I remember the first time I ever saw him, one minute the village had been dead and the next moment he was very much there. When he moved in it wasn’t really something that could have been missed. The day that the removal vans had arrived I happened to have some friends round and they had witnessed it too. No exaggeration, the day he walked into my life was the day that I knew what true beauty was. I know its not normal to go around calling men beautiful, I mean if you called a guy beautiful to his face you would be likely to get a slap.
But that’s what Ben was, and that’s what he is…beautiful.
It had been a Saturday like any other the morning of his arrival, my best friends Rena and Jemma had been over and we had been doing whatever it is that 11 year olds do when suddenly we noticed a commotion from across the road.
“Ooooh new neighbours!” Rena had squealed, she had always been a bit nosy, I guess when you live in a boring place like Norfolk someone moving in is the most entertaining thing that will happen all week.
At that point I remember us all clambering to have a look out the window, waiting to see the first glimpse of the family, all secretly hoping that it would be a girl the same age as us.
And then a few seconds later there he was, Benjamin Adams, the guy that was destined to haunt me for the next 5 years. He stepped out of the car behind the van, confident, tall and gorgeous. I had never seen anyone like him; he had wonderful tanned skin, dark hair that was curtained round his face and bright blue eyes. Right from that instant I fancied him, I was practically mesmerised as I continued to gaze shyly out of the window at him……...
It seemed that I wasn’t the only one under his spell; all three of us were standing there, mouths dropped to the floor, practically drooling at this wondrous sight before us.
“Now he is something,” Jemma said in little more than a whisper.
“You can say that again,” Rena replied, “and look who is the lucky girl who will be living near him.”
I felt a slight rush running through my body, she was right, he had moved in opposite and my bedroom was in perfect view of his. Plus I had an access all areas pass as my house wasn’t any old house, I lived on top of the local village shop and everyone in the village used it, it was the only shop for miles and I worked in there every weekend, it was more than guaranteed that I would have the perfect opportunity to strike up a conversation.
“Ooooh shall we see if they need a hand?” Jemma asked, a cheeky looking glint in her eye.
“Isn’t that kind of obvious?” I asked, “I mean would we normally go round offering help?”
“Yeah Kimberly is right” Rena agreed with me.
“Well we could just go and sit on the shop forecourt?” Jemma came up with an equally loony suggestion which for some reason Rena agreed with and before I knew it all 3 of us were sat on the wall outside the shop, our eyes all fixed to the scene across the road.
We were pretending not to look in the direction, and trying desperately hard to sit there and have a normal conversation, glancing up every now and again which we hoped looked casual enough. It was somewhat of a relief when we finally found a topic that kept us all occupied for a few minutes as we discussed what we were going to do our geography project on.
“Don’t suppose you guys have got a pair of scissors have you?” a voice interrupted our conversation.
I looked up and my eyes were met by a pair of amazing blue ones. He shifted uncomfortably under my stare.
“Ben, Ben Adams” he introduced himself.
“Kimberly White,” I managed to stutter out, “but most people call me Kim, and this is Jemma and Rena.” I pointed to each in turn.
He smiled, showing a set of perfect white teeth. I looked up to look into those eyes again, his hair was flopping slightly into his eyes, for some reason he looked so vulnerable standing there like that, although I could tell from his stance that he was anything but.
I felt myself glow red as I began to speak again. “Sorry, what did you want?”
“Some scissors,” he repeated, “we need to get some boxes open and we stupidly packed them away somewhere.”
I grinned back at him, hoping that my smile looked as attractive as I hoped it might in my head.
“Sure, come in and I’ll see if I can find you some.”
“You live here?” he asked.
“Yeah”
“Wow, imagine living in a shop.” He marvelled as we had made our way through the front door.
All my friends had always been envious of the shop, especially as the sweet counter was located right near the door and Mum always turned a blind eye to us grabbing a handful on the way out. It was the perfect little shop for village life, a bakery and newsagents in one, we sold all the grocery essentials for the local villager.
“It can be pretty good fun.” I agreed, “when we were younger my parents let us play shop when it was shut.”
I lead him through the back of the shop and into our main house. I chuckled to myself as I noticed Rena and Jemma shuffling like little sheep after us. Finding our way into the kitchen, I offered Ben a seat and began routing through the drawers for the scissors.
“So what brings you to Norfolk?” I asked.
“My Mum has always like the area and when she found a job here she leapt at the chance to move.” He explained.
I nodded knowingly, an awful lot of people loved Norfolk with its Broads, beaches, countryside and city, personally I could never see the appeal myself, the lack of major roads and farming life style made it the butt of everyone’s jokes and very inaccessible.
I continued to route through the drawers, desperately racking my brain for something else clever to say. I always found it quite hard to talk to people I didn’t know, especially when they were as gorgeous as Ben.
“You starting school?” I asked, pleased that I had found a sensible question, and one that I definitely wanted to know the answer to.
“Yeah Jarrold High.” He replied.
“Ooooh I’m going there!” the enthusiasm in my voice was alarmingly apparent and I blushed as he laughed at me.
“What year?” he asked
“I’m just going into year 7.” I commented, feeling slightly awkward, he was sure to be going into a higher year than me, he could have been 2 years older at least.
“Snap.” He grinned back.
I looked at him and smiled back, he was going to be in my year and live in my village, could life be anymore perfect.
“First year of high school and I can’t wait” he enthused.
“I’m a little scared to tell you the truth.” I replied, it was true I was nervous about starting at the larger school in Wroxham, the nearest town to our village. After spending years at our tiny local village school, high school seemed like an incredibly daunting experience.
“Nothing to be scared of,” his voice was confident, and I could see he wasn’t bluffing, he really was looking forward to it.
Finally I found the scissors and passed them over to him, as his hand connected with the metal I felt his hand brush slightly against mine, sending a strange shivering sensation up my arm that I had never felt before. I wondered if this was love, in all of my magazines, it said that this is how it started. I started going into a dream world where Ben and I were sitting in Mc Donalds, sharing a Big Mac.
“Well, I guess I’ll see you at school then.” He interrupted me from my thoughts.
“Yeah, I’ll see you around.” I replied, trying to stay casual although my heart was practically pounding out of my chest.
“Thanks for the scissors.” He shouted as he crossed the road and returned to his house.
“Not a problem,” I breathed.
I hoped that I was going to be seeing a lot more of Benjamin Adams.