The Break-Up Clause by Niamh Hargan
Chapter Fourteen
At noon on Monday, Benjamin and Fia meet at the lifts on the fifty-eighth floor, just as planned. Having spent all morning in a client consultation, it is the first time Fia has had to lay eyes on her summer associate today.
‘Hello, Benjamin,’ she says, all pleasantness, conscious – as ever – of peaking eyes, listening ears. She’s going to be better this week, she’s decided – a whole new woman. She’s going to rise above it when he goads her; she’s going to remember what’s really at stake here: nothing less than her entire career.
‘Fia,’ he replies, giving her a cordial little nod in response.
And thus ends their display of collegiality, until the lift opens, and Celia Hannity steps out of it. She’s in her trademark flats and a simple linen dress, probably the least adorned and most successful woman in this entire office. Fia cannot wait to reach that stage of her professional life, where no effort – no particular outward projection on her part – is required in order for other people to take her seriously. For the moment, though, she is still in the high heels and business suit every day, dressing up like a TV lawyer, just like everyone else.
‘Good morning,’ Celia says, and she checks her watch, as though to make sure that’s still accurate. ‘Or just about. Where are you two off to?’
‘Oh!’ Her boss’s question is casual, not interrogatory at all, but still, Fia feels suddenly as though she’s been caught with her hand in the till. ‘We’re just, uh …’ Her mind races. ‘We’re going down to Bluestone Lane for one of our mentor-mentee catch-ups.’
These (Fia has ascertained via an email attachment hunted out over the weekend) are supposed to happen on a weekly basis. She is supposed to be offering Benjamin a safe space – ideally outside the office – in which to periodically confide in her. He was correct last week; emotional support does seem to be a big part of the mentorship gig. It’s her job to instruct him, to teach him, to involve him in her legal practice where appropriate within a supportive and empowering supervisory framework.In that regard, having him on the Alyvia Chestnut case is actually ideal – it will at least give her an example to call upon when her application for promotion comes around.
‘Wonderful! Glad to see Fia’s not working you too hard, then, huh, Benjamin?’ Celia says now.
Benjamin pauses for a moment – and just like with Mr Zelnick last week, Fia knows in her bones that he’s doing this deliberately, dragging it out to unnerve her. At last, thankfully, a grin rises to his lips.
‘Oh, I don’t know about that. She does seem like kind of a tyrant.’ he replies, as though entirely in fun. As his glance shifts over to Fia, though, she can see he absolutely means it. He’s always been a pro at that, hasn’t he? The joke with a jag.
Fia manages a smile in response. As part of the new her, she’s undoubtedly going to have to dial down the general skivvying, find someone else to do her photocopying. She knows that. The fun of it had somewhat faded, anyway.
‘I’ve been hearing good things about your work so far on the Goldsberry merger,’ Celia continues, none the wiser.
‘Oh,’ Benjamin says, his expression shifting into what Fia – if she didn’t know better – could easily mistake for sincerity. ‘Thanks. That’s really great to know.’
Beside them, the lift begins to close.
‘Catch it before it goes!’ Celia says, and Benjamin duly reaches out to stop it with his foot.
‘You know, I’m actually meeting an old friend at Bluestone Lane in about an hour myself,’ Celia adds then, in parting. ‘So, I’ll probably see you guys down there.’
Inside the lift now, Fia scrambles, both to locate the hold button on the console and to figure out some means of batting away this suggestion.
‘Oh, uh, we’ll probably be gone by then,’ she manages. ‘We’re just grabbing a quick coffee. Lots to be getting back to and all.’
‘Nonsense! You guys take your time! In fact’ – Celia smiles indulgently – ‘if you’re not still having a nice, long lunch by the time I get down there, I’m going to take that as a direct breach of my instructions, ya hear?’
Fia murmurs some sound of assent, and as she releases the button on the lift, she can sense the same nervous smile on Benjamin’s face as is plastered on her own. The two of them stand there, like gormless idiots, until at last the doors close fully.
‘How far away’s this lawyer’s office?’ Benjamin asks, the second they’re alone.
‘54th and 2nd,’ she replies, and the rest – that they will now need to make sure they get over there and back within fifty minutes, for safety – goes unsaid.
He cocks his head to the side, considering it for a moment. ‘We can make that work,’ he says then.
Fia wants to believe him. She’s dubious, though. ‘D’you think?’
He looks down at her shoes pointedly, before coming back up to face her. ‘Well. I can.’
It sounds like a challenge if ever Fia heard one. And she should have well and truly learned her lesson about those, especially when issued by the man before her. The new her should be immune to this sort of thing.
It turns out, though, that the new her is not. She really isn’t at all.
By the time they arrive at Followill and Associates, they are both practically breathless. There was a time in her life when Fia might have imagined that dashing around Manhattan in a business suit would surely make her feel extremely glamorous and successful. As it is, her collar is sticking uncomfortably to the back of her neck, and she has a definite blister forming on one of her toes. But they’re here.
It’s a small little place, situated at street level; it has much more in common with some of the family-run outfits Fia remembers from back in Ireland than with ZOLA or its ilk in the US. But beggars, notoriously, cannot be choosers. Susan Followill, Fia reminds herself, has a lot of positive reviews on Yelp. And she is reasonably priced, and she was available at short notice. Tick, tick, tick.
When the woman herself emerges into the little reception area to greet them, both Fia and Benjamin leap to their feet immediately.
‘Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever seen two people in more of a hurry to get divorced,’ Susan says with a chuckle, extending her hand to each of them in turn. ‘And that’s saying something! Why don’t you guys come on in, have a seat?’
She is maybe fifty-ish, short and stocky, all of which combines to make Fia sure that she’s bound to be a very capable and pragmatic sort of person. Ideal.
As Susan leads them into her personal office, though – there are no conference rooms here – Fia takes in the cascading piles of files, the photo of a black Lab on the desk, the mug declaring Trust me, I’m a lawyer. The vibe is, overall, a lot more folksy and chaotic than she might have expected. Susan picks up a sheet of paper to scan it, and in the hush that follows, Fia is struck – more than anything – by the strangeness of being on this side of the table. The image that floats into her head is of a child at the principal’s office. Is this how her clients feel when they come in to see her? She’s never much thought about it before.
It seems – in the way it always does when time is short – like an age before the other woman looks up.
‘All right! So, like I said in my email, I think it’s wonderful that the two of you have decided to approach this process in the spirit of collaboration, and non-adversarial resolution. As your attorney mediator, it’s important you understand that I’m a neutral party in this process. I’m not your lawyer, Benjamin, nor your lawyer, Fia. I’m here to work with you both, holistically, to ensure that this process is as swift, as cost-effective, as fruitful, and – ultimately – as peaceful as it possibly can be.’
‘That sounds great – the “swift” part especially. Unfortunately, we’re, uh, we’re actually on a bit of a time crunch right now as a matter of fact,’ Benjamin says, with a sheepish smile.
Fia would have to acknowledge that it is probably the most charming possible way he could have encouraged Susan Followill to hurry the fuck up. Alas, the hint falls on deaf ears. Susan apparently has a speech, and she apparently is going to deliver it, by hook or by crook.
‘Now, of course, nobody goes into a marriage hoping it will end in divorce,’ she continues. ‘That’s why, here at Followill and Associates, we undertake a series of Exploratory Reconciliation and Reflection Discussions with our clients to really delve into all the possible options for your future. And that includes being absolutely sure that there is no path forward for you as a couple.’
Even the notion of enduring such an ordeal cements in Fia the sense that she may have picked badly here, may have unwittingly landed herself in some sort of wholly unsuitable law-firm-cum-Montessori-centre.
‘Mmm, I don’t think that’ll be necessary,’ she says.
Susan just smiles beatifically. ‘You are not the first person to tell me that, Fia. But you’d be surprised how effective our Exploratory Reconciliation and Reflection Discussions can be. In any case, at least one session is mandatory, if you want to proceed with us. We just like to make sure that when couples are on a path to permanent separation, they really have thought through all the ramifications of that and considered any other options that might be on the table.’
‘Look, Susan, this was a Vegas thing,’ Benjamin says then, all bluntness. It is as though he thinks that nothing more need really be said on the matter. Fia, as it happens, would be inclined to agree with him.
‘Oh!’ Susan looks a little surprised by this turn of events. ‘Okay. Not recently, though, right?’ Again, she scans the page in front of her. ‘You guys were married in … 2015?’
‘That’s right,’ Fia says.
‘And you’re telling me this was an impulsive, maybe not-totally-sober situation, right?’
This time, Fia just nods, as Susan’s face contorts in confusion.
‘But then you guys stayed married for … eight more years?’
‘Yep. Somebody was supposed to get in touch at a certain point, and then they just’ – Fia shrugs exaggeratedly, not caring if her smile is the tiniest bit maniacal – ‘didn’t bother! Not only that, but they totally failed to respond to any communication! Isn’t that the most hilarious thing you’ve ever heard?’
Beside her, Benjamin says nothing. But, for a guy so patently on the wrong side of this situation, he looks a lot less like it than she’d prefer. There’s a tight, fixed sort of expression on his face. As though he is tolerating her.
And, now that she thinks about it, isn’t it a little strange that he’d do that? Isn’t a little strange that, back on that very first day he arrived at ZOLA, he would have even gone so far as to apologize to her? How was she not more suspicious of that from the get-go? Concocting some bullshit way in which the whole thing was actually her fault … surely that would have been much more on brand.
Even right now, in this moment, part of her seems to have been expecting the clap back from him. The well, somebody …! to follow her own outburst. That he seems, instead, to have just … opted out, backed down, ceded the moral high ground – that’s weird. His silence strikes her as its own sort of oppressive.
She thinks, suddenly, of that box underneath her bed, the leaflet she can’t look at and can’t destroy.
‘You know, Benjamin here even went to the bother of presenting me with a contract,’ she continues breezily, ‘within which he literally promised to divorce me on a certain date. But still – that date came and went. Not a word from him.’
‘A contract?’ Susan asks, ears seeming to prick up a bit.
‘Yep,’ Fia replies staunchly, much less concerned with accuracy now than with the attempt to stick the boot in, to flush out whatever it is that Benjamin’s not saying. And it just might be working, because he jumps right in to correct her.
‘Not a real contract.’
Fia scoffs. ‘You’ve changed your tune.’
He hears her, ignores her. ‘Would you call one sentence a contract, Susan?’
Susan hesitates for a second, as though this might be a trick question. ‘… A clause of a contract, maybe?’
‘Ha!’ Benjamin declares, deadpan. ‘You’ve heard of a break clause. I guess Fia and I had the lesser-known break-up clause. Could really catch on, couldn’t it?’
‘Oh, excellent, Ben, let’s have some comedy,’ Fia snaps irritably, the conversation having careened wildly from where she wanted it, from the substance of things. ‘That’s great. Everybody loves a joker, don’t they?’
‘As opposed to a controlling, manipulative—’
‘Manipulative?!’
‘Yes! I don’t know what else we would call it, using someone for a gr—’
‘All righty!’ Susan says brightly, like a practised parent of fractious children. ‘Let’s just … put a pin in all that, shall we? I guess it’s not really relevant, anyhow. We are where we are.’
Fia nods. She’s said that one before herself. It is what it is, and we are where we are. This is what lawyers say all the time when a situation is obviously terrible but they really don’t want to get bogged down in the associated whys and wherefores. In any event, Fia is more than happy to proceed straight to the point here.
‘I was actually sort of thinking maybe an annulment might work?’ she suggests. ‘I mean, like Benjamin said, this wasn’t even a real marriage to begin with, so …’
Susan looks confused. ‘In what sense?’ she asks. ‘Was anybody underage or coerced?’
‘Well … no,’ Fia admits.
‘Bigamy? Incest?’
‘Christ, no!’ she replies, and she barely gets her own words out before Benjamin’s land on top of them.
‘This whole thing is a clusterfuck, but it’s not a crime,’ he says.
‘Okay.’ Susan nods, and for a second, there’s silence. ‘So, then, I mean’ – again, she pauses, waggling her index finger between the two of them – ‘are you telling me that you guys have never had sex?’
For reasons that Fia truly cannot begin to fathom, everything about the other woman, from her tone of voice to the expression on her face, makes it clear that she finds this notion entirely ludicrous.
‘Exactly,’ Fia replies – and at the very same moment, Benjamin says, ‘Well.’
They each halt then, their heads swivelling around to look at one another.
Benjamin quirks one eyebrow, just a little, and when he opens his mouth to speak again, the words come out quietly, maddeningly. ‘… I mean, it’s probably not accurate to say never.’