Another Way to Fall (20 page)

When she opened her eyes, the real world came crashing back into her consciousness. The security she had felt was as illusory as the world her mind was still trying to construct amidst the windswept ruins she and Ben had sought refuge in. The only warmth she felt now was from Ben’s lips. He was kissing her but as her body became paralysed by shock, he pulled away, concern etched painfully on his face.

Emma could still sense the cottage walls around her, the dampness of the derelict building and then the warmth of the family home that had taken its place. Currents of confusion skittered across her brain and it took long painful seconds for her to make sense of it all. Her previous seizures had left only vague impressions of the world she had created but this time the images circled her like predatory ghosts. She took a breath. Her lungs felt ready to implode as fear gripped her heart.

‘Emma, what’s happened? Are you alright?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said, shaking her head to force away the remnants of her alternate reality from her mind. It wouldn’t release her and she still couldn’t trust her own senses; nothing she felt or saw could be relied upon. She wasn’t even sure if Ben had really kissed her. Had he actually said he loved her?

Instinctively, she pulled away from him and barely noticed the foil sheet being snapped up by the storm raging all around. She started to run, heading back the way they had come as if her life depended on it. She slipped and slid down the first slopes on her bottom, her walking stick trailing behind her. She could hear Ben chasing after her, calling her name but she wouldn’t stop even as he appeared next to her.

‘Slow down, Emma, please,’ he begged her. ‘You’re going to hurt yourself.’

Emma stopped as Ben caught hold of her arm. She was sitting in the mud but didn’t turn towards him. ‘I’m scared, Ben,’ she told him with a pitiful sob. ‘I’m so scared. My mind’s playing tricks on me and what happened up there was like nothing I’ve experienced before.’

‘What did happen? Was it me?’

Emma shook her head and immediately regretted it as stars appeared in front of her eyes. ‘I had a seizure, Ben. A little reminder that the monster in my head is alive and kicking.’

‘I’m sorry, Emma. I shouldn’t have brought you here, it was a stupid, stupid idea. I wouldn’t rest until I told you exactly how I felt.’

Emma turned to him, searching out for a friendly face to anchor her. ‘You did tell me that you loved me, didn’t you?’

Ben nodded gently. Rain was trickling down his face in tiny rivers but at least there were no tears. Emma didn’t want to make him cry, not ever. She tried to smile but she couldn’t when the words she was about to speak were already breaking her heart. ‘The Emma in my story would make you happy, but I can’t. For every ounce of love I can give you, you’ll receive a pound of pain.’

‘Do you love me?’ he asked.

Emma felt his arm slip around her waist and her mind began to pull her back to the cottage on the hill. ‘I can’t trust myself to know how to feel,’ she said, aware that there was a perverse truth in her white lie – even their first kiss had been snagged between two worlds. ‘It’s as if what I’m writing is coming to life around me but it can’t and it won’t. I’m not the Emma in my story and I can’t have what she has.’

‘Why not?’ Ben said. ‘You’re writing about all of those lost opportunities but not all of them have to be missed. The Emma you’re writing about is still you.’

Emma closed her eyes as she tried to rein in the torrent of emotions building inside her. She wiped at her running nose and imagined what a sight she must look. Her nose and eyes would be red, her makeup running down her face. ‘You couldn’t be more wrong,’ she sniffed. ‘It’s the Emma in my book that has more substance, I’m the shadow of the woman I was meant to be.’

‘You feel real to me,’ Ben said as he lifted his hand to her face but Emma knocked it away angrily.

‘I don’t want to hurt you,’ she told him fiercely. ‘I won’t hurt you.’

Emma stumbled to her feet and continued her descent. Her head felt hazy, the left side of her body tingled but she refused to give in and stumbled down the steep slopes. Ben caught up to her again but rather than stop her this time, he helped her as much as he could without saying a word.

The rain started to ease as they reached the forest layer but the air was still thick with mist, partly obscuring her view. Emma reluctantly acknowledged that she was running out of energy and slowed her pace so she could catch her breath.

She chanced a look at Ben as they stomped along the spongy forest floor. His head was down and a frown furrowed his brow. When he caught her looking at him, his features softened. ‘I think you need to take a rest. How about your usual table, madam,’ he said with a weak smile, pointing to the log she had been sitting on earlier.

Emma sank gratefully onto the fallen log and Ben sat beside her, his head lowered. ‘I’m sorry, Emma. If today is anything to go by, then you’re better off without me.’

Emma turned to him. A sigh escaped and took with it some of the terror that had accompanied her flight down the slopes. She hadn’t wanted to hurt him but she already had. Emma lifted her hand nervously to his face, turning his head so that he was looking directly at her. ‘There are plenty of uncertainties in my life but if I’m certain of one thing, it’s that I wouldn’t be better off without you. I’m tired and I’m scared and I still can’t quite trust my senses but whether I’m stumbling through this world or the one in my imagination, my feelings for you are the same. I think I love you, too.’

‘Think?’ Ben asked. His voice was hoarse.

‘I love you,’ she said, ‘but I still don’t want to hurt you. And if you insist on being a part of my life then I will hurt you.’

‘I know, but let me worry about that.’ His voice was no more than a whisper and his lips trembled.

Emma let her thumb sweep over his cheek, where she imagined the trace of tears yet to fall. Instinctively, he moved closer to her and slowly their lips touched. This time she was fully aware of what was happening and it was a sensation she wouldn’t forget. His kisses were gentle, far more gentle than the electric current surging through her body.

‘Let’s get you home,’ he whispered.

Emma agreed but Ben had to drag her to her feet. ‘Are you sure you can make it?’ he asked.

‘I’ll be fine once we get out of this damned mist.’

Ben looked at her and there was a note of anxiety in his voice when he replied, ‘It’s not misty now, Emma.’

‘Oh,’ she said, lifting her hand in front of her face. Emma’s vision was cloudy and blurred. Her ears pounded with the sound of her heart beating wildly as she felt a new surge of panic. Her head throbbed malevolently as she realized that her brief moment of euphoria was being stamped on by the monster that had pursued and now finally caught up with her. ‘I think you need to get me off this mountain,’ she said, before adding more urgently, ‘
now
.’

Ben didn’t need any further explanation but helped Emma climb slowly and carefully down the path towards the car park. Where the ground was level enough, he carried her and she looked up at his face, fixed and resolute.

‘Will you stay with me?’ she asked.

‘I’ll never leave you,’ he promised.

She tried to say something but couldn’t grasp the word. Panic was flooding her brain and Ben was almost at the car before she had managed to catch hold of the word that had wriggled like a slippery fish in her fingers. ‘Tabernacle,’ she said with a relieved smile.

When the look of worry on Ben’s face only intensified, Emma hoped he would understand what she meant but there was no time to explain, there were other more important things to discuss. ‘Tell me about our life together in our little cottage. I want to hear it. I need to hear it.’

Chapter 10

Emma felt like she was floating and as she peered up into mist that had followed her down the mountain she could perceive nothing but flashes of light and dark, light and dark. Slowly, she became aware that she was lying on a trolley, being pushed along at frantic speed. Her brain was being knocked from side to side although she couldn’t feel it, nor could she feel the pain that had exploded inside her head as soon as she had started to thaw out in Ben’s car. She was high above it all now.

The blind spot in her peripheral vision was devouring more and more of the light that flashed above her but she wasn’t frightened. She could feel a hand gripping hers tightly.

‘Stay with me,’ she whispered.

We stood in front of the cottage, the whitewashed walls reflecting the sun and warming our faces. The rambling roses were little more than fragile stems at the edge of the doorway but they would grow, in time. The wiry plants were busily putting down roots but would eventually extend their reach, climbing taller, getting to know the feel of the place, making it their own. In time, roses would bloom and we would smell sweet heady perfume as we stood at the door and we would know we were home.

‘Is it as you imagined?’ I asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Look,’ I said, as if there was still more to prove. I stepped over the threshold and pointed up to the ceiling. There were no rafters in sight and no glimpses of sky beyond. We had a roof over our heads. We were safe and secure.

‘It’s perfect,’ she agreed and then Emma began to laugh.

I looked at her beautiful face in amazement, knowing that finally she was mine. I could walk right up to her and kiss her without fear of a slap in the face. It hadn’t always been so. When I first met Emma, I was surprised that she and Louise were sisters. They were so different. Louise was the precocious one who commanded attention whilst her sister seemed the dark and brooding type and my first impressions were, I confess, not great. She didn’t have a presence back then, not like her sister and not like Emma’s then boyfriend. She had stayed in the shadows and seemed happy there.

If I could pinpoint that magical moment when my world was turned upside down, when I stopped seeing a shadow and caught the hint of fire in Emma’s eyes, it was when the local rag gave the bistro a poor review. Emma had been furious and forgot herself. Her family had been attacked and she would have had the poor reviewer tarred and feathered if I hadn’t blocked her exit to stop her from storming over to the newspaper’s office. When she had calmed down she retreated back towards the edges of life but I kept her in my sights. I watched and I fell in love.

There was fire in her eyes now as she rushed into the garden, raising her arms to the blue skies above and spinning around in a victory dance until she made herself dizzy.

I ran to her and took her in my arms to stop her from falling. I was laughing too. When we stopped we were facing downhill. ‘That’s the rest of the world down there. Do you think it’s ready for us?’

‘I think I might just stay here and hide,’ she said, but I wasn’t going to let the old Emma back.

‘You have an amazing job waiting for you. You’ve taken a well-earned sabbatical but your talents are still in demand, Kate has made sure of that.’

‘And you?’ she asked. ‘What about your ambitions?’ She was leaning back against me and our bodies were swaying gently together as we considered our options.

‘If you have to go away then I could come with you, if that was what you wanted. Or if you insist on going on your own then I’ll be here waiting for you, building my dreams and waiting for you to step back into them. I am the ying to your yang.’

‘Yes, I think you are.’

There was no doubt about it, we were feeling smug. But we deserved it. Emma deserved it.

I turned her gently to face me. ‘Close your eyes, Emma,’ I told her. She did. ‘I want you to picture the life you planned for yourself all of those years ago. At thirty-four years old, you’re meant to have your career and at this point, your leading man.’ As I spoke, I took a small box from my pocket and flipped it open in front of her. It sparkled. ‘You can open your eyes now.’

‘I think you should go,’ Meg said. Her voice quivered and the nasally tone suggested that she had been crying. But behind the pain there was a growing tension and Emma knew her mum was angry.

‘I’d rather stay if you don’t mind.’ It was Ben’s voice. It sounded just as pained and equally tense. He was going to give Meg a run for her money.

‘I do mind,’ she replied.

‘Ben, I think it’s for the best. Emma needs her family here, that’s all.’ Louise’s voice was accompanied by footsteps as she drew nearer. Emma could hear her breathing and the swish of her long, blonde hair.

‘You don’t understand,’ Ben insisted. ‘Emma would want me here, I know it.’

There was a rustling of cotton as bodies moved and hands fidgeted. Meg was smoothing the creases in her clothes as she thought about what to say next. ‘You barely know my daughter. You don’t know what she would want and you certainly don’t know what’s best for her. You’re the one who put the idea in her head to go up that damned mountain in the first place.’

There was the sound of someone swallowing hard. ‘I know,’ Ben replied, the fight leaving his body in a long, painful sigh. ‘I know it’s my fault. I didn’t realize she wasn’t physically up to it until it was too late. I didn’t know.’

‘None of us knew,’ Louise offered. There was the sound of chairs creaking and more cotton brushing against cotton. Louise had put her arms around her mum’s shoulder.

A heavy silence filled the room and Emma could feel it weighing down on her, pulling her closer towards the world she had been floating above.

‘I shouldn’t have given in to her. I won’t any more,’ sniffed Meg defiantly. ‘She can’t take risks like that, not if we’re going to get her to Boston. I know you thought you were helping Emma but you’re not. I don’t want her distracted, not by anything.’

‘Doesn’t Emma have a say in all of this? In case you hadn’t noticed, she’s a grown woman perfectly capable of making her own decisions.’ Ben gulped as if he had tried too late to hold back the words that cut sharply through the tension.