Page 115 of Let Me Love You (Excess All Areas 5)

“You make it sound like he did something ridiculous,” she said.

“I worried about her,” Ben said. “At first, I rode the popularity wave it gave me. The Manchester Evening News ran that headline about how I’d saved her. I met the mayor and got a free tour around Man City’s grounds. When she’d reach out, I’d answer, because even then, I wanted to look out for her. Even if I was out with my mates or playing video games or practising with the band, when she messaged, I always replied because I was worried about her. She’d looked so broken the last time I’d seen her that I just wanted to check she was okay. We’re a family of boys, Mr. Tobias. At that point, she felt more like a sister.”

“And from then on, until now, she’s always used you as a security blanket. It’s unhealthy. She’s never really learned to function without you. It’s why she left Asher. She doesn’t know how to be without you.”

“Dad, there’s a big difference between not knowing how to be without someone and choosing to be with someone. I tried. But I can’t be without him. So, I come back to my question. Why can’t we be friends? Why can’t you respect me as a Jewish woman, loyal to her faith except for one thing? Loving a man who isn’t.”

“But he isn’t good for you.”

“Says who?” Ben snapped, and Chaya could feel his frustration rising. “Are you the final arbiter of who your daughter is happy with? Isn’t that a decision she gets to make on her own?”

“Not if she is blinded by you into making the wrong decision.”

Ben sighed, easing his shoulder blades down his back, away from his ears. “And this is what this all boils down to. Making the wrong decision.” Ben looked at her. “I’m sorry, Chay, but I have to say this or I’ll carry it with me my whole life.”

He turned to her father. “I think all of that dislike of me was just somewhere to purge the anger you had with yourself for making the wrong decision. You were the one who was supposed to pick her up from her friend’s house that day. You were the one who was too busy to get there on time. You’re the reason she started walking in the rain. While I would never blame you for what happened that day, it’s true your choices left her in a position for it to happen. My choices that day rescued her. And the choices I’ve made every day since. It’s just been easier all this time to be mad at me instead of mad at yourself. You’ve made this about me not being Jewish, but it’s because I remind you of the time in her life when you let her down with huge consequences.”

Chaya’s father jumped to his feet. “How dare you speak to me like that?”

“Ben,” Chaya said, squeezing his hand as tears formed in her eyes. Why hadn’t she seen it?

“I’m sorry, Chay. I know I just made this all worse. But your dad has blamed me for it my entire life. He dresses it up as other reasons, talking about how unreliable I am as an adult. But this all started because he was unreliable too, and because he loves you so much, it burns him inside.”

She placed her hand on his cheek and he kissed her palm before facing her father again. “You used to say I wasonlya mechanic, which is an honest day’s work, and therefore not good enough for her. But now I’m a millionaire, a famous rock star, and I’m still not good enough for her, in your eyes. We both know how often you mention that I’m not Jewish and that it’s wrong for orthodox Jewish people to marry non-orthodox because it will lead to the dilution and ultimate end of your people. But, honestly, I don’t even think that’s what bothers you most. It’s that you still haven’t processed the fact you weren’t there for her, I was, and you’ve never been able to make up for it since.”

“Ben,” Chaya warned. It was going too far, and everything was getting worse.

Her father silently fumed. Blood vessels twitched at the edges of his forehead, and his nostrils flared. “Get out,” he said, his voice deathly low.

“No, Chay. I might as well finish what I was saying. Because whether your dad realises it or not, he’s abandoning you all over again.” He stood, offering Chaya his hand. She looked over at her father, who look devastated. “Chaya is trying to figure out how to navigate her life and faith. You could have been there for her. You could have helped counsel and guide her. But instead of listening to her and telling her you love her and being there for her, you kicked her out. You told her she was no longer welcome because the decision she has made for herself is not the decisionyouwould have made for her. My dad is an alcoholic and has never been there for me. I kicked him out of his own house because he hit my mum. But Chayamissesyou. She misses this house and your wife and her siblings. It’s killing her that you’re cutting her off, but not enough that she will choose you over me. You are deliberately causing her pain. Last time, it was an accident. The neighbour abducting her. When you were late for her, you had no idea just how badly that call would go. But this time, you know. It ends with me and Chaya separate from you and your family, again. And I’ll pick her up, dust her off, and I’ll help put her back together because I always have and always will. Because my love for your daughter isn’t conditional on who she believes in and whether she does as I say. I don’t place any boundaries on it. I’m not Jewish and I won’t pretend to be. But I will support her in raising our kids in her faith any way I can. You could do that so much better than I could, but if you aren’t there, I’ll do the very best I can for her instead.”

The words sat heavily between them all as if they had mass. Their impact as painful as if they were punches. And the fact Ben had just stood up for her, for her faith, for her relationship with her father so passionately made her love him even more.

Chaya studied the set of his jaw, the quiet confidence, the strength she felt just standing next to him. “Whatever happens next,” she said, “I love you.”

Ready to leave, she looked over at her father, ready to absorb whatever volley he wanted to throw.

But what she found was a man, now seated again, with his head in his hands.

Words rattled around in her head to make it all right. They should apologise. She should offer words of comfort.

“I miss you too, Chaya,” he said, finally. “And Ben is right. For much of it.”

“Then, we work together to fix it, Dad,” she said as she hurried over to his chair and crouched down next to it. She took his hands in hers. “We can do that, right?”

Her dad placed his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “I think we can.”

“I’m not paying five pounds for a pie crust when I can make my own for sixty-eight pence and a bit of elbow grease,” Nan said, turning her nose up at the assortment in the freezer section of the kosher store in Prestwich.

“Nan,” Ben hissed. “We don’t have time for a per item breakdown of what you could bake cheaper. We’re here because I need to pull off a kosher meal for sixteen people in five hours and I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

It had seemed like a good idea. Surprise Chaya by inviting her family. He’d thought the hard part would be convincing her parents to come. In the month since their conversation at Chaya’s parents’ house, progress had been…tepid. It had started with her seeing them on her own. Then, he’d been invited to an exceptionally awkward Shabbat Friday night dinner, where he’d been too nervous to eat or drink much of anything.

But when he’d driven over to invite them to dinner as a surprise for Chaya, Anna had seemed quite willing. It was only when he’d gotten home he realised it needed to be kosher, using all the separation of cutting boards and pots and knives Chaya had instituted since moving in.

“Can’t I just make two steak pies and call it good?”

“And that’s the problem, Nan. I don’t know. I’ve had enough problems finding a date that worked. Chaya’s shifts rule out a bunch of dates. Then, there was this thing called The Three Weeks, which appeared to be this big mourning period in the Jewish calendar, so I gave that a wide berth. Then, there’s something coming up called The 15thof Av, which I’m still a bit mystified about but I think includes matchmaking or something. I don’t know. So, I just need to impress Chaya’s parents.”

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