Then the man of the moment, Ingmar Lorken, Ever prayed that a moment was all the time he was going to command, stepped onto the platform at the end of the lobby. The platform looked like a piece of curved aluminium foil. It was the approach to the gallery holding the paintings. He made a brief, eloquent speech thanking all who had enabled this exhibition, to those who had travelled far and wide to be here: Madonna, John McEnroe, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jay-Z and Beyoncé. It was Madonna who had been there at the beginning, before the fire had truly became an inferno, even though the paintings he gave her were destroyed after their break-up. Suzanne Mallouk was there but no Alexis Adler. Debbie Harry was there, and a special reference was made to her contribution to the exhibition – the first painting that Basquiat ever sold.

Ever was humming the telephone hanging song and staring. It was a memory plucked from his childhood. It carried a little sadness.

There was no more speech for him, only Blondie. His father had loved Blondie.

The time arrived for the doors to be opened, the aluminium stage moved aside unaided, and there was a reverent silence of anticipation. Lomita requested not to rush, or push, or to go in early, stating she was happy to sit, observe and engage in conversation with whoever was passing and seemed of interest to her – they were on her terms, these conversations.

She was, quite simply, charismatic. Ever felt comfortably insignificant in her presence. She was shining – she had been polished to a brilliance like the diamonds around her neck and the ones dropping from her ears like a goddess’s tears. The diamond, clear, pure, with nothing to hide: transparent, adored by all. The honest jewel. No flies to be found on a diamond.

Ever could never have anticipated what was about to happen to him. They were amongst the last to enter, but the crowd was not too large ­– select, he thought, so that it would not inhibit an intimate and individual appreciation of the works.

He wheeled Lomita into the centre of the marble cavern, white-floored, white-walled, white-ceilinged; it had an unusual lack of complication for Gehry, with lighting that had a focus, but was invisible.

There she sat and he stood.

*

The mental disturbance from the paintings went straight into his cerebrum.