by Tara Heavey
And then little Maia Mitchell popped into her head.
Clearly this time out with Yvonne was doing things to her mind. It was all very well vowing to be a better, kinder person but now she was getting silly. As she raced across to the pub with Yvonne, she decided that the sooner she got back to some kind of normality, the better.
Chapter 36
Sarah and Helen were doing everything in their power to make the most of what they euphemistically referred to as Helen’s ‘holiday’. Only it was really Sarah’s time that was running out.
Helen had driven them out to The Burren and the two women had spent the morning wandering on and wondering at its eerie moonscape. They were back now, sitting on their deck-chairs on the beach, while Maia lined up her rows of shells. The day was chilly and they each had a plaid blanket draped across their legs. Like Darby and Joan, Helen said. She was uncharacteristically quiet now. Gazing out to sea as if she was searching for answers. There were none. Sarah could have told her that. ‘What’s up, Sis?’ Sarah nudged her arm.
‘Nothing. Just thinking.’
‘About what?’
‘The past.’
‘It’s a dangerous place to visit, you know.’
There was an overlong pause.
‘And?’ said Sarah.
‘And what?’
‘What did you find lurking around in the hidden recesses of that brain of yours?’
Helen turned so she was half facing her. ‘I used to be so jealous of you.’
‘You were?’
‘Yes. I mean, really badly jealous. I almost used to hate you at times.’
‘Helen!’
‘I know, I know. It’s terrible. But can you blame me? Look at me. Look at you.’
‘I’ve always thought you were very pretty.’
‘Come on, Sarah. You were always streets ahead of me when it came to looks. And then there was your talent. Your fame. All the men falling over their feet to get to you.’
‘And not one of them stuck. I’m almost forty and I’ve never been married.’
‘Why did you not marry, do you think?’
‘Don’t know. It just never seemed to happen for me. Maybe I was too busy flitting around from one to another. Could never settle. Then Maia came along.’
‘And then there was Aidan.’
‘Yes. Then there was Aidan.’
‘Do you think …?’
‘Do I think that if I had a future I’d have it with him?’
‘Something like that.’
‘I think so. Probably. But we’ll never know now, will we? At least I don’t have to worry about him getting bored with me. I won’t be around long enough to be boring.’
‘Sarah!’
‘It’s true.’
They watched the sea for a while. Rolling in. Rolling out. Taking its giant breaths.
‘Soothing, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. Sarah … That’s not all.’
‘Oh, bloody hell.’
‘When I said I used to hate you. I used to sometimes …’
‘Spit it out.’
‘I used to sometimes wish that bad things would happen to you.’
‘What kind of bad things?’
‘I don’t know. Just anything.’ Helen promptly burst into tears. Not something she was prone to do.
‘So now you think you’ve given me cancer.’
‘Well, I don’t know …’
Sarah laughed.
‘It’s not funny.’
‘Well, I think it is. When did you stop feeling this way about me?’
‘Around the time I met Dave. When I started being happy with my own life. Do you think you can forgive me?’
‘Of course I can. You big noodle.’ Sarah pulled her in for a hug. Was this the way it was going to be from now on? She having to comfort people who were upset because she was dying? ‘I think,’ she said, ‘I know how to make you feel better.’
‘How?’ Helen sniffed.
‘By getting in on this confession session myself. I’ve got my own little disclosure to make.’
‘What is it?’
‘Remember that boyfriend you had? First year of college?’
‘Derek.’
‘Derek! That was him. Looked like the lead singer from Echo and the Bunnymen.’
‘He had the hair and all.’ They roared laughing and Helen wiped away the last of her tears. ‘What about him?’
‘I snogged him once.’
‘You did not! When? While I was going out with him?’
‘Yes.’
‘You bitch!’
Sarah squealed. ‘Look who’s talking!’
‘Oh, yeah. Sorry.’
‘It’s all right.’
‘When did it happen?’
‘He called around to pick you up one night. You were taking ages to get ready – as usual. Probably couldn’t fit into your ra-ra skirt or something.’
‘I’ll say it again. You’re a bitch.’
‘I know. Great, isn’t it? Anyway, I was entertaining him in the sitting room and it just sort of … happened.’
‘What do you mean it just “happened”? Somebody must have made the first move.’
‘It was me. I’d never kissed anyone before and I wanted to see what it was like. I wasn’t trying to steal him or anything.’
‘Oh, well, that makes it all right, then. Jesus. How old were you?’
‘I was fifteen.’
‘Fifteen!’
‘I know. He was practically a child molester. You’re not really upset, are you?’
‘No. I always knew he was a bit of a shit.’
‘He wasn’t much of a kisser either. I didn’t realize at the time because I had no one to compare him with. But it was like he’d lost something inside my mouth and was trying to find it with his tongue.’
‘Oh, stop. I remember now.’
‘We should give him a call. Frighten the shite out of him. For the laugh. Do you think he’s married?’
‘Not unless his kissing technique’s improved.’
The two women laughed with abandon. Maia turned to them, then went back to her shells.
They were quiet for a while, watching the waves, the surfers caught up in them, Star riding with them from time to time.
‘You’ll have to come in with me,’ said Sarah.
‘In where?’
‘There.’ She nodded her head forward. ‘For a swim. With the dolphin.’
‘Oh. No way.’
‘I’ll get you in there if it’s the last thing I do.’
Chapter 37
It was a summer’s evening in London. The workers spilled out of their offices, like prisoners on day release, onto the baking hot pavements and down, down, into the sweltering intensity of the Underground. All those people. Not one connection. Just an endless stream of humanity, looking in one direction. All about the destination. Nothing about the journey.
Alannah was among them, temporarily at least. Just one more anonymous worker. In the beginning she would forget herself, make eye contact with someone on the street and nod at them, or smile at somebody on the tube. The reaction was always instantaneous: look away from the lunatic. In this city, friendliness was equated with insanity. But in spite of that she liked it.
She would step outside her office in the evening – the office in which she was virtually inconsequential – and walk into the wall of heat that the tall buildings had retained throughout the day. Then she’d turn the corner and the first thing she’d see was the Houses of Parliament, rearing up magnificently. And she didn’t feel inconsequential any more. She felt part of the throbbing history: Big Ben, Westminster Abbey. She would stroll around the Abbey on her lunchbreak, linger at Poets’ Corner, marvel at Elizabeth I’s tomb. Oliver Cromwell – did the Brits not know what he’d done?
Today she was going directly home, to a poky little bedsit two tube rides away. She shared it with Ross. The previous night had been fantastic. He’d got home before her for a chang
e and opened the front door, naked under a floral pinny. Spag bol. The only thing he could cook. Candlelight and Spanish plonk. She smiled at the thought, then rapidly rearranged her features in case the woman sitting opposite thought she was a psychopath. It wasn’t all that difficult to quell the smile, with negative thoughts crowding in on her again. Had her dad done things like that for Mam when they were first together? She remembered him doing plenty of nice things for her over the years. She expelled the negative images. They had no place in her rose-tinted world. Ross would never betray her like that.
When she had come back from her brief visit home, Ross had accused her of ‘acting funny’. No wonder, he had said, when she had told him what had happened. She told him with shame, as if what she came from was no longer worthy and that she was no longer good enough. Ross had held her and briefly she’d felt secure. But most of the time, Alannah had felt as if she was floating and didn’t know where she would end up. She was glad she was away from it all. Then she felt guilty for having this thought.
She was on her street now, nearing her front door. Her footsteps slowed and then she stopped walking altogether. It couldn’t be. She saw something leap in her father’s eyes when he saw her. She couldn’t tell what her own looked like. She forced her feet to walk slowly forwards and he in turn walked slowly towards her.
They met halfway.
‘Dad.’
‘Alannah. It’s good to see you.’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘I came to see you, of course. I thought we could talk.’
‘What made you think I’d want to talk?’
‘I thought it only fair to give you the chance to give out to me in person. I thought you might even enjoy it.’
She looked down at her toenails, painted crimson, poking out of the front of her sandals, looking vulnerable. She wouldn’t let him soft-soap her.
‘Did you get my letter?’ he said.
‘Yes.’
She was clearly expected to say something further. The truth was, she hadn’t read it. She had carried it around with her in her pocket for two days. When she had finally opened it, she had got as far as ‘Dear Alannah’ before screwing it up into a ball and throwing it into the bin. After a couple of minutes’ intense staring, she had taken it out again and put a match to it. She hadn’t wanted to know – wasn’t ready to hear. She still wasn’t. Yet here he was, forcing himself, his explanations and justifications upon her. She felt angry and sullen and continued to stare at her feet.
‘Are you going to let me in at least? Show me where you’ve been living and what state you’ve been living in?’
‘No.’ Her response was urgent and instantaneous. She didn’t want him invading this private little part of her. She had a horrifying thought. Did he expect to stay with her? ‘How long are you here for?’
‘I’m catching a flight later tonight.’
She breathed a little easier. That was something.
She knew it was rude, not inviting him in. It went against her basic nature. But apart from anything else, Ross might be there, resplendent in his pinny. And even if he wasn’t there personally, there were bits of him everywhere. His boxers on the bedroom floor where he’d stepped out of them this morning. And while her parents weren’t stupid, and they knew that she and Ross were living together, there was no need to rub her father’s face in it. It would only embarrass both of them. Then again maybe he deserved it.
‘Is there somewhere we can go to talk?’
She sighed in exasperation and defeat. They couldn’t stay here in a stand-off all evening. And she could hardly go in on her own and leave him there. She wasn’t that cruel. And he had made the effort to come all this way to see her …
‘There’s a café on the next street.’ She marched forward. She could hear him a few paces behind. It made her feel important. She knew her way around here and her father didn’t. He was a stranger, she practically a native. She wouldn’t bring him to her favourite place in case one or other of them made a scene and she couldn’t show her face in there again. Besides, he didn’t deserve somewhere nice.
People walked by them on the street, typically uncurious. She wondered if her father seemed as out of place to them as he did to her. Like an alien that had just landed from another planet. An innocent abroad. Although, as he had proved lately, not all that innocent.
They entered the café and stood stiffly at the counter.
‘Have anything you want,’ her father said. ‘My treat.’
She swung around to him, quite aggressively. ‘You bet it’s your treat.’
He smiled at her ruefully and she forced herself not to smile back. Her feelings were so mixed that she didn’t trust herself. They sat down with two coffees and two enormous pavlovas, the tension between them equally vast.
‘So,’ he said, ‘how are you liking London?’
‘I love it. I’m thinking of staying for good.’
She wasn’t, of course. The words were calculated to hurt.
‘You mean not go back to college?’
‘No,’ she countered weakly. ‘I mean live here when I’ve finished college.’
‘Oh. And your job?’
‘The job’s great.’
It was all right.
‘Your colleagues treating you well?’
‘Ah. They’re a bit patronizing towards “the little Irish girl”.’ She grimaced. ‘They’re always telling me I’m so wholesome and fresh-faced. Things like that. And there’s this one woman and she’s always going on about my freckles. Stupid eejit. As if no one in the whole of England had freckles.’
‘Surely fresh-faced is a bit of a compliment.’
‘No, it isn’t. I bet you wouldn’t like it.’
He laughed. ‘It’s a long time since anyone accused me of being fresh-faced, Alannah.’
She looked down at her dessert so he wouldn’t see the amusement in her eyes. Damn her father anyway. He had this way of reaching her, opening her up. And she responded like some over-eager puppy. She stabbed at the pavlova with her fork.
‘Remember how you used to rub lemon juice on your nose to try and fade your freckles?’
‘Mmm.’ She was noncommittal, her mouth full of meringue. If he thought she was joining him on a pleasant trip down Memory Lane, he could think again.
He seemed to sense this. ‘Look, Lana, as you well know, I didn’t come here to talk about freckles.’
She said nothing, gave him nothing. She wanted to know what he had to say yet she was fearful of it.
‘First and foremost, I’m sorry. Sorry for all the hurt I’ve caused you and your brother.’
‘And Mam.’ She was instantly furious.
‘And your mother. Of course your mother. It’s just that I’m here today to talk about how this affects you and Tommy.’
She didn’t trust herself to speak. She was trying to control the little prickles at the back of her eyes.
‘I want you to know that it was my marriage I left, not my children. Never my children.’ His voice was low and urgent. ‘I’ve never stopped being your dad, Alannah. Not for one second.’
‘You’ve destroyed our family.’ The tears were in her voice now and she despised herself for her weakness.
‘It’s not destroyed. Just changed. Just different. We’ll be a family again, you’ll see.’
‘You didn’t see Mam, what you did to her. How crushed she was. How could you do that, Dad? She didn’t deserve it.’
‘I know she didn’t, love.’ Her father looked ashamed of himself and she was glad.
‘So why did you do it?’ She really wanted to know.
They stared into each other’s eyes and Aidan shrugged.
‘I fell in love.’
What was that supposed to mean? ‘For God’s sake, Dad. You’re not a teenager. I’m the one who’s supposed to be immature, not you. If you were going to have a mid-life crisis, could you not have just bought yourself a motorbike?’
They were sile
nced, shocked by the incongruity of her words. Then they both started to laugh, helplessly and simultaneously. Alannah was annoyed with herself, but couldn’t stop. The situation was so unreal, so ridiculous. Above all, she was glad she hadn’t chosen the other café because she wouldn’t be able to set foot in this one again. First nearly blubbing, then laughing uncontrollably. She could feel the eyes of the other customers on them. Their waitress was hovering close by with a pot of coffee.
She wiped her eyes with her napkin and blew her nose as discreetly as possible. Her father was looking relieved. That wasn’t right. It annoyed her. ‘Don’t think I’ve forgiven you or anything.’
‘Oh, I don’t.’
‘It’s going to take a lot more than a pavlova.’
‘I know.’
‘It’s not even a very good pavlova.’
‘Yes. The meringue should be sticky on the inside. This is all dry and chalky.’
‘Serves you right,’ she said.
Her father smiled, and gestured to the waitress for a refill. Alannah felt a pull in her chest. If only she didn’t love him so much. It made it so hard to be mean to him. She examined his face as he was looking away from her. He seemed older than she remembered. The lines around his eyes when he smiled were deeper.
‘Is it true?’ she said, when the waitress had gone away. ‘About … Sarah.’ It was hard to say her name.
His face clouded and he leaned forward again. ‘Yes, it’s true.’
‘How long?’
‘A month or two.’
Alannah was floored. In all their conversations about the sick actress, Tommy had never explained she was that sick. ‘Is that all?’ She couldn’t keep the words in.
Aidan nodded and looked even more tired.
‘So when … it’s all over, what are you going to do?’
‘I don’t know. I can’t think that far down the line.’
Alannah shook her head. It was incomprehensible to her. Her father – her stable, sensible father – throwing away everything for a woman who wouldn’t see Christmas. A small part of her even found it romantic. But she stuffed that bit down to where it belonged.
