The Secrets of Primrose Square

by Claudia Carroll

  Fuelled with fresh resolve, she got out of the car and walked over to where the other mothers were all gathered. She stumbled a bit on the way, then couldn’t figure out why, since she was only wearing a pair of trainers, not even heels.

  She was dimly aware of that horrible feeling she was interrupting something when the others saw her, because every swishy, blow-dried head instantly seemed to turn her way. Then a flushed, embarrassing silence, as though no one really knew what to say next. Susan hadn’t seen most of this gang since the funeral and didn’t even blame them for not knowing how to handle her. After all, what did you say to the mother of a dead seventeen-year-old girl?

  Treat me normally, she thought. For fuck’s sake, that’s all I’m asking here. Just talk to me like you would any other parent. Couldn’t they see that was all she needed here?

  ‘Hi, Susan.’

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Susan, hi there.’

  Mortified, hushed hellos as Susan became aware of all the eyes drinking her in, clearly not having the first clue what was the right thing to say. Then, thank God, Annie Gibbons, Hayley’s mother, bounced over, instantly shattering the awkward silence.

  Hayley was in the same class as Melissa, and Susan had always been fond of both the mother and the daughter. Annie was one of the few school mums who was rock-solid and dependable, no matter what the circumstances. Susan still carried a vivid memory of her back at the house after the funeral, doling out big bowls of chicken curry and bossily taking complete charge in the kitchen, flashing Susan reassuring smiles whenever she could bring herself to look up from the floor.

  ‘Hey, would you look who it is!’ said Annie, in that loud, bellowing, hockey-mum voice. ‘Susan Hayes, great to see you. Come here to me, love.’

  With that she bear-hugged Susan, who couldn’t have been more grateful the other woman had come along when she did.

  ‘So how are you then?’ Annie asked straight-up, as the other mums looked on. ‘No plamasing me now – I want the truth.’

  ‘I’m . . . well, I suppose I’m getting there.’ Susan nodded, surprising herself by even forcing a smile. ‘On a strict day-by-day basis, you know how it is.’

  ‘I dropped Melissa home last night,’ Annie went on, ‘and she told me you were back at work already. A bit soon, don’t you think? You need to take it easy on yourself.’

  ‘She said . . . I’m sorry, Melissa told you what?’ Susan answered, confused, as her thoughts trailed off. It wasn’t entirely her fault; out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of the school’s Senior Cup team weaving their way onto the rugby pitch for after-school training.

  ‘Work. That you were back working at the bank,’ said Annie as Susan’s eyes scanned through the gang of lads, now all doing vigorous press-ups and burpees, or whatever you called them, on the side of the pitch.

  Are you out there now? Susan wondered. Are you about to train for some stupid match, like you hadn’t a care in the world?

  ‘Susan?’ said Annie, worried. ‘You all right? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

  And sure enough there he was, right in the centre of the players. Laughing, messing, even joshing with another guy roughly the size of a tree trunk, larking about in horseplay. Josh Andrews himself. Laughing. Actually bloody well laughing, the bare-faced cheek of him.

  How can you act like this? Susan thought, as a flash of something beyond rage zipped through her. How can you just live your life as though you hadn’t destroyed mine? How dare you?

  Frank’s words came back to her, as clearly as if he were standing there beside her: ‘ Susan, you’ve got to let this go. You’ve got to stop fixating. When are you going to accept what the inquest told us and what the police are trying to tell us every single day?’

  But Susan was done listening to voices in her head. Before she knew what was happening, she had broken away from Annie and the gang of mothers, and wasn’t so much walking as striding towards the pitch. She could feel all their eyes following her, but she didn’t care. From behind her, she heard her name being yelled out.

  ‘Susan, get off the pitch! Come back, will you?’ Annie was hollering, but Susan ignored her. Her focus stayed rooted on that one figure, now doing squat lunges, wearing a number thirteen shirt in the school colours. Aware that Annie was hot on her heels, Susan picked up her pace and broke into a run.

  He couldn’t even see her coming.

  Good, she thought.

  Because this fucking ends here.

  Melissa

  KINGSBAY SECONDARY SCHOOL

  Melissa loved English class. Really loved it. But today she was daydreaming. If I work really hard and am lucky enough to get to college, she thought, then I’m definitely going to study English Literature.

  The first years were doing Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and Melissa had already read ahead to the end – she literally couldn’t sleep till she found out what happened to Lizzy Bennet and Mr Darcy, and that bold-as-brass Lydia when she ran off with Mr Wickham. The first time she’d smiled in ages was when she’d finally finished the book under the bedcovers late one night, then went right back to the very start to read it all over again. These days, Melissa wasn’t sleeping too much anyway, so reading was the nicest way she could think of to keep all her worries far away.

  Her dad had faithfully promised her that if she studied hard when he was away and got good grades, he’d take her to see the stage show of Pride and Prejudice that was coming to the National Theatre in Dublin. Melissa had read all about the play and its director, who was meant to be, like, really famous in Spain – Diego somebody – and she was determined to go.

  ‘Then that’s a deal,’ her dad told her over a crackling Skype call late one night. ‘We’ll go to the play as soon as I’m home again. As a very special treat, for my very special princess.’

  Melissa literally had the days counted till he was back (three months, two weeks and four days, to be exact) and had even checked out the theatre listings online to see exactly when the show was opening and how long it would be running for. For months, it seemed. Her dad would be back from Lebanon in loads of time to see it.

  And her mum might even come too, of course, providing her nerves weren’t at her. The night out would do her good, Melissa thought. It would do them all good. That was the problem with being home on Primrose Square day in and day out – there were memories at every turn, just waiting to creep up on you, even when you were trying to be brave and not cry and keep the whole show on the road.

  It had been months and months now since what happened. But to this day Melissa still bumped into Ella’s ghost in just about every corner of their house. She couldn’t go into the TV room at the front of the house without seeing her big sister stretched the full length of the sofa, glued to Netflix, with a big bowl of popcorn balanced on her tummy.

  ‘Don’t even think about changing the channels,’ Ella would say, barely looking up. ‘We’re watching Thirteen Reasons Why and that’s the end of it.’

  ‘But isn’t that about teenage suicide?’ Melissa had asked her innocently.

  ‘Yeah,’ Ella told her, ‘there’s a Darkness into Light march coming up next week and if the folks let me go to it, then I’m dragging you along with me. Do you good to see what life is like on the dark side.’

  There were memories all over school too. Afterwards, it was like a ripple of shockwaves had gone through each and every classroom. Letters had gone out to all the parents. Bereavement counselling had been offered to anyone who wanted it.

  Melissa had gone along to a few sessions, but instead of helping, she found they only made her sadder. And she couldn’t afford to be sad; she needed to be bright and happy for her parents, now that it was just the three of them. She’d asked her mum if she could drop out, but her mum had just twiddled with her hair and said, ‘Do whatever you want, love.’ It was one of her Bad Days, and much as Melissa would have loved nothing more than a big warm hug from her mother and to be told that e
verything would be all right, she knew that wasn’t going to happen.

  For weeks back in school, though, all anyone could talk about was Ella Hayes, and Melissa would have a knot in her stomach every time she so much as walked down a busy corridor.

  ‘You see her?’ Everyone seemed to be pointing and whispering in her direction. ‘That’s Ella Hayes’s little sister.’

  Weirdest of all was that even kids who barely knew Ella turned her into a kind of saint – there was even an impromptu altar by the sixth-year lockers where people would put fresh flowers every day.

  ‘But Ella wasn’t a saint!’ Melissa had wanted to scream at them all. ‘She was just . . . normal. She was my big sister and half of you didn’t even know her!’

  That carry-on went on for weeks, till Sally Jenkins, the school counsellor, put a stop to it, on the grounds that it was ‘causing unnecessary upset’. Worst of all, though, was all the talk about Josh Andrews. More letters had gone out to parents, but Melissa didn’t really understand the ins and outs of it. All she knew was that her mum was getting worse instead of better. An awful lot worse.

  No wonder Mum is the way she is, Melissa thought sadly. If it’s this horrible for me, then how much worse must it be for her? Her dad was grieving too, she knew, in his own private way. But he was thousands of miles away, with the distraction of his busy job and life in the army to keep his mind off everything. Her mum had nothing to distract her, just horrible memories and those stupid purple pills that made her sleep for days.

  I’ll make her a nice dinner tonight, Melissa vowed to herself. She was supposed to have rehearsals at her drama class after school, and while she loved drama and hated missing out on it, wasn’t her mum far more important?

  I’ll skip class and go to the supermarket instead, so I can buy everything I need.

  Her dad had sent her over some pocket money, but instead of blowing it in Zara and H&M, like all the other girls in her class, she could always go to M&S and buy some of the chocolate profiteroles that her mum used to love so much. And I’ll make a big fuss of her and I’ll mind her and talk to her, she decided. Melissa had faithfully promised her dad she’d look after her mum when he was gone and, if it was the last thing she did, she was determined to keep to her word.

  *

  ‘So why would you say marrying well is so important to Jane Austen’s heroines?’ Miss Jenkins was saying sharply to the class, pulling Melissa’s attention back to that stuffy, sleepy classroom. A weak, wintry sun was actually shining for once and the school’s senior rugby team had just jogged out to the rugby pitch to warm up.

  ‘Is it primarily for love, or for status and security?’ Miss Jenkins said, briskly pacing up and down the classroom, her eagle-eyes out on stilts for anyone who wasn’t paying attention.

  Bony-bum, Ella used to call her behind her back, but then Ella had funny nicknames for all the teachers. ‘The woman is basically Jeremy Paxman in drag,’ Ella used to say, and Melissa would giggle, even though she didn’t know who Jeremy Paxman was.

  ‘And in the world of Pride and Prejudice,’ Miss Jenkins was saying, ‘which of these would you say is most important for a woman? Would anyone care to discuss?’

  In fairness, most of the class seemed far more absorbed by the fifth- and sixth-year lads doing squats and lunges than by the intrigues of the Regency marriage market. But then everyone at Melissa’s school seemed to be completely obsessed with rugby. The team had got to the finals of the Senior Cup last year and the team captain was almost carried shoulder-high through the school, even though they’d been beaten out of sight. Melissa didn’t really understand rugby – or any sport, come to that. She’d prefer to go to a play or read a lovely book by herself any day.

  But the cheering from the pitch outside seemed a lot louder today, Melissa thought – or was she imagining it?

  ‘Will you all please try to concentrate,’ Miss Jenkins said sharply, beginning to sound narky. ‘If you’re finding rugby practice more interesting than English class, then I’ll pull the blinds down so you can concentrate properly.’

  ‘Fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight . . . ’ a dull chant drifted from the pitch into the classroom. Just the lads doing their lad things, Melissa thought, focusing on the book in front of her. But the chanting grew louder and louder, and pretty soon most of her class were glued to the window, everyone itching to find out what the commotion was outside.

  ‘Please! Will you all get back into your seats?’ Miss Jenkins snapped.

  ‘But look, miss,’ said Abby Graham, ‘there’s murder going on out there!’

  ‘What’s happening? I can’t see . . . ’

  ‘Aggro with the players?’

  ‘No . . . I don’t think so . . . ’

  ‘Jesus! It’s one of the parents having a go at your man, the scrum half . . . what’s his name . . . ’

  ‘It’s one of the mums, I think.’

  At that, Melissa’s blood turned icy cold.

  ‘Hard to see through the crowd that’s gathered . . . ’

  ‘Get back to your desks!’ Miss Jenkins yelled above the melee. ‘Otherwise, I’m warning you, it’ll be detention for the lot of you.’

  ‘Would you look at her?’

  ‘I don’t believe it!’

  ‘She’s walloping the shit out of Josh Andrews!’

  It was like shockwaves rippled through the class, just at the sound of his name. But then he was such a school star, everyone knew who Josh Andrews was.

  ‘No way!’

  ‘Josh Andrews? Are you kidding?’

  ‘He’s, like, six foot three. He’ll murder anyone who has a go at him!’

  No, no, no, no, no, thought Melissa, squirming in her seat, the only one in the whole class who wasn’t looking. It couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible. She never comes to the school any more . . . How could it possibly be her?

  Next thing, there was a discreet rapping at the classroom door and, as Miss Jenkins opened it, every head turned to see the school secretary standing there.

  ‘Apologies for interrupting class,’ she said in a voice loud enough so the whole class heard, ‘but could Melissa Hayes please come with me right away?’

  Stone-cold silence in the classroom as every head then swivelled Melissa’s way. Melissa shrivelled up in her seat, hoping that if she could make herself very, very little, it might all just go away. She’d only ever felt fear like this once before in her whole life and just look what had happened then.

  Jayne

  19 PRIMROSE SQUARE

  ‘But you’re a widow!’ Jason was spluttering at his mother. ‘So why can’t you just act like one?’

  ‘And how exactly is a widow supposed to act these days?’ was Jayne’s calm response, as she thumped away at the dough she was kneading to make tomato and fennel bread from scratch. ‘Would you and Irene be happier if I took up knitting and just sat in front of the telly all day, watching daytime soaps until the day I die?’

  ‘You know that’s not what I meant at all, Ma,’ Jason back-pedalled. ‘But you have to understand I’m having a lot of problems getting my head around this.’

  Jayne nodded, having figured as much the moment she saw his ice cream van trundle up outside her house, just a few minutes before. A good measure of how badly her son was reacting was the fact he’d even refused to sample one of the tiffin squares she’d just taken fresh out of the fridge.

  ‘I do understand, son,’ she said kindly. ‘But at the same time, you want your old mother to be happy, don’t you?’

  ‘Yeah . . . course I do,’ he said grudgingly, standing stock-still at the kitchen door, arms folded, refusing to budge one centimetre further if it meant sharing the same air space as her. ‘But come on, Ma – this? There was me thinking that you were content enough pottering around with your bake sales and your flower arranging and your bit of chat with the neighbours, and the whole time you were trawling through these dating sites looking for fellas? I mean
. . . online dating? Where did you even meet this gobshite anyway?’

  ‘On the Silver Dates website, love. And I know, in a million years, that online dating lark was never something that would even have crossed my mind. It was Violet Dunne from across the square who put me onto it in the first place.’

  ‘Violet Dunne?’ Jason spluttered. ‘You mean the Merry Widow?’

  Everyone called Violet Dunne the Merry Widow. Violet had hair the colour of burgundy, wore Ugg boots with skinny jeans, and had gone through so many boyfriends since her husband passed away, the nickname had stuck.

  ‘Well, of course I didn’t particularly want to be a merry widow myself,’ Jayne went on, ‘but I did think how lovely it would be to just have a bit of company for myself. Someone to chat to at the end of day, to tell all my news to, and to hear his in return. So Violet helped me to sign up to the site and, before I knew it, sure wasn’t I chatting away to fellas from all four corners of the world!’

  ‘Jaysus, Ma, at your age? It’s obscene, that’s what it is!’

  ‘I’m only sixty-six,’ Jayne replied. ‘That’s not really old, now is it? Not by today’s standards.’

  ‘Ma, you’re a pensioner!’

  ‘Only just,’ she said, reaching for a fistful of flour and sprinkling it lightly on her kneading board. ‘And you know Eric was telling me that in some cultures, people are respected far more as they age. Apparently in Japan, the sixties and seventies are considered the prime of life.’

  ‘Eric? Jesus, Ma, will you stop talking about him like this is actually happening?’

  ‘Oh, but it is happening, love. Eric will be here at the weekend, so you can meet him for yourself. I think you’ll like him, though – he really is a lovely man. I think we’ll all get on famously.’