Page 43 of Seven Reasons to Murder Your Dinner Guests
“I really think.”
Vivienne takes another big gulp of her wine. Tristan notices that her hand is still shaking, but she seems a little calmer.
“There’s one more thing that’s bothering me,” says Vivienne.
“What’s that?”
“I looked into the dinner party invitations. It turns out they were made in a printing shop near my old office,” she says.
“OK…”
“I used to go there quite regularly with jobs for the magazine. They know me well. I hadn’t been in years, but they remembered me when I stopped by the other day…” she explains, getting worked up again.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Tristan tells her. “It’s Central London—half of the city could be using those printers.”
“You’re right, Tristan,” murmurs Vivienne, finishing off her glass of wine. “I’m sorry to get so upset—especially on your birthday.”
“To be honest, I hoped this one might pass by without a celebration.”
Vivienne pulls a tissue from her bag, blows her nose loudly, and then reaches back in to pull out a little black gift bag.
“Happy fortieth,” she says, placing the bag on the table between them.
“You didn’t need to get me anything.” Tristan blushes. His parents had given up on buying him presents years ago, instead just emailing him online vouchers so he could choose what he wanted. Tristan has forgotten that other people actually wrap gifts for birthdays.
He reaches inside the bag and finds a brown leather cube, worn in the corners. Squeezing it open, a pearlescent watch face is revealed, with two fine gold hands pointing to 8:10 p.m.
“Oh,” he murmurs.
“It was my father’s,” says Vivienne quietly, looking down at Tristan’s hands. “I notice you always wear that old plastic one, so I thought you might like it.”
He opens the small card inside the bag, where Vivienne has written:
To my dear friend Tristan: Time is on your side.
“Thank you,” is all Tristan can say. It’s quiet in the restaurant, but all of a sudden, his ears are ringing, as if waves are crashing into his brain.
“It’s not a big deal.” Vivienne turns her attention to the menu. “It was only gathering dust in my drawer.”
Vivienne orders spaghetti carbonara for herself and a pepperoni pizza for Tristan while he silently stares at the watch face.
Fighting his instinct to close the box and push it aside, Tristan slowly removes his Casio, slips it into his pocket, and carefully puts the watch on his wrist. It’s clear he is a smaller man than Vivienne’s father had been; the buckle pushes through a pristine hole two above the one he’d used.
The watch’s brown leather strap is ridiculously large on his arm.
He feels like a schoolboy playing dress-up.
Tristan looks at it and breathes in through his nose— 2, 3, 5— and out through his mouth— 7, 11, 13.
It’s no good; he can’t escape the feeling of a handcuff tightening around his wrist. Vivienne starts talking, and Tristan forces himself to listen.
“Well, Mary wasn’t pulling any punches,” she says. “Can’t say I blame her, though. The way Christian befriended her, took her to the ballet, the theater, all the while having an affair with her husband…”
As he lets Vivienne’s words wash over him, Tristan stares at the watch on his wrist. The leather around the hole that Vivienne’s father had used is slightly split. He wonders what sort of man Vivienne’s father had been.
“Before you arrived, she was talking about Melvin, how he’d been targeted by racists during rugby games as a young man,” she babbles.
“Really?” murmurs Tristan, only half listening.
“She thinks that’s what made him so laid-back about things, just lived his life under the radar, not wanting to make a fuss, not wanting to draw attention to himself…”
A waiter appears with their meals and carelessly plonks them down onto the table.
Tristan lets out a long world-weary sigh.
“So what’s been going on with you? You’ve been quiet these last few weeks. Are you disappointed about your Moralia project?” Vivienne asks.
“It’s not that.” He shakes his head, picking up his cutlery.
When he told Vivienne about Moralia , in the most basic terms, she jumped on it and encouraged him to revisit the program.
So he spent a couple of weeks working on it, then emailed Raymond, a graduate from his class who had gone on to work for a successful company in California, telling him about the software.
Expecting to be ignored or quickly rebuffed, Tristan was astounded when Raymond replied within hours, eager to hear more.
That weekend Vivienne insisted on buying champagne and toasting him, despite Tristan’s protests.
“So what’s troubling you?” Vivienne asks, resting her napkin on her knees without taking her eyes off him.
“I…met up with Ellie last month,” he admits, cutting his pizza into ten even slices.
“Really?” she asks, letting the spaghetti on her fork plop back down onto her plate.
He’s told her about Ellie, about how she broke his heart when she abruptly ended their relationship.
Vivienne has often suggested he get in touch with her, to try to “get closure,” an American term that makes him cringe when she uses it.
He takes a big bite from his pizza and chews it slowly, trying not to give away the twist in his stomach when he remembers that evening.
That same night, after he and Vivienne had gotten through two bottles of champagne, Tristan was buzzing from the bubbles—and the sniff of success—and pulled up Ellie’s Facebook page once again.
For the hundredth time, he opened the messenger screen. But this time, he started to write.
Hi Ellie, this is Tristan. I’ve been thinking about you lately and wondered if you would like to meet for a catch-up?
Then he deleted I’ve been thinking about you lately (too creepy).
His heart raced as the arrow hovered over the Send button.
He swallowed and pressed it. Somehow he managed to get to sleep quite quickly after that and, upon switching his computer on the next morning, only remembered the message when he saw a notification of a reply from Ellie.
Hi Tristan, Yes let’s catch up! How about next Wednesday in town, 7ish?
A chuckle involuntarily shot out of Tristan’s mouth as he took in Ellie’s familiar style, the exclamation marks, how she referred to Central London as a “town” and the “ish” that followed any time suggestion.
Time to Ellie has always been a fluid concept.
When they were together, it infuriated Tristan that she’d just presumed the whole world ran fifteen minutes late like her.
Perhaps she hadn’t changed as much as he’d thought.
And true to form, she arrived at the pub Tristan had chosen, seventeen minutes late, stumbling through the door with her curly, brown hair down to her shoulders and a second baby bump poking out between her open coat, dark circles under her eyes.
Then her lovely smile broke out when she spotted Tristan.
“Tris, how are you?” she said, pulling him in for a hug, her curls tickling his nose as he leaned in and they bumped pot bellies.
For the next twenty minutes, she talked nonstop about her husband, Dale, her son, Alfie, nearly two, and soon-to-be second son.
She even showed pictures of them on her phone while Tristan nodded and smiled in the right places.
By her second glass of lemonade, she’d moved on to every detail of her teaching job: their Easter production, her latest classroom display, a little boy in her class called Henry who never left her side.
“Don’t keep me in suspense, Tristan. How did it go?” Vivienne asks.
He shrugs. “It was nice to see her. She’s still working as a teacher, has a little boy, and is pregnant with her second. Happily married.”
Vivienne snorts. He knows she always finds it hard to believe anyone can be happily married (“An oxymoron, if ever there was one,” she likes to say).
“Oh, well, good for her,” Vivienne says, not even pretending to eat her meal. “Did you tell her what you’ve been up to?”
“What have I been up to, Vivienne?” It comes out harsher than he intended.
“Your software, your flat…”
Tristan finishes off his bottle and waves at the waiter to bring another.
Once Ellie had run out of steam, she asked about Tristan’s life—well, actually, she asked if he’d met anyone.
He might even flatter himself to think she seemed nervous about his response, and once he’d confirmed that he was still single, she visibly relaxed.
Then there was silence. As if anything outside that was meaningless.
Perhaps it was. The ticking of a grandfather clock swelled from the depths of the pub, accompanied by the low chatter of the two old fellas sitting at the bar.
And all Tristan had thought of was how empty his life had become, how very little.
Ellie was still looking expectantly at him, so he spluttered out something about his work and flat in Manor House.
“Sounds like you’re doing well for yourself,” she said. Then she asked the question: “Do you ever think about the day we broke up?” and Tristan’s heart soared. He nodded, ready to tell her how much he thought about her, how much he regretted. But she carried on talking.
“I just wanted to let you know that I forgive you,” she said, reaching up to hug him.
“Thank you,” he muttered into her curls.
She bent over to pick up her large bag from the floor, and he noticed she was trembling. One last wave, and she was gone. In that instant, Tristan realized they’d made no plans to meet again.