My Buried Life by Doreen Finn

Author:Doreen Finn
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New Island Publishing
Published: 2015-03-24T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 18

I thought it would be strange, being with another man after all those years with Isaac, and in a way it is, but it’s good too. Sean undresses me slowly, not asking if I want this or that, just assuming that I do. And I do want it. I need it, need to erase all of Isaac’s fingerprints on my skin, all over my body. For a young guy, Sean knows what he’s doing. He slips his jacket off, pulls his shirt over his head without undoing the buttons, gathers me to him. The kitchen is too small for this. I take his hand and lead him upstairs.

‘Christ, it’s freezing,’ he says, as we climb the stairs, me leading him by the hand. This strikes us as funny, and we convulse again. It’s good to laugh.

I take him to my room, and we lie down on my bed, kissing. He curls into me, dragging the bedclothes over us. His fingers trail my spine, coming to rest in the hollow below my ribs. I’m conscious of how thin I am, how visible my bones are under my skin. Since it got cold I haven’t run as much, but weight hasn’t added itself to my frame. I hope he doesn’t compare me to girls of his own age, all of them still smooth with that post-adolescent plumpness to their skin and bodies.

I force myself back to the moment. Sean props himself up on one elbow. His hair falls over his face, still long and surfer-blond despite the time of year. A tattoo marks the skin on his left shoulder, loops over and down his back. I touch my fingertips to it, follow the curve of ink. Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

‘Yeats,’ he says. ‘It’s a total embarrassment.’

It’s corny, certainly, but he’s so young, so perfect, that it doesn’t jar.

‘I got it done in college.’ He rubs the words, pulls a face. ‘One of my friends was training in tattoos, and I offered to be his guinea pig. I liked the poem in school, and it seemed better than a heart or a skull or whatever.’

‘You could have got a rose,’ I offer.

‘I know. With someone’s name.’

‘Exactly! Or maybe just “Mother” printed underneath.’

He pinches his inked skin. ‘Yeah, I really missed out there.’

I trail my fingers once again over the lettering. ‘I like it.’

He shouts with laughter. ‘No you don’t, you’re just saying that.’

I grin at him in the faint light that leaks through the window. ‘Probably.’

‘Wait, you’re an English teacher, right?’

I shrug. ‘Of sorts.’

‘Of sorts? You either are or you’re not.’

‘I am. But usually in a university.’

Sean’s groan is theatrical. He rolls over on his back and puts his hand to his head. ‘Even worse.’

I prod him. ‘Why the drama?’

He lowers his hand. ‘The drama, my dear Aoife, is that you know your shit. You know poetry. I’m hoping to impress you with my prowess, and now I’m here, naked, all this stupid poetry all over me, and you, you’re probably laughing at me.

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