‘I’m sorry, Maggie. Don’t cry.’ Devlin was genuinely contrite. ‘What’s the old saying about not judging a person until you’ve stood in their shoes? I’ve no business pontificating.’
Maggie wiped her eyes. ‘I’m always pontificating to you, aren’t I?’ she said wryly to Devlin. ‘You’re entitled to do it. If we’ve something to say to one another, we’ve always said it out straight. That’s one of the reasons the three of us have stayed friends.’
‘What do you think is going to happen, Maggie?’ Caroline asked. ‘Are you going to leave Terry? Are you going to stay with Adam?’
Maggie pushed her plate away; she had no appetite. She had asked herself the same question over and over. Some days she was certain that she was going to leave her husband and bring the children with her to Adam’s. There were other days when she was going to tell Terry to sell the house and make up her mind to live in Wicklow, just herself and the children. Most of the time she felt trapped. How could she uproot the children from their home, their playschool, their friends? They loved their father and he loved them. It wouldn’t be fair on them. What was fair? What was right?
‘Caroline, to tell you the God’s honest truth, I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do,’ she said wearily.
‘This is really good. It’s even better than City Woman.’ Marcy pointed to the sheaf of pages in front of her. ‘It’s as if she’s writing from a deeply personal point of view. There’s great empathy there. The readers are going to love this one.’
‘Great,’ Sandra said with satisfaction. ‘I’ll take a copy of it and read it myself. I love the title . . . A Time to Decide. It’s very snappy, very intriguing. I can’t wait to start selling it in.’
‘With the way Maggie’s writing we’ll have a third book way ahead of schedule. It’s really flowing out of her. She’s writing like a fury. Have you spoken to her lately?’
Sandra shook her head. ‘Not since we took her to lunch before Christmas. I suppose I should telephone and see how she’s getting on. It’s just that I don’t need to get anything organized with her for a few months yet and I wouldn’t like her to think I was hassling her. That’s your job,’ the sales and marketing manager said, grinning. ‘It has been ages though, so maybe I’ll give her a call. She likes to hear the publishing news. That’s what I like about Maggie; she’s interested in it all. Not just what pertains to herself and her own books.’ She threw a questioning look at Marcy. ‘Was there any particular reason you asked me if I’d phoned Maggie?’
‘No,’ Marcy said slowly. ‘I was just wondering if you’d been in touch.’
‘Is anything wrong with her?’ Sandra asked in concern.
Marcy frowned. ‘I don’t know. You know Maggie; she’s usually a very up kind of person. Lately, I feel she’s under some kind of pressure. She hasn’t said anything but she’s not herself.’
‘But she’s writing?’
‘Terrifically well,’ Marcy reiterated.
Sandra took the thick wad of pages from the editor’s desk. ‘I’ll have this photocopied for myself. I’m looking forward to reading it now. If A Time to Decide is as good as you say, then whatever pressure Maggie’s under is obviously good for her writing. So let’s hope it lasts,’ she remarked cheerfully.
‘Can I have popcorn, Mammy?’
‘Where are your manners, Michael?’ Maggie reminded her son.
‘Sorry, can I have popcorn pleassse?’ He put an extra-special emphasis on the please and Maggie hid a smile.
‘Can I have Coke please, Mammy?’ Mimi made sure to have her manners.
‘We’ll all have some.’ Maggie cuddled Shona to her and was rewarded by a sloppy kiss. ‘Right, let’s go,’ she ordered. After her lunch with the girls, she had decided to bring the children to the pictures as a treat. The atmosphere at home had been horrible for the previous few weeks and she was sure they could sense it. Children were very intuitive like that. Mimi had even asked why Maggie was sleeping in the guest-room and not in her own bed and Maggie had explained that she was writing a new book and she had moved into the other bedroom so she could type at night and not keep Daddy awake. To her relief, her daughter seemed to accept her explanation, and sometimes before she went to bed at night, Maggie let her type some letters on the screen of her word processor, which now reposed on the bedside locker in the spare room.
She hadn’t actually lied when she’d said she was writing, because her writing was the only thing that gave her any comfort at the moment. Immersing herself in her characters’ lives released her briefly from the unhappiness of her own. Often she went to bed at nine so as not to have to sit in the sitting-room with Terry in that simmering cauldron of silence that often erupted into harsh words, accusations and recriminations.
She wrote until the early hours of the morning, spurred on by her anger, her resentment and her fear. Because she was fearful about her future. She knew things couldn’t go on like this for ever and if she did leave Terry or he left her she wanted financial independence. Terry would maintain the children – she had no fears for them – but she didn’t want to be beholden to him in any way, and if her writing career took off at least she’d have some money of her own.
Adam was urging her to come and live with him, but in her heart and soul Maggie didn’t think it would work out. Adam, her dreamer, had such unrealistic notions. Adam couldn’t cope with three lively children running around demanding to be fed and entertained, no matter how much he protested that he could. Adam was a bit of a loner – that was why having an affair suited him. Maggie could recognize that. Of anyone she had ever known, he was the most self-sufficient person in terms of not needing other people’s company. Adam was quite happy to write, play with his computer, and see her whenever she could get time to be with him. If he had to put up with the wear and tear of family life, she wasn’t sure if their idyll would stand the strain. Their love affair was not based on reality. It was a paradisiacal few hours once a week, in which real life did not rear its ugly head.
If she were totally honest with herself, she mused, as she drove past St Peter’s Church en route to the Santry Omniplex, she would have to admit that it was easy for Adam to give her the emotional support she craved, especially with regard to her writing. He had no other pressures or commitments to worry him or absorb his time. If he was in Terry’s position, trying to maintain momentum in his business and provide emotional and material security for his three children – all of which, Maggie recognized, Terry did very well – would he be able to keep up the level of support that she had grown so dependent on?
It was a question that had given Maggie much food for thought these past few weeks. She sighed deeply. Devlin hadn’t put a tooth in it when she declared at lunch that there were faults on both sides. It wasn’t a very nice thing to have to admit. But maybe she was so concerned with her own needs and desires that she had neglected Terry. What was it that Devlin said? Two wrongs don’t make a right. Perhaps if she had given a bit more instead of dwelling on her own hurts and resentment, things might have worked out for them. Should she have been as assertive as she was, particularly in the last couple of years? Was it selfish to put herself first now and again; after all, she had as much right as her husband to develop her career and grow as a person. Surely that was not the crime that Terry seemed to think it was. She had given him a hundred per cent support when he’d started out in business. He could have done the same for her. She’d always put herself out for him, she muttered resentfully, as she drove past Dublin City University. A group of students crossed the dual carriageway, laughing and joking on their way to The Slipper pub, and Maggie envied them their carefree gaiety.
‘What did you say, Mammy?’ Michael piped up from the back of the car.
Maggie feigned cheerfulness. ‘Nothing. I was just talking to myself.’
‘Are we nearly there?’ Mimi demanded. ‘I can’t wait!’
‘And I can’t wait mine own self,’ Shona added her tuppenceworth. Maggie felt a
fleeting moment of happiness. She loved her children, with their innocent needs that were so easily fulfilled: feed them, clothe them, keep them warm and dry and lavish love on them. Oh, of course there were days when she could strangle the three of them, but they were good affectionate kids, and watching them develop their individual personalities was a source of great joy to her . . . and to Terry. When she had suggested going to the pictures, you would have thought she had offered them the moon. A trip to Disneyworld wouldn’t have caused as much excitement.
‘We’re nearly there,’ she assured them. There were squeals of excitement from the back seat. No matter what happened, she thought firmly, their happiness would be paramount.
‘Can I go to the toilet?’ Mimi asked, as Maggie paid for the four of them.
‘Of course you can. Come on, we’ll get the popcorn when you’re finished.’
‘Can I go? I’m bursting.’ Michael suddenly discovered that he too had an urgent need to do wee-wee.
‘We’ll all go,’ Maggie decided, leading them across the airy foyer of the cinema, past the snack kiosk and into the immaculate pink-and-grey ladies toilet.
‘I wish Daddy was here,’ Michael announced forlornly.
‘Why, pet?’ Maggie asked gently, as guilt scorched through her.
Her son raised his big brown eyes to her and gave a sigh. ‘’Cos then I could go into the men’s toilet instead of being stuck with all these women,’ he declared in a most hard-done-by tone. There was no answer to that, Maggie thought!
They all thoroughly enjoyed the Disney cartoon, and sitting in the darkened cinema, the three children wide-eyed with excitement, Maggie put her worries aside for a while and joined in the fun.
Driving home in the deepening dusk, Maggie wondered if Terry would be home from work yet. They’d have to talk. Although she’d said their marriage was over as far as she was concerned, the needs of their children had to be considered and they couldn’t continue ignoring each other or fighting, as they’d been doing for the past few weeks.
A thought struck her. It was Nelsie’s birthday the day after tomorrow and her mother always liked to get a card through the post. She’d get one in the Winkel on the Rise. Five minutes later Maggie pulled into the well-stocked newsagents. It had been in this very shop a few years before that she had bought the magazine featuring the novel-writing competition that had made her sit down and write City Woman. Of course, the children all wanted to come in with her but she didn’t mind; they could pick a card for their gran as well and she’d buy the stamps there and post the two in the box outside. She’d noticed that there was an eight o’clock collection so the cards would get to Wicklow in plenty of time. She’d bring her mother down her present at the weekend.
She selected a pretty card with a thoughtful verse for her mother, and watched in amusement as her three youngsters argued over the selection of cards for a grandmother before finally making their choice. Maggie paid the smiling woman behind the counter, wrote her greetings on the card and let the twins stick the stamps on the envelopes. On a spur-of-the-moment impulse, she bought three lottery tickets and let the children scratch them. When they discovered that Michael’s card had won him ten pounds, there was great excitement, and they drove home singing, ‘We’re in the Money.’ Now that Maggie had made up her mind to talk to her husband, she felt marginally more positive about things. What the outcome would be, she had no idea. If Terry was still sulking she could forget it, but maybe he too would have come to the realization that talking was the only way to settle things.
‘Can I buy Daddy something with some of the money?’ Michael asked from a position immediately behind her left ear.
‘I’ve kept him some popcorn,’ Mimi announced proudly.
‘Yes, you can buy your daddy something. We’ll stop at the shop in the village. And you’re a kind girl, Mimi, to keep some popcorn for your daddy.’ Maggie eyed her children in her rearview mirror, noting their proud smiles at her praise. God bless their innocence, she thought with a pang, as she turned left off the Navan Road towards home.
Forty-Two
‘Why don’t you move in with me?’ Ria Kirby suggested, leaning across the table to rub his hand seductively.
Terry sighed and shook his head. ‘What about the kids? It’s not that simple, Ria.’
‘Of course it is!’ the curvaceous black-eyed woman retorted. ‘She’s having an affair; she doesn’t love you; you don’t love her. There’s no point in being miserable. You can always arrange to spend time with the children.’
Terry stood up from the table and helped his companion on with her coat. ‘I’ll see, Ria; I’ll be in touch. I’d better get back to the office.’
‘Spend the night with me?’ she invited. ‘It makes no difference now whether you go home or not. Come on, it’s Friday. You won’t have to get up for work in the morning and I’ll pamper you and bring you breakfast in bed.’ Ria smiled suggestively.
Terry’s eyes brightened. ‘Sounds like just what I need. You always did know how to look after a man, Ria,’ he said, smiling at her.
‘Remember how I always liked to drink champagne in the bath?’ she murmured huskily. ‘I have a bottle at home.’
‘You haven’t changed a bit,’ Terry declared admiringly. ‘I’d really better go, Ria. I’ll phone you.’ He held the door of the restaurant open for her and walked her to her car.
‘Do that!’ She smiled sexily, showing a tantalizing few inches of plump thigh as she got into her Nissan Micra and zoomed out of the car-park.
Terry grinned. She was one fast woman in every sense, Miss Ria Kirby, and he had always been very attracted to her. She worked hard and she played hard and he was glad he’d phoned her and invited her to lunch. It was nice to be appreciated and it was very rewarding to be still fancied by his ex-mistress.
Maggie wasn’t the only one who could play around, he thought grimly, as he sat into his Saab and headed back to the office.
He still found it hard to believe that his wife had actually slept with another man. He would never have considered her capable of infidelity. Terry had always thought that he could count on Maggie’s total loyalty and commitment. A man having an affair was different – and he’d only got involved with Ria when Maggie was pregnant and not very interested in sex. As far as he was concerned, it had just been a bit of a fling. But Maggie had not seen it like that at all. She had made a song and dance about commitment and trust and fidelity. And then, after all her giving out? She upped and went and did the same thing herself.
It made his blood boil when she went on about the emotional support she got from this other bloke. Was she mad? As a man, he knew that the creep she was sleeping with was only enjoying a bit on the side. ‘Emotional support, my hat,’ he muttered, driving around St Stephen’s Green. Who did she think she was fooling? She had done it to get back at him. He should have known, of course. She’d lost weight and had her hair styled differently and sometimes seemed to have a glow about her when she came back from a so-called meeting with her editor. Terry had put it down to the excitement about that novel of hers. She’d made a right fool of him. And then the cheek of her when he asked her if she was going to give the bloke up and she told him it was none of his business. Her own husband, whom she was deceiving – and it was none of his business! By God, but those feminists had a lot to answer for, for putting notions into women’s heads. There was many a woman who would be glad to have what Maggie had, he thought resentfully, pulling into the car-park behind the office. A lovely house, a generous husband, and three lovely kids. Terry’s frown vanished as he thought of the children. This carry-on was not good for them. Only the other day, when he’d snapped the nose off Maggie, his little son had put his arms around Terry’s neck and said anxiously, ‘Don’t be cross with Mammy, Daddy. It makes me feel funny in my tummy.’ Both of them had been horrified. Their one remaining bond was the love they had for their children. Terry would do anything rather than cause them grief.
He might
bring them to the zoo this weekend and make a fuss of them, he decided, as he sat behind his desk and eyed the file he had been working on with something less than enthusiasm. Maybe Maggie would come too, and they could put aside their bad feelings and give the kids a good time. That was, if she didn’t have a date with lover-boy, he thought bitterly. If she’d said she was going to end the affair he might have forgiven her eventually, but knowing that she was still seeing the bastard just stuck in his craw. He’d never have dreamed that they would end up like this, he thought miserably, as he turned his attention to a letter from the tax inspector saying that his client owed eighty thousand pounds in unpaid taxes. His client was in a fine bloody mess, and his marriage had broken up too. Life was a bitch, Terry thought, as he bent his head and tried to make sense of the figures in front of him.
‘You’re in great humour, Ria,’ Joan, one of the girls in the office, declared, listening to her supervisor humming the Roy Orbison hit, ‘Anything You Want You Got It’.
‘I’m always in great humour,’ Ria retorted. ‘I’m gasping for a cup of coffee. I’m going up to the canteen. If a phone call comes for me, make sure to put it through.’
‘There’s obviously a new man on the scene,’ said Anne, the typist, with a grin. ‘I know the signs.’
‘Did you hear her: “I’m always in great humour.” She’s hilarious! No wonder she’s still on the shelf at forty – no man would put up with her moods,’ Joan snorted. ‘She’s not the only one who’s “gasping for a cup of coffee”. And she’s only come back from her lunch!’
‘That’s one of the perks of being a supervisor: the more you earn the less you work,’ agreed Anne. ‘Maybe this new guy will whisk her up the aisle and she’ll take her gratuity and leave us in peace.’
‘You may as well dream here as in bed,’ Joan said dryly. She’d seen Ria’s men come and go. Why should this one be any different?
Ria sipped her black coffee and smiled happily to herself. To think that Terry had called her and invited her to lunch! It had been a bolt from the blue, a very welcome bolt. Of all the men she had ever dated, Terry Ryan was the one she had really fallen for. She had met him when she was out in Saudi in the eighties, and their subsequent affair had been the best time of her life. When Terry had ended it, after they had come back to Dublin and his wife had caught them making love in the shower in their bedroom, Ria had been devastated. She had always secretly hoped that one day he would leave Maggie for her. Now, after hearing the sorry saga of his wife’s affair, Ria couldn’t suppress the hope and excitement that bubbled inside her. She had been thrilled to hear that Maggie was having an affair, although to tell the truth she’d never have thought that Miss Goody Twoshoes had it in her. It was obvious that Terry was disgusted about it. Well, the more angry and disgusted the better. That would suit her purposes admirably. This time he wouldn’t be too eager to go back to his wife, and she’d make sure that he wouldn’t want to. Oh yes! Ria thought happily, she could just visualize that gold ring on the third finger of her left hand.
City Woman Page 37
