by Sharon Owens
‘Now, listen, stud. I want it to be different tonight. I want you to take things slowly. Kiss me first, gently. No, keep your hands on my back. Caress me very softly.’
‘Like this?’ He moved his palms across her waist and up to her shoulder blades.
‘Mmmm. That’s lovely. Touch the skin on my neck with the tip of your tongue. Softly, Kevin.’
‘I thought you liked me to be passionate?’
‘I do, pet. But at the very end, not at the beginning. You see?’
‘Okay.’
‘Tease me. Make me think you might stop at any moment.’
‘Will that make you want me more?’
‘Yes.’
‘Women! Are you all this hard to understand?’
‘Yes.’
He licked her neck as softly as he could, and kept up the caressing at the same time. For half an hour, there was no sound in the pale blue bedroom except for the ticking of the Belleek china clock on the mantelpiece, and the sensual sighs of Kevin McGovern and his dark-haired wife, Kate. It was very soothing for both of them.
‘Tell me I’m beautiful,’ she said, in a whisper.
‘You’re beautiful,’ he said, and then he laughed. ‘You know you’re beautiful.’
‘Don’t laugh! Look me in the eyes and tell me I’m beautiful, as if it never dawned on you before how lovely I am. Try to keep a straight face, Kevin. Try to look serious for a minute.’
‘You’re beautiful,’ he whispered, and he looked directly into her eyes, and he didn’t laugh, and Kate felt a faint flutter of excitement stirring within her.
‘Women need to feel attractive to enjoy lovemaking,’ she said.
‘Every time?’
‘Yes. Every single time.’
‘Okay, I’ll remember that.’
‘Now, close your eyes and kiss me on the mouth.’
‘Softly?’ he asked.
‘Yes. Very softly. Just brush your lips against my lips.’ This was slightly embarrassing, discussing sex in such detail, but it had to be done.
‘With my lips closed?’ Kevin wanted to know.
‘Yes. And mine, too. For a while.’
‘Then open?’
‘Yes.’
‘Who’ll open their lips first?’
‘I will. It’s symbolic.’
‘You mean, you’re ready for the next bit?’
‘Now, you’re getting the hang of it.’
She smiled at him, and kissed his hands. They were rugged and scratched from fixing cars, but also very tender and vulnerable-looking. He was really very appealing, in a strong and physical way. And he was listening to her commands and submitting himself to her guidance. That meant he trusted her and wanted to learn how to please her in bed. She realized she did love him very much.
‘Now. You can touch your favourite bits,’ she purred.
He moved his hands around to her sides, and very gradually, began to touch her breasts; concentrating not just on the sensitive nipples, but on the soft mounds surrounding them. He even kissed her collarbones and breathed warm air on her neck. He said her perfume was lovely. She felt very relaxed. Kate ran her fingers through his blond highlights and over his broad back, and enjoyed their lovemaking as she never had before. He massaged her shoulders and she kissed his cheekbones and told him he was sexy and a wonderful lover.
Then, when she was ready, she turned him over onto his back and knelt over him, and guided his movements until they became faster and faster and they both reached a peak of pleasure at exactly the same time. She was delighted when Kevin kissed her hand afterwards and said, ‘Thank you,’ without having to be told.
They lit a scented candle, and lay in each other’s arms, listening to the rain outside on the street, and Kate knew that she had married the right man. Even though she’d been on Valium when she took her sacred vows.
Several hours later, when Kevin was still sound asleep with a smile on his face, Kate slipped out of bed and went downstairs. She sat in the kitchen for a while, sipping tea and drawing up plans in a notebook. Adding up figures and calculating debts. She wanted Kevin to sell the garage and the house, pay off all their debts, and start again in New Zealand. Houses were cheaper there, and the climate was much better. Now that she was sure she wanted to stay with him for ever, it was time to tell him about her desire to emigrate. Kate Winters – Kate McGovern now – was just too glamorous for Belfast. It was the missing piece of the puzzle. She was sure she wanted Kevin. Sure she wanted to be married. But she didn’t want to live in Belfast any more. The city had robbed her of her peace of mind for many years, and now she was going away to begin again. Not running away because of her anxiety. But choosing to leave, of her own free will. Starting again, just the two of them, in a new country that they could learn about together. Without their families or the neighbours looking on. Kate wanted them to be different people, not just Kate from the dole office, and Kevin from the dusty garage at the bottom of the avenue. New, shiny, modern, happy people. And in Belfast, you could never leave behind who you were, and what you had been. Life was too small and too slow. And that was why she decided the best thing would be to slip away without a big fuss, and see what they could make of their lives in a new place.
When Kevin woke from his contented slumber, Kate was freshly showered and made-up and wearing a pretty white dress. She brought him tea and toasted hot-cross buns, and congratulated him again on his prowess the night before. She lay on the bed beside him and outlined her plans. She had made extensive enquiries about emigration on the telephone earlier. It would be pretty straightforward, she was told, because they had money and skills to support their application. Surprisingly, Kevin said yes.
‘Why so keen?’ she said, amazed. ‘Don’t you want to think about it? Won’t you miss anything?’
‘I need you,’ he said, simply. ‘I was dying of boredom before you came into my life, and now I don’t want to go back to the way things were. It was only a shadow of a life I had.’
‘Do you really need me, Kevin? No one ever needed me before.’
‘I do need you, Kate. More than you think. Don’t leave me behind. Take me with you.’
‘I will,’ she promised. ‘I’ll never leave you again.’
‘Well, then,’ he said, hugely relieved. ‘I take it you can do all the paperwork? I’m no good at that sort of thing. Just tell me when to stop taking cars in for repairs.’
‘Leave it to me,’ she laughed. ‘The house has more than doubled in value. We’ll have enough for a decent deposit on a new place, flights, maybe even a couple of months’ holiday before we have to start working.’
‘Fantastic. And to celebrate, let’s see if I can remember what you taught me last night,’ he murmured, reaching for her hand and leading her into the bathroom and towards the big corner bath with the gold-plated taps. ‘We might as well enjoy this lovely big bath, while we still have the chance.’
34. Whatever Happened To…
A few months later, as Kate and Kevin were winging their way to New Zealand, Johnny Hogan finally told Declan the true story of his birth. They were sitting together in velvet bucket-seats in the ballroom, one bright Monday morning in December. It was the first time they’d been alone together since Johnny came back from America. Johnny had tried and failed to convince his son to reopen the ballroom. And when Declan told him that he’d had a terrific offer from a builder, and that they were going to knock down the hall and build twenty townhouses on the site, Johnny couldn’t hold his tongue any longer.
Declan said nothing as he heard all the details. The way Marion had used her pregnancy to marry successful businessman Eddy Greenwood, while Johnny was busy fighting off the gangsters. How she’d used Eddy’s money to set herself up with her own shop and a fancy house. And then, how she’d kept Johnny’s son a secret from him for twenty years. And blocked him from attending the wedding of his only child. Declan just stared at Johnny for about five minutes, with tears of shock welling up in his dark brown ey
es. Yes, they did look alike. He could see that now. But he was not happy. Far from being delighted to find his true father, Declan felt uneasy beside this man with his frayed white jacket and his out-of-date hairstyle. There was something restless about him; something that made Declan think he was not a contented person. And he spoke to Declan as if he owned him, like he was some sort of a possession. You’re my son, he’d said, several times. As if he had some claim on Declan’s friendship and his career-choices, just because he was present at the boy’s conception. And he wasn’t really interested in Mavourna. He said that it would be great when Declan had a son. Then, there’d be three generations of Hogans in the entertainment business.
Declan was suddenly filled with a rush of love for Eddy. Not once, in his entire life, had he ever felt there was a distance between Eddy and himself. Not once had he ever felt less important or loved than his sisters. And he understood fully why Marion had abandoned this strange man and his dimly lit ballroom for the security of Eddy and a stable family life. Johnny Hogan might be famous, but fame was a lonely place in the daylight hours and Declan didn’t want to become like this man who sat staring at him from across the table. Johnny was a prisoner in this empty hall, just waiting for the darkness to fall so that he could open the main doors and let the people in to keep him company. Without the ballroom, Johnny had no identity and Declan felt sorry for him. He couldn’t sell the ballroom now. It would be too cruel. Hollywood Hogan would be like an orphan without his dance hall. A fifty-year-old orphan. Declan took the keys to the building from his pocket, placed them on the table, and slid them across the Formica to Johnny.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m really sorry to have to say this. But I think I should give these back to you. I already have a father and I love him very much. And I think you only want me to take over the business for you here. Shirley doesn’t want me to do it, and neither does my mother. And neither do I. It’s lonely here when the lights are out and the music is switched off. I’m sorry but there’s just no future for us. I couldn’t hurt my parents like that. After all they’ve done for me. So, I wish you all the best. But, no, I don’t want the ballroom. I’ll sign it back to you. Let’s just pretend this conversation never took place.’
He got up then, and shook Johnny’s hand, and walked out of the ballroom for ever. Johnny watched him leave, like his mother had before him, twenty years earlier. He touched the keys with his index finger. They were still warm. Johnny put them in his pocket.
He looked up at the ceiling. Yes, it was lonely when the lights went out. That was true enough. But the ballroom was beautiful when it was full of light and laughter and music and dancing and romance. And Johnny would chase out the spiders and the mice and bring it back to its former glory. He would rehire all the old gang and reopen the ballroom as a venue for old-time dancing, like James suggested. There would be no more young people fighting in the toilets and wrecking the place at weekends. The ballroom would be a proper ballroom, with better seating and more upmarket snacks and prestigious dancing competitions with trophies and ribbons. Johnny would get a new jacket. A blue one this time. He felt a wave of excitement in his chest. It would take a lot of work, but Johnny Hogan thrived on hard work.
DJ Toni was rescued from a drunken retirement in a Ballycastle rest home and continued to play his records in the ballroom. His heavy breathing was renowned throughout the six counties, and frequently discussed on Radio Ulster. But people were kind to DJ Toni, because they believed his horror-movie respiratory raspings were mostly brought on by asthma. He met and married a very elegant lady with her own hairpiece salon, and they lived very happily together in a cosy cottage in Saintfield with a wishing-well in the middle of the lawn. When DJ Toni retired at the age of seventy, Johnny Hogan found a young lad called Jonathan to replace him, and they worked very well together. Jonathan became like a son to him, and Johnny began to train him up to take over the business one day. As time passed, he got over the pain of losing Declan to the Greenwood family. He had lost his mother and father in the war, and he had survived that. He would survive the pain of losing his only child, too. He had made thousands of people happy, over the years. His life was not a failure, as Marion thought. He was Hollywood Hogan, and he had made his mark in the world.
Eileen and James said nothing about the ballroom being given to Declan Greenwood in a raffle. And then being handed back to Johnny, and the two men falling out for good. Eileen eventually worked the secret out for herself and James had always known it, in his heart. They enjoyed their days in the little bungalow by the sea and they knew that they didn’t have much time left, and they didn’t want to waste it thinking of the past. They worried about Johnny, of course. They worried that he might be lonely, living and working in Belfast by himself. But he was nearly fifty now. They had done all they could for him for half a century. Now Johnny Hogan was on his own. That was the price he paid for his career. Success, even in small-time show business, came at a high price. They blamed themselves for allowing him to go to the cinema so often, when he was a child. Maybe, if he hadn’t spent so much time in the velvety darkness, staring through the cigarette smoke at so many celluloid fantasies, he wouldn’t have ended up the way he did. But then they told themselves that he was happy, and that he could have got married if he’d wanted to. But Johnny wanted to be famous. That was all he really wanted. And there was nothing anyone could do about it.
The ballroom was ready for business in a couple of months, and the whirlwind of press releases and media interviews started all over again. The TV cameras turned up, the retirement-age ballroom dancers arrived en masse for the Grand Opening, and Johnny looked fabulous beside them in a jacket covered in blue glitter. Only once did a reporter ask him what had happened to return the ballroom to Johnny’s ownership after the raffle, and he just said, ‘That’s all in the past.’ And it was.
Marion asked Eddy if they could renew their wedding vows and have a lavish party afterwards. She wanted to tell the world how much she loved him. Eddy was delirious with happiness and set to work planning the great event. Marion wore the fabulously expensive velvet dress that she had not been able to sell in her salon, and she made a very emotional speech at the party and told Eddy she loved him in front of everyone they knew. They spent a fortune on fancy food and party favours for the guests, and all manner of entertainment and frills, but it was worth every penny. They felt truly married in a way that had been lacking the first time round. They didn’t bother with a honeymoon. They just went home to their restful cream bedroom, and lay in bed drinking tea, and talking about all the wonderful things that had happened that day.
The builder who was beaten on the ballroom deal bought another plot of land further up the road instead. A row of smart townhouses was built on the new site and Marion and Eddy bought one for their son. Declan and Shirley moved in with their little daughter, Mavourna Moon, before the plaster was even dry. It was good to say goodbye to the little flat with its broken taps and its creaking floorboards, and the communal front door that never stopped banging, day and night. Declan was moved to tears by his parents’ generosity, now that he really knew the extent of their love for him. And so, even though he had previously refused to let them help him financially, he accepted the house with good grace. He said he would repay the debt when he was working. He knew it meant a lot to Eddy that he had given back the ballroom to Johnny; it was like a formal declaration of loyalty. He hugged and kissed them both as they all had their first cup of tea in the new house. He told both of his parents that he loved them very much.
The first thing Kate did when they moved into their modern bungalow with sea views was to hang the two tickets for Hogan’s Goodbye Disco, which she’d had framed, on the bedroom wall. So she would always remember the night she had fallen in love with Kevin. They had a dream holiday, exploring their new homeland, and enjoying the scenery and eating out, and buying furniture. Kate picked up the keys to her new shop. She spent two glorious weeks painting the boutiqu
e white and supervising the construction of some pretty cube-shelving, and attending a trade event for boutique-owners. When all the new handbags were displayed on the shelves, and the champagne had been poured, Kate unlocked the door and a small crowd of excited females came swarming in with their credit cards. The shop was going to be a great success. Kevin slotted easily into his new garage environment, and even went fishing with some of the other mechanics on a boat named the Belfast Boy. He didn’t miss his old life for a second.
Declan threw himself into his studies, and his tutors said he would make a fine doctor some day. He rarely had time to think of the ballroom and what might have been. And although he had promised Shirley that he would never hide anything from her, he kept Johnny’s revelation to himself. Shirley might be upset if she had to get to know a new grandparent for Mavourna. And he sensed that she didn’t like Johnny Hogan very much, anyway. (Shirley was delighted when Declan gave the ballroom back to Hogan.) Declan never told his parents what he knew either, and they never asked him why he had given the ballroom back. As the months passed, the whole thing gradually faded into the background. He knew he had made the right decision when he lay in bed with Shirley each night. He was a family man, like Eddy. He didn’t care what the outside world thought of him. All he cared about was Shirley and their love for each other, and their beautiful daughter and their lovely home.
Shirley was thrilled with the tall, echo-filled new house and they made a vow to pay back Declan’s parents as soon as they were earning again. Shirley had great fun painting the freshly plastered walls in restful pastel colours, and looking in the second-hand shops and sales for nice pieces of furniture. She said she might have another child to keep Mavourna company, as soon as she had her strength back after the birth. She still didn’t know if she believed in God or anything else, but she knew that she wanted a surgeon standing by when she went into labour for the second time. She decorated Mavourna’s little bedroom with paintings of pink trees with pale blue leaves and pretty tree-sprites. Their statue of God’s mother ended up in the spare bedroom, but Shirley dusted it regularly.
