He commands a presence on the pitch just as I feel he does in his everyday life. The more we spend time together, the more attracted I am to him, not only to his physical being but to his integrity, his beautiful mind and his critical thinking.
I love how he reads to me when he comes across something interesting, how he plays me his favourite James Taylor songs and then listens to my own chosen artists withthe same interest, and how he tells me the most random pieces of information he hears on the news. We make plans for the future, we talk about where we might one day live, we describe our dream home and we even decorate our very own virtual bedroom that we’ll have when we get together properly at last.
‘You should be a storyteller,’ I tease him when he reads me out some trivia from the newspaper one afternoon. ‘Your voice is like Liam Neeson’s. Now, there’s a compliment and a half.’
‘You’re very, very funny,’ he replies, too bashful to agree.
We can argue too, and he doesn’t let me get away with anything, which both challenges me and pushes me, but the huge elephant in the room is my insistence on keeping our relationship a secret from our families.
‘We can’t go on hiding for ever, Kate,’ he told me as we lay in bed one morning in Dublin before our trip across the Irish Sea for this match. ‘It will suffocate us eventually, all this sneaking around in a city so far from home. It’s like we’re pretending when we both know this is very, very real.’
I tried desperately to change the subject, the bile in my throat rising every time I thought of us travelling north to face the music with our families.
I imagined the pressures of my community, bringing David into our small-minded housing estate, where middle-class locals are the enemy to the low-life thugs who set up my mother, and then the look of disdain onDavid’s father’s face if I should ever dare to darken their door again.
‘It’s still early days,’ I told him. ‘I’ll go get some breakfast. What would you like?’
‘What I’d like is for you to address this once and for all and stop skirting the issue!’ he said, not mincing his words, his voice rising on his way to the shower. He stood at the door of my en suite, naked and confident, his face determined.
‘I’m afraid to address it still, David,’ I confessed to him. ‘My family background is so different to yours, more different than you will ever understand. I grew up in a concrete jungle with soldiers on my front doorstep, in an overcrowded housing estate which was in a constant state of oppression, whereas you were practically born with a silver spoon in your mouth by comparison. Even now, my family live in the shadow of a very different world to yours and the life you’ve known. They still battle to keep their heads above water from the bad boys like Sean McGee who make the rules. Surely you understand this?’
‘I think I’ve been very understanding for months now!’ he retorted. ‘This is childish, Kate. I’m not afraid of anyone in your community and I’m surprised that someone like you would let this ridiculous underworld that tries to control a tiny part of your world ruleus. You’re acting like there’s never been someone like me in your family’s world.’
‘There hasn’t,’ I said, my eyes widening with honesty. ‘As crazy as that might sound, it’s true.’
‘Wow.’
‘Can we talk about this later?’ I pleaded as tears sprung to my eyes. ‘Please don’t push me, David. I’m doing my best to deal with this before we can go totally public.’
‘I’m not hiding this for much longer,’ he said, and at that he stood under the shower, singing at the top of his voice, like a person who had said his piece but who didn’t want to let it linger.
Now, as I stand in a cold shelter in an unknown English rugby ground, I feel a sense of freedom that I didn’t even feel when we were in our cocoon in Dublin. Here, where David lives and works, we are just an ordinary couple; we can tell everyone and we don’t have to worry about who might be watching or who knows who from our own part of the country. I’ve had dinner with his friends, we’ve posed for photographs that I know will never be seen at home, we kissed in public without worrying who was watching and he introduced me proudly as his girlfriend.
I look for him on the field and feel my heart soar when I spot him. For a fleeting moment in time, part of me wishes we could stay here for ever and forget the world we’ve left behind, but it’s not as simple as that. And I know it never will be.
So instead I choose to drift and dream a little as I stand here alone, my eyes locked on the man I love more than I’ve ever loved anyone before. I watch as he steps backwards on the grass, as he claps his hands in preparation for the bigmatch, as he bends forward and shouts instructions to his teammates. I watch as he pushes his hand through his hair, as he eyes up the ball in the distance, and when the whistle blows and the game begins, I feel my heart skip with anticipation as I cheer him on.
He is my man. He is my everything, and one day soon I’ll find the courage not to hide us away and live the life we deserve.
The after-party celebrations take place in the rugby club’s sports hall where I’m introduced to more of David’s fellow teachers and some people from the chosen hospice in aid of which the game was played. As I stand there with a glass of wine in my hand, watching as David goes to accept the winner’s shield, I catch the eye of one of his colleagues who makes her way across to me.
‘You must be Kate?’ she says to me, her hand outstretched in greeting. ‘We’ve heard so much about you from David. It’s so lovely to meet you in person!’
My eyes go wide as I wait for her to introduce herself.
‘Meg Harper! Sorry, excuse my manners,’ she says. ‘I work with David and he talks about you a lot. I have to admit, you are the envy of a lot of ladies around these parts. He’s a bit of a dreamboat!’
‘I have to agree,’ I say and we clink our glasses. ‘It’s lovely to meet you too, Meg.’
I watch as she giggles and twirls her hair, looking towards the makeshift stage where David poses for photos from eagerfans and she outwardly sighs in approval. It’s like a breath of fresh air to see David in this new environment, in a place where it’s all about him. He seems so relaxed and different, away from the tense surroundings in which we’ve spent our last month together. Dublin may be a big city and is miles from the segregation we grew up with, and deep down I know that no one knows or cares who or what we are there, but here we can just be ourselves and I can see David truly shine, which makes me appreciate him even more.
‘He does so much charity work for our school, and now he’s doing this for the hospice,’ Meg drools. ‘Honestly, we are all in awe of his generosity, and his organization skills are impeccable. He’s such an asset. Don’t be stealing him away from us now!’
She lightly taps my arm, and I don’t need to hear any more of how much he is thought of here as I can feel it in the air.
I can feel it in my bones too, because he only has to glance my way and I feel goose bumps. I’m a very lucky lady, and suddenly it hits me that I need to come clean at home or I fear I might risk losing him one day when the pressure gets too much. I can’t ever take him for granted. I need to sort out our real life world, and fast.
‘Hey handsome,’ I say, when he eventually makes his way past his admirers to find me with his colleague. He wears a black T-shirt and jeans now after showering off the muddy rugby game and he smells like a dream. ‘Wereyour ears burning? We were just agreeing how fantastic you are.’
