I never expected to get something like that from Benjamin, not in one of the most beautiful dreams I have ever had with him. The paper trembled in my hand, as soon as I finished reading the last word. I was paralyzed in the middle of the schoolyard trying to believe every word written on that simple piece of paper. While the students turned away from me, someone took the paper from my hand without me noticing who approached. I thought the worst so I thought what would happen to me if that note fell into the wrong hands.
My heart beats faster, but his pace returned to normal when I realized that the student was Carla. She read each sentence silently. She shared the attention between the note and me. Her look of surprise and doubt denounced the same as I felt. If all Ben wrote was real, or it was our mind that was playing a practical joke on us, but of course, this could not be having the same effect on both of us. Carla tossed her hair that had fallen over her shoulder back. She sketched a smile, and held in my hands, trying to stop them from trembling.
"Elle!" She called me trying bringing me to reality. "This is an invitation. Ben is waiting for you. You need to run before he walks away thinking you did not dare go there to talk to him."
"My mother?" I stammered.
"I'll watch her. As soon as she leaves, I'll send you a message."
"You will miss your bus."
"Elle! Stop being so afraid. When are you going to get another chance like that? You dreamed about that day practically your entire teenage years. All right, it was not that way, but what he is doing is incredible. If you do not talk to him now, I won't talk to you anymore. I'm serious."
"You are not."
"Do you want me to drag you to him?" Carla gave me a slight push, implying that I should hurry. "Go, Elle!" Carla said in a slightly harsh voice.
I strolled to the school gate. Butterflies in my stomach were accompanying me. As soon as I got to the gate, I looked back. I watched Carla with her arms crossed. She was serious; I am sure if I did not hurry, she would drag me to Benjamin.
The front of the school was full of students and parents. The noise of several people talking at the same time took away some of my apprehension. My eyes wandered from side to side in search of Benjamin. I would not find him quickly, because of his situation, his height would not be visible to me, and he did not leave defined in which place he would be clear until I saw... A guy was jumping, trying to be more visible than the crowd of people around him. He waved to me. I made a face of disdain, and I turned my back to him. Then he called my name, and I could see that it was with me he wanted to talk.
"Elle!" I turned around, and I could see Marcos bowing his head and saying something to someone. I do not know what this abominable being was doing here. What exactly did he want with me? I looked at the paper in my hand and tried to imagine Marcos writing those words. I messed up the paper, then regretting to remember that it was Ben's handwriting, including all the chicken scratching that accompanied it. The touch of the message on my cell phone has eliminated my suspicions.
"It's me. Marcos is with me. No, he did not steal my cell phone and sent you this message."
I felt uncomfortable knowing that Marcos was part of it. I do not like him, and he does not like me, simple. Then, he did not have to know about my "relationship" with Ben. I thought about not going to talk to Ben, but through the school gate, I could still see Carla looking defiantly at me. I took a deep breath and apologized to all the people who prevented me from reaching Benjamin. As soon as my proximity to him became more remarkable, my nervousness increased. My hands were sweating, and my throat was dry. As I finally got close, I saw that Ben did a signal to Marcos leave. He obeyed, but before he winked at me. I rolled my eyes, and Marcos walked away from a little.
"Did you read my message?" Ben asked looking at my hand. Did you read?" He took the paper from my hand. Why you did this? Didn't you like it? Don't you like Ed Sheeran? If I had known I could have chosen a song from a singer that you liked..."
"Ben is not this. Marcos did not need to know that," I interrupted him.
"Ah, the problem is Marcos. I needed him to give me a ride. So does that mean you like it?"
"I don't know," I answered without looking at Benjamin's eyes. Although I wanted to admit that I had liked it, I didn't dare say it out loud.
"So I was wrong, and my aunt fooled me. Do you like me?" If I was already feeling uncomfortable, my situation got even worse. Did Benjamin suspect I liked him? Had Ben's aunt told him that I was in love with him? Since when had he pretended he did not know anything? I stared at the floor.
"I do not want to talk about it in front of the school. If my mother sees me here with you, she will not like it," I used my mother's excuse to be nervous with me in my favor."
"I'm willing to take the risk," He said handing me the paper again. I folded it and put it in my pocket.
"Ben, I'm serious."
"Me too. Come with me, Marcos will give us a ride."
"I'm not going anywhere with Marcos. How could you have gotten in a car with him again?"
"For you, it was worth the risk."
"Don't be ridiculous."
"It was him or nothing. And Marcos is not the reason you do not want to go."
"Which is?"
"You're afraid to admit what you feel for me." Ben was managing to get me embarrassed at record speed. How could he mention what I felt with such conviction?
"What do I feel for you?" I asked him.
"This is not the right place," Ben said turning the wheelchair and going to the opposite side from where I came. He braked the wheelchair on the curb and looked at me. "I need your help to get down; the ramp is on the other side of that crowd of students. OR YOU WOULD LIKE ME TO FALL AND HURT MYSELF?" Ben made a point of saying it out loud, attracting of some people attention around us. I was embarrassed as soon as the looks of anger devoured me. It was Ben's dirty way of getting me into Marcos's car.
I walked long strides until Benjamin. As soon as I reached him, I helped him with the wheelchair. I stood in front of him, and held the armrest, with a little strength, I tilted the wheelchair up, I pushed it forward, and the front wheels reached the asphalt, but without much care, caused a small impact making Ben shake. He closed his eyes and muttered something indecipherable to me. Now behind him, I finished getting down the wheelchair, and Ben could finally drive the wheelchair on his own to the car. Work he made better than me.
"You're a mess, Elle! You almost caused me another spinal injury."
"If you already knew this, why did you insist that I helped you?"
"Because I don't have the physical conditions to put you in this car by force."
"I knew it was that" I answered triumphantly.
I observed from the corner of my eye, Marcos already inside the car tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. He had the earphone in his ear, and he shook his head in a rhythm in which only he knew which music was. Ben tapped the car's bodywork, catching his attention. Marcos took the earphone from his ear, opened the car door, and came down with a smile on his lips. He seemed to enjoy the situation Benjamin and I, but he could not admit this in so many words.
He approached, and I shrank from him, only after he had stood in front of Benjamin, that he remembered to excuse me. Marcos rested his hand on Ben's back, and the other passed beneath his legs. He lifted Ben without the slightest force; it was as if he had raised a sheet of paper. Watching the scene, I saw Marcos approaching Ben's face, pretending to kiss him.
"Stop it, idiot!" Ben pushed Marcos's face without any kindness.
"You don't know how to play anymore, huh?" Marcos motioned for me to open the car door. I hurried into doing what he asked, thinking that perhaps by carelessness he might let Ben fall to the ground. Marcos put Ben in the back seat. Benjamin put on his seatbelt, and I circled the car, and I sat next to him. I watched as Marcos opened the trunk of the car, and threw the wheelchair abruptly inside, making noise. He tried to close the trunk by force, thus hitting the wheelchair several times. Ben turned back a little, staring incredulously at his friend for the way he was treating his means of transport.
"Hey, watch out." Ben snarled at Marcos.
"My bad!" Marcos said, leaving the trunk open, and getting into the car.
"Slowly!" I finally allowed myself to talk to Marcos. He ignored me. He turned the key, passed the first gear, and moved on. "Where do we go?"
"I'm still thinking."
"Think soon. Gasoline is expensive," Marcos said.
"I'm going to pay, cheapskate."
"Are you going to pay me overtime too? A personal driver is expensive."
"Are you charging for driving for Ben? He would already be doing it if it were not for you. I should... I should...," I stuttered.
"Are you going to threaten me too, skinny?"
"Do not call her skinny."
"Ben, I know how to defend myself."
"You know?"
"I know," Then suddenly I finally caught the whole sentence Marcos had said. "Ben, are you threatening Marcos?"
"The way you ask the question does it seem like I'm the villain."
"So you are?"
"Every day," Marcos answered for Ben.
"I'm not talking to you," I said in a slightly altered voice to Marcos.
"You two, give it a break!" Ben shouted.
"I said that I and her favorite skinny in the same environment would not work."
"It would work if you shut up. Seriously, the driver drives better with his mouth shut," Marcos shrugged and decided to go the way. "Sorry, it wasn't to be like this, "Ben said leaning back against the car seat backrest.
Marcos drove to downtown already impatient for Ben not knowing where we would go. He finally realized that what we had to do was stop somewhere and eat; none of us had lunch yet. Marcos parked the car in front of a restaurant that by the entrance you could see that it was not one of the self-service restaurants that I was accustomed to frequenting my mother.
I looked at the well-presented façade and shook my head.
"Relax!" Ben laid his hand gently on mine, and now I could see how this gesture could have another meaning. Marcos was the first to go down, he walked to the trunk, pulling out the wheelchair. Marcos brought it closer to the passenger seat, opened the door, and took Ben on his lap, placing him on it. Marcos ran to my door laughing, he opened the door for me, and I went down without even looking at him.
"Which time do I come to pick you up?" Marcos asked Ben.
"I'll call you."
Marcos ran to get in the car. I followed when Ben's wheelchair moved. Ben's arm was outstretched, and his hand clenched close to the vehicle. I heard the sound like something just scratched when I saw Marcos's car door was already scratched. Marcos got out of the car when he realized what Ben had done. I watched the scene in silence, trying not to think of the worst.
"Dude! My father is going to kill me."
"Invite me to the funeral!" Ben said turning the wheelchair.
"You shouldn't have done this," I rebuked Ben; I did not like it when he acted like an idiot.
"He almost broke my wheelchair."
"For me, it is the same way."
"I'm screwed!" Marcos was still wailing.
"Come on Elle; our time is running out," We left Marcos alone muttering about what his father would do to him if he saw the car like that.
I accompanied Ben, who was greeted by an amiable girl, who helped him get in with the wheelchair. By their entanglement, I could see that they knew each other. She took us to a more private place. She pulled away and then returned with two menus in her hand. She handed me a list of the other and me for Ben, and she left us alone. I analyzed every word written on the menu. It was indecipherable, only the prices my brain could capture right. I looked around and noticed how empty the restaurant was. Ben followed my gaze and gave a half smile.
"I closed the restaurant especially for us," As soon as he finished saying the phrase, a pair of men dressed in the suit entered the restaurant. I shook my head. "Yeah, maybe I could not prevented entry the two and that couple, too," Ben concluded as soon as a woman and a man entered the restaurant.
I observed the woman who had just entered; her beautiful dress hinted that my ripped jeans and my school uniform shirt were not suitable for the place where we were. The waitress approached us again. Ben took the menu from my hand and handed it to her.
"We'll want rice, beans, steak, and French fries. I know you can provide it for me. Do not forget coca," He said, and then blinked at her, who left immediately.
Ben rested his hands on the table and stared at me.
"Can we talk about feelings?"
"Ben, I'm not good at it."
"You can trust me. I'm not here to mock what you feel for me."
"That is the problem. You speak what I feel as if you knew, but I know nothing about what you feel for me."
"Did you read the note?" He asked, and I was silent. I tried to remember every word written in it, and some came to my mind: Yeah I've been feeling everything, from hate to love from love to lust, from lust to truth...
I was frightened by what was happening; I still did not believe that Ben could come to feel something beyond friendship for me. I wiped the sweat from my hands on my jeans under the table. I looked at Ben's apparent tranquility. His eyes seemed to yearn for an answer.
"Ben, what do you want me to tell you?"
"If you want me the way I want you," Ben said slowly, pointing his finger at himself as if explaining something to a child.
"And how do you want me?"
"You tell me first."
"So that's your intention? Want to get something out of me first?"
"You are childish. Just confess."
"Confess what?"
"That you love me," The fact that I bowed my head and turned red already gave him everything he wanted to know, but what intrigued me was that he was still torturing me. I stood silent, staring at the tablecloth. "I could hold in your hand if you make it easy to put her on the table. It's just four words, Elle, just say it."
"I do not know," Ben made a face of disappointment. I was sure as soon as he put his hand on the wheelchair button that he would go away, but the waitress stopped his act coming to serve us. I could finally cool my throat with the cold coke. Ben stared at me and held his fork tightly he did not hold back. "What is your problem?" I put the glass on the table, trying to understand the meaning of the question.
"You," I answered dryly. "Tell me about your feelings for me.
"What the hell, Elle! I already told! What part do you still do not understand that I'm in love with you?" Ben was quiet as soon as he noticed that the people who were present at the restaurant stopped to listen as he shouted it. "Well, it looks like it was not just you who understood now," I put my hand over the mouth of the glass, still not facing Ben in the eyes. The butterflies in my stomach flew directly to my heart. They flapped their wings, flooding me with a mixture of happiness and unrealism. The words hit me like a whip, where the pain came with pleasure. My platonic love became something real and palpable. I narrowed my eyes, holding on not to cry, with a little difficulty I tried to speak of my feelings:
"I've always been in love with you. Not now, but always," Ben looked at me in astonishment. I continued. "I loved you even before you being that new Benjamin, even when you were an asshole, even when you acted as if I were invisible, even when your mother greeted mine on the street and you turned your face to me. I loved you even when you talk a lot of idiocy," I sighed. "I've loved you."
"I did not know."
"I thought you were convinced of that."
"I didn't know you loved me before..." He completed. "I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry. Why does not that surprise me? I do not know if it matters to you, but when I knew what happened to you, I almost died too. Carla had told me. I got bad, especially when I heard you were in a coma, it was a one less chance of you coming back. How I wanted you to wake up, even if it wasn't for me, I still wanted you to wake up. I prayed every day for you. That was the worst month of my life. I barely ate, barely drank. I spent every day searching for news about you on your friends' social networks. Maybe that is why Carla hates you, not because of you being an asshole, but because you almost took me away with you, even if it was not purposely. When I heard you returned, I passed several times in front of your house, trying to see you, I never saw you there again, nor in the street," I shrugged. "So you can already laugh at me," I said to a Ben with an indecipherable face. For the first time, I had managed to keep him quiet.
"I will not laugh at you," He finally said something. "I was just surprised. I did not expect that. I do not know if I can handle it. It has been a long time in silence, Elle. I thought the only ones who suffered because of my accident were my parents. You were so far away from me that I couldn't think you passed through it. Elle, I just thought you loved me now. You know, ever since we started to get along. I am sorry."
"It's all right."
The silence went on; the plate was untouched on the table. The lump in my throat kept me from the lunch. Maybe this was not the confession Ben wanted to hear. Perhaps this was too much for him. It was not long to he called Marcos, and he came to get us. He noticed the tense mood that hung between us. I thought about going away by bus, but I did not want to leave Marcos and Benjamin alone, I did not want to make a break for Ben to tell everything I said to him.
"What happened here? Did someone die?"
"Shut up and take us home."
Marcos as an obedient person did what Ben asked. He knew his friend was not kidding. At no time, Ben looked at me. When Marcos parked the car in front of Ben's house, I was quick to get out of the car.
"Do not make me run after you," I stopped before reaching the corner.
"How can you be disdainful of yourself?" Finally, I looked back. Marcos took the wheelchair out of the trunk. He placed Ben sitting on it, who came up to me.
"Spending two years of your life, wondering me, why this had happened with me, spending two years of your life muttering, and after this see that didn't solve anything, so I have to accepted and disdain," He shrugged. "Marcos, it was a pleasure, and thank you."
"Thanks for what? By had you screwed up with my car? Welcome, dude," Marcos got into the car and drove.
"Elle, I'm sorry. I should not have forced you to confess and then I not want to accept. Seriously, I cannot believe you already loved me. It was not to be neither friendship."
"Didn't you want to be my friend?"
"It's not that. If wasn't because of your mother, I do not believe that one day I'll have thanked her enough," Ben told himself. "Anyway, if it weren't because of your mother, we would never have spoken to each other."
Ben approached me, touched my hand carefully, his hand was warm until he pulled me into his lap. He looked at me with tenderness and admiration. I knew this look, the same one that I looked at Ben several times, finally reciprocated equally. I put one of my arms around his neck, and I rested my hand on his chest.
"I'm in love with you," He said like if he wanted to convince me. He slid his finger to my lips as he stared at her, but his gaze suddenly went in the other direction. "Damn it, Elle! Your mother is there!"
"Ben, I cannot believe you're doing this."
"This time it is serious," He said holding my face and slowly turning her to the side. The worst of it was that this time, he wasn't kidding.