The Persistence of Memory

Chapter Twenty

"I'll get the drinks," he says still looking grumpy.  God he really doesn't want to be here. But he came, for me. I smile again.

"Are you going to cheer up a little?  Come on, this is fun." I gesture my head back to the small stage which has several tables in front, mainly occupied by elderly people clapping and stamping their feet. I start clapping my hands too and turn back to find him staring at me.  He still isn't smiling but the side of his mouth looks at least partially amused.   

"This is about as far away from my idea of fun as we could get, to be honest."

"Music not cool enough for you?" I scrunch my nose at him. 

He nods, smiling. "Yeah, that's it."

"Music snob," I stick my tongue out.

He nods again and leans in to kiss me.  A small peck this time which feels chaste and tender. "So, you really want Guinness?"

I nod, eager. "Yes, I really do."

His lips curl up and he nods once more before turning to go to the bar, which looks busy but not ridiculously so. Whilst he's gone I open my bag and feel inside for my phone.  I wonder if he'd tried to call.  He hadn't called all day which was strange for him. 

I reach in but my hand finds the folded up paper first, which I pull out and unfold again.  I'd done it at every opportunity I'd got.  When he went to the bathroom during dinner, then when I had.  It was beautifully drawn.  Scraggy and quirky, but elegantly simple.  He'd signed the bottom right corner with his name: AidanJFoley.  The gesture had left me speechless earlier.

So Aidan was romantic without the slightest realisation that he was. 

I grin at the paper for another moment before folding it and slipping it back inside my grey clutch. Then I pull out my phone with a slightly heavy feeling. No calls from Oliver; just a text from my sister saying she missed me and to call her when I could.  Since I don't want Aidan to catch me with my phone and risk another potential replay of last night, I decide to reply to Gabrielle tomorrow.  He returns a few minutes later carrying two pints of the dark beer, and places them down on the table, then pulls the stool closer to me and slides gracefully up onto it. 

"Oh, I know this one," he says gesturing at the band. The band had just kicked things up a gear, the guy playing the accordion now massaging what looked to be a set of bagpipes.  Irish bagpipes?

"You do?"

He gives me a withering look before smiling and shaking his head, mouthing the word 'no'.   I hit him on the arm and slide the pint towards me.   It looks slightly intimidating —Black and thick with the familiar foamy head. 

"Cheers," he says lifting his pint. 

"Cheers."

He's looking at me with that hot familiar look I know so well now.   As though he's imagining all of the things he wants us to be doing instead of what we're doing right now.   Though as I think about it, the way he looks at me hasn't really changed.  He's always looked at me in the same way — deeply and intensely.  It's just that I had an idea of what went through his mind now.  Not all of it, god he was a fortress, but some of it he was powerless to hide.  I gaze longingly at the way his fingers wrap around his glass and imagine them instead on the parts of my body that I can still feel them echo across.   

The liquid is thick, cold and bitter, yet goes down my throat smoothly.  I wipe the foam from my lips and give him a nod as I place it back down on the table.

"It's nice," I tell him.

He nods and smiles, before a comfortable but charged silence settles over the space between us.  It feels very much like we're any other couple enjoying a first date.  Which we are but also aren't. As I bring the glass to my mouth again I wonder if it felt like that to him too.  But then I remember that he's never been on a date before. Across the table, Aidan's smile deepens.