkled in a smile.

'I was starting to think you'd got lost.'

Eve awkwardly kissed his cheek and sat down in the empty chair to his right.  She buried her brow in her hands.  It was going to be excruciating - she just knew it.

She looked up across the table, through her fingers.  Ben sat opposite.  He was smiling, but he wasn't looking at her.  He was looking to his right.  He was looking at Alex.

'Hello again.'

Eve grabbed the napkin, roughly disassembling the swan.  She gave it a loud flick to the air, spreading the starched white linen over her lap.  Ben glanced up at her.  Eve cut him daggers.

'So how's life in sunny Brighton?' Roger enquired.

Well, somebody had to say something.  They couldn't very well sit there for the next hour in silence.  Eve turned to her father and smiled.

Actually, pretty shit.  I have a boyfriend who's cheating on me...  Oh wait, scratch that.  Apparently, I don't anymore.  My so-called friends think it's good sport to stitch me up like a kipper.  I won't even have them soon, once I've wrapped that Napoleonic bronze in the warehouse around the back of Curtis's head.  Then I suppose I'll have to look for a new job... but heyho.  This one never was going anywhere - not with Tweedledum and Tweedledee waiting in the wings.  I barely have two pennies to rub together, my apartment's full of damp, and I have a huge, unbelievably painful blister, right underneath my big toe...

'Great!' she grinned, nodding at the waiter, taking a long awaited slug of Champagne.  'Couldn't be better!'

'You look nice!  Lovely dress!' gushed Alex.  'Roger, doesn't she look pretty?'

Eve's gaze darted over the polished cutlery, the gleaming crystal, the arrangement of peonies.  Straight through the gilt candelabra, the six foot acrylic lashes, searing into Alex's eyes.

'Thank you,' Eve said quietly.

'I can see you've been taking good care of my girl, Benjamin,' grinned Roger.  'I've never seen her so well.'

Eve glanced at Ben.  He smiled nervously at Roger, then looked down at the table, sipping his wine.

Roger Blake rarely gave out compliments.  He wasn't a demonstrative man.  When Eve felt his hand squeeze hers, saw the proud smile, she was stupefied.

It had been quite a shock when Eve saw him at the church: the way he looked, the way he was.  She went away travelling for four whole years and when she got back, he was exactly the same.  In these past twelve months he'd aged so much.  He was virtually grey.  Still with it though - he had a fashionable cropped cut - a touch of wax and a hint of a ruffle.  Nice suit, perfectly pleated tie - he'd always been the man about town.  But the lines cut into his face a little deeper; the jowls sagged a touch lower.  There were more wrinkles etched around his eyes. 

Eve had always seen her dad as indestructible.  It felt like he'd be there forever.  Mum was different, she'd always been fragile, physically and emotionally.  She was a butterfly. 

Dad was a lion; Eve was too, that's why when they fought there was blood on the walls.  When she first saw him, she was angry at him - not just for showing up, but for
giving
up.  How dare he look so weak?  It shook her: the idea that he wasn't immortal, that one day he might leave her too.

Her anger had come full circle.  She'd turned back on herself.  It was a year since they'd last sat down together, and with good reason on his part.  She'd been an absolute shit.

He looked at her and smiled.  Eve smiled back at him.  That was the only part of him that hadn't aged - those big brown eyes, the boyish twinkle.

Curtis and Alice had plumped for a Victorian menu, in keeping with the setting.  The first course was soup - consommé or julienne - a risky choice to Eve's mind.  What if Alice spilt it on her dress?  As the bowl of steaming consommé was carefully laid down in front of him, Eve and her father exchanged a knowing smile.  He laughed as she crinkled her nose.

It was like beer and radishes.  Eve had always hated all three.  But when she was little, she'd tried so hard to like them, tasting them over and over again with sour-faced sips and nibbles.  She was desperate to like them, because he did.  She wanted to be just like him.

The julienne tasted good.  It was a light, clear vegetable soup, but it was difficult to eat.  Every time Eve drew her spoon up from the bowl, ribbons of vegetables dangled from it.  She kept dribbling it on her chin.

Eve glanced at Alex.  She'd already pushed the bowl away.  She must have already exceeded her thimbleful of food for the day.  Her arms were like twigs.  She had some new rocks on her fingers.  Eve's eyebrow raised. 
I wonder where you got those from...

'So...' said Roger, wiping his mouth with his napkin.  'You still haven't told me how you two met.'

Ben looked up from his consommé.  He and Eve exchanged an embarrassed glance.

'Through a mutual friend,' Eve said quietly.

Ben sat through the first course in a daze.  He was in a nightmare - he didn't know where to look.  Alex was flirting with him.  She'd touched his thigh twice with those taloned fingers.  He wanted to leave.  It was as awkward as hell.

'So, Ben.  I hear you're making quite a name for yourself.' 

Ben looked up across the table at Roger. 

'Pardon me?'

'Sounds to me like you're a bit out of our price range these days,' grinned Roger.

'Oh...  Oh I see.' said Ben smiling politely.  He went back to staring into his wine.

'You know, Benjamin here sold one of his photographs a couple of years back,' Roger raved to Alex.  'It fetched a million pounds!'

'Just under,' Ben told them, diffidently, his aqua eyes flicking up.  'It was a bidding war.  You know how it is.'  He glanced at Eve.  'People get carried away.'

'Nonsense!' rebuked Roger.  'I saw it myself!  It was an incredible photograph!'

'...You do realise he fell over three hundred feet taking that?' Eve chimed in.  'Almost died from exposure?  Fractured his collarbone?  Broke his leg?'

Ben looked up at her from across the table.  He smiled timidly.  Eve managed a smile back.

'Oh you poor thing!' gasped Alex. 

Ben almost sloshed his wine in his face as he felt Alex squeezing his arm.  She wrapped both hands around his bicep, the puce claws gouging into his Alexander McQueen jacket.  Eve's eyes flickered angrily.  Ben watched them narrow.

Shame it wasn't your neck...

'...Three hundred feet?' blustered Roger.  'How in God's name did you survive that?'

'I wouldn't say fell, exactly,' Ben admitted, politely removing his arm from Alex's clutches and straightening his tie.  'More like rolled.  I lost my footing on Bosses Ridge.' 

That was the maddening part - he was so close to the summit.  It was meant to be the easiest bit. 

'Too busy taking pictures, I'm afraid.  I wasn't paying attention.  Airlifted off, all very embarrassing really...  I generally omit that part in the interviews, but thank you Evelyn for sharing it with everyone.'

They exchanged another look; a polite little smile.  Eve's was sour.  Ben gulped at his Merlot.

'I remember Ben walking into my office like it was yesterday,'  Roger recounted to his almost drained wineglass.  'When he opened up that portfolio, I knew the lad was bound for big things.  He didn't even need to open his mouth, those pictures did the pitching for him.  Benjamin, you were the best photographer we ever had. 

'Enjoy your success, my boy.  Lord knows you deserve it.'

Ben smiled back at Roger.

'Thank you,' he said quietly.

It wasn't just platitude.  It meant a lot to hear Roger say that.  Ben could remember it too.  He could barely get the zip of that damned portfolio undone, his hands were shaking so much.  He knew this was his big opportunity.  He knew his whole future could depend on what happened in those few minutes.  It was just as well he didn't have to say very much - his mouth was like cotton wool.  Ben was more scared than he'd ever been in his life.

'What was that French fellow called you used to work with?' quizzed Roger.  'Blonde guy...  ripped jeans.  Always looked like he needed a trip to the barbers?'

Ben's eyes flickered.  He stared at Roger for a second.  He shook himself; smiled and nodded at the waiter as he cleared his soup dish.

'...Antoine,' he murmured.

'Antoine!  That's it!  What's he doing with himself now?'

Everybody liked Antoine.  He was such a funny guy - until you were the butt of the joke.

'...I honestly don't know,' Ben told him dismissively.

Roger studied him.

'I thought you two lived in each other's pockets? You were like Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid!' 

Ben studied his glass again. 

He didn't appreciate the comparison.  He could guess which one was which.  Antoine always did have the gift of the gab; something clever to say about everything.

'That was a long time ago,' Ben muttered.

'What happened?' asked Roger, his eyes sparking with intrigue.  Ben could feel them all staring.  Even the old guy to Eve's right; the bespectacled redhead to his left.  It felt like the whole room was listening in.

He loosened his tie.

'It's a long story,' he said quietly. 

Everyone knows that's code for
mind your own business.

'I'd like to hear it,'  piped up Eve.

She smiled back at him goadingly. 

'Oh come on, darling!  We have got all night, after all!' 

Ben stared back at her.

'Alright.'  He put his palms together, crossing his fingers.  'OK then, if you really want to know... 

'I suppose it all started when we were living in digs,' he said pensively.  'There was a spate when my stuff kept going missing.  Pens, cds - silly things...  They'd always crop up in Antoine's room...  Or in his bag, or in his car.  He'd swear blind they were his, but I knew.  We both knew, really.  I had to start marking everything in the end.'

Fucking hell... I take it back. 

Eve squinted down at her wristwatch impassively.

We'll be here until Christmas at this rate...

'He married my sister.' 

Eve's gaze bounced back to Ben's.  She flashed back to
The Four Seasons
, lying on the bed.

She married a frog...  I rue the day I ever fucking met him.

She could see it again, the clenched jaw, quivering brow.  Eve took a slug of wine.

'...They bought a
gîte, just outside Nice.' 

Roger raised his eyebrows; smiled and nodded. 

'A beautiful part of the world!' he enthused.

'Yes,' said Ben.  'Yes, it is.  They had a little boy, Tristian,'  Ben smiled to himself.  'Really,
really
sweet kid - sharp as a tack, loves animals.  He wants to be a vet when he grows up.'

Eve remembered the phonecall, the giggles, the geese.  He was a good uncle, at least.