Chapter 37
CHAPTER 37
Summer 1970
Bernie
“Jaysus, it’s warm,” I say, not to anyone in particular.
Alice is running around the flat in nothing more than her nappy, and Marie and Elizabeth are wearing white linen dresses that were made from an old tablecloth. I wish I’d had one made for myself too, as I sweat in a long black skirt and blouse. The smell of meat protesting summer temperatures wafts up from the butcher’s shop below and every so often my stomach heaves. But it doesn’t drag my mood down. Today is a good day. The first in a while, as it so happens.
Maura and I are taking ourselves off to the pictures tonight.
“Christy is working late,” she said last week with a wicked grin. “He’ll never know.”
“What are you going to see?” Dan asks when he finishes work almost an hour early to keep an eye on the girls while I’m out.
“The James Bond film— On Her Majesty’s Secret Service , or something like that.”
“James Bond, if you don’t mind,” Dan says. “Isn’t that a fellas’ film?”
“And so what if it is?”
“No matter. Maybe you’ll enjoy it.”
“Maybe I will,” I say. “Maybe I’ll find myself a new chap in the cinema. One who actually wants to touch me.”
“Maybe you will.”
We laugh. But neither of us finds it funny. Dan hasn’t laid more than a kiss on my cheek in six whole months. I thought for sure after the first week sleeping on the couch, he’d return to our bed. But one week turned into two. And then a month. Half a year has passed, but I will not accept that Dan and I cannot be intimate ever again. I am, however, running out of ideas to sway him.
Firstly, I tried dressing up. I swallowed my pride and let Maura pay for a flowery, above-the-knee dress in Switzers.
Dan said, “That’s nice. Is it new?”
And then he took himself off for a long walk.
Next, I gave one of those wine-and-egg diets a go. But I didn’t have the stomach for chardonnay at breakfast and all the eggs gave me gas.
Dan didn’t say anything about that, but I could tell he didn’t like it. Marie and Elizabeth had plenty to say about it.
I tried straightening my hair. Maura ironed it for me, and Marie said I looked the prettiest ever. I have a small burn on my left ear where the iron tipped off my skin and I wonder if it will heal with a scar. But it was worth it when Dan said, “Holy God, Bernie, I’ve never seen you looking better.”
He took another long walk that night.
Just last week, I cooked his favorite dinner. I borrowed expensive perfume from Maura and I left off my nylons and wore high heels. All throughout dinner I could feel Dan’s eyes on me. But when my leg brushed against his under the table, he jumped back as if I’d scalded him with boiling water. Still, I didn’t give up. When the girls went to bed, I turned on the radio and danced around the kitchen. I could see Dan’s foot tapping for a while before he took me in his arms and we waltzed, carefree, the way we used to.
“You smell wonderful, love,” he said.
I pressed my chest into his and said, “I love you, Dan.”
“Jesus, Bernie, what are you doing to me? You heard what the doctor said. We can’t make any more babies. It could kill you. I could kill you. Don’t put that on my shoulders.”
“Not having a husband is killing me,” I said.
“I’m still your husband.”
“Not if you won’t touch me.”
Dan went for such a long walk that night, it was growing bright by the time he got home. I met him in the kitchen, and he took one look at me and knew I hadn’t slept either. The irony wasn’t wasted on us. The sun might have been rising over Dublin, but it was setting on our marriage.