Daytime Soap Operas
Sunset Beach Fan Fiction

Chapter 8

Disclaimer: Sunset Beach belongs to Aaron Spelling and NBC. This fanfic is purely for fans entertainment.

Meg: "Come on Ben, where are you?"

She had been waiting for almost an hour. She knew he had to go to the Liberty Coorporation first and had set up the picnic but then as the time went by she had started to get worried. She had tried his cell phone but it was switched off and she knew the car phone was broken and Ben had taken it out of the car to be fixed.

Meg: "OK, I'm giving you five more minutes and then I'll call the Liberty Coorporation and make sure you didn't surround yourself with more work!"

Suddenly her cell phone rang.

Meg: "Hello?"

Gabi: "Hi Meg. I wanted to know if you want to come shopping with me and Vanessa tomorrow?"

Meg: "Sure, I'd love to. Ben and I are taking Benjy to a movie but after that I'm free."

Gabi: "Great. Is 4.00 alright with you?"

Meg: "Thats fine. Gabi, Ben hasn't stopped by The Deep today has he?"

Gabi: "No, he hasn't. I thought you two were going for a picnic today? Oh, I haven't interupted anything have I?"

Meg: "No, no. Its just Ben was supposed to be here awhile ago but there's no sign of him yet. He was going to the Liberty Coorporation but he should have been finished there by now."

Gabi: "Well, I'm sure he'll turn up soon. Why don't you try the Liberty Coorporation and see has he left?"

Meg: "I was thinking about doing that. I'll give him a few more minutes and then I'll call."

Gabi: "OK. I hope he turns up soon. Have fun."

Meg: "Thanks Gabi. Bye."

Meanwhile Ben and Maria had gotten stuck in traffic and had talked about their feelings towards Tess. Ben had switched off his cell phone so that wouldn't be interrupted. When they finally got to the Liberty Coorporation, Ben looked at his watch and decided that he had lots of time left before he had to meet Meg. What he didn't know was that his watch had stopped and it was actually 20 minutes later than his watch read.

Ben: "Why don't you come up to my office for a few minutes and we'll finish our talk?"

Maria: "Sure".

When they got to Ben's office, he seen that the temporary secretary, Louise, was still there working on the files. She had just started that day and semed nice enough but this was her first job and was very nervous. He couldn't wait for Carol to come back from her honeymoon. Meg had been in the PR and law departments all day preparing statements for the press and shareholders on the new projects that the Liberty Coorporation intended to start working on as soon as possible and had not met Louise.

Louise: "Hi Mr. Evans. What are you doing back?"

Ben: "Hi Louise. Remember I told you I had to pick up some files and then I would be back to drop them off?"

Louise giggled: "Of course. I'm sorry, I forgot." Louise thought that Mr. Evans was drop-dead gorgeous and when he was speaking to her she found it was hard to concentrate. His blue eyes, his lovely smile his gorgeous accent....

"Louise, did you hear what I said?"

Louise came out of her daydream.

Louise: "Uh, sorry Mr. Evans. I missed that. What did you say?"

Ben: "I said this is Maria Evans. She's, um, she's my wife." It was hard for Ben to say those words once let alone twice but he knew that legally Maria was still his wife.

Maria smiled: "Its nice to meet you Louise."

Louise: "Its nice too meet you too Mrs. Evans."

Maria: "Please, call me Maria."

Maria was pleasantly surprised when Ben had called her his wife but she noticed the hesitant tone of his voice and remembered that she wouldn't be his wife for much longer.

Louise thought: "It figures. All the good ones are married". Ben: "Louise, Maria and I have something important to discuss so please make sure we aren't interupted by anyone no matter how important it is."

Ben and Maria went into Ben's office abd talked some more about Tess.

Ben: "So, we are agreed. Tess will move out straight away and we will let her know that once Benjy starts school we won't need her anymore?"

Maria: "Yes, I think thats the best way to handle it."

Meg decided to call Ben's office and the phone was ringing for a few seconds when someone picked up.

Louise: "Good afternoon, Liberty Coorporation. How may I help you?"

Meg: "Uh, hi. May I speak with Ben Evans please?"

Louise: "I'm sorry. He's with his wife right now and they don't want to be interupted. May I take a message?"

Meg was shocked: "Um, could you tell him Meg Cummings is on the phone please? I'm sure he'll want to take my call."

Louise: "I'm sorry but Mr. Evans made it clear he wanted to be alone with his wife with no interuptions. I'll tell him you called and I'm sure he'll try to get back to you as sson as he can".

Meg was still in shock and hung up the phone without saying anything else. She started to cry and thought: "How can you do this to me Ben? You knew I was waiting here and you choose to be with Maria instead of me? You told me you wouldn't be long. That nothing would delay you! Oh, God, why is he doing this to me?

Meg gathered up everything from the picnic blanket and threw it all into the basket and then put the basket into the back of the car. She seen the white rose she had bought with her in a little vase on the ground. She picked up the vase and threw the rose on to the ground and put the vase in the picnic basket with everything else. She took off at high speed towards Sunset Beach determined to get everything out in the open with Ben and make him finally choose between her and Maria. She was so angry! Why did he always do this? Put her second all the time! Maria just had to say his name and he came running and all she was left with was the little scraps of time and attention that he threw her way. And she always understood and put herself second like a naive fool. She was sick of it. Her self-respect and confidence and dwindled down to nothing in the past few months and she wanted to take her life back. She was going to make Ben finally choose! She had loved him since the first time she had met him, both over the Internet and the beach where she had first saw him. He had always been sure of her love but she had never been able to count on his love for her. What was it going to take to finally get him to commit himself fully to her? She didn't want him to feel obligated to her. She just wanted him to love her the way she loved him and she really thought he felt that way until now...

At that moment all thoughts of Ben went out of Meg's head as she lost control of the car and it crashed against a fence and down the side of a cliff. She screamed for Ben to help her and then her whole world went black.

Ben and Maria finished up their discussion and Ben offered to drive her to her art class. She accepted and as he dropped her off at the gallery he noticed the clock outside the gallery and seen that it was much later than he thought. He looked at his watch again and realised that it had stopped. He drove towards Smugglers Cove as fast as he could and decided to take a few short cuts along the way. He completely by-passed the road that Meg had been driving along when she had lost control of the car. He tried to call Meg's cell phone but there was no answer. When he got to the cove he seen that there was no sign of Meg and as he turned towards his car he seen a little white rose on the grass near the cliff and noticed the tyre marks a few steps away from the flower.

Ben sighed: "Oh, Meg. I'm so sorry. I ruined our day together."

He didn't know how he was going to make this up to her but he was determimed to do his best. He knew she would be angry but she would understand. He knew her and he knew that she would be happy that Tess would finally be moving out. He would buy Meg some white roses and maybe they could have their picnic another time.