Lily gently kicked Sam under the table. The last thing she needed was someone giving Frédérique any more ideas. Flowers, she could handle. A public serenade? Well, it might look good in the movies, but she’d probably never recover if it happened in real life.
But just when she was worrying that Frédérique was crowding her too much and trying to work out what to say about it, he reached across the table and took her hand gently in his. The touch of his skin reminded her of their date – the kissing, the fact that her body had fizzed with electricity in his arms. She looked up, their eyes locked and she found her mouth relax into a smile. It had been a trying few days, but it was impossible to ignore that there was something between them.
And she suddenly wondered whether she was the one being over-the-top.
She’d spent the last twenty years with a man who seemingly wouldn’t step out of his comfort zone for her. Who let her walk away when all she wanted him to do was be there for her.
Now she had Frédérique who, although rather demonstrative, was quite patently there. Who turned up, seemed committed, and looked like a Hollywood actor to boot. She’d felt his actions were over the top, excessive. But perhaps she was just used to being treated differently. Perhaps she should be enjoying all the attention, lapping it up rather than pushing it away.
Maybe Frédérique wasn’t the one who was being idiotic.
Maybe it was her.
31
‘Will you stop fussing? It’s only appendicitis,’ he said, trying to smile.
‘What do you mean, “only appendicitis”? They’re going to chop you open!’
‘Do you think you could… well, use different words? For a start it’s just, ahh, keyhole surgery. And secondly, oouch, that is not a relaxing thing to say to me before they wheel me to theatre.’
‘Sorry.’ She rested her head against his shoulder. ‘But you need to promise me you’ll be OK.’
‘Of course!’
‘Because,’ she said, ‘if you’re not, I seriously, seriously won’t ever recover.’
‘I tell you what. If I do die, I’ll haunt you for eternity, how’s that?’
‘You joke,’ she said, ‘but I’m holding you to that, Ben Butterworth.’
She woke up early, the sunlight shining on her pillow interrupting a dream in which she was being pursued through a crowd by a man who, in turn, would have the face of Ben, then Frédérique, then Russell Crowe (circa 2006). Her heart was pounding, and her T-shirt clung to her in what she’d have once described as ‘all the right places’.
Last night when the concert had ended, she’d been disappointed when Frédérique had waved her and Sam off, and instead of making any sort of move, had begun chatting to a couple of friends. She’d assumed he’d at least ask if he could spend the night, so had been wrestling silently for the last half-hour about whether this would be a good idea or not.
She’d started off deciding that he definitely couldn’t stay yet. But over the course of the next few songs, feeling Frédérique’s touch and glancing at him from time to time, had decided that maybe – just maybe – she’d accept his advances.
So when he’d kissed her gently then wandered off to his friends without even giving it a try, she’d felt rejected. Which conversely made her want him even more. Had he known this? Was it a strategy? Or should she simply be more upfront about what she wanted, get things straight in her mind, before asking for space then feeling put out when she was given it?
This morning she was a little more grateful that nothing had happened. She’d woken up with Ben on her mind. Even though they’d been apart for weeks now, she still expected to see him when she drifted out of sleep each morning. Each morning, she still felt a little lost when she found he wasn’t there. If she’d woken up today to find a replacement, she wasn’t sure if she’d have felt OK about it – not yet.
She looked at the clock, it was eight o’clock, but would only be seven in the UK. But Ben was an early riser – he’d always set his alarm for six on workdays. She could call him now and catch him before work. Just to check up on him. She’d promised Tyler she’d do that.
She had an hour before Claude was due to come over and cut the grass, this time with a slightly less industrial-looking mower. She’d meant to get herself sorted with a gardener or a ride-on mower by this point, but the grass had got its act together before she had. If she left it any longer, it would begin to resemble the jungled overgrowth she’d found when she first arrived.
The phone rang twice before Ben picked up with what seemed like a fairly cheery ‘hello’ for this time on a working morning.
‘Hi, Ben. It’s just me.’
‘Hi, Lily.’
‘I just thought I’d catch you, see how you are?’
‘Thanks. I’m… well, I’m getting there, I suppose. How are you?’
‘Yeah, not too bad,’ she said, deciding not to fill him in on the events of the past few days. It wasn’t worth it; nothing had happened that he needed to know about.
‘Em said you’ve been on a date,’ he said, clearing his throat slightly. ‘Did it… was it good?’
‘Em said?’
‘Yeah, she’s been over a bit. Helping… you know. I mean, she only told me because… I suppose I pressed her on it a bit.’
‘Oh.’
‘You don’t have to talk about it. It’s just… well, you know.’
‘It wasn’t really a date,’ she said. ‘Just… you know, an informal thing.’
‘Right.’
‘Nothing happened if that’s what you’re worried about,’ she felt compelled to add.
‘Oh, OK. Well, good. I mean, well you know.’
‘Right.’ Part of her was fuming, another part quite pleased that he was at least bothered.
‘Because… I mean, I know it’s not the right time to talk about it, is it? But you know… I never stopped loving you, Lily.’
She felt her chest tighten. ‘I know you didn’t. I know if I hadn’t left we’d still be together. But, Ben, you made it clear that you didn’t love me enough.’
‘Because I wouldn’t come with you?’
‘Well, yes. Because you knew I wanted—’
‘Lily, stop…’ he said. ‘You’re right. I don’t know why I said that. It’s not your fault… I know the – well – the break-up was my doing.’
Was this some sort of reverse psychology trick? ‘Right,’ she said.
‘I’m serious. I’ve been seeing a counsellor – a lot, actually – and I’m trying to be more honest about my feelings. To not be, eh, afraid to talk about them, you know? Because the kind of thing I went through… my… my anxiety I mean; it grows when you don’t expose it to the light.’
‘Well, that’s good. That you’re seeing a counsellor.’
‘And I’ve realised a few things… since starting to talk about it properly. And I need to say… I want to say that it wasn’t just my anxiety that caused all this.’
‘Oh.’
‘No. Not completely. It was the fact that I didn’t talk to you about it. That I didn’t let you in. We’d been… well, I think we lost a bit of closeness because of that. Because I was keeping myself to myself too much. Maybe drinking too much…’
‘Oh, Ben, it wasn’t that bad.’
‘Well, it wasn’t ideal.’
‘Well, no. I’ll admit. But you know, I suppose I did spring it on you rather out of the blue. The whole eBay thing.’
‘Ha. Well, kind of out of the blue. And kind of right in the middle of the blue. It wasn’t as if you’d never mentioned France before.’
‘No, I think I may have spoken about it once or twice,’ she agreed.
There was a silence.
‘Anyway, I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Because maybe if you’d known I was just… well, clinging on at the time. That I was working from home more and more because sometimes it was too much. Well, maybe things might have been different.’
‘Oh Ben…’
She was silent for a minute, wondering if she could take the risk. To actually say it, openly. To risk being hurt all over again. ‘Ben,’ she said, ‘look. It’s not too late. You can still… I want you to come here. We can work on your anxiety, we can start afresh. It’s beautiful here… lonely, but… Please come.’ She felt her palms tingle.
He was silent on the other end.
‘But you said you were building a new life,’ he said at last.
‘Only because I had to, not because I wanted to…’
Minutes later, she was on the phone to Emily. ‘So I did it,’ she said. ‘I asked him. Directly. Just like you said.’
‘Atta girl! And?’
‘And nothing. He barely said a word. It was as if…’ Lily drew in a big, shuddering breath ‘… as if I’d never meant anything to him at all.’
‘Oh Lily…’
‘No. It’s OK, it’s OK. Because I know now. At least I have some sort of… ending to it. I don’t have to… wonder any more.’
Emily was silent. ‘I am so, so sorry,’ she said. ‘I never should have…’
‘No, you were right,’ said Lily. ‘I was too afraid to ask. And maybe it was because I was scared of the answer. Perhaps I knew all along.’
Another silence.
‘So he said no?’
‘Worse. He put the phone down.’