Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails.

Connor stumbles to his feet. It’s too much to bear.

He half runs towards the gates, past the car parking spaces that are all empty, save one, sole car.

It’s white.

Chapter Seventeen

Aidan

Melissa is on Aidan’s mind as he drives towards his first appointment. Fergus too. The memories of the four of them were tightly woven together but now they’re beginning to unravel. Shared holidays. Christmases. Birthdays. Barbecues on sunny summer days. Barbecues in pelting rain. The girls holding umbrellas over the grill as Aidan and Fergus turned charred sausages and pink-in-the-middle burgers.

He still hasn’t managed to talk to Fergus despite his efforts to reach him. It shames him that he doesn’t know where one of his closet friends is living, but does he really have the right to refer to Fergus as his best friend? To call him that? He has let him down. His loyalty is stretched. Thoughts of the future dull and jaded. For now, Lucy will take Melissa’s side. Where does that leave him? Boys versus girls? He doesn’t want to choose. He wants to head back home and kiss his wife goodbye. Hold her tightly. It isn’t too late, they can still be a two.

He approaches the church where he uttered his wedding vows. The promises he made, and broke. The love he felt that day can be summoned in an instant along with the image of Lucy with pink and purple confetti in her hair. Crystal tiara glinting in the sun.

Her smile.

Her hope.

Their dreams.

At their wedding reception, she had hitched up her dress, the train still trailing on the floor, and had strode confidently onto the stage. The band smiling knowingly at each other.

‘Come here, husband,’ she had beckoned.

‘Oh no.’ He had been smiling as he had shaken his head.

She’d put her hands on her hips. ‘Is this our first married row?’

The guests began to chant his name, Aidan, Aidan, and he had joined Lucy, laughing as she handed him a microphone, knowing what was coming.

The room melted away as they sang a song – their song – ‘Islands in the Stream’.

There’s a lyric about tender love that now makes despair rise from his stomach. He is an island, lost, alone, lonely.

He never thought marriage would be so hard.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spots Connor speeding out of the graveyard. Is he just cutting through or had he lingered? Poured his heart out to the girl who couldn’t offer him comfort. He should stop. Talk to his son. Tell him that he has felt everything that Connor feels but has he? Aidan is drifting apart from his family. It’s stupid to risk them. Risk everything. He never should have started it but he’s in too deep and he doesn’t know how to clamber out unscathed.