The Break-Up Clause by Niamh Hargan
Chapter Sixteen
Inside the café, Benjamin and Fia each look around frantically: exposed brick, industrial lighting, a large poster reading GOOD VIBES ONLY – and no Celia Hannity. Their sighs of relief seem almost to be in unison.
‘You grab a table, and I’ll get some menus,’ he says.
‘Just get whatever they have pre-made,’ she replies, peering at the counter. There’s a glass case there that looks like it contains sandwiches and sweet treats. ‘We need to be already eating when she gets here.’
Fia takes a seat by the window, sliding off her jacket and feeling her jitters start to subside. This is all, most likely, going to be fine now. Outside, the sun is shining – ‘nature’s filter’, George used to call it – and just the sight seems to have its usual chemical effect on her mood.
Not everyone, she knows, is a fan of Manhattan at this time of year. It gets hot, and tourism kicks up a notch, and both of those things can make the subway incredibly unpleasant. On the pavements, groups of summer-school students trail around the city like long, infuriatingly slow snakes.
In short, there are valid reasons why many people, if they can, flee to the Hamptons or the Poconos or wherever. Fia gets it – but, still, much like the late Aaron Burr (sir), she personally thinks there is nothing like summer in the city. She loves the sense of energy as life moves outdoors, every green space and front stoop becoming akin to a communal backyard. She loves eating at rickety little tables on the kerb and going to Shakespeare in the Park and even having to put on a dab of sun cream before work.
What it all comes down to, she thinks, is that she grew up in a country where June, July and August were as much of a mixed bag, weather-wise, as the entire rest of the year. No matter the associated downsides, she simply cannot now bring herself to see several months of reliable sunshine – the ability to plan a picnic – as anything but glorious.
Benjamin arrives with two coffees and two baguettes, and they each wolf down about seven bites at speed without speaking a word. Fia is mid-mouthful when Celia walks in, and in her effort to swallow quickly, she almost chokes on a piece of chicken. She has just about finished coughing up a lung as the other woman glances around for them. She tosses a wave in their direction when she sees them, her meaningful little smile acting as a silent callback to their earlier conversation. Valiantly, Fia and Benjamin smile in return as Celia heads over to join her friend at a table in the corner – thankfully out of earshot, though still well within eyesight.
Smooth the whole thing is not. Fia’s eyes are watery, and she can feel the burn lingering in her oesophagus.
Benjamin squints over at her. ‘Are you alive?’
‘Just about,’ she replies, blinking furiously.
‘Well. Mission accomplished, huh?’ he says quietly.
And it seems to take each of them roughly the same amount of time to realize that, actually, the mission isn’t quite accomplished. Not really. Because they can hardly pick up and leave right away, can they?
‘I guess we should stay for a minute, look like we’re enjoying each other’s company,’ he says, practically taking the words out of her mouth.
‘I guess so,’ she agrees, gulping down a large sip of her coffee.
Seconds later, she realizes that Benjamin is doing the exact same thing, both of their cups landing back on the table with a perfectly synchronized clink. It’s … odd.
She clears her throat, tries to come up with something to say to him. Very obviously, it is not the time to recap any aspect of their meeting with Susan Followill. And one aspect of it in particular, Fia never ever wants to recap with Benjamin.
‘So, um … week three, now. How’ve you been finding ZOLA so far?’
It does feel more than a little ridiculous to be talking to him this way, as though he’s any other summer associate – the kind of summer associate she’d expected, a person with whom she might have actually enjoyed little jaunts out of the office under the guise of professional development. Something about Benjamin’s expression tells her that he, too, recognizes the absurdity of the situation, and yet he, too, is willing to go with it right now.
‘It’s been good,’ comes his response. ‘Kind of a baptism of fire.’
‘I bet,’ Fia says, and what’s strange is the way she can’t sense any snideness or sarcasm in him. She thinks back to this morning by the lifts, to the way he seemed genuinely pleased by Celia’s praise. For the very first time, it occurs to her that, this summer, Benjamin might end up having exactly what ZOLA is doing its level best to provide him: namely, a net positive experience. Ruling out a big corporate law firm might just as easily turn to ruling it in. Of course, his initial detachment rubbed her up the wrong way, but it’s suddenly clear to her that a late-blooming passion would be even more hideous. The only thing worse than Benjamin Lowry working at her law firm for the summer would be Benjamin Lowry working at her law firm for the foreseeable.
‘Can I ask you something?’ she says then. ‘Why are you doing all this? Not just the summer. I mean, like, generally. What’s the plan after law school? Back at Camp Birchwood’ – she lowers her voice instinctively, as though she’s referring to a former life of crime – ‘I can’t say I ever really saw you, um, heading down this path.’
She can think of no more polite way to put the fact that he always seemed, to her, so fundamentally … unserious.
‘That’s funny,’ he murmurs, a smile playing on his lips.
‘What is?’
‘Just that you’d say that. Pretty much everybody else I knew, up until that point in my life, thought I’d eventually be a lawyer. I guess on account of my mom,’ he continues, seeing Fia’s look of astonishment. ‘You remember she was—’
‘Running for Attorney General, yeah,’ Fia jumps in dryly. How could she forget that little detail? She googled the whole thing years ago, ascertained that Lisa Lowry had lost the race, would be continuing on as the District Attorney for Wake County. It was still, by any standards, a pretty big job.
‘Right. And my dad, he was a lawyer, too. I used to hate it when people would say I’d for sure be following in their footsteps or I was bred for it or whatever. I hated the idea of just, like, drifting into it.’ He pauses, takes a sip of his coffee, seeming to warm up to this subject now. ‘Most of the time, that’s what happens, right? It’s, like, “Why are you in the seventh grade?” – “Because I was done with sixth grade.” I don’t know how much of our lives we ever actually choose. Anyhow, maybe that’s why I tried something totally different with the software development and all. I guess I’ve ended up coming around to the same place now – I’m going to be an attorney, just like everyone always said I would be. But I feel a little differently about it than if I’d just come straight through after undergrad, y’know? More like it was my decision.’
It’s a more thoughtful response than Fia would have predicted, a much harder one to mock or dismiss.
‘So, what was it that made you decide?’ she asks. ‘The’ – she resists, very admirably, in her own opinion, the urge to say ‘video gaming’ – ‘the software development just wasn’t doing it for you anymore?’
He shrugs a little, reaching for his sandwich. ‘I guess you could say that.’
This doesn’t exactly feel like an answer to Fia. Nonetheless, she’s willing to move along. ‘So, one more year of law school, and then you’re done, right?’
‘Assuming I pass the Bar exam next summer, yeah. I should be a real live lawyer by next September.’
‘Well, I read Michelle Obama failed the Bar exam the first time. And Hillary Clinton did. So, y’know …’
He raises an eyebrow slyly. ‘What? You think I’ll fail it?’
She thinks back, suddenly, to what she heard about his class ranking. Evidently, Benjamin Lowry has a surprising capacity to pull it out of the bag when it comes to a standardized test. And/or, he is simply – could this really be it? – a very academically gifted person.
‘No, no,’ she replies loftily. ‘I’m just saying, if you don’t get it the first time … y’know, all isn’t lost. You could still end up marrying a very successful man.’
He laughs at that, loud and hearty. And there’s something so satisfying about the sound. It’s totally unexpected, the way his laughter – his genuine laughter – seems to feel like a triumph, seems to fill her all the way up until she’s laughing right along with him.
‘I actually did the New York bar exam myself, about a year after I came over,’ she finds herself telling him.
‘Passed first time, I figure?’
‘Passed first time,’ she confirms, a smirk pulling at her lips to match his.
It’s almost startling to Fia, this moment of … well, maybe not connection, exactly – connection would probably be too strong a word – but something other than outright hostility between them.
He coughs then, shifting in his seat a bit. It’s awkward, somehow, and it forces Fia back to an awareness of the thing he seems to have just remembered: they are not friends. They never have been.
In a flash, the moment’s gone.