The Women Who Ran Away - Sheila O'Flanagan Page 0,147
of the week.’
‘Right,’ she said.
‘You look great,’ he told her. ‘Very corporate.’
‘You look good too.’
‘I’m behind the camera. It doesn’t matter how I look.’ He gave her a short smile. ‘Now, the way this works is that Rhona has given me a list of questions. I’ll ask them off camera but I’ll film you answering them. I’ve been looking at the light and I think we should go over there.’ He indicated a corner of the visitor space. ‘Obviously I’ll be taking lots of shots of the exhibition generally. Sound OK?’
She was overwhelmed by his businesslike approach. By his apparent dismissal of the fact that the last time they’d met she’d humiliated herself in front of him and had forced him to make personal admissions to her that she knew he would have wanted to keep private. But he was behaving as though none of it had happened. As though this was the first time they’d met.
‘OK?’ he repeated.
He hadn’t changed; not, she reminded herself, that a few months should have wrought any great transformation in him. He was wearing the same scuffed leather jacket he’d worn on the ferry, and similar comfortable shoes. His jeans were stonewashed denim. His hair was still ever so slightly longer than was fashionable.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Fine.’
‘Great.’
Had he forgotten that night, or was he choosing to ignore it? She might have been the one in the wrong then, but she was the client now. So he couldn’t afford to be offended by her. He couldn’t afford to let any residual feelings he had about her behaviour back then show. She held a power over him that she felt uncomfortable with. She wanted to say something, but he was already getting her to sit on a particular seat and moving around her, checking the angle of the light and how much of the exhibition would be in the shot.
His phone rang and he had a brief conversation.
‘The sound guy,’ he told her when he’d finished. ‘He’ll be here shortly.’
‘Would you like a coffee or anything while we’re waiting?’ she asked.
‘No thanks. Plenty to be doing. Stay here, will you?’ He left her sitting in his chosen place and walked through the exhibition, taking occasional snaps of the books. Then a younger man arrived and the two of them chatted for a while before returning to where Deira sat.
‘I’m Jonah,’ said the younger man. ‘I’ll be wiring you up for sound. D’you mind if I run this wire under your dress? We’ll hide the box behind you. Perfect. Tell me what you had for breakfast.’
She looked at him, startled.
‘To check the sound,’ he clarified.
‘Nothing, actually.’
‘That’s not helpful.’ Charlie raised an eyebrow. ‘You’ll have to make it up. Cornflakes, toast?’
‘Um . . . cornflakes, toast. Actually,’ she said, as Jonah fiddled with some settings, ‘I hate both of them. If I eat breakfast, I have fruit.’
‘Someone once told me that fruit isn’t good on an empty stomach,’ Charlie remarked. ‘Too acidic. I like toast myself. Smothered in chunky marmalade.’
‘I’m a millennial, so it’s smashed avocado toast for me,’ said Jonah. ‘OK, Deira. We’re sorted.’
‘Right,’ Charlie said. ‘We’ll do the seated questions first. Then I’ll ask you stuff as we walk around. It won’t all make it into the recording, and don’t worry if you make a mistake; we can do as many takes as we need. Don’t forget, you won’t hear my questions in the actual video, so remember to give as much information as you can. Ready?’
‘Yes.’
‘Let’s go. First one. What gave you the idea for the Written Words exhibition and why did you think this was a good place to stage it?’
Rhona had emailed Deira the questions the previous evening so that she’d have some time to prepare her answers, but although she knew what she wanted to say, her mouth was dry with nerves.
Charlie took a small bottle of water from his rucksack and told her to take a slug. ‘Take your time,’ he told her. ‘We’re not in a rush.’
When she was ready, he asked the question again. This time she was able to give an answer that she hoped was coherent.
‘Great,’ he said. ‘OK, next one. How did you source the books?’
Deira told him about the late professor’s collection and how generous Grace had been in allowing her to look through it.
‘How did you two meet?’ asked Charlie.
‘We joined forces on an unexpected road trip through France and Spain,’ replied Deira. ‘It was wonderful.’