He's Got to Go

by Sheila O'Flanagan

  “I would’ve called out if I’d known,” said Bree. She wondered whether she was telling the truth or not. If he’d phoned her and asked her to see him would she have abandoned her surveillance of Adam? Probably, she admitted to herself. And then maybe I wouldn’t have found out about his damned affair and Nessa could’ve gone on living in blissful ignorance.

  “I wanted some time to myself,” Michael told her. “I’ve been surrounded by people fussing over me for the past couple of weeks. It’s driving me nuts.”

  “I suppose they’re concerned,” said Bree. “Like me.”

  “I’ll be fine,” he said. “I know I’ve been a bit down about everything but it’s such a pain not to be able to get about by myself. And every so often it hits me that I nearly died.”

  “No you didn’t,” said Bree robustly. “You were badly injured but you never nearly died.”

  “Another yard and we would’ve plowed into a lamppost,” said Michael. “I’m pretty certain that would’ve killed us.”

  “But we didn’t,” said Bree.

  “It was still a near-death experience.”

  She shrugged. She didn’t want to think about it anymore. It was over. There was nothing to be gained by reminding herself how lucky they’d been.

  “And it was my fault,” said Michael.

  “We’ve been through all this,” she told him. “Forget it. It could’ve been awful. It wasn’t. We’ll both be OK. There’s nothing to beat yourself up about.”

  “One of the many things Dad said to me afterward was that I was immature,” said Michael. “And, of course, he’s right. I was trying to impress you, Bree. Because you’re so good with speed yourself.”

  “You didn’t need to impress me with that,” said Bree. “There are plenty more impressive things about you.”

  He grinned. “So I’m told.”

  She was relieved to see some of his old spark reappear. A gloomy, introspective Michael was not what she wanted right now.

  “The thing is,” he went on. “I like you a lot, Bree. I really do.”

  “I like you too,” she said swiftly.

  “And you’re an extraordinary girl.”

  She looked at him warily. She’d heard this sort of thing before. A sentence which contained the words “wonderful girl” “brilliant girl” or “extraordinary girl” usually had a “but” tagged on.

  “But I don’t think I’m the right person for you. And I don’t think you’re the right person for me either,” he finished.

  She said nothing. What was it about her, she wondered bleakly, that made them all give up on her like this? They all liked her at the start, they all thought she was great fun to be with, some of them even took her to bed. But. But. But. She bit her lip. She’d felt so hopeful about Michael. She liked him. She thought he liked her too. Yet it seemed that sitting on the sofa all day unable to move had suddenly changed his mind.

  “I’m sure there’s someone else for you,” said Michael. “Someone who’s less likely to kill you when they take you for dinner.”

  “It was an accident,” she said dully.

  “I know,” said Michael. “But I feel that you’re the kind of girl that I’d have an accident with again. Because I’d always be trying to do stupid things to impress you.”

  “Why?” she asked. “I already said I didn’t need to be impressed, Michael. I love you the way you are, honestly.”

  “I just think it’s best,” he told her. “And you don’t love me, Bree. You hardly even know me.”

  She struggled not to cry. She reckoned that she’d done more crying since the accident than she’d done in her whole life before. So she wasn’t going to cry now even though she knew that tears weren’t far away. But she wasn’t going to let him see them. If he thought she was tough and cool and impressive then that was the way she was going to be now.

  “That’s a pity,” she said eventually. “I thought we got on well. Especially at dinner.”

  “We did,” he said. “I’m sorry, Bree. It’s just…”

  She shrugged. “No problem.”

  “I bet you have loads of blokes trying to ask you out.”

  If only, she thought, bleakly. But she smiled at him. “I should never have worn a slinky dress,” she said as cheerfully as she could. “I knew it’d all go wrong as soon as you saw my legs.”

  25

  Moon in Leo

  Confident, pushy, a desire to impress.

  Her mobile phone rang just as she arrived home. She sat on the bed and answered it.

  “Hi,” said Nessa. “I wondered how it was going? Adam phoned me just now to say he’d be home by six this evening and he’s not going out so there’s no need for you to be on watch tonight.”

  Bree struggled to find the right words and then stalled for time. “He might go out,” she said lamely. “Even though he says not.”

  “I doubt it.” Nessa sounded incredibly cheerful which made Bree feel even worse. “He told me that he’s knackered, he’s been in meetings all day plus he had a working lunch so he just wants to put his feet up tonight.”

  The lying bastard, thought Bree furiously.

  “He did have a working lunch,” she said after a moment. “In Gleeson’s pub.”

  “Oh, well,” said Nessa lightly. “I suppose a working lunch can be in a pub as well as anywhere else. Typical bloke.”

  Was she thick, wondered Bree. Did she deliberately delude herself? And was she being particularly stupid simply because she knew he had been followed?

  “His working lunch was with a woman.” Bree felt that she was being unnecessarily brutal but she couldn’t keep the facts from her sister.

  “But it was a working lunch?” asked Nessa, the hope coming through her voice.

  “Oh, Nessa,” Bree said miserably, “it might have been. I wasn’t there for the working part of it. Just the part where she kissed him.”

  Nessa gripped the receiver tightly. She’d been expecting this, she knew she had. She’d tried to prepare herself for it. But expecting it and hearing it were two completely different things.

  “Are you all right, Ness?” asked Bree anxiously. “I didn’t really want to tell you this over the phone.”

  “She kissed him or he kissed her?” demanded Nessa.

  “It was mutual kissing,” said Bree. “She started it but he—”

  “Did he stick his tongue down her throat?”

  “You know, Ness, that’s just a turn of phrase,” said Bree. “I don’t think you should dwell on the tongue business.”

  “They kissed in a public place?”

  “Obviously,” said Bree. “I saw them. It was the pub car park.”

  “He never kissed me in the car park of a pub,” said Nessa.

  “I don’t think that means much,” said Bree.

  “It does,” said Nessa. “He always told me that he hates people making spectacles of themselves in public places. Were they making a spectacle of themselves?”

  “They were kissing,” Bree reminded her. “If kissing is a spectacle then, I suppose, yes.”

  “The fucking bastard!”

  Bree had never heard so much venom in her sister’s voice before.

  “Look, Ness, maybe I should come over?”

  “Are you out of your mind?” Nessa asked her. “Do you really want to be here when I murder him?”

  “Oh, come on, Ness—”

  “He’s lied to me and humiliated me,” said Nessa. “You don’t think that means I can’t kill the fucker?”

  “Nessa, maybe—”

  “Maybe nothing,” snapped Nessa. “He’s cheated on me, Bree. I don’t suppose you know what that feels like with your free-as-a-bird lifestyle but I gave years of my life to that man and he’s reduced them to nothing. Nothing! What was the point of it all?”

  “I’m not saying he’s blameless,” said Bree. “Of course not. God knows, Nessa, I’m totally on your side. You were the one trying to make excuses for him and I disagreed with you. All
I’m saying is that you should approach it gently.”

  “Gently with a mallet,” said Nessa.

  “Are you going to tell him I followed him?” asked Bree.

  “I don’t know whether I’ll give him the chance to talk at all.”

  “Maybe I should come over,” Bree said again. “Give you some moral support.”

  “No.” Suddenly Nessa was deflated, her anger gone. “No. Don’t. Leave it with me, Bree. I’ll decide what to say and when to say it.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Bree. “I really am.”

  “Who was she?” asked Nessa.

  “I’m not sure,” said Bree. “I followed her to an office building and there was a plate on it that said A. Boyd & Associates. I’m kind of assuming she might be your triple x lady.”

  Nessa felt a lump in her throat. There was a real triple x lady. She’d always known there was. She just hated to believe it.

  “Thanks for doing it for me,” she told Bree. “I’m glad it was you who told me.”

  “I wish it hadn’t been me who found out,” said Bree. “I know I told you that you had to face up to things but, bloody hell, Nessa, I didn’t want it to be true either.”

  “I know,” said Nessa.

  “Will you call me?” asked Bree.

  “Sure,” said Nessa.

  “You’ll be all right?”

  “Fine.”

  “Certain?”

  “Certain.”

  “OK then,” said Bree.

  “I forgot to ask how you’re feeling.” Nessa tried to sound caring.

  “Nessa, I’m great. Not a bother.”

  “Good,” she said.

  “Phone me,” said Bree.

  “I will.”

  Nessa replaced the receiver and looked at herself in the wall mirror. The gray eyes that stared back at her were suspiciously bright but she blinked away the tears. She didn’t want to cry. She didn’t want to admit that there was something to cry about. She wanted to be angry. At Adam for kissing the triple x woman. At the triple x woman for trying to rob her husband. And at herself for not doing something about it sooner. But what could she have done? She blinked furiously again. What sort of person could she have become to stop him finding another woman to kiss? She’d always thought that she was the right person for Adam. The woman he wanted to be with. He’d broken up with his previous girlfriend because of her. Now did he want to leave her to be with someone else? Or was there still something she could do about it? Should do about it?

  She covered her eyes with her hands.

  She’s staying with him for the money and the house. That was what Portia had said. Something like it anyway. And she’d been furious that the girl would think like that. But was it true? she wondered. Had her love for Adam been taken over by her love for her Malahide house and satisfaction that he was generous with his money if not with his time? Did she have her priorities all wrong? Was it, after all, her own fault?

  She turned from the mirror and walked into the living room. There was a photo of them on a shelf. Adam, herself and Jill. She’d wanted to believe that they were a secure unit. That she’d managed to keep it together when so many other people had failed. But she hadn’t. Her husband was having a bit on the side just as millions of other men had done before him. And would do after him. Despite everything she’d done to make him happy it wasn’t enough. And now their future as a family was threatened. How would Jill feel if she left Adam? Or if Adam left them for his damned floozy? Was that part of his plan? Could she stop him if he did? Remind him that, even if he didn’t love her anymore there was still Jill to consider. She swallowed. She could stop him seeing Jill. She could make sure that if he left them he’d suffer by not being able to see his daughter. She rubbed the bridge of her nose, disgusted with herself for thinking those kinds of thoughts. Jill wasn’t a prize. She was a person. No matter what happened she had to make sure that Jill came out of it all right. Oh God, she thought miserably. I don’t want to have to deal with this. I don’t want it to be true. But I want to know why. Why he needed to have someone else.

  Was it her looks, she wondered? She wasn’t as attractive as she’d been ten years ago but she hadn’t let herself go that much. Sure, she’d put on a bit of weight but who the hell hadn’t? She asked him about it sometimes and he always told her that he loved her the way she was. She believed him. Besides, Adam wasn’t so shallow as to go by looks alone. He’d said that when he married her. He’d told her that he was lucky because she was pretty and smart and interesting to know. And because she didn’t make a fuss about things. That was true. Sometimes she felt fussed and pressurized inside but she never let him know about it. No matter what domestic crises might arise she dealt with them so that he didn’t have to worry. They had their areas of responsibility. He worked outside the home. She did her mornings at Dr. Hogan’s and she ran the house. Like it was a business. She looked after everything. She paid the bills, she did the shopping, she made sure that appliances were serviced. And she cooked and cleaned and did all the things that she thought she was supposed to do. As well as sleeping with him. She bit her lip. Surely it wasn’t the sex? She thought he enjoyed sleeping with her. She never lay on her back and looked at the crack in the ceiling and wondered about the things she had to do the next day. (Paula had done that—she’d admitted that her sex life with John hadn’t exactly set the world alight and that, sometimes, she’d gone through a checklist of things for the kids while he was making love to her. It was hard, Paula had said, to stay interested all the time.) But Nessa knew that she’d always responded to Adam, even in the last few weeks when she’d harbored the awful suspicions about him. She’d put them to the back of her mind, decided that they couldn’t be true even though she must have known that they were.

  How could I deceive myself like this, she wondered. Why did I?

  Jill clattered down the stairs and into the room. She was still wearing her school uniform. Gray skirt, white blouse, blue cardigan and socks around her ankles. Was it a rule, Nessa wondered, that kids had to have their socks around their ankles? They were new socks. She’d bought them during the summer. They shouldn’t be around her ankles yet.

  “Why haven’t you changed?”

  “I was doing my homework.” Jill’s voice was laden with injured innocence.

  “You’re supposed to get changed when you come home,” said Nessa. “And I thought you hated that uniform so I can’t understand why you’re still wearing it. Besides, you’ve been finished with your homework for ages.”

  “You’re very narky,” Jill informed her. “I was watching TV in my room.”

  Adam had bought the TV for Jill for Christmas. He’d laughed and joked about how it was far from TVs in the bedroom he was reared and how he was probably ruining his daughter’s life but everyone’s kids had TVs and so Jill should have one too. Nessa had been doubtful but had acquiesced. Do I do that all the time, she asked herself. Do I compromise for him because I’m afraid to do anything else? What the hell has happened to me?

  “Are you all right, Mum?” asked Jill. “You look kind of funny.”

  “Funny ha-ha or funny peculiar?” asked Nessa.

  “Funny peculiar,” said Jill definitely.

  “I must be getting old,” said Nessa.

  “Prob’ly.” Jill grinned at her. “I’m eight. That’s pretty old. So you’re actually ancient, aren’t you?”

  “I guess I am,” said Nessa. “I feel as though I’m a hundred.”

  Jill went into the kitchen to get a drink of juice. Nessa opened The Year Ahead for Cancerians. She’d already read the piece at least fifty times. “You feel imprisoned by unfair circumstances and you’ve been trying to ignore certain personal issues. Tackle these and you’ll bring about the changes you long for.”

  She closed the book again and waited for Adam to come home.

  Cate left the office at six o’clock. She got into her car and switched on the ignition trying to keep her mind on the fact that they had
just, gloriously, received another massive order for the new sports shoe and that this month was going to be their best ever. Everyone in the company was talking about the great turnaround and how well things were going. The atmosphere all day had been one of jubilation and excitement. Ian Hewitt had called her into his office to congratulate her on her hard work.

  Why couldn’t all this have happened two months ago, she asked herself as she eased into the traffic. Why couldn’t it have happened at a time when I would have been delighted by it? Now, although she was pleased about the order and the fact that the sales graph was looking healthier than it had for months, she couldn’t generate any real enthusiasm for it. Somehow it didn’t seem to matter anymore.

  She sat at the traffic lights and stared, unseeingly, at the snake of cars in front of her. It’s all gone wrong, she thought miserably. We were meant to be a good couple. A successful couple. A modern, new millennium type of couple. Now he’s successful and on his own—not that he will be for long. And I’m just another unmarried, pregnant woman. Why didn’t I just go ahead with the damned abortion, she thought furiously, instead of getting all fuzzy and emotional about it? I’m not the sort of woman who lets her heart rule her head. I’m strong and decisive and businesslike. So why the hell couldn’t I have been strong and decisive when I needed to be?

  The lights changed and she put the car into gear. She switched on the radio as she moved away.

  “…so this is Finn Coolidge thanking you for your company and looking forward to having you with me again tomorrow.”

  His voice filled the car. She tightened her grip on the steering wheel. She’d forgotten that today was the first day of the new drivetime radio show. As the music for the end of the program began to play (bright and cheerful, great drivetime sound), she visualized him slipping off his earphones and leaning back in his chair, satisfied and relieved that everything had gone OK.

  The next set of lights went red. She blinked and then blinked again as she realized that she was on Amiens Street. She was driving home, but toward the apartment, not toward Bree’s flat. She groaned. She’d been on automatic pilot, she realized, driving without consciously being aware of what she was doing. She frowned as she tried to plot a route back to Donnybrook. She’d have to go all the way to East Wall and turn down toward the quays again. That’d take ages in traffic that was still heavy. She looked around her. There was no right turn at this set of lights but if she nipped across quickly she could get to the quays in half the time.