Instead of telling my parents the real reason behind my big fat failure of a marriage, I spill my heart out to a dead fourteen-year-old just as I tell her my secrets every year on the same date and same time of the morning, when the rest of the world is doing school runs or in rush-hour traffic heading to work or having coffee in front of early-morning television.
I tell all of this to Lucy Harte, a fourteen-year-old girl who I never met but who gave me a second chance at life, even though she has no idea that I even exist. I pray for her family, whoever they are, and I thank them from the bottom of my borrowed heart for the day they said yes to organ donation.
Then I bless myself quickly and aim to get out of the church before someone mistakes me for a real Christian and I leave Lucy to do whatever it is dead fourteen-year-olds do up in heaven, while I go back to my new life of singlehood, meals for one and real estate, which is highly pressurised, fast-moving and a far cry from the soft Irish countryside where I was brought up.
I am being brave.
I am being brave but I am not brave.
I am not brave at all. In fact I am bloody scared stiff.
Fuck you, Jeff.
I want to scream and shout and kick and cry so loudly but I am in a church so I can’t and it’s so damn frustrating.
Fuck you for leaving me and fuck her for taking you away. Why? What the hell did I do that was so bad?
I think I am going to cry and I so don’t want to cry in public.
I close my eyes, breathe in and out, in and out, in and out and focus on Lucy Harte. I am not here to think about Jeff. I am here to say thank you to Lucy.
It’s been a long time, Lucy Harte. Seventeen years is a long, long time for you to beat inside of me. Why do I have the feeling that we haven’t very long left?
I really should get to work.
Chapter 2
‘Are you sure you are okay? You don’t sound okay? I’ve been calling you all weekend, Maggie!’
And don’t I know it…! My mother’s voice is always high-pitched, but today it is more frantic than ever.
‘I’m fine, Mum. I’m driving,’ I tell her. I shouldn’t have answered. My head…
I’m not really driving but it’s the only thing that might get her off the line. My mother would talk the hind leg off a donkey but she sees right through the whole ‘I’m sorry, you’re breaking up’ or ‘I’m in a bad area’ or ‘I have an important call coming through’ excuses I usually make when I can’t be bothered with conversation.
‘You’re not fine. I know you’re not fine. Robert, she says she’s driving and she’s fine.’
‘Lies!’ my father shouts back. ‘She’s not fine. Maggie, you cannot do stress! You need to rest. No stress!’
‘You should have taken the day off and done something nice, Maggie. Even your father says so. You can’t afford this stress.’
‘Yes, she should have taken the day off and done something nice,’ I hear him echo in the background. I can just picture him, standing in his green wellies and baggy old-man trousers with his braces over his checked shirt, hovering by the ancient navy-blue landline phone that is attached to our kitchen wall back home in the big farmhouse I grew up in. He will be chewing on something, the end of his pipe, probably, and he will have a pen behind his ear (chewed also), just like I always do when I am doing something I enjoy and he will smell already of manure and sawdust.
‘I’m going out for dinner with Flo after work and she is meeting me outside the office at six, so it’s best I’m there,’ I lie. ‘I’m really looking forward to it.’
‘Oh, that’s nice. Where are you going for dinner? Robert, she is going for dinner. With Flo.’
‘We’re going to… um, we’re going to that new place,’ I waffle. ‘You know, my favourite. On George Street.’ More lies. ‘You see, I’m keeping busy, Mum. Busy, busy, busy.’
‘Well, I suppose that’s better than having too much time to think. Did you go to the church?’
‘Yes.’
‘Robert, she went to the church.’
Oh, Christ.
I hear a rustle as my dad takes the phone.
‘I hope you weren’t making an eejit out of yourself in front of those people,’ he says in a fluster.
By ‘those people’, he means ‘a man of the cloth’. By ‘eejit’ he means going to what Catholics call ‘Confession’. There is no one my dad hates more in this world than the Clergy.
‘I wasn’t.’
‘You could say your piece in your own apartment and it would do the same good than telling ‘them’ boyos your problems. None of their bloody business. Nosey –.’
‘I didn’t even see a priest, Dad. I just said what I wanted to say to Lucy, lit a few candles and left. I’m about to walk into the office now, so I’d better go.’
That bit wasn’t a lie. I was standing outside our office block and Davey, the porter, was winking at me as he did every morning and checking out my boobs, legs, bum and everything in between. Davey loved a good old perv.
‘You’re a good girl, Maggie O’Hara,’ says my dad and I can hear his voice shake. ‘A really good girl and you deserve the best and you deserve to be here. God bless wee Lucy Harte, but you deserve to have a life too and a great one at that. Now, push those guilty feelings to the side and have a good day, do you hear me? And look at Princess Diana. Charles didn’t want her but it didn’t stop her finding a man again, did it?’
‘No, it didn’t, but then she died,’ I remind him.
‘Well you’re not going to die, are you? You’re even nicer than Princess Diana. You’re even nicer than Princess Diana and Elizabeth Taylor. You’re nicer than the whole bloody lot of them rolled into one and don’t you ever forget it!’
I turn my back on Davey. I feel his eyes burning on my backside.
‘I hear you, Dad,’ I say and feel tears sting my eyes. ‘I am absolutely fine and as much as I wish I looked like Lady Di or Liz Taylor or the whole bloody lot of them, believe me when I say that finding a man is the least of my worries. Now, stop worrying! I am thirty-three years old. I can cope with being dumped and having my heart broken. I’ve coped with a lot worse…’
I know that he is pointing his finger through the air in front of him as he speaks. I can just see him.
‘Well, I’m just saying that when the time comes to find love again, you’ll have no bother,’ he tells me, ‘so don’t be worrying that you are going to be on your own because you won’t be on your own for long. You’ve been through enough in your life and if I was talking to the man upstairs if there even is such a thing as the man upstairs I would be telling him that enough is enough and it’s about time he left you alone! Enough is enough!’
And at that I burst out crying.
‘Yes and that is well enough, Robert!’ my mother shouts in the background. ‘Enjoy dinner with Flo and send our love to her, Maggie. Is she crying?’
‘I’m not crying,’ I say, wiping black blobs of mascara onto the back of my hand. ‘I love you both, okay? See you soon. I will come visit really soon.’
‘Do. Yes, see you soon, love,’ says my dad and I can tell that he is crying too.
This makes me feel even worse because every time my second-hand heart breaks, I think my parents feel my pain even more than I do.
‘Morning, Maggie,’ chirps Bridget, our long-serving receptionist who caters for the six businesses who share our building, diverting calls and taking appointments and basically minding other people’s business. ‘My God, what happened? You look a mess. And you’re very late!’
Bridget is salt of the earth, but she couldn’t tell a white lie to save her own life. I know I look like shit. I don’t need her to remind me. I also know I’m late too! I fucking hate this place right now.
I stop in my tracks. I am not just late for work. I am late for a really, really important meeting. Oh shit!
‘Can you tell the guys I will be up in two? And give my apologies, please, of course. I’ve had a rough morning
.’
Bridget looks back at me somewhat reluctantly.
‘A speedy two-minute fix-up in the bathroom isn’t going to make much difference, is it?’ I say.
She shrugs and lifts her phone while I quickly nip into the bathroom and see her honesty staring right back at me. I have a face that would scare babies, all blurred mascara, and I am as white as a ghost. Ah well, nothing that a hairbrush and some good old war paint won’t fix. Thank heavens for make-up. I need to compose myself and then forget what day it is.
Lucy Harte, just for now, I will have to try and let your sweet memory go.
A few minutes later I am in the elevator. My eyes are only slightly puffy but I’ve made a good job of looking as normal as I possibly can under the circumstances.
I’m half an hour late for a meeting with Will Powers Jr. I should be terrified. I urge the elevator to speed up. My heart begins to race. See, it works. It may be broken but it works and I am reminded of its presence every day as it breaks into tinier pieces over Jeff and that cat-loving smurf he is living with.…
But anyhow…Will Powers… the boss’s son … the smooth-talking, suit-wearing, stereotypical rich kid who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and was blessed with brooding good looks to boot is waiting for me and he is probably foaming at the mouth in temper.
Will lives in Spain most of the year but comes back and forth to deal with mainly human resources matters and is always tanned and tries his best to be nice but would stab you in the back if you didn’t watch yourself. You could say he has it all really… until he opens his mouth and talks the biggest load of shite you ever did hear in a fake American accent. He has it all, apart from a heart, that is. He could be doing with a transplant too, I often think. Swap his swinging brick for something that actually shows some compassion now and again.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ I say, trying to sound convincing but I’m not really sure that I’m sorry. I can’t feel sorry for anyone, only myself, these days.
Will looks at his watch, then, like a Mexican wave at a football match, the rest do too. Copy-cats. Five faces stare back at me and I feel my face flush.
They are waiting on my excuse. Their silence tells me so.
‘I… I was…’
‘Sit down, Maggie,’ says Will.
I wasn’t expecting such a gathering and I have no idea what this meeting is even about. I was probably informed in advance, but, surprise, surprise, I can’t remember.
The company directors, all of them, are here in one room. I bet I have big red blotches all over my chest, which always bloody happens when I’m under pressure, but, more importantly, what on earth is going on?
Will pulls out a seat and I do as I am told. I sit. He smells of posh cologne and flashes an uber-white smile. ‘I know this is a difficult day for you.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Just try and relax, Maggie. Thirty minutes late is not going to change the world. Have a seat and chill.’
Chill? Who does he think he is, Jay-Z? Who even says ‘chill’ these days?
Why is everyone staring? And what on earth does he know about my difficult day and its relevance to my life? I hadn’t told anyone that it’s my heart anniversary and I keep my private life very much private. No one even knows I broke up with Jeff. Well, apart from Bridget downstairs whose brother knows Jeff’s family and, yes, I told Diane who sits opposite me and… okay, so I may have told a few people. Maybe they all know more than I thought they do about me. But what the hell is going on?
‘I’m sure you have been wondering what this meeting is all about, Maggie,’ said Will. ‘I hope I haven’t been causing you sleepless nights.’
Sleepless nights? I haven’t had a full night’s sleep since Jeff dumped me. It’s not easy to sleep and stalk mutual friends on Facebook for clues on his whereabouts at the same time.
‘I haven’t been sleeping well lately but…’
The five faces are staring at me.
Will looks up at me from beneath dark knitted eyebrows that I notice are the exact same as his father’s. No, Will Sr’s are even thicker. But greyer. Why am I even thinking about eyebrows?
‘Maggie?’
‘I’m fine. Just the odd sleepless night, but yes. I’m… I’m fine,’ I say, screwing up my forehead. I think I have overused that word for one day but it’s all I can think of. I reach out my hands in front and clasp them together. I wish I had papers to shuffle, or a diary to check or something to do with my hands.
‘You don’t have to pretend you are fine,’ says Sylvia Madden, one of the CEOs, from across the table. ‘You have been through quite a lot personally lately and no one expects you to be fine.’
They are all staring at me. I need to get out of here. I don’t want to be here any more. I feel the room closing in.
‘I can’t do this any more,’ I say, but I barely recognise my own voice. I stand up. ‘I need to go… I need to quit. I can’t do it. Sorry.’
I am going to cry. Will shakes his head. He is smiling. Why is he smiling?
‘I understand why you would feel like giving it all up, quitting,’ he says. ‘But you’re not a quitter, Maggie.’
Now, I really am crying. Big sobs just like I was earlier when I was on the phone to my dad. I sit down again.
‘I have to… I just need some time to get through this.’
I manage to blurt out the words semi-coherently as Sylvia hands me a tissue across the table.
‘Yes, I can see that,’ says Will. ‘Your work has slipped since the promotion and having done some homework, we think you need a break, but only for a while, for health reasons.’
‘Slipped?’ I splutter. ‘I suppose that’s one way of putting it. I feel like a failure. I should probably go.’
I try to recall how my work has ‘slipped’ and I cringe at the realisation. Sure, I’d taken some days out after the break-up with Jeff and before that, when things weren’t going well with us, I’d had to leave early a few times and then there was the day when I broke down in the coffee room, but that was it really. Oh, apart from the day when I was showing a client around a property and I cried because he reminded me of Jeff and I might have flirted with him a bit more than was professionally advisable… crap. And that day last week when a potential buyer from America had to wait while I got sick in the bathroom of a boutique hotel I was showing him round after drowning the poor man in the stink of vodka from the night before. Oh shit.
‘Yes, it has been poor lately and not like the vibrant go-getter we know, Maggie,’ says Will, but he is still smiling. He is not mad. ‘Days off, working ‘from home’, late arrivals, missed appointments… but your health comes first and foremost and you are too big an asset to our team to take any chances on. You seem very stressed and upset so I’d like to offer you some time out, with a payment plan, of course, to get yourself together and when you feel like coming back, the door is always open.’
Stressed? Well, of course I am stressed. My husband left me for a younger model and seventeen years ago today I lay on an operating table and I’ve outlived any expectancy the doctors could have given me, and believe me, the reminder every year of another year of survival is a big burden and a huge heap of gratitude to carry around.
But time out… a payment plan? I think I am going to choke and the walls are moving towards me again. Why are they offering me this lifeline? I don’t deserve this.
‘Can I get you some water?’ asks Sylvia. I wish they would stop staring and smiling. Why do they have to be so nice? It’s making me worse.
I look up to see Will Powers Sr enter the room, apologising too for being late. Sweet Jesus, this really is serious. Very serious. To have both ‘Wills’ in the same room always indicates a crisis. In fact, it is a sight that’s enough to put the fear of God into any working member of staff.
Sylvia gives me the glass of water and I sink it in one. I didn’t realise I was so thirsty.
Will Sr pulls a chair out right beside me and clasps my cold, swe
aty hand tight. I always admired him so much and he knows it and he has nurtured me through my whole time at the company, giving me opportunity after opportunity. I feel like I have let him down.
‘Maggie, we don’t want to lose you,’ he says gently, reminding me of my father. They are about the same age, but their lives are worlds apart. My dad drives a tractor while Will Powers Sr drives a Jaguar. My dad holidays in a caravan in Donegal while Mr Powers takes his wife on Caribbean cruises. Yet there is something about him that reminds me of old Robert back on the farm with his cows and sheep and love of a good old fry-up on the weekends and his current obsession with celebrity divorce.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Powers. I’m sorry if I’ve disappointed you in any way. I know I have missed quite a few days and my work probably has um, slipped, but I can assure you that I will make it up to you. To all of you.’
Here I am, almost thirty-four years old, in my fancy suit and expensive shoes, at almost the peak of my career and I feel like a schoolgirl who hasn’t done her homework or who has been caught cheating in an exam.
‘You have let no one down,’ says Mr Powers. The others move their heads like nodding dogs. ‘And don’t be panicking and thinking we have called a crisis meeting which is all about you. We have a few major projects to discuss today, which is why we are all here together, but it is because you are so special to us that we wanted to show you our full support in helping you get through whatever it is you need to get through.’
I think of other incidents; the car accident I almost had when I arrived at work a little tipsy from the night before… the days I had turned up so hung over I could hardly string a sentence together … there were many little things I had chosen to ignore and now they had all come to the forefront, like an abominable snowball rolling down a hill towards me. The day I sent an email to a wrong client and put ‘x’ like a kiss at the end of it, again due to a boozy lunch, and the time I called another a wrong name throughout an entire meeting because my head was too fuzzy and full of anger with Jeff to have done any preparation.
The Legacy of Lucy Harte Page 2
