The rain drizzled from the sky in a dreary mist that evening as Ben went down to Woollies to pick up a couple of frozen dinners. He didn't mind the rain, after spending all afternoon locked away in his tiny-windowed Motel room working on a new web-page for a burgeoning online florist who didn't understand the first thing about website creation, he was glad to get out for a while, even if it was in the rain. The Motel room was all right but it only had two windows. One fronted onto the patio and the car-park and he kept the curtains open as much as he could to let light in. The second window was on the opposite side of the room and the curtain on that didn't open. It was stitched or attached at the top somehow so it couldn't be pulled back.
Ben had to have a bit of a laugh about the place. As far as he'd known it had only been renamed twice but he discovered more while he was poking around the room. The first thing he noticed was the information booklet explaining all the rules and amenities (it also included, somewhat laughably, a tourist's guide to Casino) the Motel name on the title page was Beef Capital Motel. As he'd eaten the breakfast that morning, he saw all the plates had a design on the bottom marking them property of "Settlers Inn, Casino". And finally, towelling off after his shower he'd hung up his towel and found "Property of Richmond View Motel" stitched into the corner.
Talk about your identity crises.
And now Ben was trying to find some food he could quickly cook in the microwave. His budget, while large, wasn't infinite and if he ended up buying a house here, he might need every spare cent. Unfortunately, motel rooms weren't built for self-sufficiency. The microwave was the only cooking tool he had, and as far as utensils went he'd have to buy some plastic knives and forks.
Ben wandered up and down the shopping aisles, placing items in his trolley as he went, the plastic plates, the knives, the forks, the napkins. After poking around the frozen food section for fifteen minutes he literally threw up his hands in disgust and walked away, leaving the trolley and everything in it.
"Now are you just going to leave that sitting there?" said a girl's voice behind him.
Ben jumped. Caught. He eased around to face the speaker, preparing an excuse for his sloppiness. Maybe some emergency or something. That ought to do it.
He was opening his mouth, all ready to deliver an excuse of how he'd gotten a call saying his house was on fire, when he saw that it was Kath. She was grinning at him until she saw his face and the swelling bruise around his eye.
"Oh my God, Ben. Look at you," she gasped.
"Hi," Ben said shortly.
"Oh, Ben, how are you? Are you okay?" she asked, stepping around his trolley, pushing a full one of her own.
"Fine. Thanks," he said. "I have to go. I've got stuff to do."
She grabbed his arm as he turned away, stopping him.
"Ben," she said. "I'm really sorry. I didn't mean for that to happen."
For a moment he stood with his back to her, on the verge of leaving. But then his shoulders slumped and he turned back to face her.
"I know," said Ben. "It's not your fault. It's just, last night, it was like being back at school all over again. And seeing..." he stopped. "Never mind."
She shook her head, biting her bottom lip.
"Oh, Ben. I'm sorry. If I'd had any idea you were going to have such a horrible night I wouldn't have asked you along. But I just—"
She bit down on what she was going to say next.
Ben looked at her. "You just what?" he said.
Kath stammered for a moment trying to think of something else to say. "I just thought you'd want to see everyone again," she blurted.
"I wouldn't have minded seeing some of my friends," said Ben. "But Neil and those guys he hangs out with?" He shook his head. "They were no friends of mine."
They fell silent. Ben was about to ask Kath if she wanted to go and get coffee when she spoke.
"Ben," she said. "Did you...?" she paused, tried again. "When you moved away from here? Was it because of me and Neil?"
For a long moment Ben said nothing, and a hot blush rose on Kath's cheeks. What could he tell her? Of course it was? That seeing her with Neil had torn his heart out? He laughed, awkward and forced and, he knew, probably fooling Kath not at all. "Because of that?" he said with a smile that petered out halfway up his cheeks. "I left because I was never going to find work here. And if I didn't get a job soon I was going to end up being one of those guys you see on the news trying to hide his face after murdering twenty people. Besides," he went on. "We'd broken up months before anyway."
Kath knew he was lying. Ben saw it plainly on her face. But instead of pulling him up on it she said, "Would you like to have lunch on Monday, Ben?"
"Um, I don't know," he said. "I think I'm going house-hunting..."
"Afterwards then?" she said. "Please? It'd mean a lot to me."
"Yeah, alright," he said. "I'd like that."
"I'll see you Monday then," said Kath and started to walk away.
"Just you and me?" he called after her.
She nodded. "Just the two of us."
"Cool," he said, and a smile spread like a sunrise over his face. "Where will we meet?"
"I'll call you," she said.
Kath walked off and Ben watched, feeling dizzy and good all over. He tried to tell himself he was being foolish, it was two friends having lunch, nothing more than that.
But that didn't stop the soaring elation in his chest.
CHAPTER TEN