‘Fascinating,’ said Ben, who didn’t sound in the least fascinated.
‘The second, the ninth and the fourth. That’s their birthdays.’
‘May,’ said Ben.
‘May?’
‘February minus nine months is May. You must have been, you know, at your most amorous in May.’
‘No, that’s a common misconception,’ said George, shaking his head. ‘The average length of human gestation is two hundred and eighty days, or forty weeks. Which is ten months, not nine. Why we always talk about nine months has been a mystery to me my entire life.’
Ben looked down at his iPad.
‘Hey, Siri,’ he said. ‘How long is the gestation period for humans?’
‘The duration of a pregnancy for humans is forty weeks,’ replied Siri, which had been programmed to replicate the voice of a sexy young Australian surfer with blond shaggy hair and washboard abs.
‘Told you,’ said George, irritated that the younger man could not take his word for this without consulting the Internet. Ben was the eleventh producer he’d worked with over thirty-one years of Cleverley and they’d almost all been in their mid-twenties. The host kept growing older, but the producers remained the same age, a little like Leonardo DiCaprio and his girlfriends.
‘Who are you, Ben?’ he asked now, leaning forward and looking his colleague in the eye.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘I said, who are you? Tell me who you are.’
‘I’m Ben Bimbaum,’ said Ben, looking uncomfortable. ‘Don’t you remember? You’re not having a stroke, are you?’
‘I don’t mean your name. Pretend that I’m a complete stranger and I’ve asked you to tell me who you are. What do you say?’
‘Well, I’m a producer at the BBC,’ replied Ben, whose face was flushing scarlet now. ‘I work in light entertainment on the Cleverley show.’
‘And that’s it?’ asked George, looking disappointed. ‘That’s all you are? That’s what defines you?’
‘I’m also a father,’ added Ben. ‘And a husband. I enjoy fly-fishing but can never get the time to pursue this passion. I’m an Anglican and my faith is strong.’
‘That’s more like it,’ said George, smiling as he slapped the table. ‘Now don’t stop. Tell me more. I want to hear your deepest, darkest secrets.’
‘I’m a fervent royalist but believe that Princess Diana was not quite as saintly as some people like to think. And if Prince Philip did something to the brakes of her car, which is often rumoured, then maybe she had no one to blame but herself. Although we must remember that it was the Queen herself who was a mechanic during the war so, if anyone knows how to disconnect a brake line, it would be her.’
‘I met Diana many times,’ replied George, developing a glassy-eyed look at the memory. ‘Charming lady. Gorgeous skin. But you’re not wrong. She was as mad as a box of frogs.’
‘Did you ever have her on the show?’
‘Of course not. Royalty don’t go on chat shows. I mean, Fergie’s always reaching out, of course, but she doesn’t count. Carry on. Tell me more.’
‘I’m a member of a book club, but it’s been seven months since I managed to get through one of the novels,’ continued Ben, warming to his theme now. ‘I usually just glance at a couple of online reviews before going to the meetings and pass off their opinions as my own. The last one I tried, well, it didn’t even seem to be written in English.’
‘That’s pretty common these days, I understand. But I bought an eight-hundred-page biography earlier today and I’m determined to read it from cover to cover. Anything else? Any other defining points?’
‘Not really, no. I think that just about covers it.’
‘All right. Now tell me something about yourself that you’ve never told anyone before.’
‘Such as?’
‘Well, how should I know? Tell me one of your secrets. Something you’ve never even told Mark.’
‘Matthew,’ said Ben.
‘It’s the biblical names,’ replied George, waving this away. ‘That’s why I keep getting mixed up.’
Ben thought about it and looked as if he might start crying. ‘I don’t want to,’ he said, sounding as anxious as a fourteen-year-old boy with a bad case of acne being dragged into a game of Spin the Bottle.
‘I don’t care. Tell me something ridiculous or disgusting you’ve done that you’d rather people didn’t know about.’
‘I had sex with a woman once,’ said Ben.
‘Not good enough, we’ve all done that. Tell me something else.’
‘I’m not wearing any underwear.’
‘That’s just unhygienic. Try again.’
Ben thought about it, opened his mouth, then closed it.
‘Come on,’ insisted George. ‘You were about to say something.’
‘I can’t. You’ll mock me.’
‘I won’t, I promise.’
‘You promise?’
‘I just said that I promise.’
‘All right, then.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I’m a member of the Flat Earth Society,’ he said.
George sat back down in his seat and frowned. ‘The what?’ he asked.
‘The Flat Earth Society.’
George stared at him, uncertain whether or not the younger man was playing him for a fool. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘You’re telling me that you don’t believe the world is round?’
‘Let’s just say that I’m sceptical,’ said Ben. ‘And anyway, Round Earthers have had it their own way for centuries and no one ever questions them. No one dares. They have it all sewn up, you see. But perhaps it’s time to challenge the consensus.’
‘Of course it is. Why accept basic reality when you can live in a world of fantasy instead? Pretend the Earth is flat and get children to believe you, that’ll help with their education. And while you’re at it, stand up against trained scientists when they want to administer medically proven vaccines because you heard some right-wing conspiracy theorist say on her live stream that they’re not safe, despite her not having had a single day’s worth of medical training in her life.’
‘Well, I wouldn’t go that far,’ said Ben.
‘I bet you protested against wearing masks last year.’
‘I did not,’ insisted Ben. ‘I wore with one with Shawn Mendes’ lips on it.’
‘It’s because of that thing,’ continued George, pointing at Ben’s phone, which was lying on the table between them. ‘If you were an American, you’d be one of those people insisting that Donald Trump had won the election.’
‘There were irregularities in—’ began Ben, but George cut him off.
‘That’s enough,’ he said, standing up and walking towards the window, wondering whether he should simply open it up and push this idiot out. The Earth might not be round, but it was certainly hard, and a six-storey drop would put a fine dent in Ben Bimbaum’s head.