June woke on Wednesday with the brief, foolish belief that she had only had a bad dream.
Then she saw her coat on the chair, where she had dropped it after coming home. She remembered Ruby behind the kitchen table and Eli across the café. Both memories arrived before she put her feet on the floor.
There was a message from Ruby asking whether this correction would be enough.
The video was a dramatized piece. Some words were borrowed. Eli and I were never together. I'm sorry if people misunderstood.
June read it twice. Then she called her.
“No,” she said when Ruby answered.
Ruby sounded as if she hadn't slept. “It's clear it wasn't a real breakup.”
“It leaves out what you did.”
“Do you want your whole private life out there?”
“You can say you used my private account without permission. You don't have to tell them what's in it. You don't have to name Sam.”
“People will ask.”
“Let them ask.”
Ruby went quiet. June sat on the edge of the bed.
“I wanted it to be a smaller thing,” Ruby said.
“I wanted it to be a different thing.”
June ended the call after telling Ruby she was going to speak to Nina. Then she wrote her own statement, carefully, with no quotations from the pages.
I learned yesterday that Ruby's video was made from my private account of my own breakup, used without my knowledge or permission. Eli co-wrote it knowing it was mine. My earlier statement was made without those facts. I am withdrawing it as any support for that story. I will not be sharing my private account or answering questions about the person involved.
She posted it, put the phone away and went to work.
Nina took her into the office before the first audience arrived. June told her what both of them had admitted. She didn't give Nina the pages. She didn't need to.
Nina listened without trying to finish a sentence for her.
“You asked him directly before?” she said when June stopped.
“Twice. He said he didn't write it. She said she hadn't used my whole story or given him the original.”
Nina pressed her fingers against the edge of the folder on her desk.
“I knew about the stand-in,” she said. “I knew it was dramatized. I didn't know they had taken your private history without permission and lied about where the story came from and who wrote it.”
June nodded. She wanted Nina to understand the difference without making her say it again.
“I can't offer the advertised evening with that behind it,” Nina said. “I'm withdrawing it. I'll speak to Ruby now.”
“I don't want to do an evening about it instead.”
Nina looked up. “You won't.”
She rang Ruby while June was there, saying June had told her the new facts. Ruby confirmed them. June could hear her voice from the little speaker, though Nina had kept the phone against her ear.
The conversation took several minutes. Ruby asked whether she could simply remove the video discussion and do the audition material. Nina said she couldn't quietly turn the advertised programme into something else and leave the reason out. Ruby asked about the fee. Nina said the performance was cancelled before payment.
June looked at the chair near the door. Ruby had stood there on Monday holding the description with her name in large type.
Nina listened for a little while, then said, “I'm sorry it's difficult. I can't do it.”
When she ended the call, she didn't immediately speak. June was grateful for the silence.
“We'll put a short ordinary programme on instead,” Nina said at last. “People can come for that or decide they don't want it. Ruby can give a brief factual correction beforehand if she's willing. The event description needs correcting anyway.”
“Will she?”
“I don't know yet.”
June nodded. Not every decision was hers to pull out of somebody else.
Nina asked if she wanted to go home. June said she'd rather work, then found after half an hour that she couldn't remember the right total for two tickets. She went back to the office.
“I've changed my mind,” she said.
“That's fine.”
At home, June ate because she had forgotten breakfast. She sat on the floor beside the sofa to do it, unwilling to make the meal an occasion. Her phone kept lighting up. She switched off the sound.
The afternoon moved slowly. She started the dance-hall film, stopped it, and looked out of the window instead. Nothing useful happened. No answer arrived that made yesterday less true.
Near evening, she went for a short walk by herself. She passed the shop where Ruby worked and chose the other pavement. She didn't look through the glass to see whether Ruby was inside.