And here are the next seven days! Really hope you enjoyed!
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Monday
It's Leah's first day of high school. I don't stop thinking about her all day and call her as soon as I'm home. She sounds tired. I'm not ready for her to grow up this fast.
"Have you done it yet Dad?" she asks impatiently, trying to whisper. Amy doesn't know yet. Leah's my best secret keeper. Lucas is blabber.
"Not yet,"
"When?"
"Soon,"
"Can I tell Mum?"
"Not yet,"
"Okay. Have you got a diamond ring?"
I laugh.
"Yeah, maybe Brendan wouldn't like that," she says. I call her my princess and tell her to stay out of trouble.
Tuesday
I make his staff work for their minimum wage. I test the new ones, ask for something off menu. They nudge each other when they see me outside. Mr Brady, they say, he's the boss's boyfriend – don't fuck up his order.
Lunchtime today and Steven's buzzing about the place, flustered. I hear his accent flare as his temper simmers with one of the customers. I lean on the counter and get a spotty kid to list every bread type they have.
"Oli ignore him," Steven says, drifting past, glaring at me.
"Lunch?"
He frowns. "Can't. Up to my neck 'ere."
Wednesday
He's got burger sauce on his moustache. I stare it at for a while.
There's gherkins spread neatly out on his wrapper. He'd eat the entire McDonald's menu off my body but not the gherkins. I snatch one and grin at his disgust.
"I thought I'd go see the boys next week,"
Things weren't always that comfortable in Ireland for me, but the atmosphere was warming. I knew Brendan still separated there and here in his head. Compartmentalising a counsellor once said. I think that's it. It made him on edge. More than normal.
"We'll make a weekend of it."
Thursday
"I'm not asking permission to bring him. I'm telling you he's coming." A run of the mill conversation with Eileen. Her idea of Steven being with me at the soccer game, was that I'd stand right next to her friends and the family priest with Steven's cock and balls in my mouth.
Later that evening I sucked him off as the credits on the DVD rolled. It relaxed that heavy frown of his. He wouldn't tell me what was bothering him. But worry looked beautiful on him.
I tried not to start an argument again based off my own paranoia.
Friday
I started having doubts. I imagined the worst case scenarios. I was awake in the night watching him sleep, wanting to hold onto this moment, knowing if I went through with my plans on Saturday then things might never be the same again.
Would he laugh in my face? Would there be embarrassment or disgust? Worse, would there be anger? The dark times were past us, the fear a distant memory, but getting to where we were now was a struggle. Was I about to screw it all up?
GOOD LUCK TOMORROW DADDY. I HOPE HE SAYS YES LUV LEAH.
Saturday
There was a thrown together sense of romance that evening in a way that seemed to be engineered to minimise my discomfort. One candle, no tablecloth, beer not wine, classical music not some slushy CD.
His arse was squeezed in tight jeans. But he seemed a world away as he put a blowtorch to the crème brulees. I'd heard all about his previous fire-starting and I made light of it tonight.
"I'm changed man, in't I?" he said, sitting back down at the table. He touched my hand.
He fidgeted.
"Don't eat yet," he said.
Was he going to vomit?
Sunday
My phone buzzed.
A text from Amy: Call me. Seventeen alerts from Facebook.
Ste Hay is engaged. Twenty-six people like this.
"When the fuck did you get time to update that?" Brendan said groggily. He spooned me, peering over my shoulder. He reached over the top of me to grab his phone. A voicemail from Cheryl.
"When you went to buy more condoms," I grinned. I added a comment to my status underneath everyone else's. Mint innit? Well happy.
"Jesus, listen to this." Brendan pressed his phone to my ear. I grimaced as Cheryl's joyful screams went straight through me.