Read Online The Gospel According to Luke by Emily Maguire - Free Book Online

did not grieve. The day after Kip left she threw herself at Matthew Rinehart, a dreadlocked anarchist from uni who had been asking her out ever since he discovered she was married. He moved into Aggie’s house and introduced her to Tantra, deep ecology,anti-consumerism and hallucinogens. Matthew did actually love Aggie, but he had this thing about monogamous relationships being spiritual death. After six months, he told her he was becoming too attached to her and that he had to move on. Aggie was six weeks pregnant; no surprise considering Matthew had refused to use man-made barriers when making love. But he was gone, and she was alone, so she had an abortion and then a year later, after Matthew had come and gone again, she had another. He returned to her once more, nine months later, and she told him about the two pregnancies. He wept, saying he had never gotten anyone pregnant, and to have managed it twice with Aggie must mean that it was meant to be. Four months later he got another girl pregnant – a stunning raven-haired pianist – and although she too had an abortion, the fact he had impregnated someone other than Aggie with his seed meant his belief in the predestination of their relationship was shaken. He left to explore the possibility of bliss with the other almostmother of his most recent never-to-be-born child.
    Aggie was alone for three years. Then she started working as a drug and alcohol counsellor at St John Hospital where she met Dr Simon Keating. He was a decade older than Aggie, devastatingly attractive and very married. Aggie knew better than most the pain caused by infidelity and abandonment, but when Dr Simon Keating declared his passion and asked to move in with her she was so overcome with gratitudethat she managed to bury her guilt at being a homewrecker. She had two years of sex, holidays, parties and dinners and weekends spent taking his kids to the movies or Australia’s Wonderland. Then one morning as he was getting ready for work, he announced that he had been having an affair with his wife and was going home.
    Sometime later, Matthew returned, transformed from radical student to up-and-coming human rights lawyer. He wanted monogamy and he wanted it with Aggie. He moved back in, and this time Aggie really thought it would work. But after a year, he found a prettier woman to be monogamous with. He swore her looks had nothing to do with it: he fell in love with her
soul
, just as he’d fallen in love with Aggie’s all those years ago at uni. He would love Tara even if she was as plain as anything. He didn’t say,
as plain as you
, but Aggie understood that was what he meant.
    So that was that. Three relationships, intense and corrosive. No one night stands, no flings, not even a single date. She had not, like most women she knew, formed any theories about why men are the way they are, or what a woman should do to find, enthral, keep one. She did not believe men were such a generic bunch that simple tricks like never accepting a date after Wednesday or touching his arm when you said his name would work for each and every one of them. Men were just like women: varied, likeable, detestable, human.
    So it was not any philosophical or sexual political stance that led to her lack of romantic life, it was just that men did not ask out giants with frizzy hair and thick calves. And Aggie did not ask out men because she had never actually met one she liked enough to make the risk of humiliation and heartbreak worthwhile. Until now.
    Aggie called Mal and told him she had a date tomorrow night.
    â€˜Bullshit,’ he said.
    â€˜Is not. I met a bloke, I asked him over for dinner, he said yes.’
    â€˜Well, I’ll be blowed. You did warn him he’ll have to clear the cobwebs out of the way before he can get it in, didn’t you?’
    â€˜How amusing. So you wanna come over and keep me company tonight?’
    â€˜Love to, Ag, but Will and I are on our way out