Just over one year later and we were still together.

What had started as a possible university fling, and a sexual awakening for me, had become something so much stronger. I think it was stronger than either of us could have anticipated, or perhaps at the time even hoped for.

When things were strained between us, I often thought that it would have been much easier if we hadn’t fallen in love. Love had added further complications into our already difficult arrangement.

His love for me had given me everything I had ever dreamed of, but it seemed at times that my love for him had just added to his overprotectiveness and created problems that I didn’t think he needed. He could deny it all he liked, I saw further inside him than I think he wanted to delve. We had discussed his issues once, as he had tried to explain what had happened to him when he was younger. Having no siblings, it was hard for me to comprehend the depth of feeling he had for his sisters, but even I could understand the anger he felt and his desire to protect them. His previous experiences had stained the way he looked at everything.

I was seriously worried about him and what our relationship was doing to him.

As we hit our last term, when we handed in our dissertation, I thought of nothing else other than the fact I was due to be married in under six months, to a man I couldn’t even bare to look at. I could see the same fears manifesting themselves in Jack. We had moments that ranged from stealing kisses, giggling and holding each other tight in his single cramped bed, to screaming at each other in fury. It could have been intense passion, as we always enjoyed the making up afterwards. We told each other all our hopes and dreams, but were too scared to voice our biggest concerns. Most of the time he was strong enough for the both of us, but at other times, I could tell he was struggling. Sometimes after a fight he wouldn’t come home until the middle of the week, instead of the Monday. Charlie would move in with us then, and I knew that Jack had sent him to make sure I was alright.

He took a paid fight every weekend I went home to my family, which was almost all of them.

I hated it.

It was his way of subconsciously punishing me, although he swore blind it wasn’t. But knowing him as I did, I could see it. It wasn’t that I minded him fighting.

I really didn’t.

I didn’t want to change him in any way or form, I loved the very bones of him. I loved the masculine, testosterone-filled man he was. But I hated the thought of him actively looking to hit someone, or be hit by someone, because of the anger and feelings of impotency our relationship caused within him. In fact, the longer we went on like this the more disappointed I was with myself that I had allowed us to get together in the first place. I needed him, but I was convinced his life didn’t need the baggage I brought with me.

I was a mess of contradictions.

It was late on the Tuesday evening, when I climbed the stairs up to what I hoped would be a warm flat. I held a carrier bag in each hand as Charlie had once again eaten us out of house and home. The weather had turned and we had snow starting to blow its way down from the north.

I hadn’t seen Jack since the previous Friday and I literally ached for him. As usual Charlie was tight lipped about where he was. All I got was the same as always. “He’s ok, just sorting out his shit and he’ll be back.”

Clutching one of the bags between my teeth and swallowing down the instinct to gag, I located my keys and pushed the relevant one home and opened the door. Charlie jumped to his feet from sitting at the table with Katy. He took the bags from me and started to put the food away after he had examined every tin and package I had purchased.

‘Phew… it’s really getting cold out there.’ I took off my coat and hung it on its peg behind the door. I looked over at the table and smiled at Katy as she sat nursing a hot drink.

‘Is…’ I started to question.

She raised a pink looking palm in my direction. ‘Before you ask… he’s in the bathroom,’ she offered.

I felt a smile begin to blossom on my face and I let out a sigh of relief. On pure instinct, my feet started to move towards where he was. Charlie turned away from the kitchen cupboards to address me.

‘Lily, leave him for a minute, eh?’

I had just reached the start of the corridor that would lead to him and turned to question Charlie.

‘Why?’ My heart flew immediately to my mouth in panic.

‘He’s not in a good way. He’s pretty bashed up from the last fight… I’ve…’ I heard Katy clear her throat behind me. ‘We’ve… just told him that you two can’t go on like this.’

I looked between Charlie and Katy and the worried looks on both of their faces, then I continued walking down the corridor that would lead me to Jack.

Our shabby flat had no lock on the bathroom, we just hung something on the outside handle to indicate that the bathroom was occupied. I placed my hand on Jack’s T-shirt, turned the handle, taking a deep breath to swallow down my panic, and walked in.

He had his back to me with a white towel tied around his waist. I started from the floor up. His feet and legs were fine, but of course I knew they would be. Finally, my eyes left the comfort of the white material and hit the small of his back. I loved the dimples to be found there, what I didn’t like was the contusions on his skin. Bruising in a myriad of colours had taken over. I couldn’t imagine what state his kidneys would be in and was hating the thought of taking in the damage on his face.

‘Jack?’

Slowly on hearing my voice he turned in front of me. Once again, purely in self-protection mode, I cast my eyes downwards. I looked first at the knot in his towel and almost happily at the fact the bruising seemed to stop at his sides. His Adonis V was perfect and unmarked. His abs showed an occasional bruise where a punch had been landed, but nothing as bad as his back. I wondered what on earth could have caused such a mess. I lifted my eyes up his bare, well-defined chest and over his Adams apple. He stood stock still under my perusal. Eventually, I made it to his face and the sight that met my eyes was soul destroying. His face was covered in bruises in various colours, which was strange as they had all been done at the same time. His top lip was split and contained a stitch or two. His left eye was completely closed over and looked like the skin could split at any moment it was so swollen underneath. His right eyebrow was Steri-stripped together, as it contained another cut. The Steri-strip framed eye winked at me and the start of a smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, causing him to wince slightly.

‘Babe?’ a strained voice questioned.

I watched as he leant back onto the sink unit and crossed his arms over his chest.

I hadn’t realised until that moment that my hand had come up to cover my mouth to stop any gasps or cries escaping. I moved it away.

‘I don’t know what to say. What happened to you? What were you hit with… I can’t get over the state of your back.’

Tears started to course their way down my cheeks.

‘Come here.’ His arms uncrossed and opened, making room for me to be enfolded in them. When I hesitated to move, he added, ‘Don’t deny me, Lils.’

I moved into them without any further hesitation and leant my forehead on his chest.

‘I’m so sorry, Jack.’

‘There’s no need… this ain’t nothing to do with you.’

‘It is!... How can you say it isn’t?’ I lifted my head off his chest and placed my hands gently on either side of his face.

‘I don’t fight because of you. I fight because I need the outlet. My anger needs the outlet. Remember, I was doing this long before you came on the scene.’

‘You were, but not to this extent.’ I was enraged that he thought he could convince me otherwise. I dropped my hands from his face and stepped back away from his hold. His arms crossed back over his chest and his head tilted to one side as he listened to me. ‘You leave no time for your body to heal in between the fights and I know it’s me going back to Anton that makes you fight when you shouldn’t. It’s me causing this problem.’ I stopped speaking at the realisation of the hurt and harm I was causing this man.

‘It’s fine, Lils. You’re not the problem, you being forced by your family into some arsehole’s arms is the fucking problem… I hate it, I more than hate it… I. FUCKING. HATE. IT.’ He took a deep breath and carried on, ‘I can’t control the anger that spews out of me when you’re gone… Katy and Charlie are right, we can’t go on like this. So, I’ve been thinking and I’m convinced I have a plan.’ His arms uncrossed once again and he pulled me by my forearms back into his embrace. ‘Do ya love me?’

‘You know that I do.’

‘Do ya trust me?’

‘I do.’ I looked down to the floor and then back up to his face. I nodded my head at him.

‘Come on. I need to get dressed.’ I followed him out of the bathroom and over to his room. I watched wordlessly as he pulled on clothes as quickly as his painful body would allow. Once he was ready in a T-shirt and jeans, we walked out to the living space, hand in hand.

Katy was still sitting at the table, by the looks of it just waiting for us to appear. Charlie was still in the kitchen area, licking the back of the knife that had just covered several rounds of toast in peanut butter. He turned around on hearing us and directed the point of it at Jack.

‘So, gobshite. You asked her?’

I looked at Jack in question.

‘I was just getting to that.’ Jack pulled me gently to stand in front of him, my back to his front. He wrapped one arm around my waist and the other he draped across my collar bones as he gently gripped my shoulder. He kissed the top of my head, as I clasped his forearm with both hands and closed my eyes. I felt his warm breath hit my ear.

‘Marry me, Lils?’ My eyes stayed closed for a few seconds. They say that you do the most beautiful things with your eyes closed. We kiss, dream and if it means something to you, you pray. The most beautiful things in your life are felt not seen. I experienced those words deep down inside me as they burst to life.

I stood there in front of our friends, engulfed in his huge arms. Finally, I opened my eyes and looked at Katy. I watched her frantically nod her head at me.

My mouth opened in shock.

‘You don’t know what you’re asking.’ Fear swept up and down my body at what my family would possibly unleash.

I shook my head.

‘I know exactly what I’m asking. The way I see it is, ya love me and I love you. Simple.’

‘But it’s not that simple. They will never let me leave. My family have some nasty connections.’ I still hadn’t been able to tell any of them the truth behind my family, call it my shame.

‘I don’t fucking care what connections they have. All I know is that if we’re married, you’re no longer a pawn in their power games. You’ll lose your value to them. In my head, I thought we could marry and move to the U.S as soon as we finish our degrees. As ya know my sister Bella is living in New York and we could go there.’

‘We could?’

‘Yeah, I believe we could.’

‘You really want to marry me. I mean really, you’re not doing it for the wrong reasons?’

‘I want to be with you always and if that’s what it takes, then yeah I wanna marry you… What do ya think?’

I turned in his arms and looped my hands over his shoulders and around his neck.

‘I think I’ve caused enough trouble in your life already.’ He shook his head as his beautiful beat-up face looked down at me. ‘I don’t know everything about my father, Jack, but I do know he could find us in this country… in America it could be different…’ I sucked and chewed on the inside of my cheek as I mulled over the possibility.

‘So?’ His voice had deepened, as he bent his knees to look into my eyes. The one piercing blue hit my green as he questioned me.

‘I’d love to marry you.’

He took my arms down from around his shoulders and holding onto my left hand he pushed a circular piece of tightly plaited twine onto my ring finger. I lifted my hand to look at it, immediately recognising it. He had made it from a thin piece of the twine he wrapped around his hands to hit the punch bag in the gym. I turned it around my finger. In one place, I found a slightly bigger knot, it made the infinity symbol.

I fell in love with it.

It meant more than anything money could buy.

‘I love it,’ I said as I fingered the circle.

‘One day soon, I’ll exchange it for something more expensive.’

His lips tentatively came to my mouth. Not wanting to cause him anymore pain, I didn’t press back. He pulled away and pressed his forehead to mine.

‘I have one condition,’ I added, finding his one open bright blue eye.

‘Yeah, babe… let me have it. I knew there’d be something,’ he laughed.

‘No more fights until after we get married.’

‘You’re on.’ He smiled his cheeky smile at me through the bruises and damage to his face.

‘Thank God for that,’ I heard from Katy behind me. ‘So how much time do we have?’

I heard her scrabbling around. I knew what she was looking for. Forever the organiser, she was searching for a pad and pen.

‘We have a few weeks.’

Could this really be happening?

I couldn’t believe that I was going to get, what for months I had only dreamt about. As we stood holding each other as tight as his bruises could cope with, I allowed my happiness to soar. It’s incredible how one day someone walks into your life and in a short time you can’t remember how you ever lived without them.

That’s just how I felt about Jack.

The small sliver of doubt that I would ever be able to escape my family was swallowed down, until I could no longer feel its claws of terror biting into my skin. I had to be strong, I was a few weeks away from escape. It would hurt me to leave Fox and Beauty behind, but as I seriously feared for my own life I only hoped they would forgive me.