He paused a moment to stare out the window of the room. “By the time I started high school, they were each on their third marriage and third set of kids. I was more or less forgotten most of the time, shuttled back and forth between them, staying a week with one, a month with the other, always having to bunk in with one of my half-siblings wherever I went. All of my stuff – clothes, books, mementoes – were kept in a couple of suitcases and backpacks that I’d haul back and forth with me. It was little wonder that by the time my senior year of high school rolled around I had started keeping a calendar where I’d check off the days until I was out of school and on my own. And where I could finally have a bed of my own and a permanent place to keep my things.”
Lauren’s heart ached for the lonely, unwanted boy he had been, and she cupped his unshaven cheek in her hand tenderly. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “Sorry that it had to be that way for you.”
Ben gave a little shrug. “It wasn’t that bad. Not really. I mean, I was never abused or neglected, nothing like that. I just never seemed to belong anywhere, never felt like I was part of the family. And I never felt wanted. Not until I met you. But I’m getting ahead of myself just a little.”
She laced her fingers up with his. “Go on.”
“Reading – and then writing – became my escape from the time I was eleven or so. And I was a good writer, all of my teachers told me so, and I even won some awards for it. I knew fairly early on that’s what I wanted to do with my life – write. And to travel. And for damned sure to get away from the town I grew up in.”
Lauren nodded. “I don’t blame you in the least. Doesn’t sound like the sort of place – or home life – that you’d want to go back and visit.”
“You’ve got that right. Now, you know some of this next part already. I did a couple of years at the local community college so that I could save up enough money to transfer to Northwestern. After graduation I drifted around a lot, trying to break in with a travel publication since that’s what I’d decided I really wanted to write about. I’d sell an article now and again, pick up odd jobs along the way in order to pay the bills. And then I got the inspiration to write an article about traveling Highway One in California. I was making my way down the coast, staying a night here, a night there. And then I reached Big Sur and my whole life was changed forever in the matter of a minute.”
Ben’s smile made her heart ache with its poignancy, and she shivered a bit in reaction as he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
“Meeting you for the first time,” he recalled with a chuckle, “was like getting hit square in the chest with a thunderbolt. And when I touched you for the first time it felt as though I had a lightning rod beneath my fingertips. You were so full of life, Lauren, so happy and carefree. I’d never met anyone like you before, had never imagined a girl like you really existed. And those days I had with you in Big Sur were far and away the absolute best ones of my life. The happiest I’ve ever been. And,” he added as he ran a finger over her lips, “the only time in my life I ever came close to being in love.”
Tears began to pool in her eyes, and she felt her chin wobble just a bit. “Then why?” she whispered sadly. “Why? You don’t know how many times I’ve asked myself that question, Ben, or all the different reasons I dreamed up as to why you’d want to leave me. I knew you were happy there, knew that no one could fake those sort of feelings.”
He used his thumb to gently wipe away the lone tear that had begun to trickle down her cheek. “I wouldn’t have begun to know how to fake it,” he assured her. “And I sure as hell never faked anything with you. Being with you in Big Sur was the most real and true thing that I’ve ever felt. And the decision to leave that morning was without a doubt the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life. I never, ever want to have to make a choice like that again.”
Lauren took his hand in hers, squeezing it tight. “So why did you? Why did you break my heart, you rotten bastard?”
Ben laughed in spite of himself. “I didn’t want to leave. Believe me, even while I was riding away all I could think of was turning that motorcycle around and heading back to you. Back to that cabin that felt more like home to me than anywhere else I’d ever lived. And back to you, who made me feel happier and more alive than anything else I’d ever known. But I kept on going and didn’t let myself look back because I knew I could never be enough for you. And I couldn’t bear to think of what would happen to you – to us – when you eventually realized that.”
She shook her head. “I don’t get it. You were everything I could ever want. I know I never told you back then – maybe I should have, considering what happened – but I was crazy in love with you, Ben. Still am. Never stopped. Not even when I was cursing you in three different languages.”
His laugh this time was genuine. “Now that I have no trouble envisioning. God, how I loved that about you! How honest you were, how much you felt, how you never held anything back. You were the brightest, most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, and the fear that I’d be the one responsible for dimming all that light was what made me run from you. I didn’t want to ruin your life, Lauren. The life that you were always meant to live. A life that I just couldn’t give you back then.”
“What life?” whispered Lauren brokenly. She felt tears fill her eyes again, but she was too dazed by what she was hearing now to brush them away. “A life without you? Why would I have ever wanted that?”
“Because I had nothing to offer you back then, sweetheart,” he told her earnestly. “God, how can you forget so easily? Everything I owned in the word – including a piece of crap camera, as some smart-ass girl once called it – I was carrying with me on my equally crappy motorcycle. I had no place to live, didn’t own a single piece of furniture, had no real job, barely enough money in my checking account to pay my bills. Whereas you - ” his voice trailed off as he shook his head.
Lauren frowned. “Whereas I – what?”
Ben heaved a sigh. “You were just about the most down to earth, unpretentious person I’d ever met. But that didn’t mean you weren’t used to having nice things, hadn’t grown up with a certain standard of living. I knew your parents had money – a lot of it – knew that just the land both of their houses was built on was worth a fortune. And I figured they wouldn’t be too happy if their precious daughter brought someone like me home for dinner. I could just imagine what they would have thought – especially your father.”
Her gaze narrowed dangerously as she gave him a ferocious scowl. “My parents would have welcomed you with open arms,” she told him sternly. “Because that’s the sort of people they are. Yes, they have money, money that they’ve both worked very hard for. But they’re also kind and generous and just about the most open-minded people I know. They also trust my judgment implicitly. And if I had brought you home to meet them, told them you were the man I loved – the only man for me – then they wouldn’t have questioned me for one second. And they sure as hell wouldn’t have cared how much money you did or didn’t have.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t know that at the time, did I? All I could see was this world you’d grown up in – a world so different from mine it might as well have been on another planet. You’d been loved and cherished and protected, while I’d never once known any of those things. And – God – you were twenty years old, Lauren. Twenty. You’d seen nothing of the world yet, had never had to fend for yourself or make tough decisions. I knew you had all these grand plans to become a professional photographer, to see the world, have all these amazing adventures.” He paused, closing his eyes for a moment before finishing his thoughts. “And I couldn’t bear the thought of holding you back, of keeping you from realizing those dreams. Because I knew how talented you were, how capable of achieving everything you’d ever wanted to do. And I wouldn’t let myself be the one who prevented you from doing all that. Or worse, to one day blame me for ruining your life because I held you back.”