Heart of Glass (13 page)

Stumbling between the cars
and onto the muddy grass, I cursed the velvet dress that had made
me look so ravishing only hours before. The train, dragging along
behind me, was a hindrance and my dainty shoes were clogging with
mud. My Romeo had emerged from the shadows, but there was nothing
romantic about it.

Stopping behind a tree, I
fought to gain control of my emotions. It had been easy to convince
myself I didn’t love Ben when he was no longer around. I heaved
uncontrollably, sinking into the wet grass, collapsing with my head
against the rough bark of the trunk.

In an instant, Ben was
there, next to me. His arms were around me; soothing me, enveloping
me in his love. “It’s alright. Please don’t cry, Bella.
”

“
Fuck off!”

He didn’t let go. Instead,
he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and he handed it to
me.

I sobbed louder.

“
What’re you doing here?” I
repeated.

“
I wanted to see
you.”

“
Oh, get real, Ben. You had
your tongue so far down that girl’s throat you were nearly in
China.”

“
I wasn’t kissing her. We
were talking about the play. Her brother was in it and I said I
came to see you. It’s taken me months to work up the courage to
come back and then I saw you cuddled up with your boyfriend, in
your matching outfits. You looked so happy.”

“
Don’t change the subject.
You were kissing her.”

Ben was exasperated. “I
wasn’t. I was standing out there trying to decide what to do. She
came out and we sort of fell into talking. She was laughing about
how stupid her brother looked in tights. Something about chicken
legs, I think.”

“
You weren’t kissing
her?”

“
No, I was going to leave.
I thought you didn’t love me anymore. I didn’t want to spoil your
big night.”

Oh good, I thought. Now he
was playing the ‘love’ card. Typical.

“
But I’m not supposed to
love you, remember?”

We sat opposite each other
under the tree, unaware that the grass was wet and cold and that
the car park was almost deserted, so close in proximity, there was
barely even air between us.

“
You look pretty hot in
that dress, by the way,” he remarked as his grin fell to my chest,
which had almost turned blue with cold.

“
Your flattery doesn’t work
with me anymore, Ben.” Not when I was trying to hate him
anyway.

“
I wished it was me up
there on the stage, kissing you.”

I pressed my lips together.
“Maybe you should have considered that before you had sex with
Lucy.”

He slammed his palm into the
tree. “How many times do you want me to apologise?”

“
I waited for you to come
back, you know, but you didn’t. After all your
promises…”

Gingerly, his hands reached
into my lap, until our fingers touched. The attraction was as
strong as ever. I could feel it sending sparks between us, igniting
the fire that had lay dormant for months.

“
I wanted to, but I didn’t
think it was right, not so soon after the baby… I made a mistake,
but I’m here now.”

“
You don’t know how many
times I dreamt about this day, Ben. But it’s too late, I’m with
Andrew, I can’t just dump him.”

His face leant towards mine.
“Why? Are you in love with him?”

I wanted to tell him to mind
his business but his lips were almost touching mine and my head was
whirling. Why did he want me now? Why did I want him to throw me
into the wet grass and kiss me?

“
No.”

“
Then come back to me.
There’s nothing stopping us from being together now.”

“
No.”

“
You don’t mean it,” he
laughed, as he grabbed my shoulders and pulled me to him, kissing
me, giving me no chance to refuse. I could feel my body responding.
He was right, I didn’t mean it. One kiss and I was having a major
sexual meltdown.

I pushed him against the
tree. “No, Ben. Can’t you see it’s not meant to be?”

Then Andrew stepped out of
the shadows. Even in the dark, I could see the tension in his face.
“If I were you, I’d leave her alone.”  He stopped beside me,
his hand on my forearm. “You okay, Bella?”

“
Of course she’s okay. I’d
never do anything to hurt her.”

Andrew drew himself tall,
trying for all the world to look threatening while wearing tights
and a codpiece, but even with his height advantage, it wasn’t an
easy task.

“
That’s odd, ‘cause that’s
not the way I’ve heard the story. You are Ben, right?”

“
Yeah.  And you must
be Romeo. Now, if you’ll give us a minute, Bella and I have a
couple of things to discuss.”

“
I don’t think that’s a
good idea.  You’ve upset her.”

“
I haven’t done anything to
her.”

“
Then I reckon you should
leave.  Bella doesn’t want to see you.”

“
Don’t you think that’s up
to her?”

Ben stood firm. I could see
his brow lower and his hands clenching in and out as if he was
trying to control himself. His eyes glowered as he dared Andrew to
fight.

Raising his fist, Andrew
swung once, twice. Ben ducked. But not before he’d landed a good
one into Andrew’s ribs. What the hell were they doing? This was
ridiculous.

“
Please Andrew; Ben didn’t
do anything to me. Let’s go.” Taking his arm, I pulled him
aside.

He looked at me, hesitating.
“Are you sure…”

“
I’m positive. Come
on.”

As we walked away, I heard
Ben call, “Bella!”

Turning my head to face him,
I saw his face, begging me to return. “NO, Ben. God, can you just
leave it. Please.”

***

A couple of days later, as
we got off the bus, I tried to share my thoughts with Prue. It was
a silly idea, she always got so dramatic about
everything.

“
Oh my God, how exciting!”
she squealed, throwing her arms into the air and sending a hundred
dollars of Levi Strauss to a fate worse than death in the gutter.
“I wish I’d seen it. Fancy having two guys fighting over
you!”

“
It’s not a joke. Ben
looked like he was going to murder Andrew.”

“
Were you
scared?”

“
No. I was surprisingly
calm, well, on the outside anyway.”

“
So, what happened
next?”

“
Well, I sort of stopped
them fighting and then Andrew and I left. But you should have seen
Ben, he looked so sad; I almost wanted to give in.” I sighed, the
memory of Ben’s face, bittersweet, imprinted in my mind.

“
Well, why didn’t you, you
dope? You two are meant to be together.”

For the rest of the block,
neither of us said a thing but we were on the same train of thought
and it was hollering down the track to loneliness. I was pathetic.
I was scared. And worst of all, I loved Ben more than I ever
had.

At last, Prue broke the
silence. “I think you’re scared of getting hurt.”

“
I think so
too.”

We’d rounded the corner into
my street, where Ben sat waiting on the bonnet of his car. “Your
mother told me you were out. I’ve been waiting a long
time.”

Prue looked like she’d seen
a ghost, I’d never seen her move so fast. “I’ll just leave you to
it, shall I?”

I struggled to stay calm.
Once again, Ben had shown up and I was tingling all over. “Aren’t
you meant to be catching a plane or something?”

“
I thought we might be able
to have a conversation without lover boy around.”

“
I can’t talk now, Ben.
Prue’s waiting and she doesn’t like anything to come between her
and afternoon tea.”

I pushed past him and walked
down the drive to where Prue sat on my front porch. He followed,
grabbing my elbow and spinning me towards him. “Don’t go inside. We
need to talk.”

Prue went inside and closed
the front door behind her. I sat down on the step, determined not
to give, staring sulkily out to the garden. How dare he come back
and demand my heart. What right did he have?

“
Look at me,
Bella.”

How could I? If I looked I
would fall. “What do you want?”

“
I want you.” Simple as
that, no preamble, no apology.

“
But I’m with
Andrew.”

He leant over and, for the
second time in as many days, pulled me into his arms, kissing me
without remorse. My lips burnt beneath his and as he thrust his
tongue into my mouth, I fell into the pit of desire. Temptation
could never feel as sweet. As his lips left mine, he took my senses
with them.

“
Tell me you don’t love me
and I’ll leave,” he said.

I couldn’t. It would have
been a lie.

“
Come back to
me.”

“
But long distance romances
never work.” What was I saying? It wasn’t the long distance thing.
It was the whole relationship scenario. I just wasn’t good at it.
In fact, I stunk.

“
We’ll make it work. I need
you.” His hands were on my shoulders and his lips were against my
neck and I wanted him to touch me, to fondle and caress. Oh, I
wanted so much more.

“
I’ll never see
you.”

“
You can fly down in the
holidays. I’ll pay. Or I’ll come to you; we’ll work it out somehow.
Please say yes.” His enthusiasm was contagious. His smile was
infectious. I could feel myself weakening.

“
Yes.”

Once again, Ben had charmed
his way back into my life. David Cassidy was a prophet.

Chapter 11

MOONDANCE

When you come my heart will
be waiting

to make sure that you’re
never alone

there and then all my
dreams will come true dear

there and then I will make
you my own

Van Morrison

The heat of the summer of
1981 was oppressive. I’ve never been into sweat and beads of the
stuff dripped down my body and stained my metallic bikini bottoms
on a daily basis. The only relief was to lie in the pool listening
to my new man, Van Morrison. Somewhere, in the depths of the stereo
cabinet, hiding amongst the alphabetised and dusty collection that
my parents never played, I came across some old albums with songs I
knew, so I got them out and made a mix-tape of all my
favourites.

After two weeks of holidays,
I was so bored I considered starting on the English reading list
for Year 12. Ben was in Melbourne. Prue and Tim had gone away with
their parents for the Summer and Jen had a part time job sweeping
up hair at the beauty salon on the corner. She didn’t want to go
out, preferring to stay at home and pine for Tim when she wasn’t
working. Lucy and I hadn’t spoken since she’d found out about Ben
and I being back together and I didn’t think we would ever speak
again. I was all alone.

But even though I was soggy
with boredom I didn’t care, for there were only two days to go
until the summer became worth living. Mum and Dad had invited Ben
to come on our family holiday, while he was on a break. I suppose
they were trying to make me happy or maybe they wanted to keep an
eye on me but I didn’t care about the reason. Ben and I could spend
the rest of the summer at the beach, swimming, surfing and kissing.
I couldn’t wait to see him and hold him.

We’d been spending our
summers in Cuttlefish Bay for as long as I could remember. Us kids
had grown up together there and the adults had spent many happy
hours around the campfire at night. At Cuttlefish Bay, I wasn’t
Annabelle the unsure flat-chested teenager; I was Bella the surfie
chick. At Cuttlefish Bay, the other kids thought I was hip because
I was an individual, not a clone of my peers. I surfed with my
brother and fished off the rocks with Dad. I invented new ways to
bake campfire potatoes. I went for days without a shower, bathing
only in the river, wore beads in my hair and painted my nails in
colourful stripes. I was no longer invisible, I was
cool.

On the morning Ben arrived,
I played tour guide. I was excited about sharing a part of my life
with him.

“
You’re not the same girl
here as you are in the city,” he said, as we sat side by side on
the cliff, looking out to the ocean. He picked up my hand and
examined my nails, which on that day were pink, blue and green
polished stripes. “You look so different, not my sweet baby at
all.”

“
I hope it’s a good
change.”

“
You look like a woman,” he
whispered.

Jumping up, I grabbed his
hand, “Come on, I want to show you the creek, it has a great
swimming hole. It’s filled to the brim this year and there’ll be no
one around. Get your stuff and I’ll pack us some lunch.”

Before long, we were lying
on the rocks surrounded by a circle of tall eucalypts, standing
silent without the breeze to shake their leaves. The sun beat down
on us as we lay, towels spread close.