Page 60 of Seven Reasons to Murder Your Dinner Guests
Tristan nods, passes her a napkin.
“Besides, you’re not capable of murder,” he tells her. “You just don’t have it in you.”
“Do you think?” she asks, finally looking up at him.
“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 herto 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.
