Two Fridays in April

by Roisin Meaney

  That’s good, Daphne said when Una told her she was having dinner with Ciara. Relieved, probably, to be having a break from her. Imagining, no doubt, that Una was getting over things, moving on. If she only knew.

  And on Wednesday they invited her to come again the following week, and she accepted again, and so it began. She visits them once a week, occasionally more often. Usually it’s just the four of them, sometimes only three – Theo can’t always make it home from catering college in time for dinner, which they call tea – and now and again Charlotte drops in too.

  They’re easy company. The event that caused them to come together is never mentioned. Invariably Judy does most of the talking: she never runs out of things to say. Little by little Una has got to know them, and to feel comfortable with them. She’s become attached to them, she’s come almost to need them.

  Kevin eats better now; his face has filled in a bit. He’s back at work too, went back a few weeks after Una’s first visit to them. And he’s funny: it took her a while to notice that. He can make them laugh, even if it’s usually by poking gentle fun at Judy, who never seems to mind.

  They’re helping one another, Una and the family she’d been determined to hate. A random act of kindness, or whatever it was, has brought her far more than she imagined. And nobody knows, not even Ciara.

  Of course, Mo nearly messed everything up when she began working in the charity shop just across the lane, a couple of months after Una began visiting the Quirks – but when it turned out that she’d be doing mornings only, Una relaxed. Today is the first time she’s been at the house by day – but even so, there’s no danger. The two places are back to back, and what would bring Mo out to the rear of the shop?

  So her secret has remained safe from Mo and Daphne. As far as Daphne knows, Una is eating at a friend’s house each time she misses dinner at home – and as far as Una is concerned it’s true. They are her friends: at this stage, they’re almost her family. And today she’s going to Charlotte’s wedding, just like a member of the family.

  It’s the date of your daddy’s anniversary, Judy said a few weeks ago, when it was just the two of them in the kitchen, sitting over mugs of tea and slices of Judy’s tea brack. It was booked way back. Charlotte said they could change it, after … but I said no. I thought it might be good to have something to take Kevin’s mind off it. We were wondering if you’d like to come. We’d love to have you, we really would.

  A wedding, on what Una knew already would be the worst day in the year for her.

  Of course, Judy went on, we’ll understand if you’d rather not, given the day that’s in it – but it seemed to Una all the more reason to go. Take her mind off it too, help her to forget, if that was possible.

  Yes, she said. I will – I mean, I’d like to. Thank you.

  It was a gift, and she accepted it gratefully, and made her plans. And now the day is here.

  She finishes her sausages. Kevin continues to polish his shoes – surely only to annoy Judy at this stage. The kitchen door opens. A stoutly built woman she doesn’t recognise comes in wearing a figure-hugging strapless dress in a purple so deep it’s almost black. ‘Your turn,’ she tells Charlotte, who pushes away her plate and takes her mug and leaves.

  ‘I’m Gaby,’ the newcomer says, putting out a hand. ‘You must be Una.’ Her dark blonde hair is piled on her head. Her eyelashes are spiky with purple mascara. The dress shows a dangerous amount of cleavage. She takes Charlotte’s seat, begins to eat what food remains on the plate in front of her. ‘Any more sausages, Jude? I’ve a head on me after last night. I need feeding.’

  ‘There she goes,’ Kevin puts in, ‘eating us out of house and home again’ – but Gaby only laughs as she helps herself to a slice of bread and spreads it thickly with butter. ‘That’s because I’m a growing girl, Kevin – growing more beautiful every day. Pass over that jam there, Una.’ She brushes crumbs from her hands before grabbing the top of the dress to hoick it higher on her chest. ‘God, I wish this thing had straps – I’ve an awful feeling I’m going to let it all hang out today.’

  ‘Might liven things up a bit,’ Kevin says, and Judy shushes him as she adds sausages to the plate that used to be Charlotte’s.

  The door opens again and Theo enters. Una has never seen him in a suit: it makes him look older. Like his father’s, his hair has been recently cut, and the lower half of his face is smooth and pink.

  ‘Ah, you look so handsome, son,’ Judy says, spreading her arms. ‘Come here and give your old mother a hug.’

  He bends and embraces her briefly – ‘Mind my suit, Ma’ – before plucking a sausage straight from the pan and eating it with his hands, leaning against the windowsill. He meets Una’s eyes briefly and gives her what looks like a rather strained smile. She smiles back as she gets to her feet.

  ‘I’d better get changed,’ she says.

  ‘Your things are in Charlotte’s old room,’ Judy tells her. ‘First left, across from the bathroom.’

  The dress Una brought over on her last visit is one she found in a charity shop – not Mo’s – a couple of weeks after being invited to the wedding. It’s the rich bright green of new grass, a wraparound dress that falls to just above her knees, and it’s silk. She’s never owned anything made of silk before. It slithers like liquid over her skin, and it cost eight euro.

  She found the shoes on sale, twenty euro, down from seventy-five because of a little nick on one of the heels that you can hardly see. They’re cream patent with pointed toes and a thin ankle strap, and narrow heels that are four inches high, far higher than anything she’s owned before. She’s not sure if they go with the dress: she had nobody to ask.

  She’s been wearing them in her bedroom in the evenings, trying to get used to walking in them. She thinks them wonderfully elegant, loves how much longer her legs look in them – but she wonders how her feet will feel several hours from now.

  Her jewellery for today is the little gold five-pointed star on a delicate neck chain that Dad gave her on her twelfth birthday, a couple of months before he crashed into Daphne’s car door. There’s a tiny diamond set into one of the points, invisible until the light catches it. She wears it every day, hidden under her school uniform during the week.

  Upstairs she slips first into the bathroom and examines the red mark on her chin, about the size of a thumbnail. She runs water on the grazed palm she’s managed to keep hidden from them, and pats it dry. She hunts in the small press above the sink and finds a tub of Sudocrem, and rubs some in.

  She stands on the tiny landing, listening to laughter coming from Charlotte’s bedroom. She’s never been in it before. She taps lightly on the door and pushes it open.

  The room is small, like the others in the house. The air is thick with hairspray. Charlotte sits at the dressing table while Florrie brushes something onto her face. Florrie isn’t a make-up artist, she’s Brian’s sister. Una has met her just once before.

  ‘Come in,’ Charlotte says, meeting her eye in the mirror. ‘Your stuff is on the bed. Florrie, pour her a drink there. It’s just Prosecco,’ she tells Una, ‘very light.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Una takes a sip. It’s warm and a bit flowery, and not as tasty as West Coast Cooler. The bag with her stuff sits on the single bed. She places her glass on the windowsill and opens the bag, and lifts out the dress.

  ‘Here, Florrie,’ Charlotte says, watching Una in the mirror, ‘wouldn’t you kill for hair like that?’

  Florrie, stroking on eyeliner, doesn’t look up. ‘Yeah, it’s divine. Is it hard to manage?’

  Una removes her sweatshirt and pulls off the top Daphne gave her earlier, wishing she had a fancier bra. ‘Not really – I just comb it with my fingers.’

  ‘Divine.’

  A small silence. Una gets into the dress and ties the sash, feeling the others watching.

  ‘Oh, that’s lovely on you,’ Florrie says, glancing up. ‘Fabulous colour.’

  ‘Thanks.’

 
She shrugs off her shoes, shimmies out of her jeans, takes tights from the bag and eases them on. The small cream clutch that Charlotte is lending her for the day sits on the bed: she transfers her wallet and lip balm into it.

  ‘Here,’ Charlotte says, ‘what about Ursula Foley saying that to Marie last night? Jesus, I didn’t know where to look.’

  ‘I know: cow. Poor Marie was gutted – it’s not as if she hasn’t been trying to lose the weight. Look up … now look down. Course if she gave up the pints it’d help.’

  Una steps into the shoes, takes another sip from her glass. It’s actually not that bad. She folds the clothes she took off and stows them in the bag. She stands by the bed, not sure whether to stay or leave.

  ‘So, you and Theo,’ Florrie says then, glancing back at Una, mascara wand in her hand.

  Una feels her face getting hot. ‘No,’ she says, ‘we’re just friends.’ She takes too big a gulp of Prosecco so it goes down the wrong way. She catches the look the other two exchange in the mirror as she coughs and splutters.

  ‘Don’t mind her,’ Charlotte says. ‘She’s only teasing.’

  ‘I am – don’t mind me.’

  But she knows they’re wondering all the same.

  Two glasses of Prosecco later, there’s a mild pleasant buzzing in Una’s head. Florrie hid the mark on her chin with concealer and patted a little powder on her face – That’s all your skin needs, it’s so clear. She applied eye liner and mascara, and lipstick that’s darker than Una would have chosen – she rarely wears any lipstick – but she thinks she likes it.

  When Judy saw the end result, she was predictably enthusiastic. You could be a model, she insisted, which made Una laugh. Kevin, dressed in his suit finally, told her she looked smashing, and Theo, busy pinning on his carnation, didn’t say anything at all.

  Judy wears a powder blue jacket and skirt, with a little cream feathery hat perched to one side on her head. Got the suit on sale in the autumn, she told Una. The hat isn’t a bit much, is it? It’s a loan from a neighbour’s daughter. I’m not mutton dressed as lamb, am I? I don’t want to make a show of myself as mother of the bride.

  The bride better not get a divorce, Kevin remarked. We can just about afford one wedding. Judy told him to shush, weren’t Charlotte and Brian paying for most of it?

  A navy wool wrap has been found for Una, who hadn’t thought about an outer layer – Charlotte, Judy said, that lovely shawl thing you got me last Christmas will be perfect over her dress. Una isn’t altogether sure the colours go together, but the wrap is beautifully warm so she says nothing.

  They’re assembled in the kitchen now, preparations done. Kevin and Theo wear ties in the deep purple shade of Gaby’s dress beneath their pale grey suits. ‘Don’t they look gorgeous?’ Judy asks, and Una says, yes, they do, wondering why Theo seems to be avoiding eye contact with her today. Maybe he’s nervous – although as far as she knows he has no particular role to play. He’s not the best man, he doesn’t have to make a speech. Could he be annoyed with her over something?

  The beep of a car horn is heard out the back. ‘That’ll be Donie,’ Judy says, practically leaping to her feet. ‘Come on, you two. Now, Kevin, you leave here on the dot of five to twelve, not a minute later, you hear? I don’t want poor Brian waiting any longer than a quarter of an hour – he’ll be nervous enough. You hear me now?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘And take your time going down the street. I promised everyone you would; they’re going to be out waiting.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘Stop saying that. And fix your tie, it’s gone all crooked again. Charlotte, make sure to check it before he walks you up the aisle. Have I tissues? Who took the tissues I left on the ironing board? And Kevin, don’t go without feeding Dolly – it’ll be all hours before we get home. Oh, and someone come out and hold her now, so she won’t jump up on us.’

  ‘I can do that,’ Theo says – but his father goes ahead of them, and Dolly is corralled while the three of them cross the yard and get into the waiting car. ‘You go in front,’ Judy tells Theo. ‘Una, we’ll sit in the back like ladies. God, I shouldn’t have eaten those sausages – my stomach is turning somersaults. I’m feeling very jittery, I don’t mind telling you.’

  Donie turns out to be a friend of Brian’s, living on the outskirts of the city. As he drives them to the church, Una notices him glancing at her a few times in the rear-view mirror. Wondering who she is, no doubt: all Judy gave him was her name. Trying to figure out how she’s connected with the family – or maybe he assumes she’s Theo’s date, like everyone else seems to be doing.

  She turns her face away when they drive past the charity shop, just in case. Not that Mo would be likely to recognise her – her sight isn’t that great – but she isn’t about to take any chances. She glances at her watch: a quarter to twelve. She hasn’t thought of the anniversary since she reached the house more than an hour ago. She feels under the wrap and finds the little gold star. She holds on to it and keeps her smile in place.

  It’s the first wedding she’s been to since Dad married Daphne. Una was thirteen and trying to be happy for him, trying not to resent Daphne for coming between them. Because she had come between them, whatever Dad said.

  You’ll always be my number one lady, he’d told her, right after he’d broken the news of their engagement – but that wasn’t really true, not any more. He loved her still, of course he did, but he had Daphne now, and Daphne had made him laugh again. And Una did like her, she couldn’t say she didn’t: she just wished she’d married someone else, and left her and Dad alone.

  But if Dad hadn’t married Daphne, what would have happened to Una after his death? She’d have had to move in with Mo, probably. Mum’s parents wouldn’t have wanted her, she’s sure of that. They live in England – they’re English, like Mum was – and send cards to Una with ten-pound notes in them at birthdays and Christmas. There’s probably one waiting at home for her today. Best wishes, the cards always say, and their two names below in the same handwriting, and nothing else.

  The only time they met her, the single time in her whole life that they met her, was at Mum’s funeral, and they didn’t exactly act like grandparents then. She doesn’t remember much about them: she was only six, and missing Mum like anything. As far as she recalls, they were both tall – but then, everyone is tall when you’re six. They were both dressed, she thinks, in black trouser suits, but that could be wrong too.

  Una, the woman – her grandmother – said, when Finn introduced them, and she looked like the word tasted bitter. They examined Una without smiles, hardly spoke to her throughout the day, or to anyone.

  She wonders what they did with the photos of her that Mum used to send them, if they kept them or threw them into the bin. She wonders why you would blame a child for something they hadn’t done.

  No, they wouldn’t have wanted her when Dad died.

  The church is chilly. She gathers Judy’s wrap more tightly around her as she sneaks a look at the other guests. Not a very big crowd, about fifty, she reckons, mostly couples who look around Charlotte’s age, some older people she assumes are family. A few small children, fidgety in shiny dresses and miniature suits, a couple of bored-looking boys of ten or eleven.

  Judy’s sister Miriam sits next to Una, in a tight red dress that sparkles when she moves, and a streak of matching lipstick on one of her front teeth. So you’re Una, she said, when they were introduced, her gaze travelling unhurriedly from Una’s face all the way to her shoes. Her husband Robbie, in pointed shoes and with hair that seemed a bit too black, looked straight at Una’s chest as he shook her hand. She’s glad he’s sitting on Miriam’s far side.

  Charlotte and Brian stand before the altar as the priest – a family member too, she’s forgotten whose – binds them together for better or for worse. In the seat directly ahead of Una, Judy blows her nose loudly, and Una watches the back of Theo’s head and wonders again if she’s done something to a
nnoy him.

  Normally they get on fine. They’re hardly ever alone; Judy is pretty much always in the kitchen when Una visits, and Kevin is rarely far away – but she and Theo seemed to have settled into an easy familiarity. Up to today she would have said he was the closest thing she has to a brother. Now she’s not so sure.

  Occasionally her visits have coincided with days that he brought home something he’d made in catering college: a lamb tagine, a chicken or fish pie, a rhubarb and custard tart. He endures his father’s teasing as Judy doles it out – You’ll make someone a lovely wife one day, son – and if there are leftovers Judy parcels them up for Una to take home. This isn’t a problem: Una tells Daphne they came from whatever friend she was supposedly having dinner with. It’s only half a lie.

  Daphne has suggested, more than once, that Una bring her friends home so she can cook for them. We should return the favour, she says, you’re always going to their houses – and whenever this happens Una says, Yeah, sometime, knowing Daphne won’t try to fix a date. Daphne goes through the motions, that’s all.

  The organ starts up: there’s a rustle among those assembled. Una gets to her feet with the rest of them as the newlyweds emerge from the sacristy and parade down the aisle, Charlotte being ambushed for an inevitable hug from her tearful mother.

  Her bridal dress, bought on eBay and adjusted by Gaby’s friend, is white and lacy, with tiny pearl buttons pattering up the back, and sleeves that come to a stop just below her elbows. When she moves, the train of her veil slides along behind her like the ribbon of foam that follows a cruise ship. Gaby, bringing up the rear beside the best man, gives Una a wink as she passes.

  The guests leave the church in a slow, chattering mass that forms itself into little knots outside. People cluster and regroup around the bride and groom, who stand together on the steps. Cameras flash, confetti flies, laughter erupts. Shoe straps are adjusted, hats are straightened, children exclaimed over.