by Tony Spencer
We laid there for a while, not dozing exactly, but certainly relaxed, sated for now, and we talked. I wanted to talk about my father but I thought she would probably prefer to talk about her daughter.
"Tell me about Rosemary," I opened.
Maureen lifted her head off my breast where I had felt the pleasure of her breathing on my chest hairs and she looked at me with those lovely blue eyes.
"What do you want to know?"
"Everything."
"Well, she was born at eleven minutes past two in the morning, she weighed six pounds ten ounces, it wasn't a difficult birth but the air was pretty blue ..." her voice trailed off as she looked at me with both her eyebrows lifted.
"Alright," I chuckled, "I'll go with the short version, first."
Maureen settled back down on my chest again. That felt so good, as good as the sex had been. Different, but just as good.
"She was a lovely girl, no mother could ever wish for a better daughter."
She paused for a moment, thinking, I felt more of her tears drip onto my chest. I already had my arms around her and I squeezed her tightly and gently kissed the top of her head. Her hand resting on my chest clenched, pulling at my chest hairs. I don't think she realised how hard she was pulling them, I had tears in my eyes, too.
I changed tack.
"Tell me how you met Da, Frank."
"I need to go back a bit, to put our relationship in context. I was really looking for you ... and found Frank along the way."
"OK, start at the beginning. We have all the time in the world."
"I lived with my Aunt Rose for as long as I can remember. She once told me that when Momma fell pregnant, from her first boyfriend who had gone to England to find work and never came back, her family just kicked her out of the house. She moved to Cork to have me. Aunt Rose was much older, by about fifteen years, and helped Momma with a little money but it was never enough. Momma worked in a bar and was amenable to earn a little more on the side. Momma kept me for a while until I became too much of a handful, so Aunt Rose took me on in her Dublin flat. I never knew any of my other Aunts and Uncles, Rose kept me hidden from them all, knowing they would have nothing to do with me or Momma. Then Rose fell ill, when I was about ten and Momma had to fetch me and I lived back with her for a couple of months or so. That was when you came to stay with her one memorable night. After a while, Rose began to feel better and I went back home to live with her, and care for her as she was never quite as well again."
"So when did you come over here?"
"I'm coming to that," she playfully slapped me on the shoulder, so I used my finger and thumb to show I was zipping up my mouth. She reached up and nipped my chin with her even white teeth.
"Momma died first. Nobody from our family but Rose and I attended her funeral. I was still in school. Then Rose went into decline, she never really recovered from her earlier illness and Momma dying took its toll."
"Did Rose never marry?" forgetting that I was supposed to let her tell the story.
"No," she smiled at my interruption, "I think she preferred females to men but was too repressed to even try anything. I got the impression she remained a virgin all her life. She was very uptight."
"Did she ever try anything on with you?"
"With me? Oh, no! She was far too uptight to entertain any kind of relationship with me. I don't think she ever showed me a moment's love or appreciation for the care I gave her all the time I was there. I suspect in truth she was in love with Momma, who was a very beautiful woman, and never got over that Momma couldn’t return that love in the same way."
"My poor angel, I think I'll have to make up what you have been missing, love-wise."
"You are already Roger, just being here for me now is such a comfort. These last three days, since losing Rosemary, I have been totally lost."
"So what happened to Aunt Rose?"
"She was very ill for several years. Did I tell you she was a nurse? No? Well she was and I became a student nurse just as she became terminally ill and I nursed her as well as studied. She died, I graduated and came here to work, looking for you."
"And then we missed each other."
"Yes. Firstly, I applied for and got a job at the district hospital and shared a room with three other nurses. I found out there was a garage called Bird & Son, so I checked it out to see if it was your father’s garage. As soon as I saw your father I knew who he was, you two looked so alike."
"So you fell in love with him, then?"
"No, not then. Let me tell this story at my own pace, will you, hon?"
"OK, sweetheart," I chuckled, "But I will have get up shortly to use the toilet."
"I'll give you the quick version then," she laughed. "Frank was charming, handsome and as I said he looked a lot like you do now-“
“-As handsome as this?”
“Yes, if you must know,” she slapped me again, “Wretch! Let me continue.”
“OK.”
“I called into his garage showroom late on in the day, after my shift finished, and found him on his own, about to lock up."
"He always was first in and last out."
"I was very nervous but knew I was at the right place. Above the name of the company in the showroom, there were large photos of Frank and you. I told him a lie, that I was interested in buying a car but wasn't sure if my Irish driving licence was valid here and also wanted an idea of how much a suitable car would cost me. He was very patient and sat me down, saying I could use my Irish licence for twelve months but would then have to get a British licence if I intended staying. Then he showed me the sort of car he would recommend and actually took me out for a test drive. He was very charming and handsome, not pushy or anything, just very nice. It was easy to relax in his company. Then he offered to take me out to dinner."
"Oh yes?"
"Yes, but only because it was late and neither of us had eaten or had anyone at home to greet us or get back to. I wanted to get our conversation around to the subject of you. I really hadn't considered anything else, or read more into it. I was still very innocent in those days. Still am, although here were are in bed together so soon!" she chuckled.
"And I'm certainly not knocking that!” I laughed back, “What did Frank have to say about me?"
"He was so very proud of you. I got the conversation around to the photos I saw in the showroom. He told me how well respected you were in the Navy and then your career in oil exploration, adding that you were happily married and had a fine son."
"Well, that is a surprise to me! Because I never spoke to my father, he probably never knew of the problems that Jeanie and I had."
"He told me how you and he were estranged, that he hadn't seen you since you were 17, which was only a little longer than since I had seen you last. As far as he was concerned he thought you were still happily married and with a teenage son."
"Jeanie and me, well we split up almost as soon as we married, even before we knew Bobby was on his way. We were married on paper for a long time, though, she didn't actually petition for divorce and apply for maintenance until about ten years ago and I was still sending an allowance home as she has never done a day's work in her life. Those payments have all stopped very recently when I found out she was living with one of her boyfriends."
"Well, I lost hope that I would ever see you again, Roger, let alone have any chance to build a relationship with you. Of course, all along I thought you might have married but I just hoped you would be single. Frank was very attentive and realised that something in me had changed, and that I had become upset. He took me home to the flat I shared with other nurses and said he had enjoyed my company so much and would I join him for dinner again? I was lonely too, not knowing anyone in this strange town, so we started going out simply as friends at first. One evening, several months later, we made love, it wasn't planned, and neither of us took precautions that first time. By then I had fallen in love with Frank, he was a wonderful man and I stayed here at the house a few times after that. Wh
en I realised I was pregnant, I think the time I must’ve conceived was probably the very first night we slept together, because after then we did take precautions."
"Too late, though."
"Yes, much too late." She paused for a few moments, before continuing. "I was with him when you called him right out of the blue."
"About Bobby!"
"Yes, I went with Frank down to London to deal with the police and bring Bobby and Jonathan back here, they were both badly hurt and Frank thought I might be able to help."
"Both of them?"
"Roger, before we even went down there it was made very clear to Frank by the police exactly what had happened. A gay bar had been targeted by a large gang of skinhead youths who smashed up the bar and assaulted as many of the guys in the pub as they could get hold off. Bobby and Jonathan were beaten quite severely, Jonathan had spent two days in hospital having been kicked in the head. We brought them home with us and I treated their wounds and changed their dressings over the next few days. Frank was really marvellous, he treated them like he would any loving couple, allowing them to be together in the second bedroom. I didn’t stay overnight while they were there. Then, when they had recovered, he helped them get back on their feet even as far as finance their first restaurant venture which they launched successfully in Brighton. You would have been so proud of Frank, Roger."
"Yet he hid that information from me, right to the very end."
"As did your Ma, as you said earlier. Perhaps they both
