The Book of Love Read online

  Once, I lost money, an accumulation of bad gambles in Dad’s club. It was a lot of money and the only way I could fix it was to try and win it back. So, I did – I went back late one night, and I tried to win it back only I didn’t – I made it worse. I called Dad, begged him to help me, to loan me the money, begged him not to tell you. He’s never been happy with that part, well with either part, but please don’t blame him. He has tried over the years to get me to tell you about the loan, and about my habit, but I knew if I did, I would have to tell you everything. And I’d have to tell him everything – because he never knew that that phone call I made to him wasn’t made from home …

  That night, I drove home to my pregnant wife and child. Relieved. And because I just wanted to get back quickly, I was caught on camera speeding. Yes, that hand-written endorsement for a fine and three points that you saw on my old paper driving license was for the night of 10th May 1998.

  No, I wasn’t home, where I was meant to be, on the night Maisie died.

  And I’ve had to live with the question of whether she might never have died if I’d been where I should have been.

  I wasn’t there, Erin.

  You will hate me. Knowing this, I’m still begging you to forgive me. I promise, I mean promise like the word has never been used before, that I will never enter a bookies or place any form of bet for as long as I breathe.

  I promise I will never let you down again.

  Forgive me.

  Because I loved her.

  And I still love you and Jude and Rachel mightily,

  Dom xxx

  30th October 2005

  Dominic,

  Your things are packed. I want you to leave. I don’t want you here and I never want our children to witness us screaming at one another like we did last night again, when one more time you tried to lie your way out of something.

  You made your choices. Choices have consequences.

  You’re a coward. How have I ever not known that about you? I’m aching with the reality that my love has been completely blind.

  You were gambling and lying to me about it for a long time. (I don’t blame your father. I already know we’ll do anything for our children. Ten thousand pounds … God knows we had so many arguments about money back then. And you were out doing that same thing again the night Maisie died.

  Not home.

  I was exhausted, only sleeping with a doctor’s help and you knew that. You were meant to be there. You weren’t and that’s just unforgivable.

  And you’ve been running from it ever since and I’ve tried. I’ve tried to get through to you, make it possible for you to tell me anything. I’ve tried to reach you and I don’t want to anymore.

  Right now, I hate you. I hate you because everything is different, and you’ve made me question everything we’ve had. You’ve made me question if any of it was real.

  Maisie was real … And you should be ashamed of yourself.

  You and I have other children together and I will never stop you seeing them.

  But I choose not to see you.

  I want you gone.

  Erin

  19. Erin

  NOW – 11th June 2017

  From The Book of Love:

  ‘When I thought I couldn’t breathe, I found I

  could. And when I thought our life was over, it

  was really just beginning.’

  I watch Dom leave from our bedroom window. He looks the same as he did the very first night he came into my life over twenty years ago, and just as he did when I watched him leave my life on a dark morning in 2005. Yes, there’s less hair, a few of them grey, some ageing lines around the eyes and a slight roundness in the stomach, though I’d never tell him that. He stops and waves, has that same sloping stance he had when he gave me that silly nickname.

  Tree Girl …

  I loved him instantly. And now, as he disappears around the corner, my heart pitches in my chest because it’s still love I feel. I try not to dwell on the years in between when I hated the sight of him, and I head downstairs. In amongst the mail I pick up from the floor, there’s a pizza menu addressed to Jude. My son – the married man. I shake my head. He’s barely a man – how can he be a married one?

  From deep in my pocket, I retrieve my phone and dial his number. Jude’s voicemail kicks in. I listen, convinced his voice has only just broken; convinced my boy can’t possibly know what he’s doing, what he’s done, when Dom’s hour-old comment pokes me. ‘He has to be allowed to be an adult, even if you’re not ready.’ Despite Dom’s calming me down over the whole debacle during the last few days, I’ll probably never be ready.

  My laptop’s open on the dining table and touching the mouse, I can immediately see that there’s a tonne of emails. I should be at work in the Bean Pod. I’ve had months sick leave and I should have gone back to work when I returned from the States.

  Lydia has phoned. Lydia has called around and I’ve pretended to be out. Lydia wants a conversation with me, and Dom tells me she deserves one. His words. Her indignation – they make my insides boil, my face flush from within. I owe Lydia nothing. Not a hint of a thing. Nada. Sod all.

  When I try telling him this, he tries a different tack. There’s always a deep sigh followed by a ‘You’ll have to forgive her sometime, you know.’

  I don’t. I don’t know this and though I’ve tried explaining, he just looks at me with sad eyes and nods as though he knows something I don’t. Lydia has, in my eyes, done something totally unforgivable. ‘It’s not like you,’ he tells me. And I want to remind him that in fact, it is, that forgiveness is a life skill that doesn’t come naturally to me, something I’ve had to work very hard at. He, of all people, should know that.

  11th June 2017

  Darling Dom,

  While you were looking in on your dad, I re-read the last entry I wrote here before I left for New York, ‘The Queen of What Ifs’ one.

  A month has passed since then, and I think I’ve heard you use that expression rather a lot yourself. In fact, you’ve always been the King of What Ifs. We just use it differently. I tend to look forward and say, ‘What if we were to’ etc. etc., whereas your use of it has always been around the past, around regret.

  Dom, I think we have yet another chance at happiness here despite every fibre of me saying we shouldn’t. So, what if I just ignore logic? What if I throw caution to the wind and just accept things the way they are, without worrying or trying to make sense of them. I’m ready to be. In this moment. Just be. With you.

  As for Lydia, we’ll have to agree to disagree for now. She knows I really can’t get past what happened.

  I love you, am so glad we’re still together.

  Erin xx

  P.S. Do you know you’ve actually written more in here than I have? I’ve just worked it out! Most of it while we were apart but still …

  20. Dominic

  THEN – December 2005

  3rd December 2005

  My darling Erin,

  Did you know? I think you did. I think you knew that you’d packed this book with my things. I think you knew just what a statement that would make, the best way to let me know you’re done talking. You’re done writing. You’re done, and we’re finished.

  I don’t accept that, Erin. I won’t accept it.

  I’ve just had to hand our children back to you. Watch them walk up the path to the flat we were planning to move out of. You’re serious about this, aren’t you? That’s what I don’t believe. I thought you’d calm down, that I’d spend a very long time making it up to you and life would carry on with some new normal that I’d somehow eventually fix.

  And you were right. If I’d known what would happen, I’d never have told you. I’d have lied my way out of that speeding fine. A handwritten wrong date – whatever …

  I’m writing this from the budget hotel room I’ve been living in for weeks.

  Please know that I haven’t been within sniffing distance of any form of gambling joint s
ince October. I accept I had/have a problem.

  I miss you. I miss the children. I miss our lives together. I wish you’d just talk to me. Please talk to me.

  I love you because you’re you and because I genuinely can’t imagine not.

  Dom xx

  He arrived early and kept a seat for her, not wanting their sitting apart to be an option. Silently, she took his wave cue, sat next to him, placed her handbag on the ground, her coat on the back of the chair.

  ‘You alright?’ Dom asked, aware the air around him was suddenly scented by her. L’eau d’Erin.

  ‘I’m good.’ She patted her windswept hair into place then hugged her arms, glancing all around the school hall.

  ‘You can look at me, you know, neither of us will spontaneously combust.’

  She arched her eyebrows, stared back, wordlessly admitting she thought him bursting into flames wasn’t that bad an idea.

  ‘Thank you for this,’ he said.

  ‘The children want you here,’ she replied, again those unspoken words seeming louder.

  I don’t. I don’t want you here at all.

  ‘About Christmas …’ Erin seemed to be searching the group of children gathering on the stage for the twins.

  ‘They won’t be on until later,’ Dom said. ‘Donkeys. Manger. Later.’

  ‘Right.’ She turned to him. ‘Christmas Day. We’re at Lydia’s from the night before. Fitz is coming too, so on the day—’

  ‘I don’t want to cause any problems. I’ll go to Mum and Dad’s. Can I see them for presents for an hour in the morning?’

  She hesitated a moment, scratched her lower arm. ‘Yes, that’s fine. An hour,’ she said.

  ‘And I’ll send you over some extra money for the gifts. They should still be from us. And Father Christmas, as well, you know?’

  Erin waved at someone over the opposite row of chairs.

  ‘They should still be from us?’ he repeated.

  ‘Yes,’ she said wearily, ‘yes.’

  ‘I know you didn’t choose this. I know this was never in the plan.’

  Erin turned her head away.

  ‘Just promise me you won’t punish Dom the father for Dom the man,’ he whispered.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that to them,’ she said, watching the stage, leaving him under no illusion that had she had a choice, she’d have cut him from her life completely.

  ‘Have you found a flat yet?’ she changed the subject.

  Dom shook his head.

  ‘Dominic, I’m not letting them stay overnight in your shitty little hotel room. If you want them the weekend after Christmas, you’ll need somewhere to live.’

  Dom chewed his lower lip. Without realising why, his eyes had closed, as if it allowed him to concentrate more – to ask himself if that hard edge in her voice was temporary or there for good. He’d put it there – he knew that much – but surely it would dissipate over time? And what was with the ‘Dominic’?

  ‘I’ll make sure I have a place by then.’ He heard her sigh.

  ‘If you do, there’s no reason they can’t stay over. If not, just take them out for the afternoon.’

  Images collided in his head. Faceless people; men mostly, that he’d seen over the years, at the park or in McDonald’s, eating alone with their children, one eye always on the clock.

  He only opened his eyes to the first sounds of ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’. Through the nativity she clapped loudly and sang along with every carol. Dom was lost. She was the one who had a faith. She was the one who’d wanted to send the children to a Catholic school and he’d gone along with it. He looked at the tiny stage. All he knew was that his children made the most perfect donkeys and his wife still couldn’t sing.

  As the lights went back on Erin turned to him.

  ‘When they come down, they’re going to want us all to go out together, will probably suggest a pizza. That’s not happening. I’d be grateful if you’d see them and then say you have to go – make some excuse – don’t make me the baddie by saying no. They already think I’m the baddie.’

  And when the moment came, the words had gathered in his gullet. ‘No sorry, kids, not tonight,’ had almost choked him. ‘I’ve got to go back to the office.’ Their faces. The glances from him to her and back to him again. ‘You were both so wonderful!’ he hugged them. ‘We’ll celebrate another night, yes?’

  Rachel had looked back over her shoulder and blown him a kiss.

  And then he’d watched the three of them walk away.

  ‘I’ll take it,’ Dom told the agent. ‘Just get whatever checks you need to do done urgently. I need to be in by the weekend.’

  She was young and pretty and – from the way her eyes lit up at Dom wanting to take what was a small, low-rent flat – new to the job. He felt a bit sorry for her, tried to flash a smile as he gave her his bank and accountant details to take up references, but by the time she’d completed the form he was feeling even sorrier for himself. Nowadays, if he stopped to think about his situation at all, Dom felt as if he’d stumbled into another man’s life.

  It was Tuesday 27th December and the next two hours were spent furnishing his new home with stock from Ikea. Everything would be delivered and in place by Friday and for the first time in months, he felt a lightness in his chest as he drove to his parent’s house.

  His mother made him coffee that tasted like tea and they sat together in the familiar drawing room. Dom squinted at the green and brown swirls of the twenty-year-old carpet, put his drink down on a coaster with Oscar Wilde’s face on it, one of a set he’d bought her for Mother’s Day one year.

  ‘You look so thin,’ she told him, wringing her hands together. ‘Not like yourself at all.’

  He raised an eyebrow. Living in a ‘shitty little hotel room’ will do that to a man.

  ‘How are the babies?’ His mother always called the twins ‘the babies’ even though they were seven. ‘And Erin, how is she?’

  ‘Rachel and Jude are great,’ he said and hoped his mum would forget asking about his wife, as she did many things nowadays.

  ‘I told you a long time ago you needed to look after your wife,’ Sophie shook her head.

  Dom sighed as quietly as he could, saw his father fill the doorway behind the sofa that his mother sat on. Today was obviously a good day for her. Not every day was, and the fact that she could focus and remember details, that was a good thing. Not so good for him, but something to be grateful for.

  ‘What are you doing about it?’ she asked him, her eyes narrowed.

  ‘What I can,’ he said. ‘I’m giving her the time she needs and hoping she’ll listen to me and change her mind.’

  His mother shook her head.

  Dom raised the now almost cold coffee to his lips. He looked at her; her back resting against a floral cushion that his father had placed behind her when she’d first sat down. That was what he’d wanted, what he’d expected and believed he’d always have in his marriage. He and Erin, growing old together, possibly irritating the hell out of each other, but together whatever happened.

  And what had happened? Despite himself, he found the whole thing flying around his head yet again. He’d lied. He’d lied about his gambling. Tick. He’d left Maisie with Erin, while Erin was in a deep sleep. Tick. Anything could have happened. Tick. And it had. Tick.

  ‘She has a right to be disappointed in me, Mum.’

  ‘She has.’ His mother agreed. ‘But your family, your lovely family …’ Sophie began to cry, and Dom took the seat next to her, took her hand in his.

  ‘I’m trying to make it right.’

  ‘Well, make sure you do, Dominic.’

  He could hear his father’s breathing behind him.

  ‘Are you still going to meetings?’ Gerard asked.

  Dom looked at the family photos on the piano, the latest frames holding images of his children. ‘Once a fortnight.’ He laughed, a low-pitched, sorry sound, rubbed the hair on the back of his head, created a static arc. ‘I can�
�t say Gamblers Anonymous are helping with the situation with Erin, I—’

  His father interrupted. ‘Have you told her you’re going?’

  ‘Dad, she’s not interested.’

  ‘So, where’s this flat you’ve taken on?’ Gerard moved from the doorway, made a clipped change of subject and took the seat Dom had been sitting in.

  ‘A few minutes from Hawthorn Avenue. It’s small, tiny in fact, but it does have two bedrooms and I can just about get bunks in the second one.’

  ‘How’s Erin, darling?’ His mother turned her head towards him, a new, almost glazed expression on her face. At least, Dom thought, at least the look of disappointment had disappeared. ‘Do give her my love when you get home. Turned out to be such a lovely girl …’

  The following Friday evening, Lydia stood up from her haunches to open the window. Though Dom had already taken the door to the bedroom off the hinges and it now lay on its side in the narrow landing, the space to put the bunks together was still tight.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said to her, ‘It’s not easy but we’re nearly there.’

  ‘Will you leave the door off?’ she asked.

  ‘No, it’ll be okay.’

  Lydia sighed, pushed hair from her face and fixed her brown eyes on him. ‘None of this is okay, Dom.’

  He remained silent, tightening screws with the screwdriver in his hand.

  ‘It’s not just you and her, you know,’ Lydia continued. ‘It’s her and me, and we work together. And as for all of our friends ever eating dinner together again …’

  ‘I’m sorry, okay?’ Dom was growing weary of apologising.

  ‘I’m trying to explain to you that it’s not just—’

  ‘Don’t you fucking think I know this already?’ Dom threw the screwdriver on the floor and it bounced and hit Lydia in the leg.

  ‘There is no need to shout.’ She rubbed her leg dramatically.

  ‘There’s every need to shout. I know! I know! I know I fucked up my marriage and your relationship with my wife. My children are probably ruined by one bad decision I made. I know, okay? I know.’