The Book of Love. Fionnuala Kearney

in touching distance, planted one foot firmly in front of the other and matched his pace.

       There was a young couple called Carter,

       Who were madly in love as a starter,

       But tragedy struck, and their life, it seemed stuck,

       Split into before and then after …

      Sitting on a cold bench at the river, Erin realised when her son stretched an arm out and laughed out loud at a passing family of swans, that the world could still make her smile. She realised when she caught her husband looking at her – with the same look in his eyes that had been captured in the wedding photo in the hall – that his love carried on regardless of loss.

      ‘Please,’ Dom said. ‘Don’t think too much about what I said. It’s what happens when you push me to talk. I talk complete crap.’

      Erin leaned across Jude and kissed Dom gently on the lips.

      When Jude almost leapt out of her arms at the sound of a boat, she allowed herself to really believe he would grow up, and that he might have a love of sailing. When someone nearby played a radio and a piece of music she and Dom both recognised had them humming aloud, Erin allowed herself to lock eyes with her husband; to really see him, as if for the first time, again. And when Rachel giggled as Dom made silly noises at her, Erin gripped Jude tight, closed her eyes and immersed herself in the sounds of love and life.

      4th February 1999

      Dearest Dom/Tom,

      Today was so lovely, not so much like it used to be as like it can and will be.

      Please be patient with me. I know we both need sex but right now I can’t. Not because I don’t want to but because I’m afraid it won’t be like before and I’m scared shitless of getting pregnant again.

      You don’t have to write here if you don’t want to, but Fitz is right about these pages, for me anyway … I find it easier to say stuff here, things that I hold back from saying when I’m with you. Sometimes, when we’re face to face, I’m so afraid of letting you down and other times, I’m just not brave enough to say things out loud. If things are said aloud, they’re so much more real, aren’t they? Like what you said today …

      For now, I’m just trying to hang on to what matters. You and the twins. Fitz, family. But I feel as if I’m on top of a mountain trying to breathe. My lungs are tight, I can’t call out. I suppose it’s my own version of feeling ‘trapped’.

      Be patient? I’m trying.

      I love you because I know when you’ve read this that you’ll hear me.

      Erin xx

      5th February 1999

      My love,

      I will wait as long as I have to. I will do whatever it takes. But please don’t ask me to write shit down. I’m shit at writing shit down.

      And I hurt too.

      That’s all I can say here. I hurt too.

      I love you mightily,

      Dom xx

      6th February 1999

      Darling Dom,

      You’re not that shit at writing things down. Those few lines say a lot.

      All my love,

      Erin xx

      7th February 1999

      To my super-talented wife,

      Unlike you, this took me HOURS!

      ‘There was a young woman called Erin

      When I met her the room had no air-in

      She danced like a tree, I knew we would be,

      Together through thick and through thin.’

      I think from now on for Limerick purposes you should be called Pam and I should be called Steve?? Rhyming would be so much easier!

      I love you.

      Because you’re funny and you make me laugh. Because you look sexy in heels and because you always get the spiders out of the bath.

      I love you because you put a triangle of Toblerone in my suit pocket yesterday.

      Forever yours,

      Dom xx

       10. Dominic

      NOW – 3rd June 2017

      From The Book of Love:

      “Fuck-it, who cares why, Erin? I love you just because I do.”

      It’s Lydia’s party and I’m standing with a man and woman I don’t know who are having an animated discussion about Brexit. He’s ignoring me and nodding sagely as she speaks. She’s paying no attention to me either, only interested in jabbing the air with her forefinger to make her point. I look around the room – a large front-to-back ground floor of a Victorian villa, it’s packed with people, all deciding they’d rather not risk rain outside.

      The Brexit duo and I are in the exact spot Lydia and Nigel have their pine tree in December. Except for last year. Last Christmas Lydia understandably went all Grinch-like and trees and baubles and sparkles and tinsel and laughing were banned. My eyes search her out in the crowd. She must be in the kitchen directing operations, so I head that way, only stopping when I hear familiar voices in the hallway. Nigel’s booming laugh followed by a quieter, higher-pitched, tone. She sounds just like Erin – their voices have the same timbre, but the tell-tale hairstyle confirms it’s Rachel, our daughter.

      I scramble past strange faces but as soon as I near, I see that she’s brought Paul and I turn back on myself. Though I’ve heard about him, I’ve not met this older live-in lover of hers. Holding back, I watch from my vantage point. And while he doesn’t exactly have liver spots on his hands, it’s there. The age gap is, to me anyway, this big gaping thing standing tall, almost proud, between them. He’s a chino-wearing forty-year-old; shirt nicely ironed, fair hair a little too coiffured for my liking – screams ‘father figure’ – which makes me feel a little sick. Her two-tone, blue-bottomed, dreads are tied back in a ponytail; her silver nose ring glints under the light from the ceiling spotlights as she rests her head on Nigel’s shoulder. He’s hugging her tight and I want to do that so badly.

      ‘Jude here?’ she asks Nigel about her brother.

      ‘Jude’s taken a few days off,’ I hear his reply.

      Jude is interning at the school where Nigel is head teacher and term-time breaks are not encouraged. I wonder if he’s already decided teacher training isn’t his thing – he’s never been great at sticking to things. I keep moving, disappointed I won’t see my son, acutely aware that I’ve always had many more flaws than him and that I spent the afternoon talking to a stuffed elephant.

      ‘Oh,’ Rachel replies, her neat eyebrows arching, ‘he never said. C’mon,’ she grabs Paul by the hand and says. ‘I’m famished, let’s find the birthday girl.’