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Erin appreciated the thought in the gift but still replaced it in its box shaking her head, unable to imagine a time when she and Dom couldn’t simply say exactly what they wanted to one another.

The sound of the soft pad of his feet on the tiled floor made her turn around.

‘Come to bed, love.’ Dom, wearing striped pyjama bottoms but bare chested, rubbed one of his eyes.

‘I can’t sleep.’ From behind, she felt both his arms circle her waist.

‘It’s three a.m.’ he yawned. ‘What’s in the box?’

‘A gift from Dad.’

Dom pulled a chair up beside her, took a sip from her mug and grimaced. ‘No wonder you can’t sleep. That stuff is powdered shit.’ His head jerked towards the gift. ‘So, what is it?’

‘It doesn’t matter – just one of Dad’s hare-brained ideas.’

Dom took her hand. ‘You remember when we first met, Mrs Carter?’

She laughed. ‘It was only a year ago. Of course.’

‘Lydia’s New Year party. The first time I saw you, you were dancing, all five-foot-ten of you.’ He stroked the downy hair on her arm. ‘You were doing that weird hippy-sway-thing you do, those long limbs of yours flailing about.’

‘You called me Tree-Girl and I hated you.’

‘You fancied me.’

‘Okay, I fancied you a little. I hated the nickname.’

‘I knew I’d marry you, right then, that first moment I saw you.’

‘You did not.’

‘I did so.’

Erin cupped his stubbled chin in her hands, focused on the amber speckles in his tired brown eyes. ‘Really?’

‘Really,’ he nodded. ‘Mind you, if I’d known I’d be awake at three a.m. on my sexless wedding night, I’d have left you there, bopping away in the living room.’

‘Ouch.’

‘I’d have turned right around and never looked back.’

‘Liar.’

‘You know me so well,’ he smiled.

She stared back at the box. ‘You reckon we’ll always be able to talk to one another. Like this? Just spit out whatever’s on our mind?’

‘Sure. As long as it’s not always at three a.m. It’s been a long day, love, come back to bed?’

Erin sighed, stood up with him and slipped into the crook of his arm, knowing he wouldn’t sleep again unless she tried to.

Seconds later, when they climbed into bed, she shivered in the cold sheets. She curled her body into a foetal position, slipped gratefully into his spoon, instantly feeling his body warm hers; feeling his quiet mind soothe hers; feeling his love melt from his pores into hers, nourishing her. In the slivers of light angling through the Venetian blind, she caught sight of the third finger on his left hand where, rather than a ring, he’d had ‘Erin forever’ tattooed. His mother had almost had a coronary when she saw it. Erin had loved it, unable to believe that any man, especially this man; this man who had such passion for everything, had stamped himself as hers.

Her hand squeezed his. With her free hand, she reached back and touched his cheek, the scent of leather still lingering on her fingertips.

‘I am Love,’ she whispered.

‘You too,’ he said softly.

She smiled and closed her eyes.

3. Erin

THEN – April 1997

‘You’re kidding, right?’

Dom was shaking his head, his expression deadpan.

‘Yes, you are! You’re kidding,’ Erin laughed. ‘Even you wouldn’t suggest strip poker to a woman who’s nine months pregnant and who can no longer see her feet.’

She watched him as he held the tray steady in his hands, almost tripping over the small hospital bag she’d packed weeks ago.

‘What? So, I get a cup of tea and toast in bed if we play “because it’s the weekend and we can”?’

‘Yep,’ he said setting the tray down beside her. ‘And I’ll thrash you. You will be naked first.’

Erin took a bite of toast, flicked the crumbs from her flannel pyjamas, remembering the first outing of naked card games. It was only weeks after they met and they hadn’t left her room for an entire weekend. ‘I have two items of clothing on and I’m not taking them off,’ she said, but he was already pulling a deck of cards from his pocket.

‘Well, you’d better win then, hadn’t you?’

Erin groaned. ‘Dom … I—’ She felt his eyes on her.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he told her. ‘I know you don’t feel it right now but there is nothing sexier than your pregnant body having my baby. And I’m trying to keep your mind off that – the “having the baby” thing.’

Erin rubbed her tongue over her front teeth. She had morning breath. She had crumbs sticking to the creases at the edge of her lips. She’d been hoping for a lie-in, but here he was with his breakfast tray and his infectious way. She smiled, her hand held aloft for some of the cards he was already shuffling. ‘Hang onto your trousers, Dom,’ she said.

‘Won’t need to.’ He took a bite of her toast. ‘Ugh, sorry. It’s a bit cold.’

‘When I win, you can go and make some more.’

‘When I win, after you’ve put some clothes back on, I’ll take you out for an early lunch.’

‘Deal,’ she said, curling her hair around her ears, already practising her best poker face.

Having spent a perfect, lazy day with Dom, Erin leaned against the back doorway and tried to swallow a sense of unease. Her natural anxiety was, of late, worsened by pregnancy hormones.

‘You don’t understand,’ she whispered, her hand making tiny circles around her navel.

‘So, explain it to me.’ Dom stopped her hand moving by taking it in his.

Her voice faltered, unsure. ‘I suppose I’m afraid.’

‘Of what? I mean tell me exactly what you’re afraid of.’

Erin lowered her eyes. Just outside the door by her stockinged feet lay a cluster of late-blooming crocuses still not quite ready for spring. Maybe the next day, she thought, maybe the next day the purple and golden yellow flowers would open and flash their bright stamens proudly. She watched her bump rise and fall with the pull and push of her lungs. And maybe once her baby was born she would feel ready to become a mother.

Sometimes she couldn’t believe that there was another human being alive inside of her. Other times, the ones when the child kicked and complained in the confined space of her stretched womb, she was acutely aware of it. And tonight, as her insides tightened with more Braxton Hicks contractions, ‘teasers’ that could only have been named such by a man – she wondered if now would be a good time to tell Dom that she wasn’t doing this ever again. The thought of having someone else taking over her body again …

‘Talk to me,’ he pressed her.

She closed her eyes, conscious that if she said how she really felt, was truly honest with him, Dom would only worry. She could have confessed she was afraid that becoming parents would change them, that their love might not have space for another person. She might have told him that her hormones seemed to play havoc with old anxieties, fears that had been prodded and poked awake. She might have told him she was afraid she was going to die in childbirth. The sensible part of her brain knew there was nothing logical about the panic that set in when she thought about giving birth, but … She batted away the scary thoughts.

‘Erin?’ Dom said.

Raising his hand to her face, she angled it to cup her cheek, leaning into it. ‘I’m just being silly.’