The Break-Up Clause by Niamh Hargan

Chapter Three

‘As ever,’ Benjamin continues drolly, looking right at her as he speaks. It doesn’t feel like a compliment, though – not really.

Fia just scowls in response, every bit of the loathing she feels for this man reflected right back at her in his expression.

She snaps her little mirror closed decisively, pushing it into a desk drawer. How maddening to have been caught looking at herself, by him. How – she hates this word but there is no other – how disempowering, somehow.

Stepping into the office now, the door swinging closed behind him, Benjamin stares over at the desk intended to be his. He makes no move to sit down at it, though. Instead, he stays at the perimeter, leaning his weight against the glass wall. There’s a ZOLA-branded ring binder in his hand, together with a ZOLA-branded pen, and he brandishes them.

‘So, I have to go around and fill in some information about a bunch of people in different practice areas within the firm. Starting with you, as my … mentor,’ he says, as though the term tastes like bile on his tongue. ‘It’s like a get-to-know-you thing.’

‘What?’ Fia asks.

Benjamin huffs impatiently. ‘It’s an exercise to help the summer associates get to know—’

‘No, I understood you,’ she interrupts. ‘I just …’

Fia finds herself trailing off with a mirthless, disbelieving little laugh. Then, she begins again, more purpose in her voice this time. ‘First of all, we already know each other, Ben – more’s the pity. And, second of all, do you really think that should be our priority here? Your fucking worksheet?’

He shrugs, the gesture somehow detached and defiant at once. ‘What would you rather talk about?’

‘Hmm,’ she replies, affecting rumination. ‘Well, let’s review. You might remember I agreed – out of the sheer goodness of my heart, I might add – to do you a favour, and—’

‘Oh yeah, sure looks like that’s what’s happened here,’ he interjects, glancing pointedly around the office. ‘Somebody’s done somebody a favour all right, Fia. Jesus Christ.’

Fia cannot remotely fathom what he’s trying to get at with that one. It’s the least of her concerns, though. By now, there have been several hours of build-up towards saying her piece on this subject, and she’s keen to get back to saying it.

‘—and I put off dealing with the divorce,’ she continues heatedly, ‘like you asked. And where did it get me? Oh, that’s right. Emailing your Hotmail account over and over again, like some kind of teenage headcase. Having five hundred conversations with your voicemail service. Tell me you aren’t going to pretend all that somehow failed to reach you.’

‘It reached me all right,’ he replies gruffly.

Fia barely hears him, barely pauses for breath. ‘Meanwhile, from you … tumbleweed! Crickets!’

‘Oh, say more metaphors, please,’ is his only reply, and this time, Fia makes herself stop to take it in. When she does, she’s unable even to summon a response. She exhales a slow, shaky breath of some emotion she cannot exactly name.

Whatever it is, though, the strangest thing is that she’s fairly sure it’s not actually about him. Or at least, it is not only about him. It’s about the reflection of him on her. The physical manifestation of Benjamin Lowry – the biggest mistake she’s ever made in her life – turns out to be so much worse than the mere thought of him, not least in terms of the impact on her own self-esteem. How had she ever got herself into this situation? How has she failed, even after all this time, to get herself back out of it? She thinks of all her little lists, all the emails she sends on a daily basis: just following up on the below; I note it has been twenty-one days since our last correspondence; regrettably my client has been left with no option but to escalate this matter. Somehow, the efforts she makes as other people’s lawyer, all the ways she tries so hard to stay efficient, stay on-track, don’t seem to have extended into her own life – or, into this part of it, at least.

When she speaks again, her voice is quieter. ‘Look, we had our … ups and downs,’ she says, and she decides to ignore the I’ll say expression that leaps to his face. ‘But, believe it or not, I really never thought you were a fundamentally terrible person, Benjamin. And maybe more fool me. ’Cause the fact of the matter is, I haven’t heard one single word from you in …’ She counts backwards in her head, hardly able to believe the number when she reaches it. ‘Nearly eight years. Not one single word,’ she repeats slowly. ‘And now here you are, invading my life. I think you could at least have the decency to apologize.’

It’s the most sincere thing she’s said to him – certainly so far today, and perhaps ever. With it, she seems to take a bit of the wind out of his sails. He stands a little straighter, as if, at last, some part of what she’s said is beginning to register.

For what feels like a very long moment, he just stares at her, the muscles in his jaw tensing visibly. His dark eyes are as intense as they have ever been. Fia looks right back at him, her gaze unwavering. If this is a competition, it is – as ever – one she’s determined to win.

‘… You’re right,’ he replies eventually, and there’s a satisfying sort of simplicity to the admission. ‘I’m sorry.’

Fia’s mouth falls open slightly. She has never once heard those two words from Benjamin Lowry’s lips, and she’d have bet her bottom dollar that she never would. They’re so wholly unprecedented that she doesn’t quite know how to process them.

‘I … should have reached out to you,’ he continues uneasily. ‘I guess I just … got busy.’

And, with those two words, any hope of detente vanishes as quickly as it began to flicker. Just like that, Fia finds herself incensed once more.

‘You got busy?’ she repeats.

That she is still managing to keep any sort of a lid on her emotions – to restrict herself to a hissed, sitcom-esque shriek – is evidence only of her practice in this regard. There is, after all, a very particular ecosystem to a big international law firm, with all its gloss and glass. Fia has had to train herself into – and out of – a lot in order to succeed here.

‘Busy doing what?’ she barks out, when no further reply from Benjamin seems forthcoming.

Still, he says nothing – or, at least, he says nothing within the three seconds she allocates for his response.

‘Seriously,’ she continues, her voice rising a little in sarcasm. ‘If you’re going to be here, we should probably at least get caught up, don’t you think? What have you been spending your precious time on, Benjamin? When you haven’t been stonewalling me, obviously.’

She leans back slightly in her chair, crossing one leg over the other deliberately, as though she’s settling in for a saga. Unabashed now in her inspection of him, she keeps her eyes fixed on his.

For a moment, he just stares back at her. It’s not a matter of whether he’ll engage with this line of questioning – Fia knows that instinctively. It’s a matter of how. He’s weighing her, somehow, weighing his options. And then his response, when it finally comes, is as mild as if they were two strangers discussing the weather.

‘Video games, mainly,’ he says.

She blinks. ‘What?’

‘I was working as a developer and tester for a video games company.’

From this, the absolute bare minimum of information, Fia conjures the impression of a very insubstantial endeavour, but one that might be associated with a lot of perks and personal autonomy. It seems, in short, like the perfect job for him.

‘Okay. And so, what? One day – poof – you decided you wanted to be a lawyer?’

Although she would deny it convincingly, she can’t help but find herself a smidge intrigued by this career change – surely a fairly unusual one for anyone and all the more so for a guy like him.

Once again, Benjamin lets his gaze drift around the space. ‘I mean, not really this kind of lawyer …’

He trails off, and Fia pounces. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Well – how can I put it?’ he says, and the vaguely superior expression on his face drives her crazy. ‘That – uh, I don’t even know what we’d call it – cornucopia of mini muffins in the break room looked nice and all, but it’s not exactly why I’m going to law school – you know what I’m saying?’

Even Fia herself would not have expected that this – this – would be the bridge too far, bearing in mind all the other bridges that Benjamin has blazed past today already. It’s true that there are always a lot of free mini muffins in the break room. And Fia loves them. She eats at least three a day, on account of their being so mini and her days often being so long. She cannot have them insulted.

‘Oh my God! So, then, why are you even here?!’ she just about explodes. ‘If you’d rather go and fight the power in some shitty Portakabin somewhere, now would be a great time to do it!’

As far as Fia can see, that would solve everyone’s problems – or at least the one most obviously confronting them right now. Benjamin, however, seems wholly unmoved by the suggestion.

‘My mother wanted me to do a summer in corporate law, just to rule it out,’ he says. ‘So, here I am. Ruling it out.’

Subconsciously, Fia shakes her head a little in response. Unbelievable. And yet, so entirely believable. ‘Wow. And how old are you again now, Ben?’ she murmurs, although of course she knows perfectly well. He is one year younger than her: 29. ‘When do you reckon you might stop letting your mam brush your hair?’

At this, she watches a shadow of what might be embarrassment cross his features. Good, she thinks. By this stage of her life, she has met one too many men who seem like overgrown babies, men who are all about start-ups and idealism and ‘disrupting’ things, and who are always – always – funded by someone else.

‘You know what? Screw you, Fia,’ he replies.

A playground sort of insult, really, but the way in which he delivers it – spits the words out at her – somehow feels weighty. It feels cutting, and ugly.

He flips open his ring binder, pen poised. ‘Just answer these stupid questions so I can get out of here,’ he continues, his voice flat as he stares at the sheet in front of him. ‘Number one: “What does your role at ZOLA involve?”. Feel free to be extremely brief.’

Fia lets the question hang in the air for a second. Not deliberately – it’s just that she’s struck anew by the grim reality of their situation. They are really doing this, she realizes. This is the first of many occasions, over the next ten weeks, on which she and Benjamin Lowry will have to pretend. They’ll have to keep their shared secret, play their respective roles as best they can. She takes a deep breath in and out, feeling as though she is steeling herself not just for the present task but for all the ones that are to come.

‘Well, it sounds like you’ve figured out that we deal with rich people here,’ she offers eventually. ‘And rich companies. I’d have thought you’d feel right at home.’ She smiles snarkily at him, but his expression remains unmoved. Thus, she continues. ‘Most of our business is generated from corporate work – mergers and acquisitions, commercial real estate, and so on. But we also have a small private client department, because you know what sometimes happens to rich people?’

Benjamin offers no response, just stares back at her expectantly.

‘They die,’ Fia continues plainly. ‘And we don’t want all those billable hours winding up in some other law firm, now, do we? No. Sorry if that offends your delicate sensibilities, Benjamin, but we don’t. That’s where I come in. I deal with private tax planning for our high-value clients: their trusts and estates, their wills and probate. Other … family matters.’

What precisely such matters tend to be, Fia finds herself disinclined to get into right now. And Benjamin, evidently sorely lacking in lawyerly curiosity, doesn’t ask.

‘Fine,’ he says, scribbling away in his file. ‘Question two: “How did you get here?”’ At this, he looks up at her, his eyes flashing. ‘Well, I guess I pretty much know the answer to that one,’ he continues, all rancour. ‘But don’t worry, I won’t write it on the form.’