Evenings and Weekends

by Oisín McKenna

Ed is blurry, to even himself. His outlines are vague. This is fine except that you need to be solid for other people. To have relationships, to be trusted, you have to say ‘This is me, this is what I want’ and act as if that were true at all times.

On paper, Phil’s relationship with Keith never existed at all. Just like their tenancy

of this warehouse, Phil and Keith’s relationship was under the table, implicit, unofficial.

The priest says that love isn’t a feeling. It’s not the butterflies in your tummy you get in the giddy early days of a relationship. The butterflies don’t last, he says. Love is something you deliberately decide to do through repeated actions of care. Love is something you make.

Like you have to perform your love in front of all your estranged cousins in order for your relationship to be considered real.