Something in Common

by Meaney, Roisin

He responded with a grunt that could have meant anything.

  ‘I’ll send her in.’ Catherine took her finger off the button. ‘Good luck.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Helen strode to his door and tapped. No response. Bugger him. She opened the door and stuck in her head. ‘Good morning,’ she said.

  Breen stood by the open window, arms folded, shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows as usual. ‘Well?’

  Hello to you too. Helen closed the door behind her and took the chair facing his desk. No point in waiting to be asked.

  Her third visit to his office in eight years, the last two times at his instigation, to brief her on commissions that needed more than just a phone conversation. This time, she was showing up of her own accord.

  ‘I’ve brought the piece you wanted on the abortion referendum.’

  ‘You could have left it with Catherine. Or posted it.’

  He sounded weary more than cranky. Maybe he’d just had a bad night.

  ‘I could,’ she said, ‘but I thought I’d come in and give it to you in person. I’m nice like that.’ She reached into her bag and drew out the envelope.

  ‘You’re after something,’ he said, as she laid it on his desk.

  She gave him her most innocent look. On some level, and given the right mood, she almost enjoyed their exchanges. ‘You’re such a cynic. Can’t your favourite freelancer come and say hello without being suspected of having ulterior motives?’

  He came and sat at his desk then, interlaced his fingers as he studied her, ignoring the envelope. ‘O’Dowd, you were born with ulterior motives.’

  She resisted telling him, again, that her name was Fitzpatrick. There were dark shadows under his eyes, a droop to his shoulders. Something had taken the fire out of him. Not her problem. ‘Actually,’ she said, mentally crossing her fingers, ‘there is something I thought I’d run by you.’

  His expression didn’t change. He regarded her stonily. Mightn’t be bad-looking if he bothered to smile. He was no Al Pacino, but there was nothing you’d run screaming from either. Eyes shockingly blue, still less grey in the dark hair than you’d expect from a man who must by now be on the wrong side of fifty. Teeth OK, on the rare occasions she was allowed a glimpse.

  ‘I’ve been writing for you for almost eight years,’ she began. ‘I presume you like my work, you’ve never turned anything down—’

  ‘You want more money.’

  The same resigned tone as before. Something banged to the floor outside, clattered a few times before it went silent. Someone laughed, a long, rich peal.

  ‘It’s the first time I’ve asked,’ Helen said. She couldn’t read him: nothing in his face gave her any clue. ‘I’ve never looked for parity with your male freelancers, although I’m assuming you’re paying them more.’

  He got to his feet abruptly. She was going to be thrown out, told never to come near him again. He walked to the door and opened it. The end of a beautiful friendship. Just as well she had a few more irons in the fire, although his cheques would be sorely missed.

  ‘I’ll talk to Accounts,’ he said. Just like that.

  Helen, ready for a fight, was thrown. She reached to the floor for her bag, got slowly to her feet. Probably best not to pin him down to actual figures.

  At the door she stopped. ‘You OK?’ she asked, the question out before she’d had time to consider the wisdom of it.

  For the first time she saw a change in his face, a slight narrowing of the eyes. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

  ‘Just asking,’ she said, holding his gaze. ‘Well, thank you for that.’

  He inclined his head a fraction as she walked past him and left the room. She heard the door clicking shut as she approached Catherine’s desk.

  The PA smiled brightly at her. ‘Everything all right?’

  ‘Everything’s fine,’ Helen told her. ‘Everything is just dandy.’

  Walking back to the car, she wondered what, or who, had knocked the stuffing out of him. She’d never met his wife, had no idea if he had children. He knew she had Alice; he’d sent her a blue elephant when she’d broken her wrist once, years ago. It still sat at the bottom of Alice’s bed, dressed these days in one of her old Talking Heads T-shirts.

  She was getting a rise: she’d splash out on the strength of it. She stopped at the shopping centre and bought a bra and knickers in black lace. It amused her to think that Breen was paying, but Oliver would get the benefit.

  When she got home, she washed the breakfast dishes and cleared the table. As she was feeding paper into her typewriter, the doorbell rang.

  ‘Morning.’ The parcel postman gave her his usual cheery wink. ‘Two for the price of one.’

  She’d never seen him without a smile on his face. Maybe it was easy to be happy when you spent your day driving around delivering parcels to people. Maybe Breen should think about a change of career, drive a florist’s van or something.

  In the kitchen she regarded the two packets. One a light-as-a-feather A4 padded envelope addressed to herself, the other a smaller, more solid rectangle, wrapped in lavender paper stamped with cavorting kittens and tied with a pink bow, and addressed to Alice.

  They were both from Sarah, her return address printed neatly in the top corner of each package. A padded envelope for Helen, a parcel for Alice. What was going on?

  She put Alice’s delivery aside and turned her attention to her own. She slit the top and reached inside and pulled out a wispy scarf in swirls of gold and burnt orange and burgundy.

  She turned the envelope upside down and Sarah’s letter slid out. She scanned it till she got to I’m enclosing a small token, for no particular reason other than I saw it and thought you might like it.

  A small token. A present. Helen’s first present in years, if you didn’t count the money she got from her parents every birthday and Christmas.

  But this wasn’t her birthday, it was nowhere near it, and Christmas was months away. And they never exchanged birthday or Christmas presents anyway. She ran a hand along the scarf, pressed it to her face. Not silk, like Cormac’s scarf, the one she’d given to the woman on the bridge, but similar in design, with its swirls of colour.

  She closed her eyes and was back there, alone and terrified until the stranger on her bicycle had come along. She tried to summon up an image of the other woman. She could remember a trouser suit – green, was it, or blue? – and fairish hair, but the face was gone.

  Helen recalled how upset the woman had become, once she’d realised what was going on. Did she ever think about that day now? Did she shudder at the memory of it, or had she forgotten all about it as soon as she’d got to wherever she’d been going?

  She had Helen’s scarf, though, as a reminder. Or maybe she’d never worn it. Maybe she’d dropped it into the river as soon as she could, or left it tied around the railings in case the owner came back for it.

  Helen opened her eyes, unsettled by the memory of that day. The sheepskin coat she’d worn, Cormac’s coat, much too big for her but the only one she’d used since his death. Stuffed a few weeks later into a bag in the attic, the sight of it suddenly too sad for her to cope with. The maroon Beetle – his car – traded in a few months after that, another reminder that had become too painful.

  She returned to Sarah’s letter.

  How’s your romance? I hope it’s going well.

  Her romance, as if Oliver was arriving with flowers and chocolates, as if he was taking her out every week to dinner and the theatre, or whisking her to Paris for the weekend. Of course Sarah would find a quaint name for it, even though Helen had made it clear that romance played little part in what she and Oliver had been doing together for the past several months.

  Hope Alice is getting used to him.

  Her smile faded. Alice was decidedly not getting used to him. Last time he’d shown up for dinner she’d stayed in her room, coming out only after he and Helen had moved to the bedroom. Helen had heard her pattering down the stairs, the sharp click of the kitchen light swit
ch.

  She’d pictured her wolfing down the remains of the chicken pie, and had felt little sympathy. Alice was twelve, not a toddler, and her mother was far from past it. Let her sulk in her room when Oliver came around, if it kept her happy: Helen was going to enjoy having a younger man in her bed for however long it lasted.

  Neil asked me a few days ago, out of the blue, if I’d consider adoption.

  So they’d finally arrived at adoption. Helen had wondered how long it would take them. Three miscarriages would be enough, surely, to set anyone thinking about alternative means of coming into possession of a child.

  I must admit I flew off the handle a bit.

  She tried to imagine equable, reasonable, soft-hearted Sarah flying off any handle, and found it difficult.

  Am I being terribly selfish and short-sighted?

  Selfish, from someone who probably couldn’t bring herself to swat a fly in case it had a family that cared about it.

  She finished Sarah’s letter and laid it aside, and returned her attention to Breen’s latest demand: a piece on the buying frenzy that had descended on American toyshops as parents fought one another, literally, for a doll that had supposedly been ‘born’ in a cabbage patch, and came complete with its own birth certificate.

  ‘You want me to write about dolls?’ she’d asked him incredulously.

  ‘It’s the madness of consumerism you’re writing about. A thousand words by the end of Tuesday.’

  So she’d done her homework, with the help of her local library’s collection of US magazines and newspapers, and she’d visited the American Embassy and eventually found someone willing to tell her what they knew about the Cabbage Patch dolls phenomenon.

  When she got home from school, Alice regarded the lavender-wrapped package silently.

  ‘Aren’t you going to open it?’ Helen asked. ‘Don’t you want to see what she sent?’

  Alice began to untie the ribbon. ‘Why did she send me a present? She doesn’t even know me, and it’s not my birthday. And it looks sissy anyway.’

  Helen counted to ten in her head, a little too rapidly. ‘She knows me,’ she said evenly, ‘and she probably thought it would be a kind thing to do. And I’m sure she spent a long time making it look pretty.’ Poor, innocent Sarah, thinking her present would be appreciated.

  Alice undid the wrapping paper and lifted out a book. ‘It’s got my name on it,’ she said.

  It was a beautiful hardback edition. ‘It’s very famous,’ Helen told her. ‘I read it when I was your age.’

  Alice picked up a slip of paper that had fallen from the book. Over her shoulder Helen read Happy Unbirthday, Alice – when you read the book you’ll know what it means! Love, Sarah Flannery (your mum’s friend) xxx

  Alice dropped the slip and began to turn the pages. ‘What’s it about?’

  ‘It’s about a girl who discovers a secret place called Wonderland. There’s a talking cat in it, and a baby who turns into something else, and a weird guy called the Mad Hatter. It’s very cool, actually.’

  She’d forgotten Alice in Wonderland. She’d forgotten the marvellous escape of it, curled on her bed while the rain lashed outside. She wondered if Alice, who rarely picked up a book, would get beyond the first chapter.

  ‘Was that why you called me Alice, after her?’

  ‘Yup.’

  Little white lie, did nobody any harm. She’d been named after Alice Cooper, whose music Helen had loved – Cormac had been going to name the next baby – but for the purposes of interesting her in Sarah’s present, let her think Lewis Carroll’s Alice had been the inspiration. ‘You must write and say thank you,’ Helen said.

  ‘Why can’t you just tell her I said thanks? She’s your friend.’

  ‘Because she sent it to you, not to me. And because you won’t get any pocket money till you do.’

  Never five minutes away from a battle, the two of them.

  Sarah

  Both letters arrived on the same day, less than a week after she’d sent the presents. Both envelopes had been addressed in Helen’s forward-tilting handwriting. Sarah brought them back into the kitchen.

  Neil looked up. ‘Anything for me?’

  ‘No.’ She stood by the sink and opened the envelope with Helen’s return address in the top corner.

  Sarah

  Presents for both of us, and nowhere near our birthdays – what a lovely surprise. Thanks so much, the scarf is beautiful. Reminds me of one I had years ago and lost, so this will be a fitting substitute.

  Alice was charmed with her book, loved the girly wrapping too. When I saw what you’d sent I wondered if you’d wasted your money, as she’s not a big reader, but she actually started it that evening, and she’s had her nose stuck in it ever since, so well done.

  She’s written you a letter; I’ll post it off with this. Apologies for the misspellings that I’m sure it’s littered with – she refused to let me see it. Spelling is definitely not her forte. The only school subject she shows any interest in is art, and her drawing is quite good, but how many people make a living out of drawing pictures? I have visions of supporting her till I’m ninety. Hope she finds her vocation in secondary school, hard to believe she’s starting in just over a month.

  Bit of good news – I asked Breen for a rise, and I got it. Wasn’t sure how much it was going to be till today, when I got a pretty decent cheque, more than I thought he’d give. Must be getting soft in his old age. Not that he’s old – fifties-ish – just a cranky bastard most of the time. But what do I care, as long as he goes on paying me?

  And speaking of cranky bastards, my neighbour gave me a particularly filthy look over the hedge this morning. I’m guessing he’d spotted my younger man leaving earlier, and I’ve decided he’s either scandalised that I’m enjoying a healthy sex life or hopping mad that he isn’t getting any himself.

  Right, on to the serious stuff: Neil’s talking about adoption and you don’t want to hear. The way I see it, you were born to be a mum. Naturally you want to produce your own baby, and so far it hasn’t happened, which is not to say it never will.

  You say adopting would feel like accepting defeat, which I don’t get. What’s defeatist about giving a home to a child? How would it change your chances of conceiving? You and Neil could still keep trying – only difference is you’d have a real live baby to keep you company while you do. Just don’t dismiss it out of hand.

  Think about having a baby in the house. How long would you say it would take you to fall in love with it? I’d put a tenner on less than five minutes. And once it was rocking your world, would it really matter that you hadn’t given birth to it? Same feeding, changing, burping, same sleepless nights … all the gain (if you consider that gain) and none of the pain – and believe me, giving birth is like discovering a whole new city of pain.

  You’d soon get used to never, and I mean never, sleeping as long as you wanted – not to mention the tantrums and the spills and the falls and the fevers and your grandmother’s antique vase in pieces and your lipstick in the toilet bowl and the trips to A&E with a broken something or other. The many joys of having a little person in the house.

  I rest my case. I’m not trying to influence you, just telling you how I see it. Feel free to ignore me if none of this is making sense to you.

  Must fly, a piece on the Divorce Action Group to deliver to Breen in three hours, and only halfway through it. He’ll be demanding his rise back. No prizes for guessing which way you’d vote in a divorce referendum, Mrs Happily-Married-Forever.

  Be good. Look after yourself. Thanks again for our surprises.

  H

  She folded the letter and slid it back into its envelope, and ripped open the second.

  ‘More tea?’ Neil asked. She shook her head and read the short, ink-stained message on the lined sheet.

  Dear Mrs Flanery

  My mother said I had to write to you or I wouldent get any poket money. Thank you for the book. I was called after the Alice in
it. I think its a good storey but I didn’t like wen the baby turned into a pig, that bit was yuk. I liked the cat, he was cool. OK I hav to go and do my homework.

  from Alice Fitzpatrick

  ‘Good news?’

  Sarah looked up.

  ‘You’re smiling,’ he said.

  She handed him the sheet. ‘I sent Helen’s daughter a copy of Alice in Wonderland.’

  He read it, a grin spreading across his own face. ‘Was it her birthday?’

  ‘No … I just felt like it.’

  He held out the note, and as Sarah took it he grabbed her hand. ‘I love you,’ he said, ‘and I don’t deserve you.’

  It was unexpected. He wasn’t good at romantic pronouncements. Sarah squeezed his hand, met his grey gaze behind the glasses. ‘Of course you deserve me,’ she said, pulling him to his feet. She rested her head against his chest, raised the fingers still entwined in hers and put them to her lips, felt his heart beating under the checked flannel shirt she’d bought for him the week before. They stood unspeaking for a minute or so, his free hand cradling her head.

  They’d make good parents: they’d give a baby a settled, loving home. She’d think about adoption. It couldn’t hurt to think about it.

  1987

  Helen

  She squinted through the landing window. Was that a dandelion on Malone’s lawn? She stared at the small bright yellow splotch in the middle of the otherwise immaculate rectangle of perfectly striped grass, and tried to remember when she’d seen him last.

  Not anytime during the past week she was sure, up to her eyes with three books waiting to be reviewed, and Breen yelling for her take on AIDS in Ireland, and the drama with Alice last Thursday. Yes, at least a week – more, maybe two – since Malone had been spotted.

  She frowned at the weed. Was he sick? Did she care? She had no idea if he had family – she’d never seen a visitor calling. Not that she was keeping track, but with the houses so huddled together, and her working from home, it was hard to avoid being aware of the general comings and goings in the neighbourhood.