against every fibre of my being. I got up and went out the door and I didn’t know where the hell I was going, just some place far away where maybe my heart would be safe.
But Padraig caught up to me in that dark woods.
He caught me and under the moonlight he told me he loved me.
And nothing will ever be the same again.
That bubbling joy that I’d kept buried inside me, well now I was free to let it expand, let it swallow me whole. I’m fucking giddy when I’m around him, I’m feeling things I had never felt with anyone before.
It’s not just that I feel I belong here.
It’s that I belong with him.
And he is my home now.
But as much as I feel like my feet aren’t even touching the ground anymore, I’m surrounded by people in pain.
We had another doctor’s appointment in Dublin, this time we went for just the day. I’m getting pretty good at driving over here so it wasn’t a problem. The doctor wanted to see how the meds were working and give Padraig the results of the test.
The doctor couldn’t say one hundred per cent because of the way MS works, how the disease is different for everyone and no two cases are alike, but the testing combined with Padraig’s worsening symptoms seemed to point to the progressive type of the disease.
This was the worst-case scenario for us. Other cases, they get to go on more or less normally and have relapses and flare-ups that come and go during various points of their life. But with progressive, it slowly but steadily gets worse. He told us that the likelihood of Padraig being bedridden in twenty years was high.
Which, of course, was something Padraig didn’t want to hear. He can barely cope with the idea of not driving or playing the game. The fact that in the future he might not have any mobility at all, shakes him to his very foundations.
He was waiting for that news, too. To tell his coach, to tell his team and the owners of the team. He hasn’t said a word about his diagnosis yet because he was hoping he could just fake it. Fake it like we’ve been faking our engagement. Pretend that everything is fine.
But you can only pretend for so long. He’s going to have to tell them the truth eventually and when he does, the whole world will know.
He’s not ready for that.
So we go on pretending.
Then there is his father. The last time he seemed better was during the engagement party. When we returned from the woods and I explained my breakdown as just being so emotionally overwhelmed (which wasn’t a lie), he kissed me on the cheek and wished us all the luck in the world.
But the next day, he didn’t even get out of bed.
And he didn’t the day after that, not even when Nan had Gail make his favorite dish, macaroni and cheddar. He wouldn’t come to dinner and he wouldn’t eat the food when they brought it to him.
It was time to hire a live-in nurse to help him with his final weeks.
She’s supposed to be coming today, something that Agnes isn’t too happy about since it means that Agnes has to move from her bedroom in the cottage to the bedroom next to mine in the B&B. But we haven’t had any guests this month at all, so I don’t see how it’s hurting anything. Actually, I get the feeling that Agnes is putting up a tough front and being grumpy over that because she hates what this means for Colin and everyone else.
Right now, I’m standing beside Padraig by the mews, watching Hooter McGavin fly from post to post. It’s what Nan calls a “soft day,” all grey and misty, not too cold either. Padraig seems in relatively good spirits and has been teaching me more about the art of falconry.
“Ye see,” he says, throwing out what looks like a grey fuzzy lump attached to a spool of thin rope, “this is the lure. And if Hooter was a good bird, he’d be trying to go after it, thinking it’s prey. But ye see he’s a lazy cunt and a little fat, so he’s not food motivated right now.” He gestures to the other cage, where the hawk lets out a piercing cry. “Clyde, however, is eager. He wants to hunt. I’d let him out to do it but I know that bird isn’t coming back.”