The People Next Door

by Roisin Meaney

  After a minute, Kathryn stood up and left the room, her heart singing with happiness.

  NUMBER EIGHT

  It was ridiculous. It was all wrong. The timing couldn’t have been worse. It was only six months since Ali had left. Dan was going to be a father, Ali was having his baby. It was all impossibly complicated, and it would probably get a lot worse.

  Clara was twenty-three. He was thirty-two.

  She was very pretty. Her smile lit him up. She made his heart beat faster. She gave him butterflies, made him feel like some gormless, lovestruck teenager. She smelled wonderful. It was all he could do to keep his hands off her. He wanted to bite her, to lick her, to suck her up.

  She lived next door, a dozen feet from him. He wished she was a million miles away. He wished she was in his bed, wrapped around him. He lay awake, thinking about her. He fell asleep and she was there too. She slid out of his dreams and followed him to his office. She pestered him while he tried to work. He was driven mad with her. He pushed her away, he pulled her closer.

  What if Ali hadn’t left? Would he be obsessed with Clara now? No, because without Kieran he’d never have gone to the cookery classes. He’d never have met her every Thursday night, they’d never have walked or driven home together. Up to when the classes started, he hadn’t exchanged more than a dozen words with Clara O’Mahony, hadn’t given her a second thought.

  Imagine if Ali knew he couldn’t stop thinking about the Bombshell.

  Tonight was their fifth class, halfway through the course. The evening was cold, with a stiff breeze. Dan drove.

  Clara was there already. He waved down the room at her. She smiled and waved back. He hadn’t laid eyes on her all week, since she’d kissed him – how many times had he relived that brief touch? – and got out of the car.

  Judy was waiting for him at their table.

  ‘There you are, Dan. Wonder what delights Douglas has in store for us tonight.’

  He pulled off his jacket, threw it under the table. ‘He said it’d be something healthy anyway.’ He was acutely aware of Clara behind him. Was she watching him?

  They cooked a vegetarian flan. They made pastry, rolled it out and lined a flan tin, pricked it all over and baked it blind. They crushed garlic and chopped peppers and onions. They peeled carrots and sliced them wafer thin, and grated cheese and beat eggs. They sprinkled salt and pepper and they chopped parsley and sage.

  And all the time Dan thought about Clara. He answered Judy’s questions and even asked some of his own. He watched as Douglas showed them how to gather the pastry into a ball, and he thought about Clara.

  It was ridiculous. It was all wrong. He longed for the class to end so they could be alone. He couldn’t wait for the journey home, with her sitting so close to him in the car. He wished they lived on the other side of the country, a good four hours’ drive away.

  His flan came out a little flat. There was a definite, if not very deep, dip in the middle. ‘Not to worry, mate,’ Douglas told him. ‘Oven temperature might have been a bit low. I’m sure it’ll taste OK.’

  He waited for Clara by the door, as usual. He watched her walking towards him. ‘Hi. How’s your flan?’

  She made a face. ‘Well, it turned out fine, but it’s not my kind of food. I hate vegetarian.’

  ‘Mine’s flat,’ Dan told her. ‘My first failure.’

  She laughed. ‘Poor you.’ Outside, she looked around. ‘Are we driving home tonight?’

  We. His heart flipped. ‘We are.’ He pointed. ‘I’m over there.’

  In the car she told him her mother was getting married. ‘We’ve known Greg forever. He was actually a cousin of my dad’s. You’ve probably seen him – tall, thin, glasses.’

  ‘Wow, Yvonne getting married.’ Dan turned a corner. ‘How do you feel about that?’

  ‘OK, I suppose. I mean, he wouldn’t be my choice – a bit safe – but I’m not marrying him, and I don’t suppose I’ll be living at home for much longer, so it won’t affect me a whole lot.’

  ‘When are they getting married?’

  ‘Sometime next year, in the summer.’

  ‘I suppose you’ll be a bridesmaid.’ He smiled, imagining her in something long and flowing.

  She made a face. ‘I’m hoping she won’t ask. I’d probably have to wear a horrible shiny dress.’

  Dan laughed. ‘You’d look good whatever you put on.’

  Silence. He glanced over and she was smiling.

  When he stopped the car, she turned to take her flan from the back seat. ‘Well, thanks again.’ Her face was inches from his. He was powerless. He reached across and ran the back of his hand along her cheek.

  She whirled towards him, almost dropping the flan. ‘Hey.’

  ‘Sorry, I couldn’t help—’ He was mortified. She’d storm out and avoid him forevermore.

  ‘Hang on.’ She put the flan on the floor in front of her and slid it under her seat. Then she turned back to Dan and leaned across.

  Her mouth was soft. She tasted faintly of mint. She’d had plenty of practice. When the kiss was over, she whispered his name. He felt sixteen again, hot with wanting her.

  And there was nothing ridiculous about it at all.

  Kieran went to the funeral because that was what you did. An accident was what they’d called it in the paper. A tragic accident. A young man, only twenty-nine. Survived by his mother, Geraldine.

  The two men who’d heard him fall in, two passers-by who’d come running to help, were there. Kieran recognised them from their pictures in the paper.

  The coffin was covered with a white cloth. A small basket holding a few envelopes sat on the end. A single bouquet of yellow and orange carnations was draped across the top. A head-and-shoulders photo of Adam in a gold-coloured frame stood on a small folding table beside it. He was wearing a suit and tie and smiling. That picture had been in the paper too.

  Kieran hadn’t seen Geraldine properly in years. She’d left the café abruptly, a few months after their relationship had ended, and since then he’d glimpsed her across a shop floor a few times, ahead of him in a supermarket queue, sitting beside another woman in a red car once, parked outside a library. He’d never approached her on those occasions, never tried to speak to her.

  She sat hunched in the top pew beside her mother, her navy coat pulled tightly around her. (He’d sat in exactly the same place once, in a new grey suit.) Her pale brown hair was sprinkled with white and thinner than he remembered, her scalp clearly visible underneath it. She rocked gently, head bowed.

  She hardly registered the people who paraded past to shake her hand, with their mumbled offerings of sympathy. When Kieran approached, she looked blankly at him. Her face was a mottled pink and red, her eyes almost closed with the swollen flesh that surrounded them.

  ‘It’s Kieran,’ he heard her mother say quietly beside her. He took Geraldine’s hand and pressed it. She was cold. Her skin felt rough and dry. Her hand shook slightly.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he told her. She nodded and dropped her head again, her hand slipping out of his. He shook hands with her mother and with a man he didn’t recognise in a brown suit and black tie who sat beside them.

  He walked back down the aisle, past the straggling line of bundled-up mourners, past a child with fat red plaits who stood at the back holding an elderly woman’s hand, and who stuck out her tongue at him. Past the concrete bowl of stagnant water in the vestibule, past the stand of curling-paged magazines and the pockmarked noticeboard announcing pregnancy counselling and pilgrimages to Lourdes and Knock and Medjugorje.

  He hadn’t killed Adam. He wasn’t responsible for the body lying in the dark coffin under the white cloth. Even if he’d jumped in, chances were he wouldn’t have saved Adam. He couldn’t swim, he might have drowned too.

  He had nothing to blame himself for, nothing. He turned out of the churchyard and walked away quickly, undoing his tie as he went.

  One month later: 17 November

  NUMBER NINE


  She waited until he’d switched off the television. Then she said, ‘I have some news.’

  Justin dropped the remote control onto the coffee table. ‘You have?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her eyes filled with tears. She waited for him to notice them.

  For a minute he said nothing. Then he said softly, ‘Oh, God.’

  Kathryn put out her hands and he held them tightly. ‘Say it.’

  ‘I’m pregnant.’ The tears spilled over.

  ‘Oh, God.’ He pulled her against him. She felt the thump of his heart. ‘Oh my God.’

  After a while, he lifted his head. ‘How long?’

  ‘Thirteen weeks, almost.’ She’d lost the other two at eight and nine weeks.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me sooner?’

  ‘You had enough on your plate without the worry.’ She smiled at him, wiped a sleeve across her face. ‘I wanted to wait until …’

  He pulled her towards him again. ‘Come here to me.’ She leaned into him and he put a palm against her stomach. ‘Hello there.’

  She laughed. ‘I hope you’re not expecting an answer.’

  ‘Kathryn.’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘Look at me.’

  She sat up.

  ‘Even if anything happens with this baby—’ She drew in her breath and he said, ‘No, listen, even if anything happens, I’ll never stop loving you. Never, never.’ He put a hand under her chin. ‘Do you hear me?’

  ‘Yes.’ The tears came again, rolled down her cheeks.

  ‘So,’ he said, wiping them away with his thumbs, ‘I fancy Anastasia for a girl, and … Fauntleroy for a boy. Are you happy with that?’

  She laughed. ‘Whatever you say.’

  NUMBER EIGHT

  Dear Dan,

  I can’t believe you’re serious about looking for full custody. Surely we can sort this out amicably – don’t you trust me to be above board and fair to you? You’ve really hurt me. If you persist, we’ll be forced to contest – you leave me no choice. Please, please reconsider.

  Ali

  You’ve really hurt me – so they were even now. The thought gave Dan no pleasure, no satisfaction.

  David Burton had tried again to talk him out of it. ‘You haven’t a hope, Dan, I’ve told you that. All you’ll do is make things worse.’

  ‘What? Worse than they are now, with me maybe seeing my son once a fortnight, if I’m lucky? Tell me how exactly they could get worse.’ He could hear how childish he sounded, and he didn’t care.

  ‘You’ll create bad feeling. You’ll subject your child to the misery of having parents at loggerheads with one another.’ David shook his head. ‘But, of course, it’s your decision, and if you’re convinced there’s no other way, I’ll go ahead and prepare a case.’

  Brendan had phoned about a week after Ali’s letter. Kieran had answered and handed the phone to Dan. ‘For you.’

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Dan, it’s Brendan.’

  And he’d probably said more, but Dan had slammed the phone down before anything else reached him. He’d left it off the hook for the rest of the evening and Brendan hadn’t tried again on any subsequent day.

  And in the middle of all that anger and bitterness, when the thought of what Brendan had done made him want to put his hands around his uncle’s throat and throttle the life out of him, when not being near his unborn son felt like a physical pain – in the middle of all that, there was Clara.

  They told nobody. They waved hello across the tables in the long, high-ceilinged room every Thursday and Dan took his place beside Judy, and after class they said hello to each other as they always had and they walked down the corridor together, for all the world like next-door neighbours.

  And then they stole away in Dan’s car.

  They went to a quiet little pub out the road, where a turf fire flickered in the blackened fireplace and a row of elderly men perched on high wooden stools and had brief conversations with each other along the length of the counter. They sat at a table in the corner nearest the fire and held hands and whispered to each other, even though nobody was close enough to hear.

  Or they went to the cinema and hid in the back row and didn’t watch whatever was happening on the screen.

  ‘I’m too old for you,’ Dan told her.

  ‘Cop yourself on,’ Clara answered.

  ‘I’m in the middle of this mess with Ali,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll risk it,’ she promised.

  ‘What do you see in me?’ he asked her.

  ‘A lovely man,’ she told him. A lovely, kind man. And you’re not bad-looking for an old fella.’

  So far they hadn’t gone beyond kisses. They hadn’t gone beyond kisses because Clara told Dan, the third time they visited the little pub, that she was a virgin.

  ‘You’re joking.’ It was the last thing he’d expected to hear.

  ‘No.’ She said nothing more for a few minutes, turned to gaze into the fire. Dan waited.

  Finally, she turned back to him and said, ‘The thing is …’ another long pause, ‘the thing is, something happened to me when I was young.’ She bit her lip. Her fingers gripped his. ‘I’ve never told anyone this before, not even my mother.’

  Dan stared at her. ‘What?’

  Clara took a deep breath and said quickly, A man abused me – sexually, I mean. I was on a school tour.’ Her face was pale.

  ‘Christ.’ Dan pulled his chair nearer to hers, put an arm around her shoulders. ‘How old were you?’

  ‘Ten.’

  ‘Did he … rape you?’

  ‘Well, he …’ She stopped again and Dan could feel the trembling in her shoulders. He held on, tight.

  ‘He … put his fingers … in me.’ Suddenly she gave a shaky laugh. ‘So I suppose, technically, I’m probably not a virgin.’ She paused. ‘I was bleeding – I thought I was dying.’

  ‘Jesus.’ Dan was horrified. ‘You never told anyone?’

  ‘No. I was afraid, and embarrassed. I’d left the group, gone off by myself. We were in a museum. I figured it was my own fault.’ She turned back to the fire. ‘So anyway, I can’t seem to bring myself to … go there again.’

  ‘To … ?’

  ‘Sleep with someone, have sex – whatever you want to call it.’ She chewed her lip. ‘I suppose I’m afraid – I don’t know. It’s all mixed up with what he did.’

  Dan said, ‘Listen, that’s OK. You don’t have to—’

  ‘But I do want to.’ She turned back to him and watched his mouth. ‘That’s why I’m telling you … I really want to, with you.’ She gave him a shaky smile. ‘That’s if you still want … I mean, after what I’ve just told you, I wouldn’t blame—’

  ‘Ssh.’ He stroked her hair. So silky. ‘Of course I do. I’d be mad not to. But only when you’re sure you’re ready. You’ll be safe with me, you know that.’

  She squeezed his hand. ‘I know.’

  Sometimes, usually in the middle of the night, when the arguments were circling in his head, Dan told himself this thing between them was doomed. Clara deserved someone better, especially after what she’d been through. She deserved a man who could devote himself to her wholeheartedly, not someone still tied to a failed marriage.

  He’d finish it next time he saw her – he was being selfish, he wasn’t being fair to her. But then he’d think of her with someone else, imagine some other man undoing the damage that had been done to her, and his noble intentions would shrivel.

  Douglas announced, on their second last evening, that the tradition was to go for drinks after the last class. ‘I’ll buy the first round,’ he promised, ‘as long as you’re not all on double brandies – and on condition that you lot keep my glass filled for the rest of the night.’

  ‘Do you want to go?’ Dan asked Clara in the car on the way home. Her hand rested loosely on his thigh, just above his knee. Underneath it, through the denim of his jeans, his skin flamed.

  ‘Why not? It might be a laugh.’ After a second, she
added, ‘And it doesn’t really matter if the cookery people suspect we’re a little more than friends, does it?’

  ‘No, I suppose not.’ They’d probably never meet any of them again – and he liked the idea of other people seeing them together, treating them as a couple. ‘Let’s make it clear we’re a little more than friends.’

  Clara laughed. ‘Give them something to talk about.’ She squeezed his thigh gently.

  He’d mentioned to Kieran, casually, that the girl next door was doing the cookery classes too.

  ‘The little blonde one?’

  ‘Yeah. I give her a lift home sometimes, when it’s raining.’

  He’d have liked to tell Kieran. He liked the idea of saying it out loud. ‘Clara and I are …’ What were they, though? Seeing each other? He always thought that expression was a bit silly. In a relationship? Going out? Dating? Together?

  Together – that was good. ‘Clara and I are together.’ He said it out loud in his bedroom with nobody to hear him. He watched her hanging clothes on the line in next door’s garden – a lemon top, a pair of green tights, two navy towels, a blue and yellow cardigan. He saw her bending to ruffle the dog’s hair on her way back to the house, swinging the empty laundry basket. He waved, but she didn’t look up.

  He wished he knew how it was all going to work out.

  NUMBER SEVEN

  Yvonne knocked on Pawel’s door. His last patient had left a few minutes before.

  ‘Come in.’

  He was standing at the table in the corner, a green file open in front of him.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you.’

  ‘Not at all.’ He screwed the cap onto his fountain pen. ‘What is it?’

  They were fine again, back to how they’d been before the dinner. Receptionist and dentist, nothing more. He probably never even thought about it now. She wondered sometimes if he’d met anyone else, or if their experience had scared him off the website. Hopefully not.

  ‘I just wanted to let you know that I’ve recently become engaged. I’ll be getting married next summer.’

  ‘Ah.’ He looked surprised, as she’d known he would. How could she be getting engaged when she’d been out meeting men from the internet so recently?