Free A Gift to You by Patricia Scanlan Page B

demanded.
    ‘Ah, for heaven’s sake, woman, don’t be asking me questions like that.’
    ‘Well, do you, Jim? You’ve never said it,’ Irene said heatedly.
    ‘Calm down like a good girl.’ He jammed his hands in his jeans pockets and stared at her.
    ‘Is it so hard to say?’ She couldn’t understand his reticence. She’d tell him that she loved him twenty times a day, except that she knew that it embarrassed him.
‘Is it so hard to say, Jim?’ she repeated when he remained stubbornly silent.
    ‘Yes. For me it is. It’s not my way.’ He paced the floor agitatedly.
    ‘I need you to say it,’ she pleaded.
    He remained stubbornly silent, his jaw jutting out aggressively.
    ‘Do you love me, Jim?’
    ‘I suppose I do. Now are you satisfied?’ he demanded but he took her in his arms and his kiss was tender.
    She’d asked him many times during the first years of their marriage, especially in the precious moments after their lovemaking when she held him in her arms and felt that no one else but
them existed in the universe. But he always shushed her and lay silently with his head against her shoulder stroking her long, black hair. Getting him to open up emotionally, to say endearments and
to tell her that he loved her was like drawing blood from a stone.
    He worked long hours at his trade and when he came in from work, tired, he’d eat the dinner that she put in front of him and then stretch out in his favourite armchair and fall asleep.
Irene would be as mad as hell. She’d be dying to talk, to tell him the news of her day. She worked as a legal secretary in Waterford and she loved meeting the clients. She’d want to ask
him about his day and who he’d worked for making kitchens or wardrobes or stairs, or bespoke furniture, but all that she would get was a low rumbling snore as he slept in the armchair. Around
nine, he’d wake up and head off to the village pub for his nightly pint. He wasn’t a heavy drinker, she never had a problem there, he’d just nurse a pint for an hour or so and
then he’d come home and be in bed by half ten, ready for an early start the following morning.
    Gradually, over the years, resentment began to eat her up. Why couldn’t he make the effort, she’d ask him again and again? Why did he not take her needs and feelings into
consideration? What was the point in being married if they didn’t share and talk and do things together as a couple?
    ‘Oh, for God’s sake, woman! Don’t be bothering me with all this romancy stuff. Don’t we go walking on Sunday afternoons? Don’t I give you every penny I earn? What
more do you want?’ was his retort.
    ‘You never tell me that you love me. You never say anything nice to me. Is it so hard, Jim? All I want is for you to talk to me and tell me that you love me now and again.’
    ‘I married you, didn’t I? Let that be the end of it.’
    ‘Yeah, but I had to ask you. You didn’t even have the guts to ask me yourself,’ she’d blurted out one day when she was particularly afflicted with her monthlies.
    ‘And aren’t I sorry I did, if this is the way you’re going to carry on,’ he’d snapped back at her and she’d nearly died. He hated it when she nagged him and
he would take off to his shed at the end of the garden where he’d hammer and saw to his heart’s content while she’d be left fuming in the kitchen.
    When she’d found out that she was pregnant after two years of marriage she’d been over the moon.
    ‘That’s nice,’ Jim said when she’d told him the news.
    ‘Oh, Jim! Can’t you be a bit more enthusiastic! We’re going to have a
baby
!’ She’d been desperately disappointed at his reaction.
    ‘I
am
enthusiastic. It’s good. I’m glad for you that you’re having the baby,’ he’d replied, leaving the unspoken words,
it will give you
something to keep you occupied and you won’t have to be bothering me
hanging in the air between them.
    Her daughter, Beth was the most placid,