He had actually laughed. He had thought she was joking. When he became aware that she wasn’t laughing with him, he glanced over at her and saw a tear sliding down her cheek. ‘What? But why?’ His throat dried around the words and he felt his stomach contract. She was deadly serious.
Charlotte swiped at the tears with the back of her hand. ‘I need to be sure that this …’ She motioned from him to her. ‘That this is right for us. Both of us.’
Ben frowned and tried to focus on the road, although his mind was racing and he could feel his own tears threatening.
‘It’s right for me, Charlie. I’m not having any doubts. What’s brought this on?’
Charlotte had shaken her head. ‘I just … I just feel like I need some time, Ben. Ever since Dad died, I’ve been feeling so confused. And a bit rudderless. Wondering if this is it. I’m sorry.’
Ben had frowned to himself. He knew her dad’s death the year before had hit her hard but he didn’t realize how hard. Now that he thought about it, the signs were there: the faraway look she got in her eye more and more often. The sense that she wasn’t listening when he spoke. But there was something else too: the name she had started mentioning whenever she talked about work; the way her eyes danced as she regaled him with stories. He somehow felt it was connected.
They had driven the rest of the way home enveloped in a thick, dark silence, both of them immersed deep in their own thoughts. Charlotte leaped out of the car as soon as he had parked and disappeared into the flat, while Ben stayed put, still unable to digest her words. He tried to convince himself that she was just having a moment. That he would walk inside and find her waiting on the bed, laughing at how she had ‘got him’.
But as he finally let himself into the flat, he already knew that although he would find her in their bedroom, she wouldn’t be waiting for him on the bed, she would be packing.
‘Where will you go?’ He stood in the doorway, watching as she threw her clothes into two large suitcases. Not just an overnight bag. This was serious. She wasn’t planning to come back.
Charlotte ran her hand through her long, fair hair and bit her lip. ‘Lucy’s.’
Ben nodded. ‘Does she know you’re coming?’
Charlotte blinked quickly, as a flush spread up her pale, slender neck. Finally, she looked up and met Ben’s eye. ‘Yes.’
Ben felt his legs weaken. He took a deep breath and grasped the doorframe to support himself. ‘So you told her before you told me?’
Charlotte’s eyes filled with tears. ‘I just told her I was confused, Ben. She said if I ever needed some time out, she had a spare room.’
‘God.’ The feeling of betrayal seemed to squeeze the air out of Ben’s lungs. He had always thought Lucy was his biggest ally, often taking Ben’s side over her own sister’s.
‘Don’t look like that, Ben. Lucy adores you. For what it’s worth, she said that you’re one in a million and I’d be an idiot to let you go.’
Ben smiled sadly. It was a small crumb of comfort. ‘Then don’t let me go.’ It seemed so simple, so straightforward.
Charlotte hesitated, as different waves of emotion crossed her pretty, unlined face. After a moment, she seemed to make up her mind. She closed the cases and zipped them up carefully. The sound of the zips seemed to have a certain finality to it. Like a full stop at the end of a sentence. ‘I have to,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’
It had been six months since she left. How much his life had changed in that time. Here he was, living with someone new – Bella had gone home with him that first night and never really left – someone he would previously have thought was way out of his league, now expecting their first child. It made him feel dizzy to think about it. He wondered how Charlotte would react when she heard. Would she feel pleased that he had moved on with his life? Or would she feel regret that he seemed to have got over her so easily?
‘Ben?’ said Bella, as she laid her head on his chest that night.
‘Hmmm?’
‘I’d like to get married. Before the baby comes.’
Ben felt his whole body instinctively tense. He knew that having a baby was a much bigger commitment than getting married but somehow this seemed to loom so much larger. Less than a year ago, he had been planning to propose to Charlotte. Had envisaged her reaction as he asked her at sunset on their favourite beach in Portugal, her blue eyes glinting as she tearfully accepted.
Instead, he was unable to see Bella’s face in the darkness as she issued her declaration. It wasn’t a question. It was a statement. She had made her mind up and he would have no influence at all. It was going to happen. ‘Right,’ he managed.
There was a long, heavy silence and soon Bella’s breathing became regular in the way it always did when she dropped off to sleep. Ben couldn’t sleep. His mind was too preoccupied. He loved her, of that he was certain. She was sexy, clever and utterly captivating. She made his head swim and his heart dance. But for the first time, Ben thought, there was something else about her. He stared into the darkness, trying to put his finger on what it was. Eventually, just as his eyelids were beginning to droop, the words came to him. Sometimes … she scared him.
‘How’s Ben?’ Charlotte deliberately kept her eyes on her cappuccino, stirring it rhythmically, as she waited for the answer.
She had been surprised by the call from Ben’s sister, Emma, asking her to meet, sensing that there was an ulterior motive. Around them, the cramped coffee shop in Soho was beginning to fill with lunchtime customers and the noise levels were rising with them. Someone bumped the back of Charlotte’s chair, causing some of the milky coffee to spill into the saucer.
‘He’s good. Really good, actually.’
Emma’s emphasis on the word ‘really’ made Charlotte look up. ‘Great. And he’s still with …?’
‘Bella,’ Emma cut in. ‘Yes. Very much so.’
Charlotte nodded, knowing she had no right to feel anything other than pleased for him.
‘Actually,’ Emma continued. ‘I’ve got some news. He asked me to tell you.’
Charlotte felt her stomach clench in anticipation. So she had been right. There was an ulterior motive and it sounded ominous. ‘OK.’
Emma took a careful sip of her coffee, which was black and decaf. No fattening cappuccinos for her. Then she took a deep breath, before blurting out her words. ‘They’re getting married. She’s pregnant.’
Charlotte’s vision blurred momentarily and she reeled backwards slightly, grateful for the steadying resistance of the leather cushion behind her. ‘Pregnant?’ she stuttered. ‘But … it’s so quick!’
‘I know.’ Emma put her coffee cup down on the saucer slightly too hard so that some of the dark liquid sloshed over the rim. ‘We’re all a bit in shock but Ben is doing a good impression of being delighted.’
Charlotte tried to take stock of how she was feeling. She had no right to be upset. She had broken Ben’s heart and left him feeling wrung-out and confused. But the truth was, she was upset. She felt, bizarrely, like he had betrayed her. She took a sip of her cappuccino, aware that her hand shook slightly as she lifted her cup. ‘Do you not believe him then, that he’s happy about it?’
Emma raised a prettily arched eyebrow. ‘Who knows? I’m only his sister and we’re not as close as we were …’ She paused, her eyes momentarily drifting.