Chapter Thirty-Two
‘How confused are we talking?’ Liv questions me when I call her from Scotland the following day.
I’ve arrived to plummeting temperatures as it’s mid-December and a car has transferred me to a hunting lodge in the Highlands that’s been hired for the occasion.
The team is setting up and getting ready to shoot, but I’ve got a few spare minutes before I’m needed.
Hair and Make-Up have already got to work on me, and I’m on speakerphone so that I can’t mash the phone into my artfully applied make-up.
‘Very confused,’ I reply. ‘Ben was … so different. I can’t explain it. He was just—’
‘Don’t say he wowed you. I can’t hear you say that again,’ Liv answers with zero sugar-coating.
‘You’ve changed,’ I say. ‘Since you started training to become a barrister you’ve become hard.’
‘It’s my finest quality,’ she tells me. She’s stronger, more confident, more outspoken. ‘He’s still Ben,’ she goes on.
‘Yeah, maybe …’ I say. ‘I’m not sure. It’s been so long since I last saw him. Maybe he’s changing. He says he wants to.’
‘He’ll never change. He’s a good-time guy. Ollie said I should simply get over things and see Ben, but I’m not sure. Will Ben be at this house-warming party?’
‘Yes. The four of us together again. It’s perfect.’
‘Is it?’ she asks doubtfully.
‘It might be. We won’t know until we try.’
‘Hmm,’ she replies doubtfully.
Someone shouts for me in the distance and I say into the phone, ‘I have to go and get on a horse.’
Liv laughs. ‘Unexpected. I didn’t know you can ride.’
‘I can’t. I think I’m just supposed to sit on it. I hope I’m only supposed to sit on it or stand next to it, or something like that.’
‘Where are you?’
‘Scotland.’
‘Also unexpected. If you’d said you were getting into a submarine for work in Iceland or somewhere, I’d have gone with it, though.’
‘No submarines yet. And no Iceland stamp in my passport, either. Maybe one day soon, though.’
In the background I hear a message land on my phone. I wonder if it’s Ben.
‘OK, I have to go,’ I say hurriedly. ‘If I don’t see you before, Happy Christmas.’
‘You too!’
When we hang up, I look at my phone quickly before going towards the crew.
The message isn’t from Ben. It’s from Ollie.
I smile. I know exactly what this is going to be.
An apology for Ben taking his uni planner, finding my address, coming to my flat.
I’ll look at that later, I think, as the ridiculously hot photographer says to me, ‘Aurora, let’s get you up on the horse. You can ride, right?’