Still You

by Claire Allan

  She stood in the back garden, where they had spent so much time in the heat of the summer – where Charlotte had been so full of life, and she wept until her throat was raw, and her clothes soaked through.

  It was only much, much later that it dawned on her that Lorcan had not followed her to comfort her and that he had gone home without saying goodbye.

  The details from Italy were slow to come through. Painfully slow. It would have been easier if they had all come at once – like tearing off a plaster. But no, poor communications mixed with the fuzziness of tranquilisers to take the edge off grief and the exhaustion which came with trying to make sense of something which made no sense, meant that each day brought a fresh wave of grief.

  Charlotte had indeed drowned – in the pool of the Italian villa she so loved. She had been outside on the terrace after dark when it was thought she had slipped or tripped and fallen into the water. She had bumped her head on the way into the water, they were told. She wouldn’t have felt anything.

  Jack had found her – he didn’t know how long she had been in the water – but they were all grateful that neither of the children had found their mother’s body.

  And the children? The children were being cared for by friends while Jack tried to come to terms with everything. He hadn’t spoken to either Rosaleen or Áine. Rosaleen called him a coward – her anger had not abated in the days which followed – but Áine could understand his fears. What could he say? How could he face them? She didn’t want to face anyone. She wanted to lie in bed each day and look at photos from her childhood and pretend it was all a mistake. It was the only place she could escape the reality that everything had changed. As soon as she left her room she was greeted with mirrors covered with black cloths, the curtains were drawn and in the sitting room Rosaleen had set up a shrine to Charlotte. It made Áine feel sick to look at it – and to see her mother sitting there in front of it, in a daze, made her feel like she wanted to run away.

  Charlotte wasn’t coming home. That was established early on. There would be no real wake – no real funeral. She was buried close to the villa – close to her children and under her beloved sunshine. Rosaleen didn’t have the strength to argue or the means to bring her daughter’s remains home if she did. Father Michael had steadfastly tried to offer spiritual counsel and Rosaleen had repeatedly told him to go to hell. Even if Charlotte was brought home she would not have a Christian burial. The God who killed her would have no place in laying her to rest as if that made some sort of amends for his actions, she had barked.

  But instead she had set up her shrine – pictures, candles, a darkened room – a big pot of tea on the range and plate after plate of sandwiches for those who called round to shake their heads in disbelief and offer words of comfort.

  Áine yearned to do something more. She yearned to see her sister. She yearned to talk to Jack to find out exactly what had happened. Her heart ached for her niece and nephew and she longed to talk to them – to offer them what comfort she could. She wanted to hug them and whisper to them over and over and over again how much their mother had loved them – and she wanted to tell them every last detail of Charlotte’s life so that they would never forget her.

  But instead all she could really do was lie on top of her bed and wish it was all so very different.

  Chapter 18

  Present Day

  I wasn’t sure how it happened. Even now part of me wondered had it happened at all? I was sitting in my car, outside my house, playing the scene over and over in my head again.

  At some stage, while Jonathan had been telling how his mother had died – how she had been found lifeless, face down in their pool – and how his childhood had been torn to pieces, I had felt his hand on mine. I didn’t even notice it at first. It had felt natural – while he talked – that he would reach out. I had reached out too – putting my free hand on top of his as I listened to the pain that hadn’t eased over fifty years. He may well have been a grown man – and a successful, confident businessman at that – but there was, I saw, a great deal of pain in his eyes still. The kind of pain that doesn’t go away. My heart had shifted when I realised he was showing me himself at his most vulnerable and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to reach out and touch his cheek, to caress his face, to feel the soft stubble on his chin … to look into his hazel eyes …

  I hadn’t pulled my hand away from his. He had pulled his hand away from mine. Afterwards I didn’t know how long we had sat there holding hands but I knew – or thought I knew – that it felt right. That in that moment I knew the real person behind Jonathan Hegarty’s brash persona. The person who had been hurt as a child more than many of us had been hurt in our lifetimes – and the person who was doing everything in his power to stop himself from hurting now.

  And, to my confusion, as I sat there in my car, I realised I had very much seen a Jonathan Hegarty who I wanted to kiss – and by the way he held my gaze before I left I had a notion that he wanted to kiss me too.

  Indeed I was just thinking, again, of how his kiss could feel when my phone rang. In a way I was glad of the distraction – I didn’t need to be losing myself in romantic thoughts. When I saw the person who was calling me, romance was the furthest thing from my mind.

  “Matthew,” I said as I answered.

  “Ah good, good, you’re there,” he mumbled.

  “You called my mobile phone, Matthew. Where else would I be? The whole point of the phone being that it is mobile?” I tried to keep the snippiness from my voice – to come across as just a little quirky instead. I failed.

  “Okay,” he breathed out. “It’s like that, is it?”

  “Like what? Matthew – you called me. What do you want? It has been a long day and I want a shower and something to eat and maybe some time relaxing.”

  “You could come here for dinner?” he asked, his voice tentative.

  “And why would I do that?”

  “Because I don’t like how things ended last week, Georgina. It’s not what I want.”

  “Oh,” I said, “so you don’t want to leave me? You don’t want to see someone else? And you don’t want our teenage daughters – who are trying to come to terms with it all – to meet her?”

  He sighed again. I knew that what I had just said was exactly what he wanted. He just wanted me to be okay with it too. I could visualise him getting frustrated – pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation. Silly Georgie doesn’t get it. Again.

  “No … George. I just want it to be more amicable.”

  “I’m sure you do,” I laughed.

  “You can’t be enjoying this any more than I am,” he said.

  “I’m pretty sure you are enjoying much more than me,” I spat. “You’re the one who is making all the calls here. You’re the one living the life of a young single man. I’m the one picking up the pieces.”

  “Well, come over, Georgie. Let’s talk. Tell me how I can help you pick up some pieces.”

  “Okay,” I conceded, thinking that we needed to move forward in some way and at least now he was offering to listen. I looked at the clock on my dashboard. “I’ll just check on the girls, get changed and come round.”

  “I look forward to it,” he said and hung up.

  “She’s someone from school. A teaching assistant,” he said as he speared some long-stem broccoli with his fork and ate it.

  He spoke as if we were never married – as if it were the most natural thing in the world to talk to me about someone he was seeing. I imagined the broccoli choking him – just ever so slightly. Just enough to make him turn a little blue, maybe feel a little faint.

  I nodded.

  “I wasn’t lying last week when I said I didn’t know what I wanted – I didn’t. And when Sam came over I told her that – I told her I was confused. That I had been with you forever – it was only natural I felt a loyalty to you. But … I can’t lie, Georgie. Not to you. You deserve more. And, if I’m honest, Sam deserves more too.”


  I glanced down at the steak, untouched on my plate. It was such an awful shame it was going to go to waste.

  “You said you wanted to start picking up pieces,” I said. “How are we doing that?”

  “I need you to know, it was never about you. It was me entirely. I just grew up – we were so young.”

  “I grew up too, you know,” I said. “I just didn’t grow away from you.”

  I wanted to shout. I had imagined this scene being one where I threw a plate at his head, or beat his chest with my fists, or slapped him soundly around the face. But I think, in that moment, I had gone beyond that.

  “It’s too early for her to meet the girls. Much too early,” I said. “And it won’t be up to you to decide when they are ready for it. You turned their lives upside down too.”

  “I know,” he said – and had the decency to look ashamed of himself. “I miss them so much.”

  The part of me that wanted to ask him if he missed me too was too worried about what the answer would be.

  “You made your bed,” I croaked.

  “I did – and I’m sorry. If it’s of any use. I am sorry. I thought we would be forever.” And he reached out and touched my hand.

  My mind flew back to earlier that day, when another hand held mine. When that other hand made me feel something good – something positive. It made me feel useful. It made me feel trusted. It made me feel like I was someone.

  Matthew’s hand didn’t do that. In fact, it felt alien. With a strange realisation that made me feel lighter than I had in weeks I realised it had been a very long time since Matthew’s hands had really made me feel anything remotely close to alive – to cherished, to wanted.

  I slowly took my hand from his.

  “I thought we would be forever too,” I said softly. “But we just have to get on with it and pick up the pieces.”

  “Yes,” he said, sadly. “Just pick up the pieces.”

  “Oh my!” Sinéad breathed down the phone when I told her about Jonathan.

  “Yes, I know. That’s another fine mess I have got myself into.” I was in bed, sipping a cup of warm milk to try and settle myself so that I had half a chance of getting some sleep.

  “I’m not sure it’s so much of a mess …” Sinéad said.

  “Of course it is! Having any sort of feelings of any kind for Jonathan Hegarty is messy – no matter how you look at it. Combining that with the ongoing breakdown of my marriage.”

  “It’s only messy if you let it be messy. The two aren’t related, you know. You don’t have feelings for Jonathan because your husband left you. And your husband didn’t leave you because you have feelings for Jonathan.”

  “But I don’t even know if they are feelings,” I sighed. “It was a moment – a few moments. I felt sorry for him. Or fancied him. Or felt sorry and fancied him – in that moment. You’ve said it yourself, Sinéad. I’ve always been a sucker for a sad story.”

  “But his story’s not that sad – yes, okay, he had tragedy in his life when he was small. And the situation with his aunt is pretty crappy – but, bigger picture. Successful businessman. Quite the handsome kind – if you go for the George Clooney look. Well liked, generally. Single. No strings.”

  “Well, there you go!” I said. “If he’s such a catch why is he still single?”

  “Because people get divorced sometimes, Georgie. Has he never mentioned the ex? Although from recollection it was a while ago now. All fairly amicable, from what I heard. Just one of those things where they grew apart.”

  “That’s what Matthew said happened to us,” I sighed. “Did we seem like we were growing apart?”

  “I don’t think I can answer that question without making you unhappy,” Sinéad said.

  “I think if you don’t answer it, I’ll be unhappy anyway.”

  She sighed. “If you two get back together you are not to hold this against me and fall out with me for months, okay?”

  “We’re not getting back together,” I said – and for once the words didn’t feel odd in my mouth. My brain didn’t scream at the thought. My heart didn’t shatter. It ached – of course it ached because this was a very crappy thing indeed to happen. But it was the kind of ache that I knew would dull over time.

  “I still want you to promise,” she said.

  “I promise.”

  “I think you started growing apart a long time ago. You just put up with a lot because you said that was how relationships were after so many years together. You said you couldn’t expect fireworks all the time. But there should be the occasional sparkler. Or if you are lucky a great big Catherine Wheel every now and again. When was the last time you popped and fizzed?”

  “Okay, I understand,” I said, refusing to be drawn. Because if I was going to be honest about the last time I felt even the tiniest flicker or spark, it was that afternoon, in Áine’s kitchen – when Jonathan’s hand touched mine.

  “I truly believe you will be happy again,” Sinéad said. “I love you very much, my lovely friend. But stay in touch more, would you? I don’t see you all weekend and all this carry-on happens? I live only up the street.”

  “I’ll call tomorrow after work,” I promised.

  “Bring the girls. I’ll make dinner. Give Cinder-Eve the night off cooking.”

  “You’re a good friend to me.”

  “The best,” she said, “Now finish your hot milk. Go to sleep and have sweet dreams.”

  “Night-night, sweetheart.”

  I hung up, finished my milk like a good girl and switched off the light.

  That night I stretched my leg out, luxuriously, into what had been Matthew’s side of the bed and enjoyed having more space to myself.

  Chapter 19

  1964

  Lorcan didn’t come about so much in those early days. He said it was a time for family and that he didn’t want to intrude. On the very rare occasion he did arrive, Áine couldn’t help but notice that he looked deeply uncomfortable. He wouldn’t take a seat and hovered close to the door as the neighbours sat about drinking tea. He would refuse a cup, saying he had work to do at home and he was only calling in to see how Áine was holding up. She wanted to find the strength to tell him that she would be doing so much better if he was there a bit more and if he was willing to hug her a bit tighter and reassure her that it would get easier. She wanted to tell him that grief wasn’t catching and that, if he loved her as much as he had said he did, then this was the time to show it. But she didn’t want to come across as needy or maybe it was that she simply didn’t have the strength to be needy or to speak up for herself. Her needs felt silly. She felt selfish, lost and all at sea. So she watched him stand awkwardly, occasionally looking at his watch, before he made his excuses with a peck on her cheek, telling her that he would be thinking of her.

  Rosaleen remained lost in her grief – even more lost than Áine. Auntie Sheila had told Áine she wasn’t to worry so much, her mother was strong – but Áine knew that even the strongest of women could carry only so much. The loss of her husband had been tough enough – the loss of her daughter was unbearable.

  Rosaleen rarely slept. Áine had to plead with her to go to bed – and yet her mother rarely listened, preferring to pull an old blanket around her shoulders and doze on the chair which had become her home.

  And still there was little word from Italy. Jack’s mother Olive visited – a messenger from her son. She sat, wringing her hands together, eyes red-rimmed, trying to explain why Jack wanted to keep Charlotte close to him and the children.

  “He is heartbroken,” she said, “I am so worried for him. I know, I know, that’s no comfort to you – but Jack, he is grieving. He loved her so very much.”

  Rosaleen hadn’t spoken and it had fallen to Áine to tell this poor broken woman in front of her that Charlotte had loved Jack too. The truth was Charlotte had fallen for Jack the moment she had laid eyes on him on a night out with her friends. Theirs had been a whirlwind romance – one which had left both Rosaleen
and Áine dizzy with the speed of it. But neither of them could have denied how happy Charlotte was – Jack’s larger-than-life personality offered her the perfect match for her own wanderlust. When he had announced he had secured work in Italy, it had been only natural that they would marry within a matter of weeks so that she could accompany him. They had a synergy that Áine had not seen in any other couple and when the children had come along – even though Charlotte had been convinced she never wanted to be a mother – their happiness seemed complete.

  Áine remembered that first summer Charlotte had returned as a mother. She looked tired but blissfully happy as she nursed her newborn baby girl and Jack had been proud as a peacock showing off this chubby baby to anyone who would stop long enough to peek inside the pram.

  “We’ve tried to persuade him to come home,” Olive said. “We’ve told him he needs us now – that he can’t raise those children on his own but he says he will. He says he will manage – but he doesn’t sound as if he is managing. I wondered if maybe you would talk to him.”

  Rosaleen looked aghast. “And leave her? Out there? On her own? He buried her there – he can’t leave her on her own. Charlotte never liked to be on her own – no, it simply won’t do.”

  A red flush rose from underneath Olive’s ivory blouse. “I understand this is difficult …”

  “You don’t understand anything,” Rosaleen said. “You have your son. He might be upset. He might be grieving but he is alive. And if you want me to call him, to beg him to come back, to leave my daughter who never came home, then I feel sorry for you.”

  Áine sat beside her mother and took her hand. “Mother, I don’t think Olive is trying to upset you.”

  “Of course I’m not,” Olive interjected.

  “She’s just worried about Jack – and the children,” Áine said. “Jonathan and Emma must feel so lost.”