Ben Page 15

  They drew apart and her heart quickened again, because she knew this was the moment when there ought to be a kiss. He seemed shy too. And she almost thought he wasn’t going to do it. But then he touched her face with a gentle tenderness that no one had ever shown her. He looked at her like she was something unique and rare and beautiful. And when he had looked and touched for several long seconds, he closed his eyes and kissed her. She made a soft sound, and angled her face towards him. Thinking that if he didn’t stop soon, she’d melt down onto her knees in front of him, or just plain die of pleasure.

  When he paused for breath she turned and fled into the kitchen.

  “Hey – come back,” he said.

  “I don’t want to burn the dinner.”

  A feeble excuse. She was terrified of kissing him. Because it was so damn good she wanted to do it forever.

  He came and stood near her in the kitchen while she stirred the sauce. “Is anything wrong?”

  She shook her head. “No. Nothing’s wrong. Let’s eat. It’s nearly ready.”

  “You want a glass of wine? Would that help?”

  She shook her head. “No wine for a month, you remember?”

  “I meant for you, not me. I’m keeping my promise about the wine. I want to keep all my promises to you. So you don’t need to be scared. Not anymore.”

  She was grateful for that. He wasn’t going to push her. She smiled and asked him to sit down while she dished up the dinner.

  He lit the candles and then got up and dimmed the lights. Maybe a bit too much, but she didn’t care. They sat there in the candle-flickering darkness and ate the meal she’d cooked. And he kept gazing at her, smiling and holding her hand, making her feel like she’d stepped into some kind of other dimension. A Richmond way of life so far removed from the crack-addicts flat in the East End that it was like having an out-of-body experience.

  She would have liked to have kept the lights dimmed, to hide her fear, and crept over to the couch with him straight away. But he was a person who honoured duty and routine, so he insisted on doing the washing up. He rolled his white doctor’s shirt up to the elbows and stood there rinsing everything in very hot water, until it was surgically clean. She dried up. Less perfectly. Leaving things a bit damp and not worrying about putting things in the right places in the cupboards.

  But afterwards, he led her over to the sofa. And he turned some music on but kept the volume down low, and they spent the next two hours making out like a pair of teenagers in the back of a car. There were unspoken rules. He wasn’t allowed to undo any buttons. Not hers. Not his. He didn’t try, he just seemed to know that she didn’t feel safe unless they both kept their clothes on. No need to say the words. It stayed unspoken – like the declaration of love they had made that morning. He didn’t even unlace his shoes.

  But it was wonderful to touch him – to feel his young, slim body through the crumpled fabric of his cotton shirt. The curve of his shoulders. The strength in his arms. The smooth warmth of his back. And his kisses thrilled her. Warm, tender kisses with longing invested in them. His face – less perfectly smooth than it was this morning – grazed hers as he pressed his mouth against her – again and again and again. She was almost weak from what he was doing to her: making her ache – body and soul. “Stop, Ben please…”

  “Okay,” he said, dark eyes glowing with a confidence she hadn’t seen in him before. He smiled. “One day you won’t want me to stop.”

  Independence

  The following day she went out looking for work. She wanted to feel less beholden to him – an old-fashioned word, but she thought it was the right one. Yesterday, when he’d left the twenty pound notes on the bedside table – that had made her feel awful. She knew it was silly – he was willing to look after her – but it was still… embarrassing. She was proud, she wanted to be more self-sufficient. There was no way she could ever get a really good job like Ben’s, but she could at least do a few shifts in a shop or something.

  She tried an employment agency, but they were snooty and didn’t seem to want her. She had no skills, they said. They wanted legal secretaries with years of experience. Professional women who slipped from one wonderful job to another. She had nothing much in the way of qualifications. A GCSE in home economics. A first aid certificate. There’d never really been the chance to do any kind of training. You needed exams for just about everything now. She supposed she’d have to think about packing or cleaning.

  So when she saw the card in the window of the flower shop, inviting her to ‘apply within’ she almost walked on. She could see herself reflected in the florist’s window and she wasn’t at all sure they’d want a shy eighteen-year old with clothes from the thrift shop. But Ben seemed to think she was a person worth fighting for. So she decided to go in and try.

  The manageress had a style of interviewing she’d never encountered before. She picked up a mixed bouquet – the type they keep standing in buckets by the door for executives to buy for their wives.

  The woman pointed at the flowers. “Can you name them? I’m not having anyone in here who doesn’t know a chrysant from a camellia.”

  Layla could name just about any flower, so that wasn’t hard. She looked in at the bouquet and said, “Peruvian lilies and baby’s breath – gypsophila they call it, and these ones are my favourite – snapdragons – they’ve got a Latin name too. Antirrhinum, I think, is that right?”

  “Good girl,” the manageress said.

  “I grew up near the Columbia Road Flower Market.”

  And after that the little interview went from strength to strength.

  Ten minutes later, Layla came out of the shop feeling buoyant and happy. They were going to let her try out two mornings a week for a while. And if that was okay, she’d get more hours. If not, someone else would get the chance.

  But that wouldn’t happen. She couldn’t wait to tell him. Ben, I got a job. No matter that it paid very little and it was part-time with no chance of promotion. It was a real job in a lovely place where she could look at flowers all day long and didn’t have to take her knickers off.

  * * *

  So he drove to the East End every morning to be a doctor. And she stayed in Richmond. Some days she worked in the flower shop, other days she walked in the park. They kept Rakshima, the cleaning lady. Ben said he knew Rakshima’s family needed the money, so he’d feel guilty letting her go. Layla felt guilty for keeping her, when she could so easily have cleaned the flat herself. But it was very nice to have an easy life, with lots of time for drifting round the shops and having bubble baths and applying coats of pale pink nail varnish.

  In fact, it was all so perfect that she wondered why she felt so insecure. He seemed happy. She acted happy. But all the time, there was the nagging fear that fate wouldn’t let them stay like this forever. The ever-present feeling that she ought to be looking over her shoulder.

  Some afternoons she got the train to the children’s home where Bradley was living and took him out and bought him a bar of chocolate, other days she went to the temporary foster home where Jaydee was staying. Nice people – the foster family – Jaydee was warm and well-fed and always wearing a clean Babygro. But that’s not the same as the love of your own family, Layla thought, and he often cried when she had to go.

  She learned how to cook more than just mince and spaghetti. She always tried to make him something nice, and every night after dinner, there was a session on the couch. They spent the evening kissing like two teenagers who dared not go all the way. Getting more and more turned on, and more and more frustrated.

  These days, he’d unclip her bra and cup her curves. Touching and sometimes tasting. These days, she’d unbutton his shirt, sliding shaking hands across his torso. He’d healed from the beating he’d got from the Birch boys. His skin was smooth and pale and warm, and in some lights, almost golden.

  Yesterday, for the first time he’d asked her, “Shall we take this into the bedroom?”

  Reluctant and shy, s
he’d shaken her head, but he’d kissed and pressed and promised to stop whenever she said so. Standing up, he pulled her to her feet and led her gently in there to lie on the bed with him.

  “Not so scary here, is it?”

  No. More like terrifying.

  But she’d lain there with him, feeling the warmth of his body against her. He asked her to slip the shirt off his shoulders, and she’d done as he asked. She closed her eyes, feeling the marvellous shape of him there against her. Warm, male skin. Scented and smooth. His naked chest needing to be touched. His belt buckle begging to be unbuckled.

  And then the wild fears began. His hands were Ray’s hands. Harsh and cruel where Ben’s were kind and gentle. His warm breath was Birch’s breath – scented with Cuban cigars. His kiss became the crushing, brutal kiss of a drunken punter. She saw her own name on a tart card – and an image too – Luscious Layla, sprawled on the bed, in stockings and black suspenders.

  “No!” She shoved him so hard he almost fell off the edge of the bed. And the hallucination faded.

  “Hey! You only had to ask me to stop.”

  She looked up and saw Ben’s face – confused and hurt – she’d pushed him away with such force that she’d almost put the bruises back on his chest. “Sorry!”

  Hot tears welled in her eyes. Tears of aggravation. She shook her head. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

  “Layla.” His face changed – melting into concern and compassion. “What can I do?”

  “I don’t know. Nothing. I think I just need more time.”

  He nodded. “Of course. It’ll keep.”

  But there was disappointment in his face. And she didn’t want to lose him.

  Charity Dinner

  December came. Saturday morning. Layla made her favourite breakfast for them both – pancakes and maple syrup. It would have been nice to take the tray back into the bedroom and eat them where it was cosy and warm, if she had but dared to suggest it. Sometimes she thought it might be easier in the morning, when she was mellow and relaxed. Sometimes she thought it would never seem easy. But she didn’t ask him to join her for pancakes in the bedroom. No time now, anyway, Ben was rostered on at the clinic for the Saturday morning shift. He sat at the kitchen counter nursing a cup of coffee. Looking at her like he would much rather stay at home.

  Layla stood in the kitchen, on the other side of the granite counter-top, enjoying the sight of him sitting there in his dark grey suit. He was all ready for work – except for his tie. In a minute she’d fetch it for him, when he finished his coffee. And she’d tie it for him, and hope for a kiss.

  She took his empty plate away and put it in his super-shiny sink. She ran some water onto it. She flipped the calendar over to the page for December. And saw that he had written ‘pick up suit’ diagonally in his doctor’s scrawl in the square for the first day of the month.

  “Pick up suit?” she said, and pointed to the note on the calendar. “Is that something I could do?”

  He paused for a second, like he couldn’t imagine why he’d want to pick up a suit on the 1st of December. And then he remembered. “Oh, fuck. The Cancer Society dinner.”

  She looked at him, questioningly. He didn’t often swear.

  He sighed. “I go every year. I’m kind of committed to it. It’s at the Hilton.”

  “Nice,” she said.

  But he gave a groan and put his head down on the kitchen counter in a theatrical display of despair.

  She smiled sympathetically, sorry that she’d accidentally mentioned something that filled him with a sense of dread. “So tell me where the suit is and I’ll go and pick it up.”

  He looked up and carried on explaining about the dinner. “It’s a kind of annual torture. A charity event. But lots of medical people go – important people. Future colleagues, if you know what I mean… And I have friends from North Fenland who go. Martin and… Rebecca.”

  The way he said Rebecca told her the real reason he was dreading the dinner. She must be the girl – the one who married someone else.

  “Do you have to go?” she asked, quietly. “Can’t you get out of it?”

  “Not really. The medical centre paid for the tickets and it’s a very good cause,” then he smiled. “Will you come and hold my hand?”

  She looked up, and his sense of duty and dread instantly transmitted itself to her. “What?”

  “I booked two tickets, Layla. Round about the time we started seeing each other. And then I completely forgot to ask you about it.”

  She hesitated. “Me? At a Charity Dinner? At the Hilton?”

  “Layla, I don’t want to go alone. I’ve done that several years running and it’s awful.”

  She wasn’t quite ready to say yes, yet, so instead she took a risk. “Do you mean being there alone, or seeing her?”

  He looked up, and she saw by the look in his dark eyes she was right. Just the thought of meeting Rebecca and her husband seemed to cause him pain. He sighed. “Seeing her and being alone. And her seeing that I’m still alone. And seeing her with him. Although, having said that, one year it was even worse, because that year I was with someone else. Only we were on the verge of splitting up and she saw all that too.”

  “Oh, dear.” This was maybe a bit more disclosure than Layla really needed. Some things, especially former relationships, are best left undisturbed.

  He sighed. “Becca and Martin, Becky he calls her. They’re so… irritatingly happy.”

  He looked up at the ceiling like he needed divine inspiration – or new light fittings. Or both.

  So Layla went round to his side of the bench and put her arms around him. “But we’re happy too, aren’t we?”

  He smiled at her. “Yes. It’s different now. And I’m ever so happy.” He abandoned his coffee and put his arms around her. “So you’re coming? To help me get through it?”

  “I have to, don’t I? I don’t have a choice. You came to the prison with me.”

  She watched as he gazed appreciatively at the curve of her breasts underneath the silk shirt she was wearing. It was one of his shirts – obviously. She was very glad he had a lot of shirts because she wore them all the time. She slept in them, and this silk one was great for that. He lowered his head to kiss her breasts. They were just about on eye level for him, because he was sitting and she was standing. Layla shivered as he found her nipple through the thin silk fabric of the shirt, and blushed as he sucked it and made a wet patch on the shirt.

  “Oh, Ben…”

  He stopped sucking and put his hand up to cover the wet patch on her shirt, fondling her left breast while he was there. “I’m going to get you a dress that shows these off,” he said.

  Layla wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that. “I’m glad you appreciate my finer qualities.”

  He looked up at her. “You know I do.”

  She leaned forward and kissed his forehead. “Forget her.”

  “I already have. It’s you and me from now on. Ben and Layla.”

  She rose to the challenge. “Alright. You’re on. As long as I don’t have to dance on any tables or go home with strange men, I’ll do it, I’ll go to the dinner.”

  “Great. You get the suit. It’s at the drycleaners on Richmond Road. I hope it’s still there – the suit, I mean – they’ve had it for at least three weeks.”

  “It’ll be there.”

  “And buy yourself a dress – a low-cut one – no expense spared.” He got out one of his credit cards from his trouser pocket. She took it, feeling nervous, but she nodded.

  “Don’t buy it in the charity shop, Layla.”

  She shook her head. “No. I’ll find a good one. I promise.”

  * * *

  Fiona watched Ben sign in when he arrived at work that morning and gave him her usual smile. But when he’d gone she got up, picked up two files that she had hidden in her top drawer, and went to see Jonathan Lyme, the clinic director. You won’t know what’s hit you Ben Stein. Not when this gets out.

&nb
sp; Jonathan smiled warmly when she came into the room – they’d worked together for eight years now. And their relationship was entirely professional. Just as it should be.

  “What have you got for me, Fiona? More papers to sign?”

  "Ben Stein has become romantically involved with one of his patients."

  His face changed. "What?"

  "A girl - barely eighteen. She's been a patient here for a long time. The whole family are registered here."

  Fiona sat down in the chair opposite and told him everything she knew so far. And Jonathan slumped back in his chair looking like a rugby ball had just hit him in the solar plexus. He had seen just about every problem that the population of East London could throw at him. Every injury, every addiction, every illness. But he hadn’t seen a case like this.

  “You’re saying he’s breaching medical ethics?”

  “It looks like it, doesn’t it?” Fiona proffered the files labelled Gilbert, Layla and Gilbert, Edward. “He’s dating her. And he’s been to see him in prison.”

  “Why on earth would he do that?”

  “I don’t know. But I thought it was something I ought to bring to your attention.”

  “Yes. You were quite right to do that,” he said. Though he looked like he hadn’t a clue what to do about it. “I’ll have to look into it, I suppose. But, Fiona, are you absolutely sure? Have you seen them together? This is a serious allegation. He might sue us or something, if we get this wrong.”

  She sighed. “I haven’t seen them together, no. But I’ve heard he’s got a live-in girlfriend now. I asked him her name and he was very evasive.”

  “Interesting,” said Jonathan.

  “And this morning, he picked up his tickets for the Charity Dinner. Two tickets.”