Read Happier Than She's Ever Been... Online

Authors: Menna van Praag

Tags: #Spiritual Fiction

Happier Than She's Ever Been... (3 page)

BOOK: Happier Than She's Ever Been...
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Holding a copy of
Coraline
in one hand, May stopped for a moment. Perhaps the dream had been a happy one. She'd been worrying about nothing. It was fine. Everything was fine. May turned back to the shelf, then stopped, holding the book in mid-air.

False love. Fear. Panic. Anger. Despair. Reality. A scream, her scream. Feet running, dashing through a forest, faster and faster. Lies. Her heart beating in her mouth. Ba-bum, ba-bum, ba-bum. Louder and louder. Fear. Loss. Her feet tripping on a log, falling into a deep, never-ending black hole. Falling and falling and falling into…

May dropped the book to the floor.

Distracting herself with a few more sales and spending half an hour chatting with a customer about their favourite Alice Hoffman books, May got through the rest of the day without thinking about the dream again. Or, at least, not every other second. When she went upstairs that evening Ben had made sea bass in white wine and butter sauce, with curly kale and purple sprouting broccoli for dinner. Her favourite.

‘Are you okay,
bichana
?' Ben asked, as they sat on the floor, their plates on the coffee table. It was his pet name for her, meaning ‘kitten' in Portuguese. And it was what his mother had called him as a child, though of course using the male form:
bichano.
Sometimes, when she was feeling adventurous, May used it too.

‘Yeah.' May glanced up. ‘I… it, um, well, it was just a slow day, that's all. I don't like them so much, they make me worry.'

‘Don't worry,' Ben said, smiling. ‘We'll be okay. It will all even out in the end, good days and bad; it always does.'

‘Yeah, I suppose so,' May said. ‘You know, I should have had that attitude when I was running The Cocoa Café, then maybe I wouldn't have lost everything.'

‘Perhaps,' Ben said, ‘but then you'd never have published your book or crossed the ocean and I'd never have met you. Which would have been a very bad thing indeed.'

‘That's true.' May smiled. ‘It's like Shakespeare wrote: “
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so
.” I suppose that's true. Though it's sometimes hard to think so when you're in the middle of some messy, totally tragic event.' The first one that came to May's mind was the humiliating and heart-crushing break-up with Jake, the only man she thought she'd been so in love with before Ben. The one who'd taken her right to the edge of sanity and self-loathing. But of course she couldn't mention that now.

‘Hey.' Ben reached over the plates to take May's hand across the table. ‘You seem a little sad. What's up?'

May shrugged, thinking it was too silly to talk about. ‘Nothing, it's nothing, I don't know.'

‘You do,' he said, ‘I think you do.'

‘No, it's nothing,' May said. ‘It's silly.'

‘Tell me.'

‘I had this dream last night. I couldn't sleep afterwards. And, I don't know, I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.'

‘Oh.' Ben squeezed May's hand. A little rush of warmth flooded her body, and she felt again how lucky she was to be loved by this man. ‘So, what was the dream about?'

May glanced down at the last piece of broccoli on her plate. She prodded it with her fork. ‘I don't know,' she lied, scared to bring up the subject. ‘I can't remember.'

That night Ben didn't fall asleep as quickly as usual. He knew May wasn't telling him the truth. At least not entirely. And it worried him that she would retreat into herself when he was right next to her and wanting to help. But he didn't press her, thinking it best to let May tell him in her own time. He turned his head to see the luminous red lights of the alarm clock: twelve twenty-one. Past midnight. The eighth of October. Two weeks until the anniversary of their first kiss. And tonight was the first time they'd turned out the lights without making love. May had her eyes closed, but Ben knew she wasn't asleep. He felt a tiny distance springing up between them, something he'd never felt before. He reached out to gently stroke May's long, thick, dark hair. But the space was still there. Eventually, not knowing what else to do, Ben finally closed his eyes and let himself fall asleep.

As soon as she heard Ben's breathing deepen and slow, May opened her eyes. She still felt the small stabs of guilt in her chest for not telling him the truth. But she hadn't wanted to bring up the pain of her past, hadn't wanted to create a problem, to create concern where perhaps there was none. For the past year everything had been, for the first time in May's life, so perfect. And she couldn't bear to spoil it, especially with the fragments of fantasies. It was nearly four o'clock before May finally drifted to sleep. And, almost as soon as she did, she began to dream.

She was in a field full of daisies and daffodils and apple trees in blossom. A gentle breeze blew around her and pinkish petals drifted through the air, floating into her palms as she reached out to touch them. Then suddenly, as her fingers closed around the blossom, everything vanished and she was left standing on a wasteland. The ground was barren and bare, with tufts of dry grass scattered across the empty field. A few trees remained, stripped down, their skeleton fingers grasping at the wind.

May felt a knot of fear twisting in her throat. She looked out to the horizon to see a figure walking slowly towards her and, before she could see more than an outline, before the figure was anything other than a shadow, May knew who it was.

‘Rose,' May whispered, as the woman reached her, looking exactly as she remembered: thin and tiny, dressed in a twin set and pearls, with those little sparkling blue eyes and an enormous smile on her lips. May thought of the café, the chocolate flapjacks, meeting this old woman who'd touched her heart and saved her life, and the memory shone bright in her heart as though it was yesterday.

‘I knew it was you,' May said softly. ‘I hoped…'

‘Did you?' The old lady smiled. ‘So why the desolate landscape, my dear?' She threw a tiny birdlike hand in the direction of the wasteland. ‘Why ever would you conjure up this?'

‘I suppose I was scared.'

‘Of what, my dear?'

‘I don't know,' May admitted.

‘Well, enough of that,' Rose said. ‘Let's brighten this dream up a bit.'

And, with that, she snapped her tiny fingers. Instantly the landscape disappeared and they were sitting back in The Cocoa Café, the place they'd met over two years ago, at the table where they'd sat and talked, and May's life had changed forever.

‘A reunion.' May smiled. ‘It's a shame we can't eat flapjacks too. I haven't had them in so long.'

‘We can eat whatever you want, my dear,' Rose said, laughing, the sound tinkling through the air. ‘This is your dream, after all.' She clicked her fingers again and a plate piled high with chocolate flapjacks appeared on the table. May grinned and two steaming mugs of hot chocolate materialised into their hands.

‘Perfect.' May sighed happily.

‘Perfect,' Rose echoed, ‘and, funnily enough, that's exactly the topic I came to talk to you about, before it's too late.'

‘Too late for what?' May asked, suddenly anxious. ‘What's wrong? I thought everything was okay now. I took all your advice last time. I was courageous and compassionate. I came here; I sold my books; I met Ben. I'm not a miserable thing any more. I'm helping people; I'm being a bright light in a dark world, just like you said. I'm no longer drowning my sorrow in vats of chocolate, and I haven't given up my life and my sense of self for a man, not since that disaster with Jake when I became all needy and clingy and let my world revolve around him until he ran away screaming… Well, I – I thought everything was just perfect now. I thought I'd got it right this time.'

‘Oh, don't worry so much, dear,' Rose said, patting May's hand with her tiny wrinkled fingers. ‘There's nothing very wrong yet, and there needn't be anything wrong, so long as you don't get attached to the idea of perfection.'

‘What?' May frowned, thoroughly confused.

‘You have the idea, my dear, that when you find the right relationship it will be “perfect”. But this is not true, at least not in the way you think of perfection – as a life together without upset or upheaval, where you always agree, see life in the same way and want the same things –'

‘But… but,' May stumbled, ‘we do – we are. That's what it's like with Ben. That's how I know he's my soulmate.'

‘Oh, my dear.' Rose sighed and sipped her hot chocolate. ‘I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but a soulmate isn't what you think it is.'

‘What?' May asked, feeling anxiety rising in her throat. ‘What do you mean?'

‘Well, my dear,' Rose said gently, ‘like most people on the planet, you have a rather highly polished view of love: romance, sunsets, long walks on the beach and all that. You think that once you meet “the one” everything will fall into place. You'll match perfectly. You'll never disagree, fight, feel attracted to other people, get angry or want to hurt each other. You think that being soulmates means a total absence of pain, conflict, anger and fear.'

‘Well, doesn't it?' May frowned again.

‘No.' Rose nibbled a chocolate flapjack. ‘A soulmate is not someone who never challenges you, always agrees with you and sees everything exactly the way you see it. A soulmate is someone who helps you to grow, to have courage when you're scared, to forgive, to see another point of view; someone who will be gentle with you, and honest, a mirror that won't hurt you but will show you the truth. So you can learn both to love yourself the way you are and to be, at least most of the time, the happiest, kindest and most compassionate version of you. And so sometimes, when you lose your way, he'll challenge you. If you get caught up in the trap of money and fame, striving for things that you think will bring you happiness, he'll remind you –'

‘Are you saying that's what I'm going to do?' May asked. ‘Because I don't think so. I think I've learnt all my life lessons now. I think it's all going to be fine. I've been through the pain, I've got it all worked out.'

‘Oh, my dear!' Rose laughed. ‘The minute you think
that
, you're in trouble. Life is always changing, always throwing up new lessons to learn; you're going to be reacting and responding to things, for better or worse, until you die. You're not a monk sitting on a mountain top; you're a real woman trying to do the best you can in an often crazy world. Some days you'll be happy and centred and kind; other times you'll be fearful and lost and do or say something you regret. I'm afraid it's never over, it never stops.'

‘Oh dear.' May sighed. ‘Oh dear, I thought…'

‘But you don't have to worry, my love,' Rose said. ‘Remember to always have compassion for yourself and everyone else learning their lessons around you; then you'll be okay, no matter what.'

‘I don't understand though,' May said. ‘If a soulmate brings you as much pain as any other relationship, then what's the point? What's the point of finding someone you really love? You might as well just settle for anyone.'

BOOK: Happier Than She's Ever Been...
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