Apartment 3B

by Patricia Scanlan

  ‘You OK there?’ Christine peered across the room at her sister. Eve opened a concerned eye.

  ‘I’m fine,’ Liz assured them, warmed by their care. It was a lovely lazy few days that they spent together and it was just what Liz needed to help regain her equilibrium. She hadn’t laughed so much in ages.

  *

  The weather turned good for them and they spent a lot of time exploring the beauty-spots of Cork. They treated themselves to dinner in a small but exclusive restaurant in Kinsale one night and en route to their holiday cottage had to stop for petrol. It was a do-it-yourself station, which Liz hated. She always went over the amount required by a penny or two if the pumps weren’t automatic. It was infuriating but this time she was going to get it right, she thought determinedly. She waited patiently for the motorist ahead of her to finish. She guessed, from his Bermuda shorts and the thick cigar clenched between his teeth, that he was American.

  ‘There ya go, honey!’ he smiled, replacing the pump. Liz smiled back politely. ‘Gee!’ he said in amusement. ‘That’s a mighty small car. I ain’t never seen such a small car before. If a dawg pissed into your petrol tank he’d fill it. Haw! Haw!’ He guffawed, much entertained by his own wit.

  Liz was not the slightest bit amused to have her little Mini so insulted. ‘We’ve got very big dogs in Ireland,’ she said shortly, turning her back on the Bermuda-shorted man as she proceeded to fill her car with petrol.

  Christine was doubled up with laughter in the back seat. ‘You told him, girl! We’ve got very big dogs in Ireland – that’s the best I ever heard!’

  ‘Shut up, you,’ grinned Liz, her good humour beginning to reassert itself.

  They returned to the capital much refreshed and Liz prepared to put the finishing details to the mural, making sure that the tablecloths and cutlery and fixtures and fittings matched exactly those in the restaurant. It was a very demanding piece of work and Liz was able to become engrossed in it, the hours and days flying by as she painted away. It was such a relief to her that she was able to forget about everything and just concentrate on her work. For a while after Matt’s death she felt sure she had lost that ability. No matter what she did, her thoughts constantly returned to her husband and she could not concentrate. But as time passed she found that she was able to concentrate with greater intensity and she drew a great comfort from the satisfaction her work gave her.

  Marcus was delighted with the progress of the mural, and complimented her profusely. ‘Liz, it’s superb! Just what this place needed. And it’s so different from anything I’ve seen anywhere else. It’s unique!’ He smiled warmly at her as she sat cross-legged on the floor painting in a detail of the hem of a tablecloth. ‘Come on, let’s have lunch. Leave that for a while.’

  Liz shook her head. Couldn’t the man ever take no for an answer? If he wasn’t inviting her to lunch he was inviting her to dinner and she just wasn’t interested. All she wanted to do was get the mural finished. She wanted to keep their relationship strictly business but he was so insistent it was beginning to get her down. He was obviously so used to women falling at his feet it must be a new experience for him to have someone turn him down outright. ‘Come on,’ he grinned disarmingly. ‘I insist on treating you to lunch. Let’s go over to the new place off Grafton Street that everyone is raving about and see what all the fuss is about. I like to see what the opposition is up to every now and again.’

  ‘Thanks, Marcus, but I really must get this finished. Incarna has a load of other commissions for me and besides, I’m sure you want to be able to unveil this soon.’

  Marcus sighed in exasperation. ‘An hour for lunch won’t make much difference. Come on, Liz, stop playing hard to get.’

  Liz’s jaw dropped open at that. ‘Are you serious, Marcus Kennedy? Just who do you think you are?’ She was furious. ‘If you were the last man on this planet I wouldn’t be interested in you!’

  ‘I’m sorry!’ he said, taken aback at her vehemence. ‘I was only kidding.’

  ‘Not funny,’ she snapped.

  ‘Well I apologize then,’ he said stiffly. ‘Excuse me.’

  Liz sat there, fuming. Honestly, some men just thought they were God’s gift to women. Playing hard to get. The cheek of him! She worked like a demon, not even bothering to have anything for lunch. The sooner she finished his damned mural the better. Why was it that now that she was widowed some men seemed to think that she was fair game for anything. Only a couple of weeks before, she had been at a dinner party in a friend’s house and her friend’s husband had been so attentive and over-friendly that it had been embarrassing. Norma had been very cool with her when they met later that week and had cancelled an evening of bowling that they had planned. Liz was disgusted. And hurt. Didn’t Norma know her better than to think that she would play around with a friend’s husband. Didn’t her friend realize that the only man who occupied her thoughts was Matt? Obviously not! Obviously she felt threatened by the fact that Liz was single and available again. She had encountered it a few times, in fact. At first she thought she was imagining it but then she had seen another friend swiftly fly to the side of her husband who was making Liz laugh at the saga of his disastrous attempts to take up golf and heard her say, sweetly but firmly, ‘Darling, stop boring Liz. Mick wants to talk to you. Excuse us, Liz, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ Liz said, a little puzzled. Surely Mick could have come over and joined them – after all, he knew Liz well. But Laura had taken her husband possessively by the elbow and steered him across the room to Mick, leaving Liz alone. Then it struck her! Laura didn’t want her talking to her husband alone! How absolutely pathetic and ridiculous. But obviously she was seen as some kind of a threat now that she was no longer part of a couple.

  ‘That Laura one was always a jealous bitch anyway!’ Christine remarked when Liz told her of the incident. ‘Remember the shenanigans of her when Marcy Nolan, who was supposed to be her best friend, got a bouquet of roses one Valentine’s Day and she only got chocolates. She was raging. The next year she made sure she got a basket full of roses from Tommy, the fool. And boy did she go on about them. She was always like that. I remember getting a lift from her and Tommy once, before I started going with Liam. Well the two of us were getting out of the car and she started kissing Tommy as though she was never going to see him again. He was mortified. But she was just doing it for my benefit. Letting me know she had a man and I hadn’t. She’s a real pain and very immature. Ignore her,’ Christine instructed briskly.

  Painting in a delicate single rose on Romeo and Juliet’s table Liz felt a moment of self-doubt. Was she unconsciously sending out some sort of vibes or something? No, that was absolutely ridiculous, she told herself firmly. If there was one thing she wasn’t, it was a femme fatale. And besides, she just couldn’t see herself starting a relationship with anyone else. Maybe in five or ten years’ time, she didn’t know; right now though all she needed to keep her going was her work. And if Marcus Kennedy didn’t like that he could lump it. He kept out of her way for the next week, for which she was truly grateful, and it was with a sigh of great relief that she painted in the last brush-stroke.

  ‘You’ll come to the unveiling, won’t you?’ he queried as he stood beside her viewing the finished work.

  ‘It would look a bit odd if I didn’t,’ she remarked drily.

  ‘Thanks, Liz. We’ll have a great night. This is going to be a party to beat all parties,’ he promised her.

  In that, he did not lie. She had never seen so many well-known faces. People flew in from London and the States just to be there and Marcus had spared no expense. It was the social event of the year and if you weren’t on Marcus Kennedy’s guest list, your social standing wasn’t worth tuppence, as Liz overheard one well-known gossip columnist say nastily to a well-known lawyer when he inquired about the whereabouts of a mutual acquaintance who hadn’t been invited.

  Liz spent the evening being photographed for papers and magazines and her head was in a wh
irl from being introduced to so many people. Marcus paid a glowing tribute to her as he formally unveiled the mural to gasps of appreciation, and in spite of her antipathy towards him she had to admit that he had done her proud with the party. Her career was set to ascend into orbit, Incarna informed her, thrilled for her protégée. She had come as Liz’s personal guest but had to leave early to meet a relative at the airport.

  As Incarna left, a soft voice at Liz’s shoulder caught her attention. ‘Hello, I’m Angela Kennedy. We’ve never been introduced.’ A petite blonde woman was speaking to her and with a faint sense of shock Liz recognized Marcus’s wife. She was elegant and expensively dressed, with diamonds at her neck and in her ears. But despite her flawless make-up she looked tired and unhappy, as if she didn’t sleep well at night. Liz had read somewhere that she had met Marcus when she was working as a receptionist in a hotel and Marcus was running the restaurant. Together they had built up his business into a successful chain of restaurants and nightclubs. They were wealthy and successful beyond their dreams but Marcus played around and it was rumoured that Angela had suffered several nervous breakdowns. Liz’s heart went out to her: it was obvious from the way her eyes followed her husband’s progress around the room that she was still in love with him.

  ‘Your mural is beautiful,’ Angela was saying with genuine admiration in her voice.

  ‘Thank you very much,’ Liz responded warily. Did this woman realize that her husband was trying to start a relationship with her? She seemed very pleasant though.

  ‘What are you going to do next?’ Angela inquired.

  Liz laughed. ‘I’ve a list of commissions as long as your arm. I might surface around 1990 with them all completed!’

  ‘That’s marvellous. It’s great to see talent getting a chance. I’d love to be able to do something like what you do. Or to have my own business. I’d love to do something on my own.’ There was a faint trace of bitterness in the older woman’s tone. It was obvious the life of a social butterfly left Angela Kennedy completely unfulfilled.

  ‘What do you like to do?’ Liz asked.

  ‘Ooh I like . . . ’ She thought for a while and laughed. ‘I like painting and wallpapering actually. Not that I get much of a chance any more. Marcus gets the decorators in when we’re getting anything done.’

  ‘You could always do an interior design and decorating course,’ Liz suggested. ‘There are some good ones around. I could get you the details if you like,’ she added helpfully.

  ‘Would you? Would you really? How kind!’ Angela smiled and her eyes lit up. ‘Yes, I could really go for that. That would give me something to get my teeth into. These charity things that I’m involved in are all the same. I’d like to do something different now that the children are in secondary school. They don’t seem to need me as much.’

  ‘That’s the way of it with children, isn’t it? We all have to grow up,’ Liz said comfortingly. She liked Angela. She deserved better than Marcus Kennedy, that was for sure.

  ‘Oh, excuse me, Liz, would you? There’s that awful woman who writes a gossip column full of malice. I don’t want to have to talk to her. She’s so vulgar. Will you send me on that information?’

  ‘I will, of course,’ Liz assured her. Appearances were so misleading, she mused, as Angela slipped discreetly away. She appeared so soignee and self-assured and yet, speaking to her, Liz had found her self-effacing and shy. Seeing the dreaded chronicler of trivia bearing down on her in turn, Liz decided to follow Angela’s example. She slipped away to Marcus’s private office where she had left her coat and bag. It was very late and she was tired. It was time to go home, she decided.

  She was just reaching for her coat when she heard Marcus’s suave tones. ‘Allow me.’ He had followed her in. ‘Going so soon? Won’t you come and join us in ANGIE’S?’ he murmured as he held her coat for her. Liz shook her head. She didn’t feel like nightclubbing in the jewel of his nightclub empire.

  ‘I want to see you again. You must know I’m very interested in you.’

  Liz stared at him. He was incredible. His wife was outside and he was asking to see her. ‘Marcus, I’m not interested. Let’s leave it at that, OK?’

  ‘But you’ve always enjoyed my company. We get on well. Why?’ he demanded almost angrily.

  ‘For one thing, your wife who is outside waiting for you to take her home. And for another, no one could step into my husband’s shoes.’ Liz’s eyes glittered angrily. Just what kind of a woman did he think she was?

  ‘Oh Angela! She’s so bloody boring, Liz. I’ve tried, but it’s over between us. And you can’t go around being the grieving widow all your life. You’re young! You’re desirable. Face it, Liz. Men are going to want you and you’re going to want them sooner or later. So why not me?’

  ‘I think this conversation has gone far enough. Excuse me.’ Liz’s tone was icy. She brushed past him but he caught her by the shoulders and swung her around to face him.

  ‘Let me remind you what you’re missing in life,’ he said, bending his head to kiss her passionately.

  Liz was so shocked by his behaviour that it was as if a bucket of ice had been poured over her. ‘Let go of me!’ She struggled out of his embrace and stood staring at him. Blind fury took over and in an almost instinctive response she raised her hand and walloped him hard across the face. ‘You’re pathetic,’ she said contemptuously.

  Marcus rubbed his jaw. ‘You should try being a little more sophisticated,’ he said cynically.

  ‘If you consider your behaviour sophisticated, well, you can keep sophistication. I think you must be the most uncouth, insensitive man I ever met!’ That hurt, she could see by the expression on his face. Head held high, Liz strode out the door into the babble of the by now well-lubricated glitterati. Pushing through the throng, she escaped out into the welcome night air. Needless to say there wasn’t a taxi to be had on Stephen’s Green. Marcus had sent a limo to collect her and she had expected to be going home in it. But if she had to walk across the Sahara she’d do it rather than ask him for transport.

  Her anger kept her going down Grafton Street and past Trinity until she was across the Liffey and walking the length of O’Connell Street. It was a fine starry night but she never noticed, she was so angry. Why did Marcus Kennedy think he could treat her like that? ‘Because that’s the way he treats all women. Like dirt!’ she muttered to herself, causing a passing couple to give her a wide berth. By now her feet were killing her. Stiletto heels were not the footwear for a long trek home. She half considered taking them off and going barefoot. There wasn’t a taxi to be seen. What would you expect on Friday night? she mused, beginning to feel mighty weary. She was just standing at the traffic lights by the Rotunda waiting to cross the street when a car passed her, slowed down and then reversed. Her heart sank. This was all she needed, a kerb crawler!

  ‘Where are you off to at this hour of the night?’ a deep voice said from the rolled-down window.

  ‘Hi Liz!’ came two more male voices. She gave a sigh of relief; it was Brendan Fagan, a friend of Matt’s, and two other detectives in an unmarked Garda car.

  ‘You lot!’ she grinned.

  ‘Do you want a lift?’ Brendan grinned back.

  ‘I thought that was against regulations,’ she said primly, knowing full well that there was no way they were going to leave her there.

  ‘So it is. You’re under arrest,’ Brendan riposted promptly, getting out and holding the door open for her. Liz climbed gratefully into the back of the car.

  ‘What’s the charge?’ she laughed, sinking into the comfort of the seat and easing her feet out of her shoes. ‘Hi James. Hi Philip!’ she acknowledged the two other men as the car picked up speed and sped off.

  ‘Section 108 against the State – and I must caution you that anything you say can and will be used against you,’ Brendan said in his most official voice.

  ‘Section 108! Never heard of it,’ she scoffed, wriggling her toes with pleasure. She was never going
to wear high heels again, she swore.

  ‘Of course you haven’t – it’s just been invented,’ Brendan informed her. ‘Heels over an inch high are not permitted after midnight on a Friday night if the wearer is unable to procure a taxi.’ He grinned and Liz felt her bad humour lift. There she was, giving out about men and the way they treat women and along had come three lovely blokes who treated her like a queen and always had. Marcus Kennedy was just a rotten apple, here was the rest of the barrel. The trio had been good friends of Matt’s and when he had died they had kept in touch and kept an eye out for her.

  ‘Where did you have to walk from?’ James, the driver, inquired.

  ‘Stephen’s Green,’ she grimaced.

  ‘In those yokes!’ Philip leaned down and held up one of her stilettos. ‘Brave woman! They could be constituted as a dangerous weapon. Tell you what, though?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘We could be persuaded to drop the charges.’

  Liz laughed. ‘All right. You can come in and have a toasted cheese buttie when we get home.’ She knew them of old. She sighed happily. Instead of being a disaster, her night, or rather early morning, had turned into a pleasure. The lads came in and tucked into one of her toasted specialities and gave her all the news before taking their leave of her. Then, running a bath, she poured in a generous amount of Radox, wiped her make-up off with passion-fruit cleansing gel and sank back against the foaming suds, massaging her poor put-upon feet. To hell with Marcus, she decided. She wasn’t going to let their encounter get her down. There were far too many nice people in her world for her to waste her time getting upset over that gurrier.

  She lay back and began to relax, sipping a mug of hot chocolate. Liz always believed in making a production out of a bath. Not a quick five-minute dip for her; she liked to linger. Have a little read, drink a mug of hot chocolate, give herself a facemask. It was one of life’s little luxuries that she treated herself to. It was a great way to unwind, especially if she had been painting all day. Her green-and-peach bathroom was her haven.