At a click of a finger the talking clock in the hallway announced the time; six twenty one pm. Richard traced the smooth, cool wall downwards from the clock with his fingers, counting all along. At the count of eight he found the light switch and turned it on. He wanted everything to be ready for Ben to do his magic as soon as he got in.
Fifteen weeks and eleven letters. This was fast becoming the unit with which he measured time. The dear, dear calendar started on the day he received his first letter from Christina.
With a spring in his step, Richard walked over to the computer and turned that, as well as the new Kurzweil scanner, on as well.
At last a key turned in the front door and Ben let himself in, smelling as ever of a concoction of chewing gum and coffee.
’Some heat wave, eh?’, Ben said as he went straight into the kitchen. ‘People are going around next to n…naked out there’. He dropped a shopping bag on the floor. Richard followed him, aware from the sound of water that Ben was washing his face.
‘I know. And if you stay in the heat stifles you and if you step outside the sun scorches you. You can’t win really, can you?’ There was a hint of impatience in his voice which Ben picked up.
‘Right, Richard. Let’s sort the post then.’
‘There wasn’t any today’.
‘Oh. No wonder you’re looking m…miserable.’
Ben paused for a moment, waiting for a reaction to his little joke. There was none. ‘What you want m…me to do today - as I get it - is help you work the new system yourself. I don’t know why, though. If I told you once I told you a million times: I don’t mind doing it. I’d come here everyday willingly. You n…know that.’
He was already heading to the room next door where the computer was. Richard followed him, hating the awkwardness. He didn’t want to seem ungrateful, but there was no way he could let Ben read Christina’s letters any more. It struck him that for the first time – well, at least the first since Ben began reading his mail for him – he was receiving letters of a rather personal nature.
He could tell Ben was already sitting down in the armchair and fumbling with the keyboard. ‘I know, Ben’, he ventured. ‘Heck, you already come over most nights, don’t you? I don’t know what I’d do without all your help. But this letter thing, it’s making me feel rather, err…inadequate. I owe it to myself to learn how to manage on my own.’
The tutorial finally got underway. The whole thing turned out to be easier than Richard had feared. He already could dictate into the computer, but had assumed it might prove tricky to operate the new Kurzweil scanner. He could tell that this magical invention would prove priceless. And now he learned how to put a letter unto the scanner, press a button and hear the words being uttered.
After demonstrating a few times and making sure Richard would manage on his own, Ben set about tidying up. Hearing the loud hum of the vacuum cleaner, Richard retreated to the kitchen and went through the shopping bag Ben had brought.
He grabbed a pan and filled it with water, then put it on the hob. ‘Can you stay for dinner?’ he asked, tearing open a bag of pasta and emptying it in the pan.
‘Can’t. Got loads of c…coursework.’, Ben grunted as he put the vacuum cleaner away. ‘G…guess who I ran into this morning. Ok, here’s a clue. Two dogs’.
‘Jessica Hamilton from RNIB!’ Richard immediately shouted from inside the fridge, where his upper body was almost completely hidden. He reappeared holding a couple of tomatoes, a cucumber and a lime. ‘Now, that must have been a surprise. Must be two years now since she introduced us. How is the old gal?’
‘She seemed OK,’ Ben said as he unloaded the washing machine. ‘Looked p… pleased that I still help out here. Oh, and she says if you e…ever change your mind about those dogs, shout’.
 ‘Doesn’t give up easily, does she?’, Richard remarked, slicing the tomatoes. ‘It’s rather embarrassing, you know. Here I am, inundated with offers of free guide dogs from charities up and down the country. Instead of accepting them and looking suitably grateful I refuse and cite a dog phobia. I suppose it’s funny at my age but, there you go.’  
‘And Jessica went a step f…further, didn’t she?’ Ben said with a chuckle, ‘Offering you two dogs in one go! That was funny, you know’.
They carried on talking while they worked; Ben - as always - steering the conversation away from himself. This used to suit Richard fine. He knew how Ben’s parents’ divorce still affected him almost three years on. Usually, Richard would gladly natter away about his choir rehearsals, the comings and goings of Diane, a new book that he listened to. Recently, however, it became harder and harder to talk about his life to Ben while tiptoeing around a main part of it: his feelings for Christina.
Ben said he needed to see to the mess outside – the waste collectors had been late in the morning and the wind had played with the contents of the recycling box; various flyers and cereal boxes were now stuck to Richard’s hedge.
He stepped outside, sandy blond hair reflecting the last rays of the sun; round, pale face still more of a child’s than a man’s, despite the frowning. It was a sight that the residents of Richard’s close had grown used to: the youth working in Richard’s front garden and looking perfectly at ease. For Ben, it was the only time he knew what to do with his long limbs - the body that seemed to grow without him having a say in the matter.
Richard carried on preparing dinner, finding it hard to wait for Ben to leave so he can be alone again. Standing there by the kitchen window, feeling the warmth of the sun on his skin, he wondered how, only a few weeks ago, he had ridiculed the idea of finding solace in letter writing. He had filled the form Diane got from the church and sent it off, with Ben’s help, in a moment of exceptional boredom. A few weeks on, Christina and her letters filled his heart with a nameless feeling. He struggled to find a word to capture it, but couldn’t.
Soon enough, Ben reappeared to announce he was ready to go. He pocketed the shopping money Richard owed him, switched the lights off and left.
Alone at last, Richard took the bunch of letters over to the computer and sat down in the armchair with a glass of wine. He decided to work his way through the letters starting with the first. He still remembered how light and entertaining it was. It introduced him to a world he knew nothing of. Fashion, nightlife, glamour. He was hooked right from the start.
The computerised voice was male, for one thing, and ridiculously English when the letters themselves had the echoes of the tropical radiating off their every word. But he cherished the privacy, and the freedom to listen to Christina’s words over and over again.
After a short interruption to have dinner and wash up, he settled down again to listen to the rest of the letters. It was easy for him to see how she turned his life upside down; she stirred longings inside him that he had forgotten even existed. The steady rhythm of his life peaked into a climax with the arrival of a letter and slowed down into a standstill with the delay of another.
It was just after midnight that he finally turned the computer off. He remained sitting there for a long time. And then it came to him at last – the word he was searching for.
Christina made him feel flattered.