My Mother's Secret

by Sheila O'Flanagan

  ‘I … I’m not sure.’

  ‘I remember when you came home,’ said Sarah. ‘All tanned and glowing and looking fabulous. With a wedding ring on your finger.’

  ‘I remember that too.’

  ‘Mum was devastated.’

  ‘She got over it.’

  ‘When Roisin was born,’ Sarah nodded. ‘And you became the golden girl again.’

  ‘Oh, stop with that golden girl nonsense,’ said Jenny. ‘It’s all in your head, you know.’

  ‘No it’s not,’ said Sarah. ‘You always were the best in her eyes. And she’s probably looking down on us all now and thinking you still are.’

  Jenny winced. She’d won a gold star for one of her art projects, and for the rest of the day her mother had called her Golden Girl. Sarah had never forgotten it. Because she’d taken it as a slight, a signal that Jenny was the favourite daughter. Which wasn’t true at all. If Kay had had a favourite, Jenny thought, it was Lucinda. She’d always gone easier on Lucinda than anyone else.

  ‘I’ve been lucky,’ she told Sarah. ‘Things have worked out for me.’

  ‘And yet they so very nearly didn’t.’

  That was true, thought Jenny. But Sarah didn’t know the half of it.

  Chapter 9

  When Jenny and Pascal touched down at Rome’s Fiumicino airport at the start of their Italian holiday, she almost fainted with excitement. After all of her years of dreaming, she’d finally made it to the Eternal City. Pascal, whom she’d told of her dream, had arranged the trip through a travel agent to surprise her. She’d been completely shocked, especially as they’d only been going out a couple of months and hadn’t even spent a weekend away together, let alone a fortnight. Her parents had been horrified. The idea of their unmarried daughter going away with a man who wasn’t her husband was something they weren’t in the slightest bit happy about.

  ‘I hope you have separate rooms,’ Kay told her.

  Jenny didn’t bother to answer. She was twenty years old and there was nothing Kay could do this time, either to stop her or to prevent her from having the time of her life.

  She could feel the heat in the air as soon as the aircraft door opened. Mixed with the smell of jet fuel was another smell too – the smell of a hot country. She’d never experienced anything like it before. On the coach from the airport to their hotel, she fanned herself vigorously with the brochures she’d kept from her school project all those years before. Pascal had laughed at her when she showed them to him. He said that times had changed since they’d been printed and that the city would surely be a lot more modern now. Jenny didn’t care. She was glad to be there even though the heat was making her feel seriously dizzy.

  Their hotel was small and inexpensive. It was located on a side street a twenty-five-minute walk from the centre of the city, but it was scrupulously clean and the woman behind the polished-wood reception desk was friendly and welcoming. She told them that they were in a room on the fifth floor and indicated an old-fashioned lift with wooden doors and iron safety grilles that rattled its way up and down.

  The room was small but neat, and thankfully had air conditioning and a full-length window leading to a tiny iron balcony. Jenny gasped with delight as she stepped outside and took in the vivid blue sky over the jumble of terracotta roofs of the surrounding buildings, the colourful potted plants hanging from the railings of other balconies, and the constant chatter of people in the street below. It was when she leaned over the railing to look down on the street below that dizziness overwhelmed her and Pascal had to grab her by the arm as she stumbled back into the room and sat down on the bed.

  She’d recovered enough by the evening to enjoy the walk to St Peter’s Square and was astonished at the sheer number of priests and nuns who thronged the nearby streets.

  ‘I suppose it’s like being at Global Headquarters for them,’ remarked Pascal, which made her laugh.

  After a visit to the Basilica (and the purchase of some rosary beads for her mother), Jenny fulfilled her long-held dream by having coffee in a pavement café. It was a tiny place, well away from the main tourist areas and therefore not as ruinously expensive as some of the others they’d seen. The coffee was nothing like she’d tasted before: strong, dark and aromatic, with a slightly nutty flavour. She drank it tentatively before telling Pascal that it was the best she’d ever had, and that she wanted to buy a cafetière to bring home.

  He laughed and told her that she was turning Italian, and she smiled and said that she felt different here. Adventurous. Carefree. Glamorous even! She perched her sunglasses on top of her head as she spoke.

  ‘You’re certainly that,’ said Pascal as he reached across the table and gently touched her face. ‘And more than glamorous. You’re fabulous in every way, Jenny. And I love you.’

  He’d said it before, but hearing the words now made her heart swell with happiness. And with love for him too. It was easy to be in love in Rome. And it was easy to be in love with Pascal Sheehan, who might not have been as handsome as the young men who swaggered along the streets with their fashionable haircuts and even more fashionable clothes, but who made her feel cherished and secure and special. He made her feel more fabulous than ever when they went back to their inexpensive hotel and made love with the windows open and the sounds of the street as a backdrop to their passion.

  The next morning she woke early and was sick in the bath. Pascal, who’d drunk an unidentified liqueur in the tiny hotel bar the night before that had effectively knocked him out almost immediately, slept through it. After she’d cleaned the bath and showered properly, she went back into the bedroom, where he was still sleeping soundly. She left him a note saying that she’d gone to breakfast, although the idea of food made her stomach churn again. Later, after he’d got up and found her sipping a glass of water in the shadiest spot on the terrace, they went exploring the city. Although the Roman ruins and architecture were wonderful, Jenny, who’d completely recovered, was more enthralled by the street life. She was entranced by the fruit and vegetable market they passed, where everything was colourful and noisy and where people squeezed the oranges and lemons and argued about the size of the peppers. (She’d never seen a red pepper before. She thought it was the most fantastic vegetable in the world.) She was enchanted by the narrow streets with cafés on every corner. She loved the musical language and she enjoyed saying ciao and grazie to people. She told Pascal that she wanted to paint it all and she said that she wished she’d gone to college and studied art instead of getting her Civil Service job.

  ‘I was good at it in school,’ she said. ‘But it was never con-sidered an option.’

  ‘You can take night classes,’ he said. ‘Nothing to stop you.’

  And he put his arms around her and kissed her on the mouth, much to the joy of the people on the street, who wolf-whistled and clapped their approval and made her feel like a movie star.

  The next morning she woke early again. This time Pascal heard her vomiting. He was concerned about her, saying that perhaps they’d overdone it in the sultry August heat and that they’d take it easy for the rest of the day. But she said she felt much better and insisted that they take their planned trip to the Villa Borghese gardens. When she wolfed down an enormous plate of spaghetti for dinner that evening, Pascal told her that she was obviously fine and that he was glad her bug had been fleeting.

  However, when he heard her throwing up the following morning, he went into the bathroom and held her hair from her face while she was sick.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said afterwards.

  ‘For what?’ he asked. ‘For being pregnant and not telling me?’

  She looked at him in dismay.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, Jenny,’ he said. ‘Morning sickness? Even I know about morning sickness.’

  ‘I’m being sick in the morning,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t mean it’s morning sickness. It could be the food.’

  ‘When did you start being sick?’ he asked.

  ‘Just bef
ore we came away,’ she answered. ‘I thought it was excitement.’

  He frowned.

  ‘Have you … you know … are you late?’

  Jenny said nothing.

  ‘Well? Are you?’

  ‘I can’t be pregnant,’ she said. ‘I really can’t. I’m too young. It’s too big a deal. And besides—’

  ‘Besides, you told me you were on the Pill,’ he interrupted her.

  ‘I am,’ she said. ‘That’s why I think maybe it’s something else.’

  She didn’t tell Pascal that she was hopeless at taking the little tablet every day. That sometimes she forgot. She hadn’t truly believed it would make a difference.

  ‘Have you had a test?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘You need to see a doctor and do a test.’

  ‘It’ll ruin our holiday if we … if I …’

  ‘There are more important things than holidays,’ said Pascal.

  ‘Not for me,’ she told him. ‘This was my dream and you made it come true. The longer I don’t know if I’m pregnant or not, the longer I can hold on to it.’

  He stared at her. She was so lovely, her untamed hair tumbling around her shoulders, her eyes bright with emotion. So lovely and so naive and so damn silly. And if she was pregnant, she was pregnant with his child. He couldn’t abandon her. He wouldn’t. Besides, he was in love with her. He’d told her so.

  ‘I love you, Jen,’ he said. ‘If you’re pregnant, we can sort it out.’

  ‘We can?’

  He took her in his arms and kissed her.

  The next morning, despite waking just as early, she wasn’t sick. She said that it must have been a bug after all. She told him he was fussing over nothing and that she wasn’t going to a doctor. But Pascal was insistent. As a compromise, they went to a pharmacy where, after a long conversation in broken English mixed with a couple of Italian words from Pascal, the pharmacist sold them a home pregnancy test.

  ‘I didn’t think we’d be able to get one you could do yourself,’ said Pascal as she disappeared into the bathroom of the hotel room with it.

  ‘And I knew I didn’t need to go to the doctor,’ she called through the closed door as she took it out of the packet. But when she saw the result, she started to cry.

  ‘Hello, you two!’ Lucinda walked across the grass to join her sisters. ‘Nice dress, Sarah.’

  Sarah gave her a wry smile. ‘I spent ages looking for something. And I end up with an outfit that looks better on you.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ said Lucinda.

  ‘At least you got the one with the cap sleeves. I would’ve preferred that myself but they didn’t have it in the shop in Galway. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Possibly good, because I would’ve bought it and then we’d be absolutely identical. But bad because I could’ve done with those sleeves to hide my feckin’ bingo wings. I should’ve brought a cardigan or something.’

  ‘Your arms are fine,’ said Lucinda, although mentally she was feeling slightly smug that hers were definitely more toned than her older sister’s.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Sarah. ‘But you don’t have to be nice. You definitely look a million times better in that dress than me.’

  ‘It suits both of you,’ said Jenny.

  ‘You’re wasting your time trying to smooth the troubled waters,’ said Sarah. ‘Two women turning up at a party in the same dress is a total disaster.’

  ‘However, it’s not your disaster.’ Lucinda grinned. ‘And we’ll get over it. C’mon, Jen, we should be celebrating your big day. You must be delighted.’

  ‘It was certainly a surprise,’ said Jenny.

  ‘Jen hates surprises,’ remarked Sarah.

  Lucinda laughed. ‘But this is a nice one. How could anyone not like a nice surprise?’

  ‘I would’ve liked the opportunity to get my hair done,’ confessed Jenny.

  ‘It’s fine, what are you on about?’ Lucinda made a face. ‘You look fab, you always do. That’s what forty years with a good man will do for you.’

  ‘Not that either of us would know,’ remarked Sarah.

  Jenny heard the edge to Sarah’s voice. She knew that her sister had always resented the way she and Pascal had come home from Italy and sprung the entire Roman wedding and baby thing on them. But it had been the only way to do it. Nevertheless, her relationship with Sarah had never been the same afterwards. It probably hadn’t been the same with Lucinda either, but at least she didn’t seem to harbour a grudge in the same way that Sarah did.

  We’re all adults, she reminded herself. Neither of them are my responsibility. And yet she couldn’t help feeling as though they still were. And that she’d let them down. She took another slug of rosé. And wondered if she was going to be completely off her head before the day was over.

  Steffie could feel heat rising from the wooden veranda. It reminded her of the time she was small and her parents had brought her to a beach with a pier. She couldn’t remember the beach but she did remember the warmth of the wood and the slightly tarry smell of it as she sat dangling her legs over the side. Her mother had warned her to be careful and she’d complained that they were always telling her to be careful of things and that she wasn’t a baby any more. She couldn’t have been more than four or five then. Neither Roisin nor Davey had been with them that day and she’d looked forward to having her parents’ undivided attention. It was a pity so much of it had been of the ‘watch what you’re doing’ variety. Afterwards, though, her dad had bought ice-cream cornets and they’d walked along the seafront with them, dipping the chocolate flake into the whipped cream and licking it. She smiled to herself. Summer memories were always good. Warm summer memories even better.

  Camilla Rasmussen walked over to her.

  ‘This is very nice,’ she said. ‘Very nice for your parents, and for Davey to come home.’

  ‘He can come home any time he wants,’ said Steffie. ‘It’s not that far, is it?’

  ‘No, but when you are in a different country, you live to the rhythm of that country,’ Camilla said. ‘You are caught up in your life there and you don’t think of anywhere else.’

  Steffie leaned against the wooden rail that surrounded the veranda. ‘I travelled abroad for my gap year, but I guess that was different to actually living abroad,’ she said.

  ‘I lived in Malaysia for a year,’ said Camilla. ‘It was good, but I was glad to return to Denmark.’

  ‘You wouldn’t think of living in Ireland?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Camilla. ‘If the right opportunity presented itself.’

  ‘And would you and Davey being together be the right opportunity?’

  Jeepers, thought Steffie as the words left her mouth, I’m as bad as the aunts trying to find out if one of us wants to get married. I’d better cut back on the fizz before I say something I’ll really regret. But Camilla didn’t seem to be offended by the question. She smiled and said it was possible but that she didn’t know what the future held.

  ‘He’s a good guy, my brother,’ said Steffie.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘A touch drifty, maybe,’ Steffie continued. ‘More like me than Roisin.’

  ‘Drifty?’

  ‘Roisin is the organised one in our family,’ Steffie explained. ‘Me and Davey allow our lives to flow along and fall in with whatever happens.’

  Camilla nodded. ‘But Davey is changing, I think.’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘He is good at his job and is doing well in his career.’

  ‘And with you?’ asked Steffie. ‘Is he doing well with you?’

  Camilla nodded. ‘I think, at least for the moment, we are good together,’ she replied.

  It was hardly a ringing endorsement, thought Steffie as she left Camilla to fill her glass with something non-alcoholic. And not exactly encouraging for Davey’s prospects.

  Paul was rummaging in the drinks cupboard to see if Jenny and Pascal had another bottle of rum when Summer came into the kitchen
carrying some empty glasses.

  ‘It’s my fault,’ she said when he told her there was none left. ‘I shouldn’t have asked for a mojito in the first place.’

  ‘You weren’t to know.’ Paul couldn’t be angry with her when she looked so apologetic. ‘And from what I hear, they were a great success.’

  ‘Yes, but I think that your wife is pissed off at me,’ confessed Summer. ‘She wanted everyone to be drinking wine.’

  ‘There is rather a lot of it,’ he said. ‘There’s a lot of sparkling rosé too.’

  ‘We could make Bellinis with that,’ suggested Summer. ‘What else is in that cupboard?’

  ‘Tequila,’ said Paul. ‘Vodka. And brandy.’

  ‘You don’t want to make anything with brandy. Not in the middle of the afternoon,’ Summer said. ‘Is there any Cointreau? We could do margaritas. Well, if there’s more lime juice, that is.’ She looked enquiringly at him. ‘Or perhaps I should butt out?’

  ‘Cocktails are fun and the mojitos were great,’ said Paul. ‘We should’ve thought of it ourselves.’ He took a bottle of Cointreau from the cupboard. ‘How d’you make a margarita?’

  ‘Easy peasy,’ said Summer. She rinsed a glass and then sliced one of the limes that Roisin had brought to add to the jugs of water for the guests who asked for it. ‘This is the version we do in the bar,’ she said as she mixed it and then handed it to him. ‘I can make it stronger.’

  ‘It’s pretty good the way it is,’ said Paul when he tasted it.

  ‘I could do with a proper cocktail shaker,’ Summer said.

  ‘I bet Jenny and Pascal have one somewhere.’ Paul started rummaging in the cupboard again.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Neither of them had noticed Roisin walking into the room.

  ‘Ow!’ Paul yelped as he banged his head on the cupboard door. He turned slowly, rubbing his temple. ‘Hi, sweetheart. I was looking for a cocktail shaker.’

  ‘For heaven’s sake! There’s to be no more cocktails.’ Roisin looked angrily at him. ‘This isn’t an episode of Mad Men. It’s a garden party. With wine and beer. Nobody is supposed to be having hard liquor.’