by Anita Notaro
‘Tell me about it.’ I smiled sadly. ‘It was just one of her talents. No matter how often I skirted around a point, she’d give me a couple of minutes – at most – before she’d tell me I was talking utter rubbish and then say what she thought the real issue was. It used to throw me when I got to know her first, but over the years I relied on it more and more, and when I had a problem I always found myself wanting to ring her, even to half tell her what was in my head, because she invariably made sense of it before I did.’
‘So how’re you holding up?’ He reached out and pulled me towards him. He seemed to know exactly when I needed a strong arm around me these days.
‘Thanks, I needed that,’ I said into his chest, and as he loosened his grip slightly and tilted my face in order to look at me properly I saw someone I knew well heading towards me.
‘Mum?’ I said, confused. I felt myself stiffen slightly, which was at odds with my first thought which was ‘Thank God you’re here, I need you.’
Mike swivelled around just as my mother swooped. She grabbed me but didn’t immediately hug me, simply held me at arm’s length and said, ‘It’s OK, darling. It’ll all be OK, I promise.’ I must have looked stunned, because she too tilted my face up, but this time it felt like she was reminding me who she was. ‘It’s such appalling news, I am absolutely shattered.’ She put her arms around me, and it was only then I realized that my sister Becky was with her. She grabbed me too, which felt odd, because my family were not huggers.
‘How did you get here – I mean, when?’ I asked Mum.
‘This morning. I had trouble with connecting flights so I wasn’t sure I’d make it in time, which is why I didn’t tell you.’ She smiled. ‘I didn’t want to upset you by not turning up after all.’
Either I’d got the wrong mother, or she’d had a brain transplant, I decided. Martha had never worried about upsetting me before.
‘I’ll see you later.’ Mike made to move away, but I grabbed his arm – in a vice grip, I only realized a few seconds later, when he tried to prise my fingers away.
‘No,’ I said, and he practically fell over I pulled him towards me so fast. ‘I’d like to introduce you to my family. This is Mike, he’s a . . . client of mine but he’s also a friend and he’s been fantastic to me since . . . all this happened.’ It was all I could think of.
Martha had him in a vice grip in an instant, but then she’d never been one to let a man away if she could help it. ‘Thank you. Thank you so much.’ She kept releasing him then grabbing him again. ‘It means so much to me that someone’s been looking after her for me.’ It was so outrageous that it almost gave me the only laugh of the week, or it would have if it hadn’t been so totally false-sounding. My mother barely knew my phone number, never remembered my birthday and would be hard pushed to recognize my face in a police line-up it was so long since she’d seen me.
‘Hello.’ Mike shook hands as soon as she put him down. Becky took over then, thankfully, and explained that when Mum had heard the awful news she felt she needed to see her two daughters.
‘We should probably go in.’ Mike indicated the thinning crowd. ‘By the way, Ronan rang and said he might be a bit late so not to wait for him.’
‘Thanks for telling me. Yes, we’d better.’ I linked my arm in his and whispered, ‘Could you stay with me, please? I’m not sure how much of my new, caring mother I can take this morning.’
‘Sure.’ He grinned. ‘Families, eh? They’re an acquired taste – at least mine is. Still, you must be delighted she came. Where did you tell me she lived again?’
‘San Diego,’ I murmured. ‘And Martha is definitely an acquired taste, trust me.’
‘She’s a good-looking woman all the same.’ He winked, and as I looked at her I realized why I nearly hadn’t recognized her. She looked normal. Normal as in middle-class, well-heeled wife, that is. No cleavage – well, not much anyway – discreet jewellery and high heels. There was something up though, otherwise why would she be here, out of the blue? I realized I needed Maddy around to find out what. She’d have had the entire story out of Martha in a flash.
37
YOU COULDN’T HAVE SAT THROUGH THE CEREMONY WITHOUT getting a real sense of Maddy, even if you hadn’t known her. Her family had done an amazing job organizing it, in spite of their shock and sorrow. I’d always known they were a tightly knit bunch, but this smacked of a military operation. Everyone, it seemed, had a role. Her colleagues from TV walked on to the altar at the start with mementoes of her life as an actor. And each one told the congregation of the significance of it. There were lots of tearful laughs, especially when the awful hairnet she’d worn for so long on Southside Girls appeared. Everyone who’d ever met her knew how much she hated it. ‘The minute they call “Cut”, I yank it off. The make-up girls go mad,’ she’d told me once. ‘That’s because as soon as I do it the bloody director calls for another take and they have to do my hair all over again, but I don’t care.’
Her brothers and sisters all said the Prayers of the Faithful, each one special to Maddy, so that we prayed for all the things that were close to her heart. Her favourite nephew and her only godchild brought up the gifts, and all the while a gospel choir sang and people choked back tears. Maddy loved singing, she used to waft around the place clapping and singing ‘Oh Happy Day’ and always said she wished she’d been born black so she could sing gospel properly, and now this group sang their hearts out for her.
Just before the end of the mass I was asked to say a few words, and Martha was clearly delighted that I’d been chosen to speak. I was sandwiched between her and Mike, and she prodded me even before the priest had finished.
‘When Maddy and I first found each other all those years ago, we knew, right away, that we’d always be friends,’ I told the crowd. ‘I just never thought I’d have to do without her. She slept in my bed the night before she died, she gave up Christmas dinner with her beloved family because I was on an adventure she wanted to be part of, and the last words she said to me as she leaned out of the taxi on the night she died were “Love you, babe.”’ I saw Connie get upset then, so I went on to talk about more general things, what a lousy cook she was, how she’d talk to anyone – homeless men under the arch at the Halfpenny Bridge or superstars she met in make-up – because Maddy treated everyone the same.
‘I can’t tell you how much I’ll miss her in my life,’ I finished up by saying. ‘We had so many wonderful, crazy plans and, in a way, I’d built all my dreams around her.’ I had more, but suddenly it was as if I’d only just realized that all my dreams had in fact died with her that night, or at least that’s how it felt, so I simply shut up and bowed my head and let the tears flow. My legs refused to budge when I tried to get off the altar and I saw the priest rise, but Mike got there first. He put one arm around me and cupped my elbow with his other hand and led me gently back to my seat.
‘I can’t go to the grave,’ I told him as soon as we sat down.
‘That’s fine,’ he said. But as we filed out behind the coffin, so many people came to tell me they felt they knew me from over-hearing Maddy cracking up on the phone sometimes when we talked, or simply to hug me and say, ‘Don’t give up on your dreams, she’ll come back and haunt you if you do,’ that by the time the cortege was ready to leave I knew I had to see this through and throw my white rose on her coffin and beg her to keep an eye out for me.
In the end it was Clodagh who finally cracked as the coffin was lowered, so I had to concentrate all my efforts to keep her going, which made it a bit easier for me. Mike and I linked her as we made our way back to the cars, and he rubbed her back and soothed her just as he had me.
‘Thanks for rescuing me on the altar,’ I told him when we were back at the hotel having lunch with her family and friends and anyone who’d travelled or had the time to spare.
‘I’d love to take the credit but, to be honest, I probably wouldn’t have done it except your mother practically drop-kicked me out of the pew.’ He
grinned. ‘I would have expected her, or your sister, to go get you, but they seemed paralysed and suddenly I found myself in the aisle with a foot attached to my arse.’
I burst out laughing. It was so typical of my mother and sister, they were useless in a crisis, and anyway, if there was any crying in public to be done it was usually one of them so consequently neither of them knew how to react when they were forced into the role of carer with me.
‘You really do overestimate my family if you think either of them would have come to get me,’ I told Mike.
‘Not that I wouldn’t have done it or anything – I did, as it happens – but I just felt it should have been one of them.’
‘Well, thank you for accepting the kick up the ass so graciously. For just a second or two I felt incapable of putting one foot in front of the other, which was strange, considering I couldn’t wait for it to be over because I was so nervous.’
‘You were perfect,’ Mike said. ‘If anyone is half as nice about me when I die, or cares as much, I’ll be delighted.’
‘Well, I think you’ll be too dead to care one way or the other, no? But I’d bet Louis would be well into the dramatic speech at your funeral, and I’d also bet that it’d be one for the record books.’ I giggled as Mike squashed his face like a bulldog.
‘If (a) you’re alive, (b) still talking to me and (c) you let Louis anywhere near my funeral arrangements, you’ll have more to worry about than a suspected intruder,’ he told me. ‘And Pete will be useless because I’ll be a ghost and, trust me, I will be lurking around you for years.’
Connie joined us then to thank me for speaking and I told her about my mother kicking Mike out to go and get me.
‘Your mother’s changed,’ she said simply. ‘I think she misses her two girls and wants more of them in her life.’
‘Connie, there’re not many people I could say this in front of, but it needs to be aired and Mike has some idea of my dysfunctional family after today, but you’ve been more of a mother to me for the last ten years than Martha has ever been.’ Strangely, I didn’t feel sad saying it, and in a way it was the final proof of how far I’d come.
‘Come ’ere to me, darlin’, and gimme a hug.’ I did as she asked and she held me tight. ‘You know without me saying it that I’m always here for you.’ She sat back down. ‘And now more than ever I’m going to need you to keep in touch, because I won’t hear about you from Maddy.’ This time, Mike and I both put our arms around her. ‘But relationships with kids are complicated more often than not. We all make mistakes, and children when they grow up make them too. It’s just that, as parents, we’re always expected to get it right, and the fact is they don’t give you a manual when you give birth.’ She smiled. ‘There should be a Reader’s Digest, I think, or a Delia equivalent – a load of tried and tested methods that never fail.’
I thought again of all my clients and their various complications where kids were concerned and knew she was right. It was hard to be perfect, and the parent and child bond was so special that by its very nature it was also fragile. ‘You’re right, of course,’ I told her. ‘I suppose all relationships need to be nurtured.’
‘Well, you’re a great girl, always have been. I know your childhood wasn’t what it should have been. Maddy told me that you’d lost out on a lot. But you’ve turned into a fine young woman and I notice you’re much more content recently so I want you to come and talk to me any time if you need help, OK? In fact, come whether you need it or not.’
‘OK.’ I swallowed hard and hugged her again, and I noticed Mike watching the two us.
‘And go easy on your mother, even if she is only doing now what she should have done years ago.’
‘Yes, boss.’ I smiled.
After a few hours of talking non-stop I was wiped out, so Mike offered to drop me home.
‘I’m actually going back to Bray tonight, I’ve decided, so I’ll grab a cab and pick up Pete on the way,’ I told him. ‘Clodagh’s sister was always going to stay with her tonight anyway – she’s up from Kilkenny for a course – so she’ll be glad to see the back of me, I reckon. And you’ve been so good, I can’t tell you how much your support has meant, but I’m sure you won’t be sorry to get your life back either.’
‘Well, you lot have sort of crept into my life, to be honest. You’re quite a threesome.’ He realized what he’d said straightaway. ‘What I meant was—’
‘It’s OK, I know what you meant,’ I told him softly. ‘And you’re right, we were quite a threesome, that’s what’s so hard about all this. When I think of my future without her in it, it just doesn’t seem to work.’
‘I know. Come on.’ He put his arm around me. ‘Let’s go collect Pete.’
‘Are you sure you have time?’
‘Certain.’ We said our goodbyes, and I promised to call Connie next day. By the time I sat in the car and the heat kicked in, I realized that I’d be asleep long before we reached Bray if I wasn’t careful.
‘I’ll go get Pete.’ I jumped out for air as soon as we arrived at Mary’s. ‘Will I borrow a towel so that he won’t destroy your leather seats?’
Mike smiled. ‘I love my car, but I’m not anal about it.’ He leaned out the window. ‘And why are you worrying about my car seats? Where’s the new Lulu you told me about when I first met you? Besides, have you not got enough on your plate just now?’
‘Think I’m just trying to pretend that life is normal,’ I told him. ‘I really couldn’t care less about your seats, if you must know.’
‘That’s my girl – normality doesn’t suit you anyway.’
Pete was paralysed when he saw me first. After staring at me for a second he flung himself on me and danced about like a circus animal. He had a look of pure joy on his face and he licked me wet. In the car he sat on the back seat with his head as close to me as he could manage. I stroked him and talked to him and told him how much I’d missed him all the way home.
‘OK, let’s get you two inside.’ Mike opened the door for me. ‘You bring Pete; I’ll carry in your luggage.’
The place was freezing, it was as cold inside as it was outdoors. ‘Listen, I’m not sure you should stay here, it’s like walking into a fridge. Why don’t you stay at our place – we have a spare room?’
‘No, honestly, it’ll warm up really quickly once I turn the heat and the gas fire on,’ I told him. ‘Can I offer you a cup of coffee? Something stronger?’
‘No, I’d better go check on a few emails. Sure you’ll be OK?’
‘Yeah, I’m fine. You go. And thanks again.’ I reached out and gave him a hug and, just like before, he buried me against him and I felt safe.
‘Goodnight. Call me if you need anything, won’t you?’
‘Will do.’ I pulled away reluctantly, and he headed off, and I realized as soon as his engine noise died away that this was what I’d been dreading, finding myself alone with no best friend to have a giggle with if it all got too much. Pete jumped up on my lap, something he’d never done before. Even after all this time together he was usually so happy to be back with me that he made himself scarce until I’d settled in, just in case.
‘Oh Pete, how will I ever get through this?’ I asked him, and he looked at me with the saddest eyes as if to say, ‘I know how much you loved her but you still have me.’
The tears came then, and I sat and cried a bucketful, and Pete never took his eyes off my face, just snuggled in tighter. Then I heard a noise and my heart jumped, but Pete wasn’t worried so that calmed me down. I was still wondering if I’d imagined it when the door opened and Mike walked in. He took one look at me, blotchy and curled up in a ball with a dog, and said, ‘As soon as I drove away I had a feeling you’d be like this, so I got us fish and chips so that you could at least eat while you bawled on my shoulder.’
If he’d given me a winning Lotto ticket it wouldn’t have meant as much to me as what he’d done. ‘I’m just so lonely without her,’ I started again.
‘I know you
are.’ Mike busied himself setting out the food, then he sat beside me, handed me a box of tissues and told me to tuck in. ‘But you’re strong, you’ll get there and, knowing Maddy, she’ll be up there watching over you and bossing God around, making sure everyone she loves is top of his list when it comes to happiness.’
38
THE FOLLOWING DAYS WERE SOME OF THE TOUGHEST I’D HAD TO deal with. There was still a fair bit of publicity surrounding Maddy’s death and it seemed everywhere I went her picture haunted me. Also, everyone wanted to talk about it, which I found the hardest part. Eventually – after I saw the photo of the three of us taken the night of the launch on the front of one newspaper – I stopped going into newsagents and asked Mary to warn people I wasn’t up to discussing it just yet. Eventually I ran out of tears.
I was dropping in to see Connie every second day. Her neighbours were guarding her as if she was royalty and her children were cleaning, cooking and shopping for her, so I knew she was well looked after. In some ways, it was me seeking comfort from her instead of the other way round, and our meetings had a bitter-sweet tinge to them, because sometimes she’d look at me in a certain way, or smile Maddy’s smile, and my heart would turn over. I knew she was suffering too, because most days she seemed to be looking for reminders of the daughter she’d lost. Whenever I visited she showed me a photo of the two of them, or pulled out a birthday card that boasted ‘For the World’s Greatest Mum’, or wore a scarf or other item that Maddy had brought back from her travels. She looked so lost as she ran her hands over the precious items it made me realize that we needed each other equally now.
‘I desperately want to feel her near me,’ she told me more than once, and I knew exactly what she meant.
‘Me too,’ I agreed. ‘Yesterday I went back through loads of emails she’d sent recently, and it was hard, but in a funny way it gave me comfort, as if reading her words brought her back into my life for a moment or two.’
