The drive to the banquet was quiet and awkward, it seemed that Charlie's initial observation of his fellow Golden Ticket winner was made in haste and with disregard of all the facts, as it turned out, Veruca was more than capable of getting ready on time. The only thing that made the awkward silence even worse was when traffic grinded to a halt around the Covenant Garden district, leaving Charlie and Veruca stuck in the middle of the road. There were a few cars ahead of them that blocked the view, so Charlie stuck his head out the driver's seat window to get a better view of what was causing all this backup. As it turns out, a group of people were marching in the middle of the street and stalling traffic for yards on end, a lot of them carrying posters on poles and all of them chanting out of a sense of frustration. Charlie couldn't tell what these people were protesting for or against, they were too far away to be able to see what was on their posters and their chants sounded more like muffled grumbles by the time it reached his ear. It seemed like he and Veruca would have to try and ponder what was going on while they waited for the protestors to pass them, but luckily for them the clearest sign about what these manifestations were about soon came into focus as it literally floated over their heads.
With a balloon of a diaper-clad, screeching orange baby gliding over the city, Charlie remembered something he heard on the news not that long ago, and blurted out, "Oh, that's right, Crump's on an official state visit today. I should call Mr. Wonka and tell him what's going on, he might get a kick out of it. Joining the protestors might be the only thing that gets him out of the factory."
Veruca gave Charlie an odd look, she'd heard the stories about how Wonka never left his factory, but she didn't believe he never actually ventured out, no matter how awkward he was, leading her to ask, "He really doesn't go out?"
"Indeed, I've only seen him outside the factory on a handful of occasions," Charlie replied, almost amazed at the realization that talking about the master chocolatier with someone outside their mutual circle of acquaintances was necessary to open his eyes to just how strange his mentor really was.
The citizens protesting the American President's visit to London eventually all passed by and cleared up the road for the line of parked cars waiting to move on from beyond the intersection where the manifestation had just occupied the street. After this delay, it only took Charlie about another twenty minutes to reach their destination, and with still a few minutes before the event officially began. It seemed that Charlie lying to Veruca about what time the event was turned out for the better, despite her actually getting ready by the time the Good Boy told her he'd be there to pick her up, the extra time between when they would've arrived and when the event began was just enough to make up for the time lost waiting for the protestors to clear the street they needed to take to get where they needed to go.
The banquet was held at the Millennium Conference Centre, a beige building with a green trim around the windows of the hotel rooms on the upper floors, and even though a valet was present to park his car in a secure spot, Charlie still decided to drive around the building until he found somewhere to park without having to pay a small fee. It took a while to walk from where Charlie parked his car to the entrance of the conference center and all because Charlie took Wonka's lesson about being frugal with his own money and not spending it on unnecessary things, like valets, to heart. Veruca, on the other hand, looked quite displeased with Charlie's decision to forego the easy way out and force her to have to tread dozens of yards to reach the banquet while in heels. But apart from tiring her feet, the little brute simply could not understand why someone wouldn't just pay someone else to solve any obstacle that arose in front of them; what was £100 to her, anyways. Their views about spending money, with each of their stances stemming from their individual, unique childhood experiences, only highlighted their polar opposite natures and thus raised questions about what these two had in common apart from having won a tour of a mysterious chocolate factory years ago.
Once off the street, Charlie and Veruca made their way into the lobby of the Millennium, a beige floored room with brown walls and columns and a white ceiling, where they spotted several posters on easels guiding all the TABA ceremony guests towards the back where the event would take place. They followed the signs until they reached a bottleneck, there was a red carpet that led into the banquet hall where people had begun amassing inside, which just so happened to pass by photo-taking station. Both Golden Ticket winners knew what to expect here, they had to wait their turn in line until they had their picture taken by a photographer hired by the event planners to memorialize all of the guests present, in front of a poster covered in the logos of TABA and a couple of the companies sponsoring the event. Charlie's social awkwardness made him dread nights like these, he hated being crammed into a room with hundreds of people chatting all at once for he could hardly hear himself think, but Veruca thrived in these types of environments, for every single person was just another individual waiting to be blessed by her glorious presence in their lives, at least that's what she thought.
The little brute focused all of her attention on the photo station and acted super impatiently as she waited for their turn, and the second the group in front of them wrapped up their shoots, Veruca grabbed Charlie by his arm, and proclaimed, "Ooh, Charlie, it's our turn!"
"Wait, hold on, Veruca," Charlie replied rapidly as his guest pulled him up to the photo station without any disregard if she was hurting his arm by grasping it or pulling him too hardly.
"Ready?" The photographer asked as his new subjects got in position.
"Hold on!" Veruca barked back as she got herself ready for the shoot. As a vain, self-obsessed woman and SwiftyPic model, Veruca pulled out all the stops in order to ensure that she came out as perfect as ever.
The little brute ran her hands down her hair like one might to do a human body to make sure everything was in its place; and speaking of human bodies, she also ran her right index and middle fingers down the slit between her breasts and stretched the gap out to expand it. However, the brat wasn't done yet, she grasped both of her breasts with her hands and pushed them up while pulling her shoulders backwards in an effort to make her cleavage seem bigger than it really was. That simple act boosted Veruca's self-esteem but made Charlie feel even more awkward than he already felt for he didn't want to creep his fellow Golden Ticket winner out by watching her adjust her body in such an intimate fashion, but he also couldn't avoid watching her do so since she was literally standing right next to him.
Veruca very much enjoyed these red-carpet photo-ops, not just because they remind her of her heyday as a professional model and ballerina, but because they gave her an opportunity to expose her good looks to a fresh set of eyes. She posed for the camera, turning to the side, and made a seductive face as she flashed her pearly white teeth for the lenses, all of which was in complete contrast to Charlie who just stood awkwardly in front of the camera. He was nowhere near as photogenic as the little brute was, while he typically came out looking nervous in pictures, this time he appeared a bit more uncomfortable as Veruca pressed her body up against his and wrapped her arms around his waist, and called out to the photographer, "Ready, take the shot."
The flash went off multiple times and so did changes in Veruca's pose, ensuring every photograph taken would be at least a bit different from the last. There was something about Veruca's positive attitude in situations where she was the center of attention that Charlie found so soothing, most likely because she was willingly redirecting all of the attention away from him to feed her own ego, and that was a trade he was all too willing to make. Something else Charlie ended up liking very much about Veruca was her use of high-heeled shoes despite already being above average height. Those few inches she gained by wearing heals were enough to make her tower above Charlie, but instead of getting angry and insecure like most men would, the heir was not just fine with Veruca's choice, but, in fact, a bit of him liked seeing her wear them and stand taller than him.
The photographer finished with Charlie and his guest, but while the heir left the photo station Veruca was not ready to move on, she continued to wield that sense of domination she oozed, ordering the photographer, "Take more pictures me, now!"
"Veruca, what are you doing? Can't you see there's a line," Charlie anxiously pleaded with the brat, gesturing towards the line of people clearly annoyed at Veruca for hogging the photographer all to herself.
But this request did not faze the little brute at all, in fact, she seemed to enjoy watching Charlie get nervous about her violating a rule, even if it was unspoken, like giving everyone a turn to get their picture taken. It was almost as if both of them were back in school and Charlie, the goodie-goodie, was worried the two of them were going to get caught and sent to the Headmaster's office because Veruca, the rebel, was trying to break into somewhere the students were not allowed to venture to. And just like in that school scenario, the brat dismissed all the Good Boy's worries as the illogical, neurotic fears of someone who just had to learn to let loose, and with a huge smirk on her face, she replied in a playful tone, "What can I say? The camera loves me."
"Or you love the camera," Charlie sniped in response before walking away from the situation and the line of banquet attendees giving him stink eye because his guest was delaying their entrance to the hall.