by Marian Keyes
Jessie had played slightly sneaky to guarantee Ferdia’s attendance: she’d invited Sammie, who liked the sound of an alcohol-fuelled weekend in the west before she left Ireland. Ferdia had grudgingly said he’d come if Barty was also invited. So there it was.
Rose and Canice did their best to ignore Ferdia – and Saoirse, of course – and Jessie wanted to push back. She loved Johnny but she would not pretend that her marriage to Rory hadn’t happened …
A series of beeps from her phone distracted her: they had coverage again. But, scanning her emails, there was one from Posie, the manager in Malahide, with the happy news that she was three months pregnant.
Ah, shite.
Shite a thousand times.
Posie ran that shop brilliantly. All kinds of logistical personnel shenanigans would be needed to cover her absence.
Even when it was highly inconvenient Jessie prided herself on being good to her staff. Posie’s maternity leave would be six long months. Jessie would throw a baby shower and buy a high-spec Bugaboo.
Six months off, though! She’d barely taken a month with each of her own children.
Now she’d take a quick look on Facebook. But that also gave her a shock.
‘God.’ She swallowed.
‘What?’ Johnny asked.
‘Facebook’s suggesting I friend request Izzy Kinsella. Why would they do that? Why now?’
‘Their algorithms are mad. Ignore it.’
‘But … has something happened? Someone I know must have friended her.’
‘Their metrics are far more random than that.’
‘Sorry, babes.’ It didn’t matter, and poor Johnny already had enough going on. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Ah, you know.’ He tightened his hands on the wheel and kept driving into the sun.
FORTY-ONE
Liam braked suddenly, sending Nell’s pencil skidding across her graph paper. They’d come to a standstill in yet another small town.
‘How much longer?’ she asked.
‘You sound like a kid.’
Sitting helplessly in the car for the last four hours had been torture. Four precious hours that she could have been working, instead of desperately trying to draw in a moving vehicle.
‘Are we there yet?’ he taunted.
She checked her phone: another seventeen minutes before they arrived at Westport station to pick up Ferdia, Sammie and Barty. After that, another twenty minutes before they reached the holiday home.
Another thirty-seven minutes of achieving nothing.
Even talking about the project would have helped untangle some of the ideas in her head, but Liam was still off with her. It was hard to know whether she should feel guilty or resentful. They’d never had a situation like this before, where he chided her for being selfish. But her work was really important to her and he knew that. Surely he knew what a great opportunity this was. Or maybe she should be kinder. Liam’s parents were both total pieces of work. This weekend would be hard for him.
‘Text them,’ Liam said.
They were parked outside Westport station, waiting for Ferdia and gang. Their train should have arrived about ten minutes earlier, but there was no sign.
‘What’s his number?’
Liam made a ‘Pffft’ of irritation. ‘I don’t have it. Text Jessie.’
She clicked off a text. But after staring at her phone for a long, silent time, she said, ‘She’s probably out of coverage.’
‘So what are we supposed to –’
‘I’ll go in and have a look round.’
She jumped from the car and headed into the deserted-looking station. A man in a uniform was measuring a bench on the platform. ‘It’s delayed,’ he called. ‘The Dublin train. Twenty-five minutes.’
Okay. She could sit on a bench – so long as she didn’t get in the way of any measuring – and work while she waited. She’d go and get her stuff.
But back at the car, Liam said, ‘We’re not hanging around here.’
‘Liam, please, I promised Jessie.’
‘They say twenty-five minutes, but it could be anything.’
She went back inside to the man. ‘When you say twenty-five minutes, do you actually mean twenty-five? Might it be longer?’ If he said something twee like, ‘The man who made time, made plenty of it’, she’d literally cry.
The man straightened up slowly. ‘This isn’t Switzerland!’ He sounded wounded. ‘Someone was telling me about a train there that was six minutes late and they gave all the passengers free cake.’
Nell was too anxious for this. ‘Thanks.’ Outside, she came back to the car and said, ‘Your man was a bit vague. But, Liam, we can’t just abandon them.’
‘They can get a taxi. Or a bus. Or hitch.’ He started the engine. ‘I’m not hanging around here all evening. Get in.’
Reluctantly, she did so. They’d been driving for several minutes when her phone rang.
‘You were looking for Ferd’s number?’ Jessie said. ‘What’s up?’
‘Their train is delayed. The man wasn’t sure how long it would be. So we didn’t wait. I’m sorry, Jessie.’
‘You’re fine. I’ll send Johnny in when they arrive.’
FORTY-TWO
‘The sun’s too bright,’ Tom said. ‘It needs a light-shade.’
‘We’re driving directly west.’ Ed explained to the boys how the sun rose and fell and it gave Cara a safe, happy feeling.
Then she got her first whiff of the salty air. ‘Vinnie, Tom!’ she exclaimed. ‘Can you smell the sea?’
‘There it is!’
Out past a long stretch of pale sand, the sun had turned the water into liquid silver. Ed, following his satnav, kept driving towards the edge of the land. The road got narrower and quickly became a single-track boreen.
‘We’re not lost?’ Cara asked anxiously.
‘Have I ever got you lost?’
He hadn’t. ‘But where are these houses of Jessie’s? We’re nearly in the sea.’
‘They should be right … about … here!’ Ed turned in off the boreen.
Out of nowhere, an enclave of six perfect-looking houses, made from cream-coloured clapboard, had appeared. These were a far cry from the usual grim bungalows that were Irish holiday homes.
‘We’re practically on the beach!’ Cara laughed with delight. ‘Trust Jessie. I mean, how does she even know about this place?’
There were no formal boundaries, but each property was demarcated by bunches of rough sand grass.
‘Ammophila,’ Ed said. ‘Coming from Greek words meaning “sand” and “friend”. These grasses survive in soil with high salinity –’
‘Dad?’ Vinnie said.
‘Son?’
‘Shut it.’
‘Yes, son.’ Ed chuckled softly.
Jessie and her lot were milling about outside the first house.
‘You’re in the second house,’ Jessie called, waving them along. ‘The key is in the door.’
As they jumped from the car the roar of the waves was much louder. Grainy white sand blew up underfoot from the nearby beach and Ed’s sandgrass was bending in the breeze. At almost 6 p.m., the sun was still hot.
‘What took you so long?’ TJ and Dilly came running over to Vinnie and Tom.
‘I can’t believe you’re even later than us!’ TJ exclaimed.
‘Daddy drove really slowly!’ Dilly said. ‘He doesn’t want to be here.’
‘Because Nana and Granddad are nightmares. Are you coming for a swim?’
‘Course!’ Vinnie said.
‘Can we, Mum?’ Tom asked.
‘Bring your stuff in first and then off you go.’ Cara opened the front door of the little house, and the four children swarmed in ahead of her.
Inside, it was airy and light, with hardwood flooring and Hamptons-style furniture, in pale blue and cream. Marine motifs abounded. Behind each house sat a slab of salt-roughened decking, facing directly towards the water.
‘My God.’ Ed, hefting a sui
tcase into the double-height hall, stopped abruptly. He dropped the bag. ‘This is incredible. Too bad that –’
‘What?’ she asked. ‘You okay, honey?’
‘Ah, you know.’ He squinted towards the sun. ‘This is amazing. But Mum and Dad …’
Cara was surprised. He so rarely got rattled.
‘I know.’ She went to him and hugged him.
‘Especially Dad,’ he mumbled into her hair. ‘Being round him is like being around an unexploded bomb.’
‘All be over by Sunday.’
‘Say it,’ he said.
‘I’ve got you.’ She squeezed him tighter. ‘You’re safe.’
‘Thanks.’ He pulled away and flashed a smile. ‘I can cope now. Right. Bedrooms.’
‘Can this be my room?’ Vinnie called from somewhere in the house.
‘Is it the biggest?’ Cara called back. ‘Does it have an en suite? Because then the answer is no.’
I need my own bathroom.
With that, her mood dipped. She’d managed to forget about food and all that other stuff. It was no surprise that now she found herself navigating to the kitchen. The fridge was filled with wine, beer and other ‘essentials’. ‘Ed, look!’
‘Jessie’s doing, no doubt.’
And here came Jessie now, in a floaty beach dress, carrying a glass of rosé and accompanied by Bridey.
‘This place!’ Cara exclaimed.
‘I know, right. This weekend is going to be awful – no offence, Ed, but when Canice and Rose have once again broken our spirit, at least we’ll have somewhere nice to lick our wounds.’
‘Seriously, though, was it really spendy? I feel guilty.’
‘Would you stop? I got it for half-nothing from a customer. Anyway, spending money calms me. I needed to stay somewhere nice for the sake of my sanity, and I’m not booking my crowd into a swanky gaff, leaving the rest of you in some shithole. We’re all in this together.’
‘But you got that wine and beer in.’ Cara took a wad of notes from her bag and pushed them into Jessie’s hand.
‘No.’
‘Yes!’
‘Christ, you’re strong-willed when you want to be,’ Jessie grumbled. ‘Thanks, hon.’
The four younger children stampeded into the kitchen.
‘They’re in here.’ Dilly wrenched open a cupboard door.
‘Deadly!’ Vinnie had found a stash of biscuits. He tore a packet open and shoved one into his mouth.
‘Hey!’ Bridey called. ‘You can’t go for a swim now. You’ll get cramp.’
‘You’ll be fine.’ Cara whipped the packet away from him. ‘Get your togs and go.’
Returning the biscuits to the press, she couldn’t help taking a glance – tons of stuff in there: chocolate, Haribo, what looked like cupcakes …
‘Ice-cream in the freezer,’ Jessie said.
‘Oh.’ No.
‘Just, we all need every possible prop to get through this weekend. Cara, Ed, take a good long look at me now. This is the last time there’ll be a sober sighting of me. I plan to start drinking, get scuttered and stay that way until Sunday afternoon. I’ll be in a constant process of topping up.’
‘Maybe it won’t be so bad,’ Ed said.
Jessie gave a hollow laugh. ‘Ya think?’
It was harder for Johnny and Jessie, Cara knew. Canice was nasty to all three of his sons but it cut Johnny to his quick.
And while Rose was hostile to her three daughters-in-law, she definitely had it in for Jessie the most.
‘Okay,’ Jessie said. ‘I’ll get my swim out of the way, then make a good run at the drinking.’ She looked at Ed and Cara. ‘You coming?’
‘I am not.’ Cara made her voice good-humoured but no way on earth was she putting on a pair of togs.
‘What about you, Ed?’ Jessie’s phone rang. ‘Ferdia? You’re actually there? No, Liam couldn’t wait, but hang tight, I’ll send Johnny in.’ She hung up. ‘Ferdia. Train was delayed.’
‘I’ll go,’ Ed said. ‘It’s no bother.’
‘Ah, no … Are you sure? Just Johnny’s not in great form …’
‘Course.’
Jessie, surrounded by children carrying togs and towels, strode off towards the water’s edge, Ed got into the car and drove away, and suddenly Cara was alone in the sunny little house.
She wasn’t quite sure what to do. She could unpack but that would only take five minutes. Maybe she should sit on the deck and simply be.
She touched her tongue against the ragged edge of her broken tooth. The day it had happened, she’d been freaked out, convinced she’d managed to rot her entire mouthful of teeth. She couldn’t face the judgement of the dentist. But, as it happened, the broken tooth didn’t hurt, so everything was grand. A bit weird that a lump of enamel had broken off for no reason, but maybe it was just natural shedding.
Out of nowhere, the idea of ice-cream appeared in her head. The clock was ticking. Ed would be back in about forty minutes and the kids might be even sooner.
She’d intended to have a healthy weekend, but the proximity to food and the freedom of her solitude …
Her heart was thumping. Her blood was pumping through her hands and feet, pulsing against her fingertips. Like an automaton, she went to the kitchen and opened the freezer door. There were four tubs of Ben & Jerry’s. One of them was Cherry Garcia, her favourite. A horrible combination of soaring relief and bleak misery meant that this was now out of her hands.
Three sharp raps on the front window made her jump.
‘Knock, knock!’ It was Johnny.
She hadn’t been doing anything bad, but she was shaking as she went to the front door.
‘God bless all here.’ Johnny pretended to remove a cap, mimicking an old-fashioned farmer.
‘Hi … ah, hello. What’s up?’
‘Can we talk a bit of business?’ He went to the living room. ‘Small bit of business. Tiny. Nearly invisible.’ He seemed slightly manic. ‘About the Airbnb thing. I know, Cara, you offer to do this out of the goodness of your heart and I pester you on your weekend away.’
‘No good deed goes unpunished,’ she managed to say.
‘That’s it. So look, just a simple change: instead of the income going straight into our current account, can it go into a new account? I’ve already opened it, all the info here.’ He slid the pages towards her.
She scanned it. The account was in Johnny’s name alone. Every other account, every other bill she’d seen, was jointly shared between Johnny and Jessie.
‘Will the mortgage be paid out of this same account?’ That made sense, to keep the whole enterprise self-contained.
‘Ah, no. Who knows how this Airbnb thing will work out? What if there isn’t enough income to cover the mortgage every month?’
The mortgage was tiny. Airbnb in central Dublin was booming.
‘Let’s try it this way,’ he said. ‘At least for a while.’
Cara was still grappling to understand: the mortgage on Johnny’s apartment was to be paid from the account he shared with his wife, but the income was to go into a new account that was solely in his name? Maybe Johnny picked up on her confusion. ‘It’s actually for Jessie.’
That made zero sense.
‘Just in case,’ he said.
Just in case of what?
FORTY-THREE
The house was ridiculous. New, really upscale, like a gaff in a movie. Everything was blue or creamy-coloured and full-on discreet luxury. What if they spilt something?
The kitchen. Jesus. A high-spec wonderland with an icemaker, a boiling-water tap, a literal Gaggia coffee machine that you’d see in an authentic Italian coffee bar …
It was too much.
Liam baggsed the master bedroom, an expanse of white and dove-grey. Nell stood anxiously at the doorway, eyeing the walk-in wardrobe and massive bathroom. ‘Shouldn’t we give it to Ferdia? Jessie’s paying for this, and he’s her son?’
‘Him? He’s only a kid!’
‘Oo
ookay.’ This room was bigger than the others. She could annex a corner for her work and still leave plenty of space for Liam. ‘Is it okay if I use the dressing table to draw at?’
‘Sure,’ he said.
She hefted in her box of tools and materials and laid out the crude little models she’d hastily fashioned from MDF. This presentation on Monday would be the shoddiest she’d ever done …
‘You coming for a swim?’
She looked at him steadily. ‘Working. Enjoy your swim.’
With an over-elaborate quizzical look, he left and she exhaled. Right, let’s do this. She sat cross-legged, focusing on the challenges of the job, but just as her head began to burrow a pathway into them, Jessie arrived, glass of wine in hand. She stood up. ‘Jessie. I’m so sorry about Ferdia –’
‘Stop. Who wants to be hanging around a station, waiting for an Irish train? Ed has gone for them. All grand.’
‘If you’re sure? And, really, Jessie …’ She was incoherent with gratitude and mortification. ‘This house. There was no need, we could have slept in a tent.’
‘Ha-ha, you young people. No, we need a bolthole. This weekend is going to be brutal.’
‘You mean Canice and Rose?’
‘Yeah, but especially Rose. She’s always making out that I had Johnny on the go at the same time as Rory. Which I totally hadn’t!’
‘Of course.’ It was none of Nell’s business.
However, she liked Jessie. She was a bit insane, her and her extravagance, and they didn’t have much in common, but she was basically sound.
‘No, seriously, Nell. I really totally didn’t. I’m a stone-cold Goody-Two-Shoes. Even if I’d fancied Johnny, which I didn’t, I’d have been too repressed to do anything about it. But if I said to Rose, “Actually I didn’t even notice Johnny when Rory was alive because I was so in love with Rory”, she wouldn’t like that either. She told me she wasn’t happy that Johnny was my second choice.’
