Instead, Sean was jerked backwards and found himself floating. He’d never done a parachute jump. Some of the lads in work, fellow milkmen, had tried to sign him up for one telling him it was in aid of charity. He didn’t care; he was terrified of heights. Not that he admitted that to them. He said he was busy. It was the Mrs’s birthday and he’d promised to take her out.

Sean struggled to remember where he’d taken his wife. Was that the time they saw Sleepless in Seattle and Maggie had cried all the way through? For a tough woman, she was an awful sap. Once he’d come home to find her in floods watching a rerun of Little House On The Prairie. Mary, the eldest daughter, had just found out there was no cure for her blindness. Maggie blew her nose and stuffed the tissues out of sight, but her red cheeks and the puffiness under her eyes gave her away. He’d turned the TV off, kissed her on both lids. Their son Oliver wouldn't be home from school for another couple of hours so they made love on the battered sofa. She asked him afterwards if seeing her in tears turned him on.

‘Only when it’s not for real,’ he replied.

She smiled at him. ‘You think you can tell the difference?’

Come to think of it, they hadn’t been to the cinema in ages. Sean would make sure they went as soon as... As soon as what? He landed? He was still floating and seemed to be descending very slowly but there was a long way to go. He wasn’t frightened any more. He was beginning to enjoy the sensation of lightness. Like his body was no longer a weight dragging him down to earth. There was an amazing freedom, even though he didn’t dare to move at all. He just let gravity take its course.

He appeared to be drifting above the rooftops. The sun was coming up and the black tiles of the roofs winked at him. He’d never seen his house from the sky before; never noticed just how similar it was to all the other houses in the street. They'd bought the place shortly after Oliver was born. Even his fear of how to pay the mortgage hadn't eclipsed Sean’s joy at escaping his mother-in-law. Six months of living with his wife’s family had him on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Although he’d married her shortly afterwards, Maggie’s mother still acted as if Sean getting her daughter pregnant was an act of rape; as opposed to consensual, if rather drunken, sex in Sean’s sister’s flat. They were meant to be baby-sitting but even the wailing of his sister’s child next door hadn’t been enough to put them off.

God but he was an irresponsible fool back then. He could nearly hear Maggie’s sarcastic, ‘It’s not like you've changed.’ After over ten years together, Sean often heard her responses to his thoughts. Though he’d no idea what she’d say to his current predicament.

He was now hovering just above his van. It felt like if he reached out his arm, he’d be able to pluck a milk bottle out of its crate. Suddenly Sean could see Oliver. The sight of the boy made him smile. He was only nine years old but he was dead smart, full of questions like his mother. Soon he’d turn into one of those sulky teenagers that’d be embarrassed to be seen walking down the street with his father, but right now he was still young enough not to be disillusioned. He looked up to Sean, trusted him.

Sean felt a wave of sickness and fear. He was sweating, but also very cold. He attempted to say Oliver’s name, to let his son know he was floating above him. It was a great effort to get his lips to form the word.

They'd called him Oliver after his granddad, Sean's father. A quiet, thoughtful man who rarely spoke but drove like a demon. He’d died of liver cancer three months before Oliver was born. Sean had wanted to ask him if he knew he was dying but his mother wouldn’t let him. She insisted on talking about him getting better, how well he was doing. Even though his skin had turned a strange shade of yellow and the blue had faded away from his eyes. The doctors didn’t want to put a time on it, but you only had to look at the man to see him turning into a skeleton before you. He’d been a hard drinker all his life. If he’d been louder and more aggressive, you'd have said he was an alcoholic. Yet, because he sipped his whisky so softly, everyone was surprised when his liver packed up.

Sean didn’t cry at the funeral, but afterwards in bed, with Maggie’s arms around him, he sobbed like a baby. He didn't know where all the grief came from.

He said to his wife, ‘I loved him you know, but I don’t think we ever had a personal conversation.’ Only when his father died did Sean realise that this man, whom he adored, was a stranger.

He wanted it to be different with his own son. He made an effort to ask Oliver how school was going, who his friends were, what comic book super heroes he liked. He didn't want to spend twenty years hidden behind a newspaper the way his own father had. Maggie disapproved of him taking Oliver on the milk round. She thought it was selfish of him exploiting his son. But Sean wanted to bring the boy into his world. There was an intimacy to work that was unique, a special bond that came from doing something practical and useful together. Sean also knew that his wife had hopes for her son that went far beyond the delivering of milk. She wanted him to be a lawyer or a doctor. She wanted him to stay in school.

Sean thought she was right, although he'd hated school himself. He remembered being beaten when he was there, so avoided going, and then being beaten for not showing up. The Christian Brothers believed the only way to make a man of you was with a long leather strap. He could’ve forgiven them if he hadn’t had the feeling they were enjoying themselves. There was one, Father O’Donnell, a huge, fat man with massive arms, who particularly had it in for Sean. Every chance he got; he kept Sean back after class. Telling him he was a good for nothing gurrier who’d never amount to anything. One afternoon as Sean was pulling up his trousers after a particularly vicious beating, the priest put his large hairy hand on Sean’s prick. Sean froze. He was only fourteen and had no idea what to do.

Father O’Donnell leant in close, his breath in Sean’s ear. ‘You like that, don’t you?’ he whispered.

Sean kicked the priest as hard as he could in the shin and ran. The man’s shout of pain echoing in his ears. That was the end of his education. He never went back to school. But it wasn’t only his fear of what Father O’Donnell was up to, it was his utter shame and humiliation that when the priest touched him, he’d had a hard on.

He’d never been very academic anyway. So he didn’t figure it was such a huge loss. He didn't tell Maggie the specifics of why he’d dropped out at fourteen, he just said he was thick, which was true enough. Still, if he ever found out some teacher was messing with Oliver, he'd slit their throat.

Sean could see that his son was crouched over somebody lying on the ground. The door of their house opened and his wife came rushing out. She pushed Oliver to one side and taking one look at the man stretched before her, she ran back in. Sean had never seen Maggie look so terrified. He drifted closer.

Oliver was leaning against the milk van. His face was completely white. Sean wanted to tell him not to be scared, but he wasn’t feeling so confident himself. If this was a bad dream then he’d had enough of it, he wanted to wake up. He floated nearer and was now level with the top of Oliver's head. He had a clear view of the man who lay at a strange twisted angle. Most uncomfortable, Sean thought.

He leant in closer to see the face. It was his own. Sean had the strongest sensation of deja vu he’d ever experienced. It was as if this moment, when he realised that his body lay sprawled on the side of the road, had happened to him a thousand times already. He shivered. Was he dead? He couldn't remember.