Rise and Shine, Benedict Stone

by Phaedra Patrick

  The letter D again. The initials DJ in Gemma’s notebook must refer to her boyfriend. And what was her dilemma?

  When Charlie had girlfriends he always fell hard for them, exclaiming he was in love after only a few dates. Perhaps Gemma was like that, too.

  Benedict was more cautious. He believed that love was something that grew and blossomed. A person’s looks might hit you between the eyes, but it was their personality that had to seduce you. He liked to take his time.

  There was only once when he hadn’t followed this instinct, when he had been so overwhelmed by a moment that he lost his self-control, and it was something that ricocheted and affected every area of his life, and his relationships, from then on.

  He closed the journal and hoped that Gemma wasn’t living through anything like it.

  17.

  AZURITE

  memories, release, mysteries

  EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO, Benedict Stone made the biggest mistake of his life. Since then it had weighed on his mind, it broke his sleep and it might ruin his marriage. It made him want to eat, to dull the heavy regret that he carried with him like a wooden yoke across his shoulders.

  Before Charlie left for America, Benedict always exercised control in his life. He organized everything, from Charlie’s packed lunches to the sorting out of the insurance to pay off the mortgage on the house after their parents’ deaths. He ensured that Charlie was on time for his football practice each week, and that his school clothes were freshly washed and pressed each Sunday night.

  When Charlie grew older and started to bring girls home for tea, Benedict cleaned the house beforehand and brought out the best plates for the sandwiches he’d made. Afterward, when Charlie didn’t offer to do the washing up, Benedict did it. And he never complained once, because he wanted to do the best for his brother.

  Whether this influenced Charlie to grow up to be carefree and spontaneous, and rather ignorant of other people’s feelings, Benedict didn’t know. He supposed he gave his brother a safety net, so that if Charlie ever tried and failed at anything, Benedict was waiting to catch him.

  But then everything changed.

  It was one of those rare English summer days, when the evening was as hot and sticky as the daytime, when events set in motion.

  * * *

  Charlie had been flopping around the house all day in his shorts and flip-flops, bored and too hot. The sun had burned his shoulders the same reddish shade as his hair.

  “Phone Amelia up,” Benedict suggested. “The three of us could drive up to Scarborough and have a picnic on the beach this evening.”

  “A picnic with you?” Charlie sniffed. “I’m eighteen, Benedict, a bit old for all that.”

  “It’s up to you. I thought it would be nice.”

  Charlie lolled around some more, then shrugged and said, “Sure.”

  When they got in the car, Benedict knew that his brother had something to say. Charlie had a tell when he was pondering. Around exam time, when he was stressed over his revision, Charlie licked his top teeth over and over. And now, in the car, his tongue moved from side to side like a windscreen wiper.

  Benedict stole a glance at his brother. Just look at the size of him now. The spindly white limbs that once smelled of talcum powder were filling out. His freckles were showing, rust colored, on his nose. His eyes were blue, the same as Mum’s and Dad’s. Benedict always felt the odd one out with his dark gray eyes.

  He looked down at his own body, bursting around his seat belt. He’d always been thicker set than Charlie, but recently he’d noticed a band of fleshiness that curved over his waistband. Running the jewelry shop and sorting Charlie out meant he didn’t get as much exercise as he should do.

  They picked up Amelia and arrived in Scarborough at just past 8:00 p.m. There were still families on the beach, kids paddling and dogs running into the sea to retrieve soggy tennis balls. Charlie brought their old cricket set along but the bat was too small, and after half an hour of playing, Benedict had a stiff back from being bent over double. He flopped down beside Amelia while Charlie continued to run around with the bat and ball on his own.

  “You’re not as fast as you used to be,” Charlie shouted at him. “You’re putting on a lot of weight there.”

  Benedict adjusted his T-shirt.

  “Ignore him,” Amelia said. “You look fine.”

  Afterward they lit a fire at the quiet end of the North Bay, where only a few dog walkers roamed by.

  Charlie picked up a long piece of spindly driftwood off the beach. He poked at the fire and his tongue began to swipe his teeth again.

  “Do you have something to say?” Benedict asked.

  “How do you know?”

  “I can tell when you have something on your mind.”

  “Years of bringing me up, eh?” Charlie took the driftwood out of the fire. He blew on the smoldering end. “I’ve decided to go to America with Amelia,” he said. “We’ll stay on her parents’ farm out there for a while.”

  “Oh,” Benedict said, not expecting this.

  Amelia curled up her legs on the rug. “It’s only for a few months or so,” she said. “We want an adventure.”

  Benedict watched the fire crackle, black embers floating like small flying beetles into the night air. “America? Well...that’s a surprise. Why?”

  Charlie laughed and slapped him once hard on the back. “Man of few words, Benedict. I tell you I’m going to live in America, and you respond with why?”

  “It’s a good question.”

  “I suppose it is.” Charlie shrugged. “The thing is, why not? I feel like I need to get out of Noon Sun, away from the house. Away from you...”

  “Thanks.”

  “Not in a bad way.” Charlie scratched his head. “Everything feels so claustrophobic and I need time out.”

  Benedict liked Amelia. She was tall with tanned caramel limbs and had the same easy, laid-back manner as Charlie, as if neither of them could get flustered about anything life threw at them. She looked comfortable when she came over to the house and chilled out on the sofa, and she showed an interest in Benedict’s shop and jewelry.

  Benedict took sausages out of a plastic box and speared them onto a wooden skewer. He handed them to Charlie and Amelia, then prepared one for himself.

  “I want to take a chance,” Charlie said. “I wonder how things would have worked out if Mum and Dad hadn’t been killed. What happened to our parents, well, it changed us. It made you more careful, I know that.”

  “I had to look after you. I wanted to look after you.”

  “And I love you for it.” Charlie gave Benedict’s leg a punch. “I just want to go and see other places, meet new people. Staying with Amelia’s family will give me that option.”

  Benedict felt a lump rising in his throat and it was difficult to swallow away. It must feel like this being a parent, when kids moved out of the home to go to college. One day they broke out of their cocoon and they were ready to fly. “It sounds like a great opportunity,” he said. He tried to think of how this was good for Charlie, not how alone he’d feel with his brother gone.

  “Thanks. I knew you’d understand. And you can also do what you like. You’ve been stuck looking after me for eight years. There must be things you want to do, want to see...”

  Benedict shook his head. “I have the shop to run. There’s the house, and I like it in Noon Sun.”

  “Well, you should still think about it. I’ll miss you. But I know we’ll stay in touch. Stone brothers forever, eh?”

  “Stone brothers forever,” Benedict said quietly.

  After they’d eaten, and the sun began to sink in the sky, Benedict and Charlie kicked sand onto the smoldering fire. Benedict carefully collected their beer cans, tinfoil and napkins, and rolled up the picnic blanket. A
s usual, Charlie didn’t help. He studied a blister on the underside of his foot, then performed a clumsy cartwheel. Amelia threw an empty beer can at him, which skimmed his shoulder. “Missed,” Charlie laughed.

  Benedict shook his head and carried on tidying up. Amelia helped him.

  Back in the car, Charlie yawned loudly. “God. I’m tired now. I want to go to bed. Could you drop me off first, Benedict, then drive Amelia home?”

  “I can do, but...”

  “Thanks, Benedict.”

  * * *

  Charlie swaggered up the path and waved from the door of the house. Amelia raised her hand back and laughed. “He’s so lazy,” she said when Benedict started the car again. “I think staying on the farm will be good for him.”

  “You do?”

  “Sure. My mom and dad will make him work, but don’t tell him that.” She winked.

  When they arrived at Amelia’s apartment, she invited Benedict inside. “Let’s grab a beer,” she said. “My roommates are out and Charlie can pick up the car in the morning. You’ve done all the work tonight and deserve a break.”

  Benedict was glad that she’d noticed, because Charlie never did. “Maybe just one beer,” he said.

  He and Amelia sat on the squashy sofa and chatted. They drank three bottles of Budweiser each. Benedict told himself he should get home, but it felt good to be away from the house and Charlie.

  She showed him photographs of when she was young, with her family back in the States. “You can come over and visit,” she said. “It’ll be fun.”

  “I have the shop to look after...”

  Amelia sighed. She sipped her beer and studied him. “Don’t you ever have fun, Benedict?”

  “Yes,” he said, though he wasn’t sure that kicking a football around with Charlie was what she meant. “Sometimes.”

  “Hmm.” She blew into the neck of her bottle.

  “Very musical,” Benedict said.

  “I have lots of secret talents.” She laughed. “Did you also know that when I first met you, I got a little crush on you?”

  Benedict gave an embarrassed laugh and picked up another photograph.

  “I did,” she said. “You’re so protective and caring, and kinda mature. You made me feel welcome. Hey,” she said, noticing that he’d finished his Budweiser. “Do you want another beer?”

  “I should go...” Benedict said. “It’s late.”

  “Aw, stay awhile.” Amelia moved closer and gave his T-shirt a tug. “We can talk some more.”

  Benedict glanced out of the window and knew he should leave. Something had switched in the air and he wasn’t sure what it was.

  Amelia took his bottle from him and set it down on the floor. She inched her head toward his, and Benedict didn’t move his away. Her breath smelled sweet, like toffee. She smiled and studied him, and he didn’t know what to do. Her face was too close for him to turn his away. “I’ve drunk a little too much,” she whispered.

  “I think I have, too,” Benedict said.

  It was the prompt that told him to feign naivety and resume conversation about America, and her photos, but he ignored it. The hairs sprang up on his forearms, one by one. Their faces remained so close that Benedict could see that her eyelashes were sun-kissed on their tips and she had a tiny mole next to her left eyebrow.

  “Benedict,” she said, smiling. “I’ll miss you.”

  “Amelia, I...” he said, not sure what he was going to add to his words.

  She pressed her lips against his and they were soft and firm. The closeness of another person was something he hadn’t experienced for such a long time. Benedict had just a couple of seconds in which to make his decision. He could pull away or kiss her back.

  And, in the heat of the moment, he made the wrong choice.

  * * *

  When Amelia opened the front door for Benedict to leave, they both knew it had been a mistake. They didn’t need to say anything. Amelia’s eyes were low as she said a quick, embarrassed “’Bye,” and Benedict’s feet felt like lead when he walked home.

  In the early-morning light, he found the white drawstring bag full of gemstones that had returned in his mother’s rucksack after her death. The gems represented Benedict and Charlie’s happier times under the gem tree and, heavyhearted and full of regret, Benedict pushed it into the front pocket of Charlie’s rucksack.

  And he never saw Amelia again.

  Charlie and Amelia moved to America within a few days, and Benedict never knew if Amelia told Charlie about what she and Benedict did. But he guessed that she must have done, because the two Stone brothers never spoke again.

  Charlie wrote twice after he left. One postcard said that he and Amelia had married and had a child. In a second letter, Charlie told Benedict that he never wanted to see him again.

  He never left a forwarding address.

  Benedict’s foolhardy half hour on the sofa with Amelia on that hot July night was one reason why having a family of his own was so vitally important. He wanted to bring up a child and not mess up this time. He could try to compensate for his mistake with Charlie, and start a new untarnished version of the Stone family.

  Benedict also thought that if Gemma was hiding anything and if she was in any kind of trouble, he wanted to know. So he could try to help her.

  And in doing so, he could make some kind of amends for what he’d done to his brother.

  18.

  RED AVENTURINE

  attraction, action, perseverance

  NOON SUN MANOR was situated at the end of a dirt track, around half a mile’s steep climb up a hill from the high street. Benedict huffed as he trudged toward the gray square building, with its overgrown topiary and cracked Georgian windowpanes.

  “Think of WEB,” Gemma said beside him. “You’re getting fitter.”

  Benedict grunted and pressed on the stitch in his side. In his hand he held a lilac envelope, and inside that was a small handwritten card which smelled of violets.

  “Who is Violet de Gama?” Gemma asked. “I like her name.”

  “She was born in Noon Sun, in the ’40s, and starred in a few Hollywood romances. She had an affair with the head of the studio, and his wife made sure that Violet never worked again. After that, I think she started to drink too much and had a series of affairs with married men. She stayed on in America but moved back here over a decade ago.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “Estelle read a magazine article about her once. Before that, I didn’t even know who she was. She’s a real recluse.”

  “But she’s interested in your jewelry. Way to go, Uncle Ben.”

  * * *

  When Violet opened the door, Benedict’s senses were accosted by a flourish of heady rose-and-patchouli perfume. He could hardly see Violet’s face because her hair and forehead were hidden under a voluminous purple paisley turban. The lenses of her sunglasses were black, large and round, making her look like a bluebottle under a microscope. She wore a man’s red silk dressing gown over an emerald green top and trousers, and three strings of chunky pearls around her neck. The only unglamorous thing about her appearance was her sturdy black shoes, which were each fastened by three straps of thick Velcro.

  “Come in,” she croaked, her voice sounding like she smoked and drank whiskey all day long.

  Benedict and Gemma trod along the frayed woven rugs lining the hallway and into a room lit only by candlelight. It was small and square, with the only furniture a leather sofa, a chair and a round table upon which lay playing cards mapped out in a game of Solitaire. The walls were covered with black-and-white photographs in thick black frames. They were mainly of men, posing, smiling and smoldering for the camera. Lawrence Donnington wouldn’t have looked amiss amongst them, Benedict thought.

  Then h
e told himself that he should try not to worry about Lawrence. He’d managed to convince himself that Estelle’s conversation with the gallery owner on the balcony was purely platonic, about art.

  “I received your note,” Benedict said as Violet nodded curtly for them to sit down.

  Benedict and Gemma sank into a battered black leather sofa with a crisscross of duct tape on the arm. The room was so cold Benedict could see his breath, and Violet’s perfume did little to mask the smell of damp. Gemma picked up a fading ocher velvet cushion and put it on her lap.

  “Of course you did,” Violet said with a prickly tone. “I posted it myself.”

  “You did?” With her theatrical clothes, it looked like she might be more used to being chauffeured around.

  Violet gave an exaggerated sigh. “You should ignore stories about my decline and my death, Mr. Stone,” she said. “It is all fantasy made up by others, to enhance their own boring little lives.”

  Benedict had never heard anyone discussing her, and he doubted that many villagers even knew of her existence. The main topic of conversation in Noon Sun at the moment was Bonfire Night, and maybe Estelle’s art exhibition.

  “People can be so jealous,” she continued. “It’s why I keep myself to myself. Then they can talk about me all they like, and I can’t hear them.”

  “Okaaay,” Benedict said. “How can I help you?”

  “I want to sell some of my jewels,” Violet announced. She said it as if it didn’t matter to her, but he heard a tremble in her voice. “I have no need for them any longer and I have bills to pay.” She picked up a small worn tan leather suitcase, positioned it on her lap and flipped open the lid. Inside was an array of smaller boxes, each with an embossed name on top—Tiffany, Chanel, Cartier, Bulgari.

  She opened a red velvet box and took out a string of pearls. “Davis Hamilton gave me these. He was my most voracious lover,” she purred. “Heathcliff Matterson was supposed to be well-endowed but I couldn’t see what the fuss was about, and Taylor Benjamin left his wife for me. He gave me a pink sapphire ring to mark the occasion.”