Duncan’s brought her to a restaurant in Double Bay. He picked her up and drove her across the Bridge, to the eastern suburbs, all so they could have dinner at a place he thought she would like. It’s flattering, and also elevates the stakes of the evening: for him this is clearly a date.
The restaurant is expensive and formal and Christina’s glad she wore the short-skirted Pucci suit she brought with her from LA. It was the only thing in her wardrobe that looked like it might be appropriate for dinner in a nice place. When Duncan picked her up he complimented her on it, and she appreciated that he noticed.
‘Finally I get you to dinner,’ he says now, accepting a menu from a waiter.
‘Finally?’ She raises an eyebrow as she scans her own menu. ‘I didn’t realise you were waiting that long.’
‘Only a few years,’ he says and she looks up, surprised, even though he’s already told her that he liked her while they were at school.
She makes a face. ‘You’re just saying that to be nice.’
He laughs. ‘Why would I? I could just say I like you now and we’d still be here having dinner. But I want you to know that this means a lot to me – you being here.’
The waiter reappears to take their drink order: Duncan orders a glass of red and Christina has a gin and tonic. When she was in LA she rarely drank alcohol – she couldn’t afford the calories – and she’s not drinking much here, but a dinner out seems like a good opportunity to relax her rules.
‘Why did you like me at school?’ she says. It’s the thing she really wants to know. She remembers herself as gangly and socially inept, with a fairly flat chest and acne. Not the sort of girl boys like. She barely liked herself.
Duncan’s smile shifts – he no longer looks like he’s laughing at a joke and instead as if he’s basking in a compliment. ‘You had this …’ He looks away and shrugs. ‘There was just somethingabout you. But I’m not going to pretend I didn’t think you were beautiful.’
‘Beautiful!’ She almost guffaws and instead manages to snort her laughter.
‘Yeah.’ He sits back in his chair. ‘C’mon – you knew that, right?’
‘No! I had acne.’
‘We all did. It washigh school, Chrissie.’
‘I was skinny. Awkward.’
‘Are you trying to talk me out of something I was thinking two decades ago?’ He grins cheekily.
‘Maybe.’
‘Not gonna work.’
‘No, but you can’t seriously –’
‘Are you Christina Clarke?’
The voice is at Christina’s right and she turns toward it. An older woman stands there, clutching a handbag to her chest and looking expectant.
Christina swallows. She knew that wearing the brightly coloured Pucci suit was a risk, but she thought enough time had passed since the scandal that she could get away with it.
‘Yes,’ she says, because often it’s easier than denying it and having to answer the follow-up questions that always come:Are you sure? You look a lot like her. Did you know that you look like her? Have you ever met her?Et cetera.
‘Ohmygod, I knew it was you,’ the woman screeches. ‘I told my Mario – he’s over there –’ she gestures to a table in the corner where a dark-haired man sits, waving – ‘that I was sure it was you. “I’d know her anywhere,” I said. Even with your hair that colour! It suits you. Are you going to keep it?’
Duncan stands and extends his hand. ‘Hello, Mrs …?’
‘Cobolli. Fran Cobolli.’ She shakes Duncan’s hand but keeps staring at Christina. ‘Ohmygod, my niece is going todiewhen I tell her. Shelovesyou.’
‘Where are you from, Fran?’ Duncan asks.
‘Greystanes,’ she says, naming a suburb a fair distance away.
‘Greystanes, eh? Long way to come.’
‘It’s Mario’s birthday. We wanted a fancy dinner.’ She’s now flapping a hand at nothing in particular. ‘Ohmygod –Christina Clarke.’