Riva stamped her boots outside the entrance and tried to retie her mussed-up hair with a wooden clip. Of course she wasn’t going to confess to Ben that Aman and his film were the reason for her lateness. She had always hidden those little jaunts to the cinema from Ben, assuming that he would be jealous of the unlikely success of their old classmate, particularly as he was also her old flame. It was one of Riva’s more awkward memories when Ben had once spotted a cinema ticket to Feltham Cineworld in her purse, after she had told him she had been to see a Hollywood film starring George Clooney. He had had the good grace to laugh off her white lie, and even jested a little at the memory of Aman’s crush on Riva back at uni. But Riva had, of course, been mortified to have been caught red-handed with the ticket to Ishq in her purse, a feeling akin to the time her father had spotted seven Crunchie bar wrappers in her bin, bought using the change she had pinched from the bowl in the hallway.
Riva thought up her excuses now, rehearsing them as she stepped through the doors of the restaurant and spotted Ben sitting by one of the tables at the window, looking out at the rain. She slipped off her coat and handed it to the waiter before making her way across the crowded room towards him. Her heart melted at sight of his slumped shoulders: everything about him spelt out his depression.
‘Oh, Christ, sorry to be so late, love,’ she said, lightly kissing Ben’s cheek and sinking into the seat facing him. ‘How long have you been here?’
‘What excuse do we have today, huh?’ Ben asked, raising his left arm and waving his watch at her, his voice uncharacteristically peevish.
‘Oh, don’t ask! No cabs to be had for love nor money on a night like this. And the meeting at Gideon’s just dragged on and on. Antonia, the PR girl from the publisher’s was there too, and wanted to discuss the digital media campaign for the new book. You’ll never believe this but they’re talking about a seven-city tour across Europe, which, of course, would be lovely, except…’ Riva realised that Ben was no longer listening, his attention focused quite deliberately on the wine list.
Riva lapsed into silence, glad to have been stopped in her tracks while lying so shamelessly to her husband. It really did make her feel quite hateful. Not that all of her utterances were lies exactly, as Riva had indeed had several conversations with both Gideon and Antonia in the course of the day, but it was certainly not true that she had been in a meeting with them this evening. It suddenly crossed Riva’s mind that Ben may have read something online about Aman Khan being in London to promote his new film. She flushed at the thought – it would not take much for him to put two and two together and guess that she had gone to see him at BAFTA. Nervously, she reached out for Ben’s glass of water and watched him over the rim as she sipped. His face looked more drawn than usual today, his grey-blue eyes bloodshot, and Riva wondered if he had spent all day staring at his computer screen. She sighed and sat back in her chair, feeling an inexplicable surge of sadness overcome her. Riva had always striven not to rub Ben’s nose in the success of her publishing career, conscious of the fact that Ben had been the one with real writing ambitions back in college. Of course, he had greeted Riva’s unexpected book deal with excitement and good grace at first, perhaps anticipating with typical confidence that his own chance would surely follow before long. He had even joked of how they might one day become the ‘golden couple in publishing’, both of them enjoying flourishing literary careers. But, as the years passed with submission after submission of his being turned down, Ben had not been able to help becoming just a tiny bit bitter. Riva had done her best to assist in whatever way she could, but she cringed when she recalled the weary look that would come over her publishers’ faces whenever a husband with writing ambitions was mentioned. The most brutal blow had come when Gideon, Riva’s own literary agent, had returned Ben’s manuscript with a terse and uncomplimentary letter of rejection. Ben had found it astonishing that the man had not even done him the courtesy of a phone call and angrily reminded Riva that it was her sizeable royalties that were keeping Gideon ensconced in his fancy Covent Garden offices. In Riva’s opinion this wasn’t true at all – Gideon had many other successful writers on his list – but Ben had not wanted to hear that, and accused her of taking sides with her agent. They had ended up rowing that day and Riva had subsequently stopped advocating on Ben’s behalf. Recently he had complained again about the stand she had taken, claiming to be writing much better material now that he no longer had his job at the bank distracting him from concentrating on the book, but Riva had held firm, quite sure that he should try his chances like all other aspiring writers did, rather than expecting favours merely because he was married to a published author.
‘What do you want to drink?’ Ben passed Riva the menu, interrupting her train of thought. ‘There’s a rather nice Bordeaux listed…’
‘You choose, Ben. Although I think I’ll have a mint tea first, to warm my poor icy fingers,’ Riva replied. Once, a chance remark like that would have had Ben promptly reaching out for her hands to massage warmth into them. But Riva rubbed her own palms together now, feeling saddened again by the distance that had crept into their marriage somewhere along the way. Where did these cold gusts fly in from, she wondered, blowing aside all life in a marriage and leaving only the carcass of something that was once so warm and loving?
Riva folded her pashmina and pushed it into her bag before running her fingers through her hair and sitting up in her chair. She was determined to enjoy her evening out with her husband and hoped – both for her sake and Ben’s – that she had managed to cover up her silly secret outing to BAFTA. It suddenly seemed so terribly sad to have snuck off to gawp at a film star she had once vaguely known – one who, in all likelihood, would probably look right through her if he saw her today! But it was even sadder, Riva thought, that she should have to hide such a thing from the man she was married to. It was daft and mean and Riva resolved she would never do such a thing ever again.
Ben, sitting across the table from Riva, scanned the extensive menu without seeing it. He had spent the past hour assiduously reading its contents in minute detail while waiting for Riva to turn up and knew exactly what he was going to order. What was preoccupying his mind was not Riva’s lateness. Nor was it anything to do with her carefully elaborate explanations of her whereabouts this evening. He and Riva never questioned each other about whom they had met in the course of the day; theirs simply wasn’t that kind of a watchful, possessive relationship. Tonight, however, Ben simply could not erase from his mind the conversation he had overheard between Riva and her dislikeable little sister, Kaaya, the previous night. It had left an acrid taste in his mouth and Ben wondered now if he ought to tell Riva about how hurt he was feeling. It would, of course, ruin their meal out and Ben knew that would only make him feel more wretched. It was true what they said about eavesdroppers never hearing good things about themselves – although he had not been eavesdropping, but had merely stumbled upon an accidentally overheard conversation. It must have been close to ten o’clock by the time he had come in from the pub. He had entered through the kitchen door and the sisters, sitting in the living room, had not heard him come in. He was just about to stroll into the hallway to say hello when he heard Kaaya’s loud voice ring out in her horrible brassy manner.
‘Admit it, you’re just too, too soft on Ben, Riva, constantly tiptoeing emotionally around him and thinking up various imaginative excuses for what is plainly typically selfish male behaviour.’
As Ben froze at the kitchen door, he had been relieved to hear Riva respond tetchily. ‘Look, it’s not as if he’s never worked, Kaaya. Don’t you go forgetting, honey, that Ben not only supported me for the time it took to complete my creative writing course at East Anglia, he bailed you out too with that loan for your PR diploma. Besides, he was a rock to us all when Papa died.’
But Kaaya – in Ben’s opinion, a self-seeking opportunist who mysteriously had every single