Here's Looking at You Page 11

  Chris was on the sofa with a beer. Aggy and her mum were crouched over sheets of paper strewn across the carpet, covered in circles drawn round the base of a water glass. Anna held her Prosecco against her chest and peered at the annotations on the page: ‘AUNTY BEV: NOT NEAR DAD OR UNCLE MARTIN???!!’

  ‘Aunty Bev can’t be near anyone with much success.’

  ‘Look at the theme, sister-in-law-to-be,’ Chris winked at Anna.

  Anna held strands of her hair out of the way and read the table titles aloud. ‘Havana … Manzanillo … Santa Clara …’

  ‘Because we got engaged in Cuba,’ Aggy said, looking up.

  Anna looked at Chris, nonplussed. ‘Nice …?’

  ‘Keep reading,’ he said.

  ‘Aggy!’ Anna cried. ‘Guantanamo?!’

  Chris hooted with laughter. It was very Chris-ish to not tell Aggy, so he could enjoy the joke for longer.

  ‘It’s a city in Cuba!’

  ‘A city in Cuba kind of inextricably linked with a massive US naval base-slash-torture prison.’

  ‘That’s not Cuba’s fault!’ Aggy said. ‘Why is everything about politics these days?’ She scribbled out Guantanamo in irritation and her mum rubbed her back, supportively.

  ‘I reckon, go for broke, do a famous prisons theme instead,’ Chris said. ‘Abu Ghraib. Barlinnie. Broadmoor.’

  ‘One for Aunty Bev at a distance, called Alcatraz,’ Anna said.

  ‘There must be other Cuban places,. Aggy started hammering at her iPhone. Pause. ‘Has anything ever happened in the Bay of Pigs?’

  23

  Aggy’s enthusiasm for her wedding planning carried them through cold meats, olives and bruschetta, porcini ravioli, the pork and roast potatoes, the salad course, and was threatening to continue into the cheese. Anna had never known a wedding had so many discussion points.

  Or that gift lists could feature something as pointless as Tiffany solid silver Stilton spoons. The sentence ‘Have you by any chance got a dedicated spoon for this blue-veined king of cheeses?’ was a phrase that had been uttered by no one, ever.

  ‘Why black tie? I don’t have a tuxedo,’ their dad said.

  ‘It looks so glamorous and smart. Otherwise everyone wears what they want,’ Aggy said.

  ‘Imagine that, people wearing what they want,’ Anna said. ‘Hired tuxes smell like goat’s pockets, according to colleagues who’ve worn them for Royal Society stuff.’

  ‘We’ll buy one!’ Judy said to Oliviero, adding, ‘You’d have to buy a new suit anyway.’

  ‘When will I wear it again?’ their dad grumbled.

  ‘Anna’s wedding,’ Aggy said.

  ‘By the time of my wedding, people will no longer need clothes. They will float naked and hairless in cots of saline water and download their consciousnesses to a virtual ceremony,’ Anna said.

  ‘Shush. You need to stop trying to be clever with men and just be yourself,’ their mum said, which caused much amusement.

  ‘Not clever. Yourself,’ Chris said, pointing his knife and then shearing off another lump of Grana Padano.

  ‘My daughter is the cleverest girl in London,’ Anna’s dad said, raising his glass to her.

  ‘Yes but men don’t like that, they like to relax,’ Judy replied.

  ‘You haven’t met all men, Mum,’ Anna sighed.

  Conversations with her mother and Aggy sometimes made her feel that the women’s rights movement had been a largely wasted effort.

  ‘Now you’ve finished eating, we’ve got a surprise,’ Aggy said. ‘Chris and I are writing our own vows. And we wanted to try them out on you. An exclusive preview of coming attractions.’

  Anna put her glass down with a bump.

  ‘Aren’t you meant to say these for the first time to each other on the day?’

  ‘I’m not leaving that to chance! What if his are rubbish?’ Aggy said.

  ‘For better, for worse,’ Anna said.

  Too late, Aggy was producing notepaper from her bag. Anna groaned.

  ‘Chris, don’t be bullied by my mad sister. We don’t have to hear them.’

  ‘Are you kidding? I stayed up until one this morning writing these, on your sister’s orders. You’re hearing them!’ Chris said.

  ‘OK, so. Me first,’ Aggy said. Anna looked round the crowded dining-room table. Her mum looked delighted and expectant, her dad neutral. Anna wanted the pistachio-coloured Wilton-covered floor to swallow her up. Sometimes, despite her and Aggy’s evident physical similarities, she felt like a foundling in this family.

  ‘Christopher. When I first met you I was afraid. I was petrified—’

  ‘Bwahahahaha!’ Anna burst out laughing. ‘Isn’t this “I Will Survive”?’

  ‘Mum!’ Aggy said, stamping her foot. ‘Tell her!’

  ‘Aureliana, not everything has to be a joke, you know,’ their mum said.

  There was some shuffling, coughing and pouting, and Aggy returned to her notes.

  ‘… Of opening my heart to love again. You have taught me what it is to love. You see into special secret places inside of me …’

  ‘Ahahaha!’ Anna burst out laughing again and the table erupted; their mum chiding, Aggy squealing, Chris and their dad doing some begrudging laughter.

  ‘He sees what?!’ Anna said. ‘There are going to be children at this ceremony, remember.’

  ‘Mum, tell her!’ Aggy said, in mock-and-real indignation.

  ‘Aureliana. One more word out of you and you will be sent to the sitting room.’

  ‘Please, please send me out!’

  Aggy composed herself again.

  ‘You are my hero, my soulmate, my prince. I promise to always make your favourite calzone with sausage and to stop nagging about Sky Sports, especially as you say, it is part of the monthly TV bundle we chose together.’ Aggy looked up. ‘The Write Your Own Vows site on the internet said to make particular promises,’ she said.

  Anna held her napkin over her mouth, wheezing silently.

  ‘When you are ill, I promise to cut your toenails …’

  ‘What?’ Anna said, removing the napkin. ‘Since when do you cut the toenails of an ill person? That isn’t a thing.’

  ‘Remember when Chris broke his leg playing football and he was in the plaster cast? He was getting proper hobgoblin Catweazle feet.’

  ‘I wouldn’t invoke toenails in a wedding speech. It’s the least romantic part of the body.’

  ‘Not to foot fetishists,’ Chris said. ‘Google the name of any actress, any of them, and it auto completes with “feet”. Sicko stuff.’

  ‘Google actresses a lot, Chris?’ Anna said, and he threw a piece of breadstick at her.

  ‘Mum! Now Anna’s got us talking about celebrity sex feet!’ Aggy barked.

  ‘Aureliana, quiet!’ Judy said, her own auto complete phrase.

  Aggy went back to her paper. ‘I promise to honour you, cherish you, obey you …’

  ‘Now we’re talking turkey!’ Chris said, and drummed his palms on the table.

  ‘Obey?!’ Anna said. ‘Are we in the nineteenth century?’

  ‘What are the chances of your sister doing this?’ Oliviero said, and Anna had to concede his point there.

  ‘From this day forward, I will love you forever. My special man … my Chris bear … my best … one.’ She looked round the table, eyes shining.

  ‘Oh Agata!’ their mum said, wiping her eyes.

  Anna shared a smile with her dad.

  ’So, Chris. Your turn!’ Aggy squealed and hugged herself.

  Chris wiped his mouth with his napkin and opened the paper he’d taken from his pocket.

  ‘Agata. You look so beautiful today, like a dream—’ He broke off. ‘Not today, obviously. When I see her, then.’

  Aggy rolled her eyes. Anna clapped.

  ‘When I asked you to marry me, I wasn’t sure if you would say yes. Surely you could do better. But I’m so glad you said yes. And now here we are.’

  There was a pause. Chris r
e-folded the paper.

  ‘What?! Is that it?’ Aggy shrieked.

  Chris looked befuddled. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Thanks for turning up, OK, nice one?’

  Anna couldn’t believe she hadn’t wanted the vows to be read. This was the most fun ever.

  ‘I can add more!’ Chris said, acting stung.

  ‘You better do.’

  ‘Aggy, personal vows. Personal. Prince Chris Bear’s choice,’ Anna said.

  ‘Yes and he best choose more personal words,’ Aggy said.

  Once they’d cleared away from lunch, Chris offered Anna a lift. He and Aggy lived in Tottenham and they often dropped Anna home.

  This weekend, Anna saw an opportunity and decided to exhume the unexploded bomb of her box of school diaries from the loft. The reunion had set her thinking about a clear out. She always feared them being opened by some third party, some day. Time to dispose of them once and for all. Would Anna read through them? She wasn’t sure she could stand it. She knew the ending.

  As they were loading the box and a lumpy bag of odds and ends into the back of the van, Anna had a few seconds to speak to Chris out of Aggy’s earshot.

  ‘Don’t be steamrollered by her, you know. This wedding has to be about you, too. Your vows are fine.’

  ‘Oh, they’re not my vows. I was winding her up. Like I’m going to read them now. They can be a surprise,’ he winked and Anna laughed.

  Aggy was spending what she called ‘mad stacks’ on this wedding, Anna thought, but she already had Chris.

  She hoped her sister could sort the things worth their weight in gold from the solid silver Stilton spoons.

  24

  James found the room at UCL on the site plan easily enough, wrenching open the doors to the empty lecture theatre with a sense of foreboding he’d not felt since his own degree when finals were looming. (Psychology, Exeter – as much use as Luther in a Lambeth dog fight.)

  Anna, sitting in a seat at the front, raised her hand in greeting. She made the acknowledgement without a smile and James nodded, with a weak upward tweak of the mouth, which wasn’t much but was better than her nothing.

  He adjusted the weight of his messenger bag as he descended the stairs and felt lead in his belly at having to spend an hour with this woman. For God’s sake, why did some people have to bring such an attitude to work?

  It wasn’t his fault if she and her boyfriend were arguing or a supervisor was bullying her or her kitchen extension had gone over-budget. Just, be civil, you know?

  ‘Hi. I see all the tech’s sorted,’ he said, gesturing at the video camera tripod pointing at the lectern, and the microphone clipped to Anna’s dress. Given that she was going to be on film, she didn’t look particularly smart.

  Her mass of curly hair was again drawn off her face with an elastic band, into a bundle that looked like it was on the verge of collapsing. She was in a black cobwebby jumper with pieces of silver sparkle threaded through it, the sort of shapeless thing that probably cost loads from the Toast catalogue. Eva sometimes used to get ‘scruffy Sundays’ clothes from there.

  Why did academics always look so messy and schlumpy? Did they want to make the point that their minds were on higher things than tailoring and ironing?

  Ah well. Her funeral. Which she was dressed for.

  ‘My colleague Patrick’s on audio visual stuff,’ Anna said, gesturing up at the glass-fronted booth at the back of the auditorium, where a figure lurked.

  James’s eyes moved to the plate she was setting down next to her. It was strewn with the remnants of something egg-based and strange, with a smear of dark brown HP sauce.

  ‘What is that?’ he blurted before he could help himself.

  ‘An omelette in a bap. It’s the canteen speciality here.’

  ‘Ah,’ James said, not wanting to offend. Thank goodness he’d eaten.

  ‘Can I confirm that “doctor” is your title?’ James said. ‘Dr Anna Alessi?’

  ‘Yes that’s right,’ she said, stiffly.

  There was something familiar in her name, it had niggled him. He suddenly realised, Alessi was that make of trendy homeware. He had an Alessi bottle opener somewhere.

  Best not ask if she was part of the Alessi kitchen plastics dynasty and have her throw some equal opps racism thing at him, accusing him of trivialising her ethnic heritage.

  ‘So I’ll ask you questions as prompts, and you talk about any points of interest. We’re looking for one- or two-minute soundbites for the app.’

  Anna nodded and sipped from a cup that had been at her feet, which had a pink-ish teabag and a Twinings label hanging out of it. Of course she drank herbal tea.

  ‘Also,’ James turned from his screen again, ‘I wanted to take this chance to apologise if we got off on the wrong foot when you’d stumbled into that godawful reunion. My friend Laurence isn’t backward in coming forward with women. I did tell him not to bother you, but—’ he shrugged, ‘that’s Laurence.’

  ‘Sure, forget about it,’ Anna said, quickly.

  James had expected something more – a dressing down, perhaps, but instead there was simply an expectant silence.

  ‘Uhm. OK. The designers have a particular question they’d like me to run past you, first off,’ he called up an image on his laptop screen. ‘They’re keen to make a reconstruction of Theodora’s headdress here a major feature and wonder if they could check the detailing with you.’

  Anna put her head on one side.

  ‘The crown? I can describe fragments of the originals but we’d need to use imagination for a full-scale reconstruction and I’m reluctant to make things up. It’s a bit of a no-no in my field, you know, someone else comes along and contradicts you. I’d prefer to use artefacts where we know we’re getting it exactly right if that’s OK.’

  ‘Such as?’ James was sighing inwardly. Nothing was going to be easy.

  ‘The girdle we’re getting on loan from the Met in New York is amazing. It’s pure gold and very heavy. It would’ve been worn in state ceremonies and events and it’s just as important as any crown.’

  ‘OK. Hmmm. Anticipating what they’ll say … I think the crown has that familiarity factor? People know what they’re looking at. A girdle will be slightly more awkward as a defining single image.’

  ‘The girdle has the “being a fascinating and complete historical artefact where we’re not bodging it” factor though.’

  Oh for God’s sake. ‘The designers were very keen on the crown idea.’

  ‘The designers aren’t historical experts. I’m guessing they only want it to look pretty. You’re asking me for my opinion and I’m giving it to you.’

  Yes. Yes, you are, James thought. ‘I’ll feed that back to them and maybe they can deal with you direct.’ Lucky old them.

  ‘So if you can look at a point around about here while you’re talking,’ James said, standing up and walking to a position on the right of Anna.

  ‘Not straight into the camera?’

  ‘That could look slightly bossy. Think conversational tone. It’s not a lecture. I can stay here, if it’s useful.’

  ‘I can remember which direction to point my eyes without that, I think.’

  Good grief. James dropped into one of the seats.

  ‘Imagine we’ve seen an image of Justinian and Theodora in the mosaic. How much do we know about how and where they met? Repeat the question back at the top of the answer for context. “We know that when they met …” etc.’

  Anna was slightly creaky at first but as the questions got going, her natural enthusiasm for her subject took over and she became animated, almost infectiously so.

  It was pretty interesting, James had to admit. This was proper bloody Game of Thrones history, not broken pottery and feudal taxes. By the end of the session, James knew they had some good material. Even if they hadn’t had a good time.

  ‘I can show you some examples on our website of previous apps if you’d like? Might give you more of an idea of how we’ll use
this,’ he said, hoping to win her round.

  Anna nodded and James turned to the laptop, angling the screen on the seat so she could see the Parlez homepage. Navigating the site, he accidentally brought up the About Us section.

  ‘What are those pictures, next to your names?’ Anna squinted at the thumbnails.

  James suppressed a cringe.

  ‘Ah. Food.’

  ‘Food?’

  ‘Yeah, like. Everyone’s favourite food.’

  She looked at him as if he’d said they all talked like pirates on a Tuesday.

  ‘What’s that?’ She pointed at Harris’s photo.

  ‘Uhm. A dessert … Bananas Foster.’

  James squirmed, and thought telling Anna that the rest of the office had had a non-PC snigger about camp Harris loving Bananas Foster probably wouldn’t help matters.

  ‘What’s yours?’ she asked, scanning down.

  James clicked away, muttering: ‘A Lahmacun. It’s like a Turkish pizza.’

  ‘Yes, I know what it is,’ Anna snapped.

  ‘You can talk though, you eat omelettes in baps.’

  ‘It’s not on my profile on UCL’s site. Here’s Anna, she specialises in Byzantine history. She also likes omelettes in baps.’

  ‘Just a bit of fun,’ he snapped. Oh no. He’d used the phrase ‘just a bit of fun’. Epic fail.

  ‘Different world I guess.’

  ‘Is it?’ James said, not bothering to hide his exasperation. ‘Everything doesn’t have to be stony serious, does it?’

  ‘I know. But “favourite food”. Reminds me of old Smash Hits interviews. “What’s your favourite colour, Kylie?”’

  She smirked, and James felt a twinge of shame and dislike for having been made to look a fool.

  ‘I hope your colleague Parker, the firm’s Mac and Cheese fan, isn’t going to be doing more Googling on our behalf,’ she said.

  James knew what the company man answer was here. An acknowledgement, a self-deprecating joke, a semi-apology. But sod that. She was being so needlessly needling.

  ‘Parker was speaking off the cuff. We’re here to present the content, not create it,’ James said, voice tight.