Chapter Six #2
But then Art stands up and says, ‘Right, McDermott, let’s get you some lunch that doesn’t rob us both of the will to live,’ and I find myself putting on my coat and following him out of our office.
‘How’s your script coming along?’ I ask, as we make our way down the stairs.
‘Fine, of course,’ says Art.
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. ‘Of course.’
‘You really take everything too seriously, McDermott,’ says Art.
‘One of us has to,’ I say, ‘given that we’re actually at, you know, work.’
We’ve reached the small lobby at the back of the TV building and Art glances at me as we approach the doors. ‘Where’s your pass?’
‘In here somewhere,’ I say and start rummaging around in my bag. ‘I think.’
Art rolls his eyes and holds his own security pass up to the door-release panel. He waves it in my face. ‘Just wear it around your neck!’
His pass photo, I notice, is a lot more flattering than mine. It doesn’t look like a mugshot, at least. As I glance at his name, a thought strikes me.
‘Why are you called Art, by the way?’ I say, as we walk towards the canteen. ‘Did your parents think it would push you towards a creative career?’
‘No,’ says Art. ‘They named me after my grandad. Art’s short for Arthur.’ He looks at me as if this fact should have been blindingly obvious, and in fairness, he’s not entirely wrong.
‘Oh right,’ I say. ‘It’s just that I thought all Arthurs were either, like, a hundred years old or twelve. I mean, I can’t imagine a baby in the late eighties being named Arthur.’
‘Well I was, obviously,’ says Art.
And then, because I’m flustered by my ridiculous assumption about his name, I blurt out the first thing that comes into my head. ‘I can’t picture you as a baby.’
Art looks surprised to hear this, not unreasonably. ‘I’ll have you know I was a lovely baby. Enormous cheeks. Anyway, what about you, little orphan Annie? I bet Annie’s not the name on your birth cert. What’s it short for? Or long for?’
‘Anne,’ I say. ‘Nothing exciting.’
‘Did you ever think of calling yourself Anastasia or Annabel or something instead?’ says Art. ‘Annie isn’t a very goth name.’
‘I wasn’t a—’ I stop myself getting dragged into that one again. ‘I’ve always just been Annie.’
‘Hmmm,’ he says. ‘It suits you, I suppose.’
I’m weirdly taken aback by this, but luckily I don’t have to answer him because we’ve reached the canteen and, to my relief, Simon gives us a friendly wave from the table where he’s sitting with Nora. Once we get our food, Art and I join them.
‘By the way, Art,’ says Simon, after we’ve sat down, ‘I watched your film last night! It was deadly. I actually cried at the end.’
Nora grins at him. ‘Of course you did, you big softie.’
‘Oh, cheers,’ says Art. ‘Which one did you watch?’
‘Um, Grand Music?’ says Simon, naming Art’s award-winning feature. ‘Is there another one?’
If Art’s disappointed to hear this, he hides it.
‘Yeah, I wrote another movie after I worked on Slow News Day,’ says Art. ‘It didn’t exactly set the world on fire. But I’m proud of it.’
‘I loved Slow News Day!’ says Nora. ‘Didn’t you win, like, a bunch of Emmys?’
‘We did,’ says Art, though as I recall from my googling the other night, he didn’t win the Emmys himself.
And next thing I know, he’s holding forth about award shows and after-parties, and Nora and Simon are hanging on his every word, plying him with questions.
It’s like the film studies class all over again.
Yes, I will admit he can be quite funny, and yes, he might tell an amusing story about being mistaken for someone’s driver at a fancy Beverly Hills hotel, but the ease with which he sits back and tells these glamorous tales, the confidence, the fact that even his self-deprecating stories end up making him look good – it rubs me up the wrong way, just as it did back then.
He seems to find it all so easy. I do not find any of this easy.
I’ve literally never felt as comfortable in a new group as he clearly feels right now.
Unlike me, I bet he’s not going to go home this evening and analyse every word he said over lunch and convince himself that he was offensive or rude or irritating.
But Nora and Simon seem delighted by him. I still seem to be the only person in Ireland who’s immune to Art Sullivan’s charms. It’s infuriating.
‘Are you all right?’ he says, when we’re back in our office. ‘You were surprisingly quiet over there.’
‘I’m grand!’ I say airily.
We work all afternoon in silence (thank God for noise-cancelling headphones). I’m in the middle of a tricky scene when Art says, ‘Right, I’m off’, so I barely look up as I say, ‘Oh right, see you tomorrow.’
Roo’s out working at an event when I get home, but after spending a day with Art Sullivan I’m quite happy decompressing by myself. I’ve settled down on the couch to watch a Spanish period drama when the doorbell rings.
It’s probably someone selling something, I think as I drag myself off the couch and out to the hall. As I open the door I’m about to say that I’m sorry, I don’t need to change my broadband provider, but then I see who it is and for a moment I can’t say anything.
‘Annie! Um, sorry, I wasn’t expecting to see you.’
The man standing on the doorstep has expensive fashionable glasses, a painfully Gen Z mullet and a terrible moustache. He wasn’t sporting any of these things the last time I saw him. When he was still Roo’s boyfriend.
I give him my most ferocious glower.
‘What do you want, Justin?’
‘I tried to ring Roo to say I was coming to Dublin but I couldn’t get through.’
‘She blocked your number,’ I say.
Justin shifts from one foot to another. ‘Is she there?’
‘No.’ I almost add, ‘She’s working,’ but I stop myself in time and say, ‘She’s in town.’ Let him think that Roo’s off on a hot date with some tall, handsome man with great hair.
‘Oh right,’ says Justin. ‘Can I come in?’
Can he come in? To my house? After the way he treated Roo?
‘Justin, you are never setting foot in this house again.’ I start to close the door but Justin grabs it and says, ‘Wait!’
‘Let go of the door,’ I say.
‘I will!’ says Justin. ‘I just …’
He looks awkward all of a sudden and it hits me that maybe he’s seen the error of his ways.
Maybe he’s come back to apologise. Maybe he wants Roo to take him back.
And even though I think she should stay well away from him, I know that if a reconciliation with Justin were genuinely what she wanted, if it would really make her happy, I couldn’t and wouldn’t stand in her way.
Even though it would mean leaving this house that I’ve already started to think of as home.
What I want doesn’t matter. I have to hear him out.
I fold my arms. ‘Go on.’
‘I left some of my games under the stairs,’ says Justin. ‘I want them back.’
I stare at him, speechless.
‘Oh God,’ says Justin. ‘Roo didn’t throw them out, did she? I didn’t think she’d be so petty …’
‘No, Justin,’ I say. ‘She didn’t throw them out. Though she should have. She should have set them on fire and sent you the ashes! But she doesn’t give enough of a shit about you to do that.’
Justin’s expression is peevish. ‘Can I get my games, please?’
‘If it’s the only way to get rid of you,’ I say. ‘Stay there.’
I march down the hall, open the cupboard under the stairs and peer around. There, behind the hoover, are four board-game boxes. I start dumping them out in the hall.
‘Careful!’ cries Justin from the doorway.
‘Shut up,’ I say, emerging from the cupboard. I pick up the boxes and stack them awkwardly in my arms.
‘You’re going to drop them,’ says Justin, reaching out as I approach him.
‘No,’ I say. ‘I’m going to do this.’ And mustering all my upper body strength (which admittedly isn’t much), I fling the entire pile out the front door.
‘My games!’ wails Justin as the boxes burst open on the pavement. He rushes over and starts gathering up the scattered contents.
‘You’re too old for that haircut!’ I say, and slam the door.
I feel strangely exhilarated after the encounter with Justin.
I’m so glad Roo didn’t have to face him herself.
Also, I was hundreds of miles away when he left her, so I couldn’t show him what I thought of him and his horrible cheating ways.
I can’t wait to tell her all about it. I’m still feeling quite cheerful later that evening when my phone pings and I see that Art has sent me a message.
He must have got my number from the group Susan created.
It’s a faded photo of a ridiculously cute, chubby baby in red dungarees with a shock of dark hair, big aqua-blue eyes and, yes, enormous cheeks.
The caption is simply ‘PROOF’.
I laugh out loud.
Then I glance over at the small desk on which I’ve displayed a few framed photos, including one of me and Laura when I was eleven and she was nearly sixteen.
My pre-teen self is wearing a rainbow-striped jumper and a bright-red skirt and is beaming at the camera in a way I wouldn’t dream of doing a year later.
I snap a photo of it and send it to Art with the caption ‘Proof I was never a goth’.
His reply arrives a few minutes later:
That’s not proof of anything, McDermott. You had plenty of time to go goth by the time I met you.
He’s right there. I decide not to reply.
But when I’m lying in bed a few hours later, I picture him sending me that baby photo. I start to think that despite his snobbery and his showing off and his general annoyingness, Art Sullivan might not be so bad after all.
And I can’t help smiling as I drift off to sleep.