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My heart expands. “That’s amazing, Ben. I know you’re passionate aboutit.”
He shrugs modestly. “I want more kids to learn self-reliance. We come into this world without any skills. Some people get good hands, others get terrible ones. It’s unfair. But we can help level the playing field forthem.”
“But it’s not only for them,” I say. “No one’s an island. It spills over to others in their families, thecommunities.”
He nods. “I suppose itdoes.”
“This is why I want Vane’s business,” I comment after we’ve ordered drinks and glanced at the menus. “I want to help people. I want to employ people. Leave the world better when I’m gone than when I entered. It’s not about his couples’ resorts, it’s about the resources that would bring in, the platform to support people thinking more flexibly and inclusively about relationships. Being happy doesn’t have to be poster-worthy moments in bikinis on the beach with tannedabs.”
Ben lifts his glass in a silent toast. “But why now? Besides Lil's tuition, but that's not what made you get a meeting with him in the first place. You could’ve started pursuing the Richard Vanes of the world a long timeago.”
His question catches me off guard. “There’s always been someone more ready, more worthy. I worry that one day I’ll get up and look in the mirror and see what I’ve built and feel like a fraud. I don’t want that tohappen.”
“Then stop thinkingit.”
My chest tightens, the past rushing at me in a jumble of memories that make meache.
I know what it’s like to have someone close to me decide they don’t believe in me anymore. Vi as much as said it. The thought that my team and clients might someday feel that way is awful. But as I sit there, I realize there’s something worse—if Ben didn’t believe in meanymore.
Our drinks arrive and I take a long sip of my wine. “This isgood.”
“Cara knows what she’s talking about.” He smiles over his glass, and I let go of some of thedarkness.
“What are you afraid of?” I catch a drop of wine on the edge of my lip with afinger.
He follows my movement with heavy eyes that take a heartbeat too long to return to mine. “When you start to build wealth, people decide you're worth taking advantage of, and it has nothing to do with who you are and everything to do with what you have. Holt is sharpening his dagger, which means I have to stay three steps ahead ofeverything.”
“Even love?” The implication makes me ache, for him, not forme.
He shakes his head. “Love can destroy as readily as it can save. It didn’t protect my mom. She still fell under my dad's spell, and it cost hereverything.”
“Cities fall to time, or war, or politics. Does that negate the fact that they were built? Diminish the people who lived inthem?”
Ben slings an arm over the back of his chair, turning to look out over the skyline. “I’m not a city. All I have is myself. If I crumble, there’s nothing left forme.”
The admission is so thoroughly Ben, and I squeeze mynapkin.
I say, "There's a poem by W.H. Auden called 'The More Loving One.' It's about love unrequited. How the stars don't love us the way we love them, and how it's better to be the one whose love is unreturned than the one who'sindifferent."
Ben’s gaze finds mine and lingers. “You believeit.”
“I want to. There’s beauty in it, and power. Knowing we don’t need another person to experience love. That it’s not a transaction, but a way of being that you can feel anytime you wantto.”
His heavy gaze lingers on me as our food comes: caprese salad for me and a steak for him. We eat and talk about everything from work to our families to movie andmusic.
On the way out, he cuts me a look. “I never want to lose what we have. And I meant what I said. I want to be there for you thismonth.”
The one thing I want you to give me is something you don’t want togive.
“What would you want your boyfriend todo?”
I sigh. “Make me baths. Bring me dinner when I’m stressed. To believe in me, when people are watching, but mostly when they’re not. When I’m great, and when I’m justme.”
“You’re always great. Especially when you’re justyou.”
He threads his fingers through mine, and I don’t know if it’s him practicing, or because he thinks I want him to, or because he wantsto.
The backs of my eyes burn, lights blurring in front of me as we amble down the street. I blink and focus on the intersectionahead.
