Happier Than She's Ever Been...

by Menna Van Praag

  Ben sat at the far end of the bar. He hated bars. They were loud and lascivious and, while they no longer stank of smoke, he swore he could always smell the faintest whiff of desperation and despair hanging in the air whenever he was dragged into one. But this time Ben didn’t care. The fight with May had been so bad that a black coffee at Alice’s café just wouldn’t cut it now. He’d ordered a scotch neat and was currently coughing his way through it.

  Ben didn’t notice her at first, the tall thin blonde sitting at the other end of the bar. He didn’t notice anyone or anything, except the bottom of his glass. He was going to lose May; he knew it. It was over. She would go to England and she wouldn’t come back. She’d probably meet some rich, successful author at an event and shack up with him. After all, why wouldn’t she? Now she was rich and successful herself and clearly fed up with him, what was keeping her here?

  Ben sighed, gulped down the last of his scotch and ordered another. The blonde smiled at him, trying to catch his eye. Ben nodded slightly, then returned to his drink. The blonde, interpreting the nod as an invitation instead a dismissal, stepped off her stool and strode across to him. She stuck her thin arm in front of Ben’s glass so he had to look up, then flashed him a perfect set of bright white teeth and stroked his shoulder.

  ‘Is this seat taken?’ she asked, sliding into it before he could say anything. ‘I’m Nina, by the way. It’s lovely to meet ya.’ She turned to the barman, slowly wrapping her long manicured fingers around the stem of her cocktail glass. ‘Raspberry cosmo again, Ryan, thank you, darlin’.’

  ‘I’m not looking for company, Mina,’ Ben said without looking up. ‘I’m married. Well, actually I’m not, but I damn well should be.’

  ‘It’s Nina,’ she drawled, ‘and what on earth is that supposed to mean?’

  Ben shrugged.

  ‘So you married or not?’ Nina persisted. ‘’Cause you ain’t wearing a ring.’

  ‘I am in my heart. But no, I’m not married,’ Ben admitted, ‘not technically.’

  Nina threw her head back and laughed, loud and long, as though he’d said something absolutely hilarious. ‘Well, if you ain’t yanking my chain, ’cause that’s the first time I ever heard a man say that. Usually it’s the other way round.’ She slid her hand onto Ben’s thigh. ‘In which case y’all won’t mind my doing this.’

  ‘Yes,’ Ben said firmly and removing her hand, ‘I’m afraid I do. Only my… May can touch me like that.’

  ‘Aw, that’s a shame. Now, what d’ya say your name was, sweetie?’

  ‘I didn’t.’ Ben downed his scotch in one gulp and then signalled for another.

  ‘No need fer names anyway,’ Nina said, giving Ben a wink. ‘Always better that way.’

  Ben sighed, ignored her and kept drinking. If only May was with him. If only she wasn’t about to leave and take his heart with her. What had gone so wrong between them? He couldn’t understand. What had he done? What had he not done? Why hadn’t he been able to save their relationship? Ben put his head between his hands and groaned. His eyes were glazing over; his memory was beginning to fade, his senses starting to numb. That was good. He ordered another drink.

  The next time Nina slipped her hand onto his thigh Ben didn’t move it off. If he was honest, it felt good to experience a little affection, a little comfort after all he’d been through. He couldn’t remember the last time he and May had made love. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d looked at him the way she’d used to. He would give anything, absolutely anything, to have that back. But he knew he couldn’t. So he’d have to make do with what he had right now. Compared to the love of his life, the woman sitting next to him was small compensation, but at least she soothed his broken spirit just a little bit. And, after all Ben had been through in the past year, his alcohol-addled brain decided he surely deserved that much.

  He turned to Nina. ‘My girlfriend is leaving me.’

  ‘Aw, I’m sorry, darlin’,’ Nina purred, though she didn’t seem sorry at all.

  ‘I don’t know…’ Ben’s mind was starting to spin as he tried to find the right words. ‘I don’t know what went wrong, what I did so wrong.’

  ‘Petal,’ Nina said softly, sliding her hand further up his thigh, ‘love is like this: if someone wants ya, ya can’t do it wrong enough to put ’em off, but if they don’t, then ya can’t do it right enough to convince ’em to stay. Trust me, I’ve tried it both ways, been through a lot of men in the process, but that’s the truth of it, believe me.’

  And as Ben caught the lost look in her eye, he did. It made sense. Here he was twisting himself into knots, hurting his brain and breaking his heart, to try to get May to love him again. But it was no use. He couldn’t do it right enough. She didn’t want him any more; that much was clear. And Ben could barely breathe from the pain of accepting it.

  ‘I know you’re hurtin’, sweetie.’ Nina leant close to whisper into Ben’s ear. The heat of her breath brushed his skin and he shivered. ‘But I know just how to take that pain away. It’s my special gift, my magic…’

  Ben let his gaze drop down to the V-neck of her low-cut dress, to the dip between her breasts. When Ben first met May he’d known that was it as far as he and other women were concerned. When they’d first made love, he knew he never wanted to see another woman naked. And that hadn’t changed. Even now, he was so uninterested in this woman that he could barely be bothered to respond.

  But the despair and desperation he’d felt in the air when he’d walked into the bar had now sunk deep into his skin and he’d do anything to shift it. This woman was like alcohol or cocaine. She was offering him a drug that would lift him up out of his pit. And, with five shots of whisky firing through his blood and a bad case of unrequited love weighing down his heart, Ben didn’t see why he shouldn’t take it.

  When Ben crept back into his flat at half past three that morning, May was fast asleep and surrounded by suitcases. He switched on a table light and tiptoed over to watch while she slept for what he figured was probably the last time. He leant forward, intending to kiss May’s forehead, to pretend that he’d get to spend the rest of his life loving her, to forget everything that had happened since he’d walked out. But then another wave of nausea passed through him, so he staggered towards the sofa, sat down and promptly passed out.

  Ben woke early to May clattering around in the kitchen. He groaned, slowly opening his eyes and squinting in the sunshine. The bright light stung so he shut his eyes again. A few minutes later Ben tried to sit up, but his head throbbed and spun, and he was hit by another wave of nausea.

  ‘May,’ he said weakly.

  ‘What?’ she called, her voice still frosty, though she’d been loud on purpose, hoping to wake him so they might make up without her having to make the first move.

  ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Ten past six. I’ve got half an hour. The limo driver’s already waiting outside with my stuff. I didn’t know whether or not to wake you,’ May lied, desperately hoping that Ben still loved her but too scared to ask, desperately hoping that they could reconcile before she left but too scared to beg. ‘You seemed pretty out of it.’

  Ben’s stomach twisted so tightly he thought he’d throw up right there. But he knew this time the sickness had nothing to do with alcohol. She was going to leave him without saying goodbye. She really didn’t love him any more. With great difficulty Ben pulled himself off the sofa and walked into the kitchen. He slid onto a stool next to the coffee machine.

  ‘Want some?’ May picked up a cup.

  Ben shook his head.

  ‘I’ll call you tonight, from the hotel, or whenever I can, okay?’ Her tone was dismissive, and for Ben, having no idea how she really felt, it was as though each word cut into his skin. ‘But I don’t know what they’ve got planned for me when I get there,’ May continued.

  When he looked at her Ben felt as though he was seeing May from a thousand miles away, from beneath the sea or through thick fog. Her voice was col
d and crisp, her body stiff, her eyes empty, as though her soul had left ahead of her and was already halfway across the ocean.

  ‘You’ve already gone,’ Ben said. ‘You left a long time ago.’

  May bit her lip. Having forgotten what Rose had said, she still thought true love should be easy, but her heart was hurting as though it was about to crack open in her chest. She could hardly bear it. Suddenly May just wanted the pain to stop. She wanted to run away until it was all better and then she’d come back. She blinked back tears and glanced towards the door. Ben watched her, seeing in her eyes how much she wanted to leave. And so he decided to say the thing that would let her off the hook.

  ‘May,’ Ben said, unable to look her in the eye. ‘Last night I… I slept with someone else.’

  For several moments time slowed down as it had when her mother had died, and May just stared at him. She had no words. There were no words. She looked at Ben, waiting for him to take it back, to undo it, to say it wasn’t true. But he said nothing. He gazed at her, tears in his eyes. She waited a moment longer. Then she ran. And Ben, his heart now broken in two, watched her go.

  DENIAL

  May didn’t call Ben when she reached the hotel as she’d promised to do. Instead she sat on the bed and stared out of the window until, at some point in the early hours of the morning, she finally fell asleep. And when she woke up her head ached as though she hadn’t slept at all. She glanced at the alarm clock on the bedside table. She’d been unconscious for twelve hours. Afternoon sunlight streamed in through the windows: floor-to-ceiling glass with long cream silk curtains still pulled back. May blinked up at the tasteful glass chandelier, then glanced around the rest of the room: plush, deep pile carpets, flowered silk-upholstered sofa, white dressing table and chairs, a writing desk that stood by another window that overlooked Hyde Park. The hotel was exquisite, expensive – swanky, that’s what Ben would have called it.

  May rubbed her temples. Slowly she got up and walked across the carpet to the bathroom: marble tiles, heated floors, a bathtub that would fit a family of four. She stood in front of the mirror, pulled her mess of tangled hair away from her face and gazed into her own shining eyes: the colour of moss after rain. She swallowed hard, trying to blink back tears and practise a fake smile, wide and bright, so no one would see that her heart was broken inside her chest.

  That evening her prestigious London publishers took her out to dinner. She arrived twenty minutes early, surrendered her coat, then sat down at the empty table for five. She ordered a bottle of water and gingerly fingered the silver cutlery. She watched the waiters gliding between the tables with trays and plates held elegantly aloft as though they were performers in an intricate modern dance routine.

  May glanced around at the impeccably dressed people populating the booths close to her. She sat up a little straighter. Only a few metres away sat the star of a film she’d watched on the plane: in the flesh, actually eating real food with a knife and fork. Next to him was someone else she recognised, though it took May a few minutes to place her. It was Caitlyn Walker. A bestselling author: tall, thin, blonde, beautiful… an American writer who’d had seven of her books turned into multi-million-dollar films, every one of which was a box-office smash. Little did May know that Ms Walker was far more lost even than May, suffering from a broken heart, a battered spirit, a wounded soul, and writer’s block.

  On the surface at least, the evening went wonderfully. May’s publishers loved her, loved the book and were very excited about the high-octane itinerary they’d lined up for the coming month. Almost every hour was accounted for, with only a half-day off on Sundays. They’d booked her appearances on every chat show, daytime and evening, fluffy and cultural. They’d appointed interviews in newspapers – tabloids and broadsheets – and magazines. They’d arranged advance book readings around London, followed by a nationwide tour once the book came out. It was BIG. And it was only the beginning.

  When May finally returned to the hotel, it was long past midnight and her head was spinning so much she had to hold onto the wall while opening the door to her room. She walked over to the sofa and sat back with a sigh, still dizzy and staring up at the ceiling, breathing deeply, trying to steady herself, trying to figure out what she was feeling. And then, slowly, she knew. Right now, finally alone again, she didn’t feel happy or excited or scared or sad. She was numb; she felt nothing, absolutely nothing at all, which was the worst thing of all. Just as Lily had warned, she’d lost her heart by focusing on success instead of self-fulfilment, and with it the love of her life.

  ‘That’s quite a story,’ the interviewer gushed. ‘You must feel pretty damn proud of yourself, what with all you’ve achieved?’

  May was sitting on the sofa of her Hyde Park hotel room with a tabloid journalist. They’d done the photo shoot earlier that day and it had been a little risqué. She knew Ben wouldn’t have approved. But of course, sadly, it didn’t matter what he thought any more.

  ‘I don’t know, I suppose I feel, well…’

  ‘So, what’ll the headline be?’ the journalist mused, biting his pencil. ‘From penniless waitress to international writer –’

  ‘Well, I wasn’t really a waitress. I owned the café.’

  ‘Okay,’ he considered, ‘from baker to bestseller –’

  ‘Well, actually I wasn’t –’

  ‘Yep, that’s not bad. ’Course we need to sex it up a little, but I’m sure the editor’ll take care of that, smarmy git. So,’ he said, turning back to her, ‘how do you feel, now you’ve done everything you’ve ever dreamed of ?’

  It was an easy question, with an easy answer. May opened her mouth, waiting for all the clichés about living a fairy-tale life to trip off her tongue. But nothing came out. She was silent.

  Surprised to be still waiting, the journalist prompted her. ‘Stupid question I suppose. So then, is there anything left, anything else you still want to achieve, or would you say you have it all?’

  What else did she want? May pondered this. Well, to go back in time and make different choices. To have her life back, her lovely little life before she lost her heart and all sense of perspective. To know unconditional love again. To have joy in her heart and peace in her soul. To be a good person again, a worthwhile person, a person who brings light to other people’s lives. To remember why she promoted the book in the first place. And to feel something. Anything at all.

  ‘No, nothing else,’ May answered, smiling. ‘I have everything I’ve ever wanted.’

  ‘Yeah?’ The journalist laughed. ‘And everything every other bugger in the world wants too!’

  ‘Yes.’ May nodded. ‘Yes, I’m very lucky, very lucky indeed.’

  It was May’s first half-day off. The first morning she hadn’t crawled out of bed at the crack of dawn, the first time she’d had more than a minute to herself. And now it was almost midday and she hadn’t got out of bed at all. She’d turned the television on and off again numerous times, tried reading the papers, but nothing could hold her attention. Every few seconds she glanced at the telephone by the bed. A soft voice inside her heart whispered to her, telling her to call Ben. And her cousin, Faith. Now May knew why she was so scared to call Ben, but didn’t really understand why she was putting off calling her favourite cousin. Faith would be rather hurt if she knew. May told herself she’d been meaning to every day and couldn’t understand why she kept putting it off. Sometimes, when she’d escaped the media madness for a moment or two and was walking through the park, or had stopped to listen to a street musician, or given a homeless person a ten-pound note – since meeting Harry she’d sought them out – May thought of Faith and her heart ached from missing her. But she was nervous too. Probably because she knew that Faith would say it was all her fault that everything had gone wrong. And she didn’t want to hear that because she knew it was.

  Another week passed in the blink of an eye. The month was almost up and May still hadn’t called Faith or Ben. But most of the time she didn’t
have to think about it or what to do next because every decision was made for her. And that, at least, was a blessing.

  Now she sat in the back of a taxi, speeding towards her very first UK book signing. It was being held in a famous bookshop on Oxford Street, the name of which had momentarily escaped her, the importance of which had not. It was an incredibly prestigious location to have as the first stop on her book tour and, as such, she should have been feeling extremely excited and certainly very proud. But May felt neither of these things; she didn’t even feel nervous, just numb. As usual.

  As the taxi swept up to the venue, May was surprised to see the queue of customers snaking out of the bookshop and down the street. And she was even more surprised when they clapped and cheered as she walked inside. But the biggest surprise of all was saved for when May sat at the table and looked up to see the first person waiting for her, book in hand and grinning from ear to ear.

  Jake.

  She blinked at him, unable to believe it. Even looking straight at him: tall and broad, blond hair and blue eyes… Absolutely completely and utterly gorgeous – and he still knew it. The man who had adored her for a few brief blissful months, then left her six months after she’d become needy and clingy and ever-so-slightly obsessed. The man for whom she had given up her sense of self, the reason she had vowed never to do it again. Indeed the man who was a major reason why she’d screwed things up so spectacularly with Ben.

  May had fantasised about this moment for years. Since the day he’d walked out, since she’d self-published her book, she dreamt that one day it might become a bestseller and Jake would see it in a window.

  He would read it and realise he’d made a hideous, horrible mistake. He’d see how much everyone else adored and admired her, and he’d come running. Just as she still wished her father would.

  And now here he was, standing three feet in front of her. She stared at him. He stepped forward, holding her book, smiling the dazzling smile that had always made her melt. In the next few seconds the last few months of their relationship flashed through her mind: the nights when she’d crept out of bed, reading his phone messages in the dark, finding nothing but new depths of self-loathing and despair she never imagined she’d reach. The days she’d pursued him, calling far too often, trying to spice things up, to delve deeper into him, chasing him – the more he pulled away until he started being cruel. Staying close to him no matter what he did or how much it hurt. Until finally, he left her.