Mistake

by Sheila O'Flanagan

  But Ivo can, and does.

  ‘Take care of yourself, Roxy.’

  ‘You too.’ I can hardly speak.

  He squeezes my shoulder gently, then successfully places the lightest of kisses exactly where he intended, on my cheek, before turning away and striding towards the terminal building.

  I think about the near miss the whole way home. Not the near miss of the tractor tyres on the way to Shannon airport, but the near miss of Ivo’s kiss that grazed my lips and left them burning. And I can feel the feather-light touch on my cheek, too. The casual goodbye kiss that ended up where it was supposed to. But that I still wasn’t expecting. Because clients don’t kiss their drivers goodbye. And clients don’t hold onto their driver’s shoulders and look deep into their eyes and make them feel as though nothing and nobody else in the world exists.

  But Ivo is a different sort of client.

  I’ve misread him in so many ways – thinking that he was callous about his father and offhand with his sister when the reality is a difficult childhood relationship that’s been hard to overcome. Thinking that his high-maintenance girlfriend was a kind of trophy woman when she’s a qualified chemist. Thinking that he had ulterior motives in wanting me to stay overnight at the hotel when it was simply necessary for his travel arrangements. Thinking that Dave’s text last night saved me from something else. Yet everything I’ve thought about Ivo has been a product of my own fevered imagination. And a way of looking at things that probably comes from a diet of too many TV soaps and trashy celebrity magazines. Ivo Lehane is a good man. And right now, my heart is overwhelmed with longing for him. Because all the time our eyes were locked together, the only thing I was thinking was that I wanted him to kiss me properly. That I wanted to know what it would be like. That I wanted him to hold me tightly and protect me and love me.

  I’m an hour into my journey home and I have to pull into the improbably named Barack Obama Plaza service station, because suddenly my hands are shaking uncontrollably and there are tears streaming down my cheeks. And I don’t know if that’s delayed shock from the tyres or if it’s something to do with my inexplicable longing for Ivo Lehane.

  I spent all day yesterday worrying that he might want to get me into bed. I’m spending today wishing he had. The woman who swore she’d never cheat on her cheating husband now regrets not being a cheating wife. I wonder what sort of song Dolly would write about it.

  I fill the car with petrol and then buy a coffee from Bewley’s, which I drink standing up, replacing the fresh mint of Ivo with the roasted taste of arabica beans. I look out at a day that has become bright and sunny, so that everyone coming into the plaza seems equally sunny in their outlook. But I’m here, hands around my coffee cup, and I’ve never been more confused in my life.

  How can I now be wishing that Ivo Lehane was the sort of man who would’ve knocked at my door in the middle of the night and made mad passionate love to me without stopping? How can I possibly be thinking that if he had asked me to come with him into the airport and found a cupboard to make love to me in, I would have said yes.

  While all he did was brush my lips with his – by mistake.

  What the hell am I like?

  My phone beeps.

  My heart does a triple jump.

  Hope your trip was OK. See you later.

  I stare at Dave’s message and then send a thumbs-up in reply.

  I realise that I didn’t ring the children this morning. Not that there was a good time to ring them, but I could have broken my ‘no personal phone calls while I’m driving rule’ and Ivo wouldn’t have minded. He likes hearing about Tom and Mica. He likes knowing that I have a happier family life than his.

  A life I would have risked just for a quickie with him.

  I’m worse than Dave.

  I’m a different version of Julie Halpin.

  I hate myself.

  I turn on talk radio as a distraction from my thoughts, but I’m unable to concentrate on the discussion about the health service even though it’s something that normally engages me. Instead I’m wondering if what happened to me is what happened with Dave and Julie, only with a different outcome. Was he taken over by an unstoppable desire to know what it would be like to be with another woman? Was it something he simply couldn’t resist? Was it the same moment of madness I felt with Ivo Lehane?

  When we first started going out together, Dave told me he’d slept with another girl before me. Only one. Which was one more than the number of boys I’d slept with before him. We were both teenagers, and back then, though there was a lot of kissing and fumbling, sleeping with someone was a very big deal. I know it seems ridiculous that Dave has been my one and only, but it’s never bothered me before. In fact, it’s been a source of pride.

  Now I can’t help feeling as though our lack of experience was a mistake. For both of us.

  I pull up outside Mum’s house. Her car isn’t there, which means she’s already gone to collect the children from school. I let myself in and wait for them to come home. When they arrive a few minutes later, Tom throws himself at me and tells me he’s missed me. Mica follows behind, a little more circumspect.

  ‘Did you have a good business trip?’ Her voice is serious.

  ‘Very good,’ I tell her.

  ‘Did you miss us?’

  ‘Unbelievably.’

  ‘Did you buy us presents?’ asks Tom.

  I hand them the bags of sweets I picked up along with my coffee at the Barack Obama Plaza, and they beam at me. I also give Mica the mini bottle of shampoo I took from the hotel bathroom, as well as the amenity kit of nail file and cotton buds. She kisses me with delight.

  ‘Don’t eat all those sweets at once,’ I warn. But Tom’s already tearing his bag open as they head to the living room. Mum follows them with sandwiches she made earlier and I cross my fingers that they’ll eat more of them than the sweets.

  ‘How was it?’ she asks when she comes back.

  ‘Tiring,’ I say.

  ‘You look terrible.’

  Only a mother can say that to you without you taking complete offence. Even though it’s bad enough her telling you.

  ‘Early mornings.’

  ‘Late nights?’

  ‘It was only one night,’ I remind her.

  ‘I looked up that place you stayed. It’s very flashy,’ she says.

  ‘Not so much flashy as luxurious,’ I tell her.

  She raises an eyebrow.

  ‘His company was paying,’ I say.

  ‘That was generous of them.’

  ‘It was convenient.’

  ‘Did you like staying there?’

  ‘It’s probably the only time I’ll ever stay somewhere that expensive. So yes, I liked it.’

  ‘And you seem to like him too.’

  ‘I like a lot of my clients. I like Leona Lynch. And Thea Ryan.’

  ‘But you’ve never spent a night away with either of them.’

  ‘I might if I ever need to.’

  ‘And everything’s OK?’ asks Mum.

  ‘Of course it is,’ I lie. ‘Why wouldn’t it be?’

  ‘Why indeed,’ she says.

  I round up the kids and drive home. The familiar scent of our house – Airwick, children and a kind of underlying whiff of the greasy lubricant that Dave uses on his jobs – wraps itself around me.

  ‘What’s for tea?’ asks Tom.

  ‘You had sandwiches at Granny’s,’ I remind him.

  ‘But I’m starving,’ he howls.

  So I make them spaghetti hoops on toast, which they devour. As they get down from the table, I hug them both so hard that they complain.

  ‘Well, I’ve missed you,’ I say.

  ‘You shouldn’t have gone away,’ says Mica. ‘Then you wouldn’t have missed us.’

  Does she think this herself? Or is it Dave talking?

  He arrives home at seven, and, as they did with me, the children rush to greet him.

  ‘How’s my man about the house?
’ he asks Tom. And then, ruffling Mica’s hair, which normally she hates, ‘How’s my best woman?’

  They tell him they’ve had a great time at Granny’s and that I bought them sweets. He looks at me.

  ‘I thought all sugary stuff was banned,’ he says.

  ‘Not all the time.’

  ‘Only when I bring it home.’

  ‘Dave. Please.’

  He gives the children another hug and walks into the kitchen.

  ‘Any food for me?’ he asks.

  ‘Fry-up?’ I suggest.

  ‘Sounds good.’

  I cook a meal for him but nothing for myself. I sit down opposite him with a mug of coffee. He doesn’t ask if I’ve eaten already but he does ask about the trip.

  ‘Tiring.’ I repeat what I said to Mum.

  ‘I knew it would be.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I should have thought it through more carefully.’

  He looks at me in surprise.

  ‘I didn’t think it would be so full-on,’ I explain. ‘It was more than I expected.’

  ‘And what about the hotel?’

  ‘More than I expected too.’ I keep my voice light. ‘And then this morning . . .’ I tell him about the incident with the tyres.

  ‘Bloody hell, Roxy!’ He’s genuinely upset. ‘You could’ve been killed.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I say. ‘But it was a scary moment all the same.’

  ‘No wonder you look like a ghost.’

  ‘I think I’ll go to bed early.’

  He nods. ‘I’m glad you’re home.’

  ‘Me too,’ I say.

  We sit together in the living room once I’ve tidied up the kitchen and the children are in bed. Dave is watching an old war movie – he’s a bit obsessed with them and the perfect English of the actors. I sit beside him on the sofa and take out my phone.

  Home , I type. All well. Hope is OK with you too.

  It’s about an hour later when it pings in reply.

  Greetings from New York. Glad you got back safely.

  Glad you got there safely too. Take care.

  Take care. I say it without thinking every time Dave or the children leave the house. But I mean the words. I want them to be safe. I don’t want anything bad to happen to them.

  I put the phone back in my bag and yawn suddenly.

  ‘You have to stop.’ Dave mutes the TV and turns to me.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The driving, of course,’ he says. ‘How would I have coped if you’d been killed today? How would the children have coped?’

  Would you have mourned me or replaced me? I wonder, but I don’t answer.

  ‘You’re too important to this family for anything to happen to you,’ he continues.

  I’m sure he doesn’t mean to make me feel like a cog in the machine, but he does.

  ‘Today was exceptional,’ I say. ‘Both the overnight and the accident.’

  ‘It’s too risky.’

  I wish I hadn’t told him about the tyres. But it seemed like the right thing to distract him from Ivo Lehane.

  ‘The same thing could happen to you,’ I remind him. ‘You’re out every day in the van. Sometimes you have to drive long distances. You can’t wrap me in cotton wool, Dave.’

  ‘It’s my job to protect you,’ he says. ‘Look, I’m not saying you have to stop forever, but you should take a break.’

  This is a new way of looking at it. But I know that if I take a break, I’ll never go back. Besides, I have bookings. So I can’t. That’s what I say to him.

  ‘Honour the ones you have,’ he says. ‘But then stop. You need a rest, Roxy. You’ve been burning the candle at both ends.’

  Mum says that too. But I haven’t. I’ve been doing something I love doing. I’ve managed everything else.

  ‘Your family is more important than any business,’ Dave reminds me.

  He’s right about that.

  ‘So we’re agreed,’ he says when I stay silent. ‘Good.’

  He doesn’t wait for me to say anything. He unmutes the TV and goes back to watching it.

  I walk out of the living room and up the stairs. I take my time getting ready for bed even though I’m feeling exhausted. I cleanse, tone and moisturise my skin. I brush my hair. I get under the duvet. I lie in darkness and silence and tell myself that Dave has a point and that my driving is both unnecessary and troublesome. So perhaps it would be better for all of us if I gave in and sold the car. Perhaps that would fix everything.

  I’m still awake when he comes into the room and gets undressed. He slides into the bed beside me, then puts his arm around me and pulls me towards him. I don’t want this tonight, but I’m kind of relieved that despite our argument of earlier, he does.

  He falls asleep afterwards.

  I don’t.

  Chapter 24

  I do my best to be Supermum over the weekend and then keep what could be described as a low profile for the following week. Fortunately the jobs I have booked are strictly during the children’s school hours, so once again I’m home whenever Dave is home. I don’t say a word about clients and I also adjust the cooking arrangements so none of the Punishment Book recipes appear.

  But I feel like I’m walking on eggshells. I never used to feel like this in my own home. I never felt as though I was keeping part of myself from Dave either. And yet I am. I’m driving when he doesn’t want me to, and although I’ve turned down some jobs that don’t suit me, I know I’ll agree to ones I like if they come. And that’ll create an even bigger problem later.

  Obviously I haven’t heard from Ivo Lehane. He’s off working in the States and he’s forgotten all about me. I wonder, though, if he’s planning to resume his visits to his dad. And if he does, will he want me to drive him? Leaving aside the fact that Dave thinks I’m about to take a break, I couldn’t possibly have Ivo in the car again. I wouldn’t trust myself. In my mind I’ve become an unfaithful wife. And telling myself that my husband was actually unfaithful while I’m only daydreaming about it doesn’t make it any easier.

  Mum drops in to see me on Wednesday afternoon, shortly after the children come home from school. They’re in the garden, jumping on the trampoline, even though autumn has become more tangible and it’s chilly outside. I’m indoors, loading the washing machine. Mum waits for me to finish before following me into the kitchen. The kids rush in to say hello and she gives them a couple of chocolates each.

  ‘Love you, Gran!’ they cry before disappearing outside again.

  ‘I’m trying to limit their eating between meals,’ I tell her as we watch them leaping around. ‘It’s good for me too.’

  ‘In fairness to you, the weight loss suits you. Just don’t go too far with it,’ she remarks.

  ‘I won’t. I still snack between jobs. But honestly, since I’ve started eating better, I have more energy. I shouldn’t have been so dismissive of Gina Hayes before.’

  ‘You weren’t,’ says Mum. ‘You were envious of her.’

  ‘Maybe of the fact that she’s so successful and good-looking.’

  ‘So are you,’ says Mum, in the loyal way that all mothers have.

  ‘You say the nicest things.’

  ‘I speak the truth.’ She grins. ‘Anyhow, I’m here on a mission.’

  ‘Oh?’ I put the kettle on and she sits down at the table.

  ‘I want everyone to come for a family lunch on Sunday,’ she says.

  ‘Everyone?’

  ‘You and Dave and the children. Aidan, Kerry and theirs. It’s your dad’s birthday.’

  Of course it is! How could I have forgotten?

  ‘I didn’t do a month’s mind for him,’ she continues. ‘I’m not into that sort of thing. But I think it would be nice to celebrate his birthday.’

  A month’s mind is a memorial mass that’s held about a month after a person has died. Dad wasn’t remotely religious and Mum’s relationship with the Catholic Church is pretty à la carte, so I never even thought of the possibi
lity of a month’s mind. But I like the idea of celebrating Dad’s birthday, and say so.

  ‘Good.’ She smiles at me. ‘I haven’t had everyone around me since the funeral. It will be nice to have you together at a happier occasion.’

  I’m not entirely sure how happy it’ll be without Dad, but I swear to myself that I will be as positive and cheerful as Mum needs me to be. To be fair, she’s looking positive and cheerful herself right now, and she’s wearing her Charlotte Tilbury make-up as well as a nice blouse and trouser combo I haven’t seen before.

  ‘I needed new stuff,’ she says when I compliment her on the blouse. ‘It would be easy to flop around the place in tracksuits and T-shirts all the time, but I’ve got to make an effort, otherwise it’s the beginning of the end.’

  I glance involuntarily at my own tracksuit, which has a dusty streak across the arm. I’m conscious that I’m not wearing a scrap of make-up. There is something deeply disturbing about the fact that my sixty-two-year-old widowed mother looks more glamorous than me.

  She laughs when I say this and tells me that no working mum can possibly look glamorous. When I say that some do, she shakes her head and then suddenly asks if I’ll be driving ‘that man’ to Kildare again after my two-day jaunt with him.

  I lean down and pick one of Mica’s discarded chocolate wrappers from beneath the kitchen table. My face is flushed when I get up again.

  ‘Dave and I are arguing about the driving,’ I say.

  ‘Oh, Roxy.’ Her eyes are full of concern. ‘Does he want you to stop?’

  ‘He’s never been a fan in the first place,’ I say. ‘He still wants us to sell the car and use the money for a holiday. And he’s asked me to take a break although I know he really means stop for good.’

  ‘There are worse things you could do,’ says Mum.