Lou arrived down at the harbour two hours in advance of the race. He hadn’t raced for so many years, he wanted to get accustomed to the talk, get a feel for being on the boat again. He also needed to build up a relationship with the rest of the team: communication was key and he didn’t want to let anybody down. Not true – he didn’t want to let Quentin down. He found the beautiful Alexandra, the forty-foot sailboat Quentin had bought five years ago and that he had since spent every spare penny and every waking moment on. Already on board, Quentin and five others were in a tight group, going over the course and their tactics.
Lou did the math. There were only supposed to be six on the boat; Lou joining them made seven.
‘Hi there,’ he said, approaching them.
‘Lou!’ Quentin looked up in surprise and Lou realised then why there were already six people. Quentin hadn’t trusted him to show up.
‘Not late, am I? You did say nine thirty.’ He tried to hide his disappointment.
‘Yeah, sure, of course.’ Quentin tried to hide his surprise. ‘Absolutely, I just, eh …’ He turned around to the other men waiting and watching. ‘Let me introduce you to the rest of the team. Guys, this is my brother, Lou.’
Surprise flitted across a few faces.
‘We didn’t know you had a brother,’ one smiled, stepping forward to offer his hand. ‘I’m Geoff, welcome. I hope you know what you’re doing.’
‘It’s been a while,’ Lou looked uncertainly at Quentin, ‘but Quentin and I were sent on enough sailing courses over the years, it’d be hard for us ever to forget. It’s like riding a bike, isn’t it?’
They laughed and welcomed him aboard.
‘So where do you want me?’ He looked at his brother.
‘Are you really okay to do this?’ Quentin asked him quietly, away from the others.
‘Of course.’ Lou tried not to be offended. ‘Same positions as we used to?’
‘Foredeck man?’ Quentin asked.
‘Aye, aye, Captain,’ Lou smiled, saluting him.
Quentin laughed and turned back to the rest of the crew. ‘Okay, boys, I want us all working in harmony. Remember, let’s talk to each other, I want information flowing up and down the boat at all times. If you haven’t done what you should have done, then shout, we all need to know exactly what’s going on. If we win, I’ll buy the first round.’
They all cheered.
‘Right, Lou,’ he looked at his brother and winked, ‘I know you’ve been looking forward to this for a long time.’
Though untrue, Lou didn’t feel it was a good idea to object.
‘Finally you get your opportunity to see what Alexandra’s made of.’
Lou punched his brother playfully in the side.
Ruth pushed Pud’s buggy through Fusiliers Arch and they entered St Stephen’s Green, a park right in the centre of Dublin city. An ice rink had been set up in the grounds, attracting shoppers and people from all around the country to join in the unique experience. Passing the duck-filled lake and walking over O’Connell Bridge, they soon entered a wonderland. Instead of the usual manicured gardens, a Christmas market had been set up, lavishly decorated and looking like it had come straight out of a Christmas movie. Stalls selling hot chocolate with marshmallows, mince pies and fruit cakes lined the paths and the smell of cinnamon, cloves and marzipan oozed into the air. Each stall owner was dressed as an elf, while Christmas tunes blared out of the speakers, icicles dripped from the roof of every stall and machines blew fake snow through the air.
Santa’s Igloo was the centre of attention, a long queue forming outside, while elves dressed in green rags and pointy shoes did their best to entertain the waiting masses. Giant red and white striped candy canes formed an archway into the igloo, while bubbles blew from the chimneytop and floated up into the sky. On one patch of grass a group of children – umpired by an elf – played tug of war with an oversized Christmas cracker. A Christmas tree twenty feet tall had been erected and decorated in oversized baubles and tinsel. Hanging from the branches were giant water balloons, which a queue of children – but more daddies – threw holly-covered balls at in an attempt to burst the balloons and release the gifts inside. A red-faced elf, wet from the exploding balloons, ran around collecting gifts from the floor, while his accomplice filled more balloons and passed them to another team-mate to hang on the branches. There was no whistling while they worked.
Pud’s chubby little forefinger pointed in every direction as something new caught his eye. Lucy, who was usually all chat, had suddenly gone very quiet. Her chocolate-brown hair was cut bluntly at her chin, her fringe stopped above eyebrows that shaped big brown eyes. She was dressed in a bright red coat that went to her knees, double-breasted with oversized black buttons and a black fur collar, cream tights and shiny black shoes. She held on to Pud’s buggy with one hand and floated along beside them all, drifting away in a heaven of her own. Every now and then she’d see something and look up to Lou and Ruth with the biggest smile on her face. Nobody said anything. They didn’t need to. They all knew.
Further away from the Christmas market they found the ice rink, which was swarmed by hundreds of people young and old, the queue snaking alongside the rink so that those who crashed and fell could be viewed by spectators who chuckled at every comedy fall.
‘Why don’t you all go and watch the show?’ Lou said, referring to the mini-pantomime that was being performed in the bandstand. Dozens of children sat on deckchairs, entranced by the magical world before them. ‘I’ll queue for us.’
It was a generous gesture and a selfish one both at the same time, for Lou Suffern couldn’t possibly change overnight. He had made the attempt to spend the day with his family, but already his BlackBerry was burning a hole in his pocket and he needed time to check it before he quite simply exploded.
‘Okay, thanks,’ Ruth said, pushing Pud over to join Lou in the queue. ‘We shouldn’t be too long.’
‘What are you doing?’ Lou asked, panicked.
‘Going to watch the show.’
‘Aren’t you taking him?’
‘No. He is asleep. He’ll be fine with you.’
She headed off hand-in-hand with a skipping Lucy, while Lou looked at Pud with mild panic and full of prayer for him not to wake. He had one eye on his BlackBerry, the other on Pud, and a third eye that he had never known he had on the group of teenagers in front of him, who had suddenly started shouting and jumping around as their hormones got the better of them, each screech from their mouths and jerk of their gawky hand movements a threat to his sleeping child. He suddenly became aware of the level of ‘Jingle Bells’ being filtered through the speakers, of the feedback that sounded like a five-car pile-up when a voice cut in to announce a separated family member that was waiting by The Elf Centre. He was aware of every single solitary sound, every squeal of a child on the ice, every shout as their fathers fell on their arses, every crack of bones. On high alert, as though waiting for somebody to attack at any moment, the BlackBerry and its flashing red light went back in his pocket. The queue moved on and he ever so slowly pushed the buggy up the line.
In front of him, a greasy-haired adolescent telling a story to his friends through the use of serious explosion sounds and occasional epileptic-fit movements caught Lou’s eye. The boy, getting to the climax of the story, leapt back and landed against the buggy.
‘Sorry,’ the boy said, turning around and rubbing his arm, which he’d bumped. ‘Sorry, mister, is he okay?’
Lou nodded. Swallowed. He wanted to reach out and throttle the child, wanted to find the boy’s parents so that he could tell them about teaching their son the art of storytelling without grand gestures and spittle-flying explosions. He peeped in at Pud. The monster had been woken. Pud’s eyes, glassy, sleepy and tired, and not yet ready to come out of hibernation, opened slowly. They looked left, they looked right, and all around, while Lou held his breath. He and Pud looked at one another for a while in a tense silence, and then, deciding he didn
’t like the horrified expression on his father’s face, Pud spat out his soother and began screaming. Scream. Ing.
‘Eh, shhhh,’ Lou said awkwardly, looking down at his son.
Pud screamed louder, thick tears forming in his tired eyes.
‘Em, come on, Pud.’ Lou smiled at him, giving him his best porcelain-toothed smile that usually worked on everyone in business.
Pud cried louder.
Lou looked around in embarrassment, apologising to anybody whose eye he caught, particularly the smug father who had a young baby in a pouch on his front and two other children holding each of his hands. He grumbled at the smug man and turned his back on him, trying to end the screech of terror by pushing the buggy back and forth quickly, deliberately clipping the heels of the greasy teen who’d put him in this predicament. He tried pushing the soother in Pud’s mouth, ten times over. He tried covering Pud’s eyes with his hand, hoping that the sight of darkness would make him want to sleep. That didn’t work. Pud’s body was contorting, bending backwards as he tried to break out of his straps like the Incredible Hulk from his clothes. He continued to wail, sounding like a cat who was being hung by the tail and then dunked head first in water, followed by a strangling. He fumbled with the baby bag and offered him toys, which were flung rather violently out of the buggy and around the ground.
Smug Family Man with the front pouch bent over to assist Lou in his gathering of dispersed toys. Lou grabbed them while failing to make eye contact, grunting his thanks. After most things from the baby bag lay scattered on the ground, Lou decided to release the dough monster. He struggled with the trickiness of the catch for quite some time while Pud’s screams intensified and they gathered more stares, and, just as someone was close to calling social services, he finally broke his son free. Pud didn’t stop crying and continued to yell with snot bubbling from his nostrils, his face as purple as a Ribena berry.
Ten minutes of pointing at trees, dogs, children, planes, birds, Christmas trees, presents, elves, things that moved, things that didn’t move, anything that Lou could lay his eye on, and Pud was still crying.
Ruth came running over with Lucy.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Woke up as soon as you left, he won’t stop crying.’ Lou was sweating.
Pud took one look at Ruth and reached his arms out towards her, almost jumping out of Lou’s arms. His cries stopped instantly, he clapped his hands, his face returned to a normal colour, he babbled. He looked at his mother, played with her necklace and acted as though nothing had happened to him at all. Lou was sure that when nobody else was looking, Pud smiled cheekily at him.
Feeling in his element, Lou’s stomach churned with anticipation as he watched the coastline move further away, as they made their way to the starting area, north of Ireland’s Eye. Bundled-up family members and friends waved their support from the lighthouse on the end of the pier, with binoculars in hands.
There was a magic about the sea. People were drawn to it. People wanted to live by it, swim in it, play in it, look at it. It was a living thing that was as unpredictable as a great stage actor: it could be calm and welcoming, opening its arms to embrace its audience one moment, but then could explode with its stormy tempers, flinging people around, wanting them out, attacking coastlines, breaking down islands. It had its playful side too, as it enjoyed the crowd, tossed children about, knocked lilos over, tipped over windsurfers, occasionally gave sailors helping hands; all done with a secret chuckle. For Lou there was nothing like the feel of the wind in his hair, gliding through the water with the rain in his face or the sun beating down. It had been a long time since he’d sailed – he and Ruth, of course, had had many holidays on friends’ yachts over the years, but it was a long time since Lou had been a team player in any aspect of his life. He was looking forward to the challenge; he was looking forward to not only being in competition with thirty other boats, but trying to beat the sea, the wind and all the elements.
In the starting area they sailed near the committee boat Free Enterprise for identification purposes. The starting line was between a red and white pole on the committee boat and a cylindrical orange buoy which was left to port. Lou got into position at the bow of the boat as they circled the starting area, trying to get into the right position to time it perfectly so that they’d cross the starting line at just the right time. The wind was north-east force four and the tide flooding, which added to the sea’s bad humour. This would have to be watched to keep the boat moving fast through the choppy, lumpy sea. Just like old times, Lou and Quentin had talked this out so both knew what was required. Any premature passing of the starting line would mean an elimination, and it was up to Lou to count them down, position them correctly, and communicate with the helmsman, who was Quentin. They used to have it down to a fine art when they were in their teens, back then they’d won numerous races and could have competed with their eyes closed, merely feeling the direction of the wind; but it had been so long ago and the communication between them had broken down rather dramatically over the past few years.
Lou blessed himself as the warning signal appeared at 11.25. They moved the boat around, trying to get into position so that they’d be one of the first to cross the starting line. At 11.26 the preparatory flag went up. At 11.29 the one-minute signal flag went down. Lou waved his arms around wildly, trying to signal to Quentin where to place the boat.
‘Right starboard, starboard right, Quentin!’ he yelled, waving his right arm. ‘Thirty seconds!’ he yelled.
They came dangerously close to another yacht. Lou’s fault.
‘Eh, left port! LEFT!’ Lou yelled. ‘Twenty seconds!’
Each boat fought hard to find a good position, but with thirty boats in the race there could only be a small number that would make it across the starting line in the favoured position close to the committee boat. The rest would have to do their best with stolen wind on the way up the beat.
Eleven thirty heralded the start signal, and at least ten boats crossed the start line before them. Not the best start, but Lou wasn’t going to let it get to him. He was rusty, he needed some practice, but he didn’t have time for that, this was the real thing.
They raced along, with Ireland’s Eye on their right, the headland to their left, but there was no time to take in the view now. Lou didn’t move, thinking fast, looking around him at all the yachts racing by, with the wind blowing in his hair, his blood pumping through his veins, feeling more alive than he’d ever felt. It was all coming back to him, what it felt like to be on the boat. Perhaps his speed was down, but he hadn’t lost his instincts. They raced along, the boat crashing over the waves as they headed towards the weather mark, one mile up in the wind from the starting line.
‘Tacking!’ Quentin shouted, watching and steering as they all prepared. The runners trimmer, Alan, checked that the slack on the old runners had been pulled in. The genoa trimmer, Luke, made sure that the new sheet had the slack pulled in and gave a couple of turns on the winch. Lou didn’t move an inch, thinking ahead about what he needed to do and watching the other boats around them to make sure nothing was too close. He instinctively knew they were tacking onto port and would have no right of way over boats on starboard. His old racing tactics came flooding back and he was quietly pleased with how he had positioned the boat right on the layline to the weather mark. He could sense Quentin’s confidence in him gaining at their now favourable position when the tack was completed, powering towards the mark with a clear passage in. It was Quentin’s belief in him that Lou was fighting to win, just as much as first place.
Quentin made sure that there was room to tack and started the turn. Geoff, the cockpit man, moved quickly to the old genoa, and as the genoa backwinded, he released it. The boat went through the wind, the mainsheet was eased a couple of feet and the boom came across. Luke pulled as fast as possible, and when he couldn’t pull any more he put a couple more turns on the winch and the grinding began. Quentin steered the new course.
‘HIGH SIDE!’ Lou yelled, and they all raced to hang their legs over the windward side.
Quentin whooped and Lou laughed into the wind.
After rounding the first mark and heading towards the second with the wind on their side, Lou jumped into action in time to hoist the spinnaker, then gave Quentin the thumbs up. The rest of the team instantly got busy, tending to their individual duties. Lou was a little too much fingers and thumbs but he could tell it was coming together.
Watching it raise to the top, Lou happily called, ‘UP!’
Alan trimmed the spinnaker while Robert grinded. They sailed fast and Lou punched the air and roared. Behind the wheel, Quentin laughed as the spinny filled with wind like a windsock, and with the wind with them they raced to the next mark. Quentin allowed himself a quick look astern and it was some sight: there must have been twenty-five boats with spinnakers filling, chasing them down. Not bad. He and Lou caught one another’s eyes and smiled. They didn’t say anything. They didn’t need to. They both knew.
After thirty minutes of queuing for the ice rink, Lou and his family finally reached the top.
‘You guys all have fun,’ Lou said, clapping his hands together and stamping his feet to keep warm. ‘I’ll just go to the coffee place over there and watch you.’
Ruth started laughing. ‘Lou, I thought you were coming skating.’
‘No.’ He scrunched up his face. ‘I’ve just spent the last half an hour watching men older than me on the ice and they look like right eejits. What if someone sees me? I’d rather stay here, thank you. Plus, these are new and dry-clean only,’ he added, referring to his trousers.
‘Right,’ Ruth said firmly, ‘you won’t mind taking care of Pud then, while Lucy and I skate.’
‘Come on, Lucy,’ he instantly grabbed his daughter’s hand, ‘let’s get us some skates.’ He winked at a laughing Ruth and made off for the ice-skates. He got to the counter ahead of Smug Family Man, who, like the Pied Piper, was leading even more children now. Ha. He had a sense of silent victory at arriving at the counter first. The ice was nearby and child in Lou had come out to play.
Cecelia Ahern 2-book Bundle Page 21
