The People Next Door

by Roisin Meaney

  Divorce seemed the obvious way out, but his halfhearted enquiries dampened his enthusiasm for it. Far too much fuss, and an alarming lack of privacy about the whole business. So, characteristically, he decided on the route of least resistance, and took his pleasure where he could find it outside the home.

  He was in the middle of his third affair when Grainne, unaware of his extramarital activities, became pregnant with Justin, during one of their increasingly rare episodes of intimacy. He had, in fact, barely got back to work after a lunch hour in his mistress’s bed before Grainne phoned the office from her doctor’s surgery and told him he was going to be a father.

  It had made no difference to his lifestyle, apart from having to leave a dinner date when Grainne phoned him to tell him her waters had broken.

  The marriage had stumbled on, with William increasingly absent from home on one pretext or another. Ann was born two years later, leaving Grainne preoccupied with two small children, and William even freer to pursue his outside interests.

  When Ann was four, William’s business partner had introduced him to his girlfriend, soon to be his fiancée. A week after the engagement was announced, she and William had absconded, leaving an impressive trail of destruction behind them. Five years after that, William had applied for a divorce, having already produced two new children with the woman who, despite being nine years younger, was his match in every other way.

  He was pleased at how his first son and daughter had turned out. The fact that both seemed fairly well balanced and content – their current bereavement apart, of course – helped him to feel better about having had practically no hand in their upbringing.

  For years after the divorce, William’s only contact with Justin and Ann had been through infrequent, stilted letters and birthday cards with five-pound notes, and later ten-pound notes, tucked inside, and horribly formal meetings on neutral ground at Christmas, when everyone sat around politely and tried to find something to say.

  But look at them now, each getting on fine, as far as he could see, despite his lousy parenting. He could glimpse, three rows ahead, Kathryn’s shoulder touching Justin’s. No doubt they were holding hands; those two were very touchy-feely. And what a shame Suze wasn’t brave – or brazen – enough to sit next to Ann and hold her hand; that would have given the good people of Belford plenty to talk about.

  News of Kathryn’s pregnancy had pleased William. The idea of his first-born son becoming a father was satisfying – if Fate or God or whatever, didn’t intervene and ruin everything again. William hadn’t seen Kathryn much over the years, but he decided that he approved of his son’s choice; you had to admire anyone who’d survived having Grainne as a houseguest for the past two years. He’d love to know how the two women had got on – and Justin, who must have been caught in the line of fire every now and again.

  ‘Let us pray,’ the priest announced, and everyone knelt. Out of the corner of his eye, William felt someone looking at him, but to his disappointment, the target of the pretty blonde woman’s gaze seemed to be one of the men in front of him. Surely she wouldn’t prefer either of those scruffs.

  His thoughts returned to the semi-detached house on the other side of Belford that he’d bought more than thirty-nine years ago, which Grainne, as the deserted wife, had been perfectly entitled to stay in, and which, according to the terms of the divorce, was to be considered hers for her lifetime. William had felt it was the least he could do, particularly as his new partner had a thriving business of her own, and a riverside apartment in Limerick.

  Still … the Belford house should be worth a pretty penny by now.

  He wondered how long it would be before the will was read.

  It was only about twenty minutes after that, as they were trailing out of the church, Greg walking slightly ahead of her with Clara, that Yvonne stumbled on an uneven tile and reached for the nearest solid object to steady herself. It happened to be the arm of the white-haired man beside her; he had already reached towards her to break her fall.

  ‘Oh, sorry—’ She grabbed his sleeve at the precise moment that he clutched at her wrist, and there was a second or two of undignified scrambling before Yvonne got her balance back and lifted her head and met his gaze.

  And it was right then, at the door of the church, on their way to bury Grainne Taylor on a bitterly cold January morning, that the most startling thing happened.

  Six months later: end of June

  DOLORES

  She worked in a shop now, a small corner shop that sold newspapers and overpriced groceries. Every day she got dressed and ate the toast her mother made, spread with the thin-cut lemon marmalade they both liked, and at ten to nine she walked to Gilligan’s. When she got there she put on her navy overall and changed into her old black shoes and stood behind the counter until lunchtime, doling out Turkish Delight and slices of ham and pints of milk. Mrs Gilligan didn’t like Dolores to sit down, she said it gave the wrong impression when someone came in.

  Mrs Gilligan didn’t like her, full stop. Dolores knew this because Mrs Gilligan often gave her funny looks, and would disappear into the back without saying where she was going or how long she’d be. She always came out the minute there was a rush on, so Dolores knew she was just staying back there so she wouldn’t have to talk to her. She probably peeped out every so often to make sure Dolores wasn’t sitting down.

  At half past twelve Dolores took off her overall and changed back into her good shoes. She walked into town and looked around the shops for half an hour and then went into Murphy’s Coffee Corner and got a salad sandwich, no onion, on brown bread with mayonnaise and butter, and a cup of tea. She was back behind the counter at Gilligan’s at half past one on the dot.

  Her mother cooked dinner every evening. Dolores liked it to be on the table at half six, so she’d have time for a bath after she came home from work. The shop always made her feel dirty, all those people coming in, giving her their money with grubby hands.

  But it was better than the clinic, with patients sneezing into her face and coughing with no hankies, complaining if they had to wait more than five minutes, and Yvonne going on every lunchtime about how great her life was. She was well out of all that.

  On Sunday afternoons, she and her mother went walking down by the river if the weather was fine. There was a nice round you could do in three-quarters of an hour, which was as much as either of them wanted.

  If the weather was bad, they went to a matinée. Dolores’s mother liked a nice period drama or something musical, and she preferred English films to American, but Dolores didn’t mind what she watched, as long as it wasn’t too gory or too sexually explicit.

  In the evenings, she and her mother looked at television or read their books if there was nothing on. They never went out at night. It was too dangerous, in this day and age, for two women to be out after dark. And where would they go anyway, except to a noisy, crowded pub or to a snooty restaurant for a meal that they could cook for next to nothing at home?

  Dolores slept soundly at night, untroubled by dreams. She didn’t believe in dreams. What good was something that never came true, that you hoped and hoped for all your life, and that never arrived? Or that never arrived for you, just for everyone else.

  All you got was men looking through you, or past you to the glamorous women. Or men who bought you a drink and pretended to like you and then tried to shove their hands up your dress or under your blouse and called you a bitch, a tease, when you pushed them away. Or once, a man who told you that you weren’t in a position to be choosy, that you should take what you got and be glad of it.

  Was it any wonder she’d had to make them up, the loving husband who took her away for anniversaries, the children who did her proud, who gave her so much to be happy about? She’d had to make them up because they didn’t exist. They’d never exist for her. And where was the harm? Who was she hurting?

  But they’d acted like she’d committed a crime, like she wasn’t right in the head. Her moth
er dragging her off to doctors, who’d shoved her into a place that wasn’t called a loony bin. Even though it was full of loonies.

  Until she’d pretended to be cured, even though she wasn’t sick, and they’d let her out and she’d learned to keep her mouth shut and just carry on.

  Keep putting one foot in front of the other, that was all you had to do. And eventually you’d get to the end, and it would all be over.

  She wondered how long it would take.

  DAN

  Beside him on the worktop, Colm jiggled in his bouncer and gurgled at Dan.

  ‘What’s that?’ Dan tipped the can of chopped tomatoes into the saucepan of gently sizzling onions and picked up a wooden spoon. ‘Could you repeat that, please? I didn’t quite catch it.’

  Colm pulled one of his socks off and immediately brought it to his mouth.

  Dan reached out with his free hand and grabbed the chubby bare foot. ‘Why are you so damn gorgeous?’ He waggled the toes and Colm chortled through the sock.

  ‘You want some salt with that?’

  ‘Gah.’

  ‘Gah yourself.’ Dan eased the tiny white sock from Colm’s hand and quickly replaced it with the yellow rubber teething ring that had fallen between Colm and the bouncer. ‘Here, that might taste a bit better.’

  Colm eyed the ring and waved it in the air.

  Dan added minced beef to the saucepan. ‘Now, young man, pay attention. I am making a spaghetti Bolognese. Repeat after me: spaghett-i.’

  ‘Gah.’

  ‘Very good. You catch on quick. You must take after your father.’

  He reached up and took the quarter-full bottle of red wine from the open shelf above him. He held it in front of the bouncer.

  ‘Listen up. This is called wine. You will never drink it. Alcohol will never pass your lips. You will take the pledge at your confirmation, and you will keep it forever. Are we clear?’

  Colm gurgled and reached a pudgy hand towards the bottle.

  Dan regarded him sternly. ‘Have you been listening to a word I said?’ He pulled out the cork and tipped the wine into the saucepan and turned up the heat to medium high.

  All gone. Now I stir – like this, see?’

  They spent their days together, just the two of them. Six months ago, Dan had handed back the keys to his little room at the top of the wooden stairs, and now he worked from home.

  Everything was different. His life had utterly changed.

  Their daily routine didn’t vary much. While Colm slept, Dan worked. When Colm woke, Dan fed him and changed him and talked to him, and kept his playpen stocked with fluffy things and teething rings. When Colm closed his eyes again, Dan managed a little more work. He was getting through about half the jobs he’d done before Colm’s arrival, but it bothered him not at all. What did work matter?

  Dan adored his son. He sat and watched him sleeping at night, watched the rapid rise and fall of Colm’s chest, touched the wisps of damp, dark hair, laid his finger gently against the plump wrist to feel the tiny, precious pulse. He loved the little roll of fat at the back of Colm’s neck, the dimples in his knees, the soft curl of his miniature toes. He put his face to Colm’s stomach and inhaled him. He nibbled his fingers, kissed the tips of his ears. He rubbed Colm’s button nose with his own. He couldn’t get enough of him.

  He had nightmares about Colm dying and woke sweating, leaping out of bed to check the cot. He imagined someone hurting Colm, and the murderous rage that filled him frightened him. The sound of Colm’s laughter, the impossibly sweet gurgle of it, made him weak with happiness.

  He cried more, since Colm. He felt more. Every emotion was bigger than it had been before.

  ‘You’re so soppy now,’ he was told. ‘Where’s the real man I fell in love with?’

  ‘Still here,’ he’d respond, pulling her close. ‘Didn’t go anywhere.’ Starting to open the buttons of her shirt. ‘Let me show you what a real man I am.’

  They were a proper family, the three of them. And most of the time it felt right. It felt like it was meant. But now and again, usually late at night, he found himself wondering what his life would have been like if he hadn’t made the decision he had, if he had chosen differently, six months ago.

  And very occasionally, lying quietly in the dark, he allowed himself to imagine the other life he might have had, with her.

  He heard the front door open. ‘Guess who’s home from work,’ he said to Colm, and the baby blinked at him and chewed his ring. Dan spooned cream into the saucepan, sprinkled nutmeg and lowered the heat.

  The kitchen door opened and Colm’s head swivelled towards it. ‘Hi.’ Ali walked straight to the bouncer. ‘How’s my favourite little man?’ She butted her head gently into Colm’s stomach and he gurgled delightedly.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks.’ Dan stirred the mixture in the saucepan.

  Ali straightened and kissed his cheek. ‘That was funny the first three times.’ Her hair was shorter, the way he liked it. He hadn’t mentioned it, but she’d got it cut soon after she’d come home.

  She peered into the saucepan. ‘Smells good.’

  It wasn’t the same as before. It wasn’t a bit like it had been before – they’d probably never have that back again. It was different now. They’d both changed.

  She was more careful with him. She watched him when she thought he wasn’t looking. He was more relaxed with her. He knew, if she left again, that he’d manage. He’d be fine.

  They hadn’t seen Brendan since Ali had come home. Dan had offered to be there when Ali told him, but she’d refused. Afterwards she didn’t talk about it, and Dan didn’t ask.

  He supposed they’d have to come face to face eventually – a family funeral, somebody’s wedding – and he assumed they’d deal sensibly enough with it when it happened. He didn’t dread it. He’d always liked Brendan.

  He told Ali about Clara a few weeks after her return. He had no idea how she’d react.

  She said nothing for a while. Then, without looking at him, she said, ‘Were you getting even with me?’

  Dan considered. Was that what Clara had been? Someone to pay Ali back with? Was she his revenge? Was that all she’d meant to him?

  He remembered her tipping her head back to look at the stars, the way she played with his fingers when she spoke to him. How giggly she got after wine. The World’s Best Dad mug she’d given him when Colm was born. He remembered the scent of her, the softness of her skin. How she’d been planning to go dancing with him, once everyone knew.

  Her tears, the way she’d clung to him, that first time.

  ‘No,’ he said to Ali. ‘It wasn’t like that at all.’

  Telling Clara had been horrible. He’d put it off as long as he could, not knowing how to do it. He hadn’t rung her for almost a week, had avoided her at Grainne’s funeral, had felt her looking across the aisle at him in the church. He knew he should contact her, but he couldn’t bring himself to tell her.

  And then, when he’d finally plucked up the courage to phone, she’d been the one apologising to him. ‘I’m sorry – I should have been more understanding.’

  He didn’t know what she was talking about until he remembered their last phone conversation, when he’d told her they weren’t going to Charleton after all. She must have thought he was annoyed about that, the way she’d hung up on him. The way she’d turned off her phone afterwards so he couldn’t contact her.

  ‘You’ve nothing to apologise for,’ he told her. ‘I wasn’t mad at that – it’s just that I need to talk to you about something. Can we meet later on?’

  And then, sitting beside her in the car, he’d made a complete mess of it. ‘Ali wants to come home’ – tumbling the words out too quickly, trying to ignore the look of utter shock on her face – ‘she’s asked me if we can start again.’

  She hadn’t seen it coming, hadn’t had the slightest notion that anything was wrong.

  ‘I have to. We have Colm, I have to …’

  He’d trailed off
, turning away, unable to watch her face crumpling. Knowing he’d done it all wrong because there was no right way.

  Clara had burst into tears. She’d cried like a young child, unselfconsciously, letting the tears drip off her chin, making no attempt to wipe them away. ‘I don’t believe it, you can’t do this—’

  ‘I’m sorry—’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head violently, hands clamped to her ears. ‘No, please, Dan, don’t leave me – I can’t bear it, please.’

  He pulled her hands down and held them tightly between his own. ‘Clara, I have to try again – I have to think of my son—’

  She cried, she wailed, her face inches from his own, her desperation wide open for him to see. ‘No, no – you have to think of me, I love you – you love me, you told me’ – the tears streaming down her face, her nose running – ‘I told you everything – I trusted you.’

  He felt like the worst kind of monster. He wanted her to hit him, to scream at him, to curse him, anything but this desolate moaning. ‘I’m sorry – I’m so—’

  And then, abruptly, she’d pulled away her hands and fumbled with the car door and had half-fallen out, still crying loudly. She leaned against the car and sobbed, and Dan stayed where he was, hating himself.

  Eventually her sobs lessened. She took a deep, shuddering breath and walked away. Dan heard the click of her garden gate, heard her footsteps stumbling up the path. He’d sat in the car until the cold drove him indoors.

  He saw her a few times after that, passing the front of his house on her way to work or coming home again. Hurrying up the back garden path, laundry basket in her arms, head bent. Never glancing towards number eight, never tilting her head in the direction of his house.

  They’d come face to face just once, on Dan’s way back from the garage shop one rainy evening. Clara, walking out of number seven, looked blankly at him as he passed, ignoring his forced smile.