The Art of Keeping Faith Read online

“Lilah, you asked me to leave and I thought for once that maybe I should just do as you asked. I knew you would not want me around, not after what I pushed on you.”

  He hesitates and I can’t stop myself from asking, “What did you push on me?”

  “I made you lose the baby, our baby.”

  “Ben,” I start to say, ready to turn over. But he smoothes a hand over my shoulder and my skin catches fire.

  “Lilah, wait, I need to tell you something. That baby was the only thing that I ever wanted for us. I wanted it last March when it never happened, and it has never gone away. I won’t forgive myself for destroying that, and I don’t expect you to either.”

  I don’t know where this is heading. Why is he here, then?

  “Why are you here, Ben?”

  “Because I got your text, and I need you to know that I love you, even though you don’t want to be with me anymore.”

  What?

  What? I don’t know what to say.

  “Why do you think I don’t want to be with you? You haven’t even asked?” My lungs physically ache to breathe.

  “Because I don’t see how you would forgive me. Lilah, I need you to know how I feel. I know I should never have left, back in October. I should have stayed with you. But you never asked me to stay, so I assumed that it was what you wanted.”

  Fuck. Way to go, Scarlett.

  “Ben. Wait I need to tell you something.”

  “No, Lilah. I need to tell you something. I loved your article. It gave me some faith to come out, and find you, and ask you to forgive me to your face.” He chuckles a little but it is a bitter sound. “We really were good together, hey, Lil?”

  Oh for fucks sake this is ridiculous.

  I push up from the sweaty wet patch I have created with my tears.

  “Ben. Please. For God’s sake, look at me. I still think we can be perfect together. I’ve been trying to find you to let you know. I am so sorry I told you to leave.”

  He stares at me as I get to my knees. First the blues take in my face, every inch of it, like they are staring at their favourite painting. It is how I am probably staring at him. Then they flicker lower, and then lower still, until they rest on the bump peeking out from under my T-Shirt.

  “What?”

  I reach my hand for him, but he backs away.

  “Lilah, what is going on?”

  “Ben, it’s why I tried to call you about a million times. It’s why everyone else has been calling. And it’s why for the last two months I have just wanted you home with me.” My voice breaks on home, and I stare at him wildly, waiting for him to make a move.

  “What?”

  “Ben, I never lost the baby, I am so sorry you left because I got so angry. The moment I got to the hospital I knew I’d made a terrible mistake. You have been gone for so long now.”

  He gives his head a little shake.

  “Too long,” he whispers, so low I think I’ve not heard right.

  “Pardon?”

  “Too long,” he repeats again and before I can say anything else he is up off the bed and out of the room.

  What the fuck? Did he just walk out again? No fucking way.

  Like lightning, well a pregnant lightning, I am up off the bed and chasing after him down the hallway.

  I grab him firmly by the arm.

  “Don’t you dare walk away from me again, Benjamin Chambers!” I screech. He winces at my words and spins to face me.

  “How can you even look at me, Lilah? I left you pregnant. I left you alone all because I had my feelings hurt. You’ve been by yourself for months, all because I am a self-obsessed bastard.”

  “Ben! No! That’s not it at all. I have been by myself because I am a crazy person who does not believe I am good enough for you.” There, I have said it.

  “Why didn’t you tell me the moment I came home and you threw up on the floor?”

  “Because I wanted just one more day with you before I changed us forever. I knew you would give the up band, and I was worried I might turn you into your dad and you would hate me, or us.” I gesture at the bump and me.

  He starts to laugh. I can’t for the life of me work out what is funny.

  He reaches a hand for me, and slides it down my arm, linking his fingers through mine. The perfect fit.

  “Lilah, I will never be my dad.”

  “Really? You would not regret giving everything up for me, for us?”

  “Lilah, I did give everything up for you and it was the most liberating thing I ever did. I just never got to share it with you.”

  “Ben,” I start but don’t get to finish because he steps toward me, his firm, lean body pressed against me and the bump.

  “How long will it take you to forgive me for leaving you?”

  “How long is it going to take for you to forgive me for being a jealous incredible hulk?”

  His lips smile as he lowers his face down toward me. “Delilah McCannon, can I please come home?”

  Home. Home. Home.

  “Well, actual …” I start but am stopped by the feel of his lips brushing against mine.

  I take a sharp intake of breath. Heaven.

  “Delilah McCannon, can I please come home and never have to leave again?” His lips start to kiss around my own.

  I don’t bother to reply. I slide my hands into his hair and kiss him properly. We have so much to sort out, but right now I’m happy to go with kissing.

  A few moments later he pulls away and links his fingers back through mine and guides me back to my room, which I guess may now be ours again.

  “So, what have I missed?” he asks, the blues twinkle and crinkle as he tugs me through the door.

  “Well you know. Not much. It’s been pretty dull.” I giggle, a hysterical sound escaping from my lips as he twirls his gran’s ring around my finger and looks at it gleam in the afternoon light. “Ooh, the baby likes “Hey There, Delilah.” I announce proudly.

  ”Oh I am sure it does, I am sure it does.” He smiles at me as the blues search my face. I smile back and then I start to cry, big fat tears of relief, hope and love all mixed in together.

  21st July

  The Leaver’s Ball

  Yep, here we are again, although I am not leaving. Assuming I pass my exams that is.

  Ben and I talked all night and all of today, the general consensus being that we have acted like fools, and made some terrible mistakes. The simple truth though is that I love him and he loves me, even if we are completely challenged by miscommunications.

  At six this morning he leant over and planted a kiss on the bump. “I was always going to wait for you Lilah, that was never going to change. It can only ever be you for me.”

  Ben has been keeping some secrets of his own.

  Last week, before he played the Isle of Wight and I texted him the three words that changed everything, he had contacted the admissions board and asked if he could come back. He had already decided that he was going to come back and win me all over again if that is what it was going to take. He thought he would have to start from scratch to earn my love again.

  The admissions board said, yes of course. It’s Benjamin Chambers. Of course they said yes.

  So he is going solo, and he is going to be a student with me. Together we are going to be parents to one psycho cat, and a baby that hopefully won’t be psycho. Somehow we are going to make all the crazy work. It’s what he always wanted, to be a student come singer. So he gets what he wanted, and I get what I want; him and my baby together. I also get to come back next year. I am going to try and carry on until November and then take some time off for the baby, and then come back with us all sharing the childcare.

  “Where the hell are we going to live?” I wailed at one point. “We can’t live with Tristan and Meredith with a baby.”

  He grinned at me.

  “Upstairs, I bought the flat upstairs.” His grin grew wider. “Although I hear we have a terrible neighbour who complains all the time.”

>   “What! How did you do that?”

  “Well the good thing about being the song writer in the band is that I get a large cut of the royalties. Every time Sound Box play one of my songs, or they are on the radio I get money for it.”

  “You are such a clever boy.”

  “Oh, I know.”

  Now we are at the Ball and he is off getting drinks and the entire place is staring at me. As they quite rightly should. The bump is quite obvious. Ben insisted, and as we walked in he made sure his hand around my waist was firmly placed against it. He is ridiculously proud and it makes me regret even more the last couple of months of living apart.

  I watch him weave through the crowd, walking toward me with his artistic grace and I smile like the proudest woman on earth. But I am also secretly thinking, please let my child look like him and not me.

  He pulls me onto the dance floor and twirls me about.

  “I’m going to injure people,” I laugh. I have laughed more in the last twenty-four hours then I have in the last eight weeks. Mainly hysterical laughter of relief.

  “No, you’re not,” he whispers against my cheek, his fingers linking through mine as he sways us together in time to the music.

  “So just where have you been the last couple of months?”

  “Dorset.”

  “What? I spoke to your mum and she was going mad with worry because she didn’t know where you were.”

  “Well, let me just say it had a pea green bidet.”

  “No bloody way! Were you there the whole time?”

  “Yep, apparently I write my best music when surrounded by green.”

  I laugh and rest my head on his shoulder.

  The song changes but I am not really paying attention until Ben starts singing it softly in my ear.

  “Wonderwall.”

  I pull back and look at him.

  “It’s the song I was singing the first time I saw you. Well the first time I knew I wanted to see you again. It made me smile when you sent Baz playing it during that crazy row we had, because even though we weren’t talking, we were always on the same page, and always feeling the same thing.”

  “Really? You were playing this at that Christmas Party? I’m sorry I don’t remember very clearly.” Oh, I so am. It seems like a lifetime ago now.

  “That’s okay, your life was different then. It’s what made me want to see you again.”

  “What was?”

  “I wanted to save you from whatever was making you unhappy.”

  I look up into the blues.

  “Ben. You did.”

  “I know. I know that now, and you saved me, too. The last year has not been easy for either of us. Actually, I would say it has been downright hard, but I never lost sight of you, nor the fact that you’re the only thing that I have ever truly wanted.”

  “Did you know you wanted me straight away?”

  “Yeah, I took one look at you, you were biting your lip and you had this look on your face that spoke to me above anything else. I was singing this song, and the words just seemed so right, that no one would ever feel for you what I did right then.”

  I don’t know what to say.

  “Lilah, I had something I wanted to say to you the first time I saw you, and the last and about a million times in between.”

  “Yeah what’s that?”

  “Lilah, will you marry me?”

  What?

  “What?”

  “I asked if you will marry me?”

  “No not that. You said you wanted to ask me the first time you ever saw me?”

  “Yes. And again at the Freshers’ Ball when I carried you home drunk. And again on our first date. And again on your birthday that went so wrong. And again, last Easter, when I even asked your Dad in preparation. And then again, on the fountain at Trafalgar. And again, this year at the Freshers’ Ball when you kept running around telling everyone your hot boyfriend was back.”

  “Okay, okay stop. I get the picture,” I laugh.

  I really do. For once I get our complete picture. It does not matter what is said or written about us, or what people like Barbie, Richard, or Mihraandah do to us.

  We are just made to love each other and that’s all there is to it. It’s as easy as breathing, always had been and always will be.

  Which means there is only one answer I can give him.

  “Yes.”

  “You said yes?”

  “I said yes.”

  Then I start to laugh and cry at once.

  “Lilah, are you laughing and crying?”

  “Oh, this.” I wave at my face. “This is normal, I am pregnant, you know.”

  “Oh I know.”

  “I love you, Benjamin Chambers.”

  “I love you, Delilah McCannon, and I always will.”

  He slides his hand into his pocket and pulls out a slim white band that is the exact replica of the one I bought him.

  Foi Vainquera. Faith Conquers.

  Yes it bloody does.

  Faith is in everything we do. It is the substance that binds us together. And as he slips the ring down my finger, I know that it will be the bind that keeps us together forever, no matter what life has to throw at us.

  Also from Soul Mate Publishing and Anna Bloom:

  The Uni Files: Book I

  THE ART OF LETTING GO

  For Lilah McCannon, life has taken a bit of a wrong turn. Engaged to a guy she is not in love with and stuck in a job with her tyrannical father as her boss, life has definitely not turned out the way she expected. At twenty-five years old, Lilah knows that she has a simple choice: live the life she has created or change it.

  Enrolling on a course at the local University, Lilah sets out with some clear rules to ensure her success at being a grown-up. No alcohol, no cigarettes, no boys, and no going home. But the last thing she anticipates is meeting Ben Chambers, the lead singer of a local band. With Ben, it’s instant, it’s hot, and it’s deep, but when Ben is offered the opportunity of a lifetime and it looks like his future lies on a different path to hers, Lilah has some heart-rending decisions to make.

  With the academic year slipping by too quickly, Lilah faces a barrage of new challenges. Will she ever make it up the library stairs without having a heart attack? Can she handle a day on campus without drinking vodka? Will she ever manage to read a history book without falling asleep? Most of all, will she be able to make the ultimate sacrifice and learn The Art of Letting Go?

  Available now from Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/k35upfq

  A Uni Files Short:

  THE SAVING OF BENJAMIN CHAMBERS

  Benjamin Chambers needs saving, he just does not know it yet. Bored of his life of repetitive gigs with a band going nowhere fast and one-night stands with girls who are only interested in his role as a lead singer, something has got to change. It’s just what do you do when the only life you know involves messing around with guitars and attempting to run away from any female attention that comes your way.

  Ben has a New Year’s resolution and one that he is determined to keep: quit the band and get a life of his own. Little does Ben realise that on his last night with his band, Sound Box, he is going to meet a girl who will turn everything he knows upside down.

  As Ben sets himself the challenge to find ‘The Girl’ again, he may be about to learn that in an effort to rescue her, he himself will be the one to be saved.

  Available now on Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/m6t655j

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Anna Bloom is a contemporary romance writer who likes to write about life and how it actually happens. Whilst working on The Uni Files and other projects, she is a wife and mother, and also spends time working in a local school where she reads books to the children whether they like it or not.

  Contact the Author @; [email protected]

  On twitter @annabloombooks

  Or visit the website www.annabloomwrites.com

  for updates on the series and other projects.

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