She’s beginning to laugh now, and – to my annoyance, because this frequently happens to me when she laughs, even though I am often very irritated by the reason that she’s laughing – my own mouth is widening in response.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘It’s just… This is so ridiculous. I mean, Sonja. The producers.Oh, you two really didn’t seem to hit it off, so we’re going to force you to stare at each other for several minutes and complete checklists about each other’s faces. It’s insane. Why did we agree to this? Why are we here?’
I nod. ‘For once, you make a very good point.’
She looks at me for a long moment. I’m pretty sure I know what’s coming.
And, yes, she says, ‘I feel like this is the last time I’m going to say this, but this is all your bloody fault.’
‘Moot point,’ I say, really just for the sake of it. ‘You wrote the books. If you hadn’t written them I would not have said it.’
‘Oh please.’ She looks like she’s saying it just for the sake of it too. ‘If the possibly fictitious clients of yours hadn’t married the wrong people and then pretended that my books were the catalysts for their inevitable separations, you wouldn’t have had your rant at me on national television and we wouldn’t be in this position.’
‘Not fictitious. I had to say it.’
Freya glares at me. ‘Andagain, and I hope for the last time, I am not going to stop writing my books because they arenotin fact dangerous; theymake people happy.’
‘I…’ I don’t finish my sentence because I’m remembering that I did in fact very much enjoy her books and if I had to analyse my emotional state after reading them I would have to apply the descriptionfeel-goodto them. I did not, however, feel good after my ex-wife compared me unfavourably to the hero in one of Freya’s books. Having read several, I don’t know which hero she was comparing me to. Maybe all of them.
Freya smiles at me, and I don’t like that smile. It’s far too smug. Complacent.
‘Would you say,’ she asks, ‘that on anaveragebasis, as in afor-the-greater-goodbasis, if a book made one hundred people happy, and one person sad, it would overall be a good thing?’
‘That’s a stupid question,’ I point out. ‘You have to define the sadness. How bad is it? You wouldn’t want someone you care about to do an activity with a five per cent mortality rate, would you, no matter how much the ones who survive enjoy it.’
‘That’s different,’ she splutters.
I shake my head. ‘If for every one hundred people who read a book ninety-nine come away happy and the hundredth goes through an utterly horrific divorce as a result of it, and the divorce issohorrific that overall the average is net misery, should we not ban that book?’
‘Youcannotban all romances. That’s beyond ridiculous.’
I frown. Thatisridiculous; she’s right.
A smile begins to spread slowly but widely across Freya’s face, and in checklist mode, I’m forced to acknowledge that she does have very good teeth. Even better because theyaren’texactly perfect; her front two bottom teeth cross just a tiny amount, and it’s…cute; that’s the word.
‘You think I’m right, don’t you?’ she asks.
Really, really maturely, I decline to answer and decide to roll my eyes instead.
‘Toddler,’ she says, very conversationally. And then she laughs. A lot. And I find myself laughing too.
Yeah, odd.
‘Have we all finished our checklists?’ asks Petra. ‘Time to draw. Paper first.’
I actually quite enjoy the drawing. The result isn’tamazing, but surely no-one’s will be.
‘Now show your partners,’ Petra commands.
‘No way.’ I’m genuinely astonished by Freya’s picture. I have to be honest. ‘That’s really goodandreally bad. It doesn’t look like me in the slightest. But it really does look like a person. Likereallylike a person. It’s amazing.’ It’s really, really good. Except not, given that it was supposed to be me.
‘Now yours?’ She’s trying to peer over the top of my easel.
I take the drawing off and show her.
She takes her hands and covers her face with them.
