The Importance of Being Aisling

by Emer McLysaght

  ‘Mammy, do you have a number for Geraldine?’ I ask, inspecting the vat of mashed potatoes on the Aga. Nice and lumpy, her signature spud. Elaine once made me mashed potatoes using a potato ricer and, honestly, I couldn’t stomach them. So smooth, not a bit of bite.

  ‘Geraldine from Geraldine’s?’ she says, reaching for her phone. ‘I do, but she won’t be there this evening, pet. She does Zumba with Mags today.’

  ‘It’s grand, I can call her tomorrow.’

  ‘Are you looking for a slip or something? I might have one upstairs.’

  ‘No, it’s something else. I’ll tell you after I talk to her. Where are the Morans?’

  ‘Over at the house,’ she says softly. ‘Or what’s left of it. They’re all coming back here in about an hour for a good feed.’

  ‘Grand, I’ll set the table so,’ I say, heading for the drawer where she keeps the good tablecloths. I suppose it’s a special occasion.

  ‘Oh, there’s a letter for you on Daddy’s desk, Aisling,’ she calls after me without turning from the pot. ‘It was registered so I had to sign for it. Pat wouldn’t even get out of the van, the lazy fecker. It has a Las Vegas postmark, if you don’t mind.’

  Chapter 37

  ‘I’m sorry, how did you get my address?’

  I usually know a scam when I hear one, but the letter from Vegas said I’d won a prize and to ring this number and it looked official enough. Better to be safe than sorry. I’m on high alert, though. They’re probably somehow dialling into my phone to steal all my passwords every second I stay on the call.

  ‘Ma’am. Ma’am, if you could just bear with me. Were you in Las Vegas in February of this year?’

  By God they’re good in this day and age. She’ll probably be telling me the colour of my knickers next. ‘Who is this?’ I wonder if she’s somehow watching me on the camera on my phone as I talk.

  ‘You placed a bet in the lobby of the MGM Grand. A fifty dollar … Sorry, a fifty euros bet?’

  Hold on a second.

  ‘Ayes-ling … I’m sorry, I can’t read the surname, but are you a Ms Ayes-ling?’

  ‘Aisling. It’s actually Irish and means vision or drea– eh, yes, that’s me.’

  She doesn’t sound like she’s going to scam me, to be fair. Although that’s probably what she’s been trained for. I must check my bank balance the second I get off the phone. The sophistication of these operations is off the charts.

  ‘Congrats Ms Ayes-ling–’

  ‘It’s Ash-ling’

  ‘You’re the winner of our MGM Grand Prize Sweepstakes. You are the proud owner of a Ferrari 488. Can I just confirm a few details with you?’

  ‘A what now?’ Something is coming back to me. Ever so faintly.

  ‘A Ferrari 488. Will you be collecting the vehicle in person or should I arrange delivery?’

  Me and Antony in the hotel lobby, plastered. A big, red, shiny car. ‘Daddy would have loved this.’ Fifty euro pressed into the man’s hand. ‘Hey, big Irish spender. No skin off my nose. Money is money.’ He was wearing some sort of clown outfit? Maybe a poker outfit, with the visor? I was very drunk, to be fair to me.

  ‘Ms Ayes-ling? Are you still there?’

  Scrawling my name and my number on an entry slip and guessing the number of … somethings packed into the car.

  ‘How, how did I win this?’

  ‘You guessed the number of poker chips inside the car with the greatest accuracy. Congratulations, ma’am. How may I help you to collect your prize?’

  How in the name of blazes am I going to get in and out of a Ferrari? My knees are up around my ears when I sit on a bean bag, and it’s not a dignified scene trying to get out of it. I’d have to be hoisted out of a Ferrari it’s that close to the ground. I can’t bring a thing like that home. You’d be plagued going to carwashes.

  ‘Er, I’m Irish. I live in Ireland.’

  ‘Okay, Ms Ayse-ling, that’s no problem.’

  Her voice is starting to get a little tight. I leave the correction of the pronunciation this time, although it nearly kills me.

  ‘We can offer a cash alternative of two-thirds the value of the vehicle. It’s all in the small print.’

  Two-thirds. The lousers. Still, though, that’s better than nothing. Every little helps at the moment. A few grand will certainly fix a few things here and there. I’ve already bought two Winning Streaks in the hope of getting on to spin the wheel.

  ‘So I will be sending the cheque to – am I reading this right? Bally-Go-Berd? Can I ask for your house or apartment number and ZIP code, please, ma’am?’

  ‘Oh, there’s no house number. It’s just the main road out of Ballygobbard, the Dublin side. Pat Curran knows me. And we all decided collectively as a country to ignore the postal codes so you needn’t bother with th–’

  ‘And the cheque for $200,000 will be made out to you, ma’am. Can you just spell your surname for me? Your entry really is like a chicken scratching, but we’re used to that.’

  Thud. I drop the phone.

  Someone must be having me on. Someone is playing a cruel joke on me. I race to my ancient laptop and fling it open. I google ‘MGM Grand Ferrari poker raffle’. I’m sure that’s not what she said it was called, but surely it’s close enough. There it is. There it is. A picture of the car and all in the lobby. It’s from the MGM Grand’s official Facebook page – 1.2 million Likes can’t be wrong. They only give away two a year. Jesus, imagine how much money they’re making off drunk eejits like me.

  Two hundred thousand dollars. Mammy’s farm. The café. Majella and Pablo and Shem and Liz and Shane. This could be the answer to all our prayers! I hear Mammy moving around downstairs and I race down to her, taking the narrow stairs two at a time and nearly coming a cropper in my stockinged feet. The Morans, Pablo and all are still at their house surveying what’s left of it.

  ‘Mammy!’ I round the kitchen door and slide to a halt. She’s sitting at the table, the place mercifully quiet for the first time in days. She’s got the photo albums out. ‘You’ll never guess what! Just as well you’re sitting down.’

  ‘Ah, Aisling. I’m just being silly. Looking at photos of us all here over the years.’

  She pushes the book towards me. I’ve seen the handful of photos of myself so many times – and all of our family photos, to be fair. I know them like the back of my hand.

  ‘There you are on top of the hay bales. And Paul in the wheelbarrow. Haven’t we had some great times here?’

  ‘Mammy, I’ve got some news,’ I say, gently closing the album.

  She looks up at me in shock. Every mother’s instant reaction to that sentence is ‘she’s pregnant’.

  ‘I’m not pregnant.’

  She looks relieved. ‘It would be grand if you were, of course,’ she says quickly.

  ‘I know, I know. But listen to me. I’ve won some money. Loads of money.’ I pause for dramatic effect. ‘Two hundred grand.’

  She looks immediately suspicious. ‘What are you on about? Two hundred grand? Are you sure it’s not a scam? Where did you win it? Hardly a scratch card? And the Lotto machine in Filan’s was broken the other day. There was war over it. Tessie Daly’s been playing the same numbers for fifteen years, and if they had come up this week and she not able to buy the ticket she would have put Matty Filan up against a wall.’

  I have to interrupt her. ‘I won it in Las Vegas. Well, I won a car but I’m taking the money instead. I googled it and everything. It’s true. It’s all true! Isn’t it just great?’

  My excitement is infectious and the scam scales start to fall from her eyes. ‘Two hundred thousand. Did you really, Aisling? Well, isn’t that just brilliant? And it couldn’t have come at a better time.’ She smacks a tea towel off the table with delight, and we both sort of shout at the same time.

  ‘We can use it to save the house and the farm, Mammy.’

  ‘You can use it to start the café back up again, Aisling.’

  She looks at me, confus
ed. ‘Save the house and the farm? What are you talking about, pet?’

  ‘Are you not going to sell it? I saw the document from that property-surveyor crowd in Dublin. And I know you were looking at a new little house in Rathborris. And, and … well, you just seem very stuck for money. And I haven’t been much use. I’m not even paying you rent.’

  ‘I don’t want rent off you, Aisling. Don’t you do enough to help me? What would I do without you? You keep me from going doolally rattling around in this house missing your fath–’ Her voice catches.

  ‘What’s going on then? You were giving out about the price of boiling the kettle.’

  Mammy stretches herself up proudly and fixes her lips in a prim manner. ‘Boiling the kettle every ten minutes is one of the reasons the icebergs are melting, you know, Aisling. Constance and I are going into business. We’re opening an eco-farm.’ She looks pleased as punch. What in the blazes is an eco-farm?

  ‘You’re doing what? I don’t think the Tidy Towns will go for wind turbines blowing away half of BGB. I can just imagine Mad Tom hanging off one of them.’

  ‘No, Aisling. An eco-farm. Growing organic vegetables and opening a farm shop and installing solar panels and having a petting zoo for school tours. That kind of thing. We’ve been slaving over a business plan – inspired by you, actually. Constance’s fondness for posh colouredy carrots means she’s well up on the demand for organic vegetables, and BGB is closer to Dublin than ever with the good roads and Jamie Oliver chopping boards in Knock Garden Centre.’

  She’s right there. Nothing pulls people into the countryside quicker than a good road and a notions Garden Centre. And now maybe Mammy’s eco-farm.

  ‘What about the livestock?’

  ‘We’ll keep some sheep and cattle, but not too many. We’ve already ordered the piglets for the petting zoo, and William is flat out designing a hen house. He’s going to build it from scratch.’

  ‘Mammy, I really thought you were looking to sell up and buy a handy little two-bed?’

  ‘Well, I’m not. I’m not dead yet, Aisling. Constance is downsizing, though. She’s only rattling around that mansion by herself. She’s putting the money from the sale into the eco-farm, and one of her friends is going to take her horses. I’ve been helping her find something smaller.’

  So that’s what the Woodlawn Park brochure was about. ‘And where are you getting the money, Mammy?’

  ‘Savings, pet. Me and Daddy were never short. We had great plans for when we retired. We were going to travel the world. And now, well, that’s not going to happen, is it?’

  I blink away tears. What a woman. You forget that mammies aren’t just mammies. They have plans and ambitions and dreams. I’ve never felt prouder.

  ‘Are you sure I can’t give you money, Mammy?’

  ‘No. I won’t hear of it. And you know I would have given you the money for the café, pet, if it wasn’t already tied up in the eco-farm? Now, if you want to invest some money, that’s a different story. We’re also looking at expanding into eco-tourism – yurts and the like. Hen parties go mad for them. Imagine BallyGoBrunch providing them with their sausage sandwiches after a night on the rosé by the campfire?’

  I haven’t seen Mammy this fired up since … well, ever! Yurts in BGB. Her and Constance running a business. She’ll have Mammy in a wide-brimmed hat and a pair of riding boots in no time.

  ‘Look at us, Aisling. Businesswomen!’

  Well, my business is in tatters, but things are certainly looking up.

  There’s a clattering at the back door. The Morans are back. Shem and Liz are anyway. They look so defeated. I can tell Liz has been crying. I pull out a chair for her and usher her into it.

  ‘Shem, Liz, I’ve to tell you something.’

  ‘What is it, Aisling?’ Shem is already down at the Aga checking it for fuel and giving it a stoke. He’s like Daddy in that way. Not happy unless he’s doing something useful. Although, in Shem’s case it’s usually trying to sell sand to the population of Curracloe.

  ‘I’ve come into some money. Unexpectedly.’ No point in beating about the bush. ‘And I’d love to give you some to help you get back on your feet.’

  Shem stands up dead straight. ‘No, thank you, Aisling. That’s very generous of you, but no, thank you.’

  ‘But–’

  ‘No. Thank you.’

  I look at Liz and she shakes her head. ‘We couldn’t, Aisling. We’ll be okay. We’ll have the insurance money and we’ll get back on our feet.’

  There’s silence for a moment. Shem looks like he’s trying very hard not to cry, gulping away like there’s no tomorrow.

  I pipe up again. ‘Well, will you let me hold a fundraiser for you at least? Everyone in the village wants to help – Mammy’s phone has been hopping for days. We’ll raise a few bob.’

  Shem is still struggling to compose himself. Liz speaks up, smiling gently. ‘That would be lovely, Aisling.’

  The back door goes again. Who could that be? It feels like half the town is already in the kitchen. Mammy crosses the kitchen to answer it as Liz and Shem settle at the kitchen table.

  ‘Carol! Are you alright, love?’

  Mammy swings the door open wider, and Carol is standing there, a small suitcase balanced on the handlebars of her bike and an old canvas rucksack on the carrier at the back.

  ‘You said there might be a place for me here … if I needed one.’

  It takes Mammy a few seconds to compute, but almost immediately she steps back, swinging her arm into the kitchen. ‘Come in. Come in. Shem, will you get Carol’s bags there?’

  Shem busies himself with the bike and the bags, and Liz makes noises about packing up their own stuff and slips out into the hall. The Morans are moving to the Mountrath for a short while. Majella and I always dreamed about living in a hotel, so while the circumstances aren’t ideal, I’m delighted that someone is finally going to make her bed for her every morning.

  Carol sinks down at the table. ‘I’ve left him.’

  ‘Oh, good woman,’ Mammy yelps almost involuntarily.

  Carol continues. ‘He’s away in Germany for a week at a butcher’s conference, and as each day passes I’m dreading him coming back more and more. So I’m just not going to be there when he arrives back. I’ll be on my feet a bit by then, please God.’ She looks terrified, but her voice is steady.

  Mammy swings into action. ‘Aisling, get some sheets out of the hot press. The good ones. And lift up That Bloody Cat out of that armchair and let Carol sit somewhere comfortable.’

  Mammy’s in minding mode. Her default and best setting. Carol will be okay.

  Chapter 38

  I should have known Geraldine would completely take over. She’s suddenly acting like the fashion show in the Mountrath to raise money for the Morans was her idea when in fact all I wanted was a few mother-of-the-bride ensembles to make up the second half. The first half is ‘contemporary fashions’, and Knock Garden Centre has those covered, although I’m not sure what’s contemporary about pastel rugby shirts and colouredy wellies. Sadhbh is getting the 4 p.m. Timoney’s bus down – God knows what she’s going to make of it all. If she brings Don Shields there’ll be a riot.

  In typical Ballygobbard and Knock fashion, the entire parish has come out to help the Morans, and all 400 tickets were quickly snapped up. People can’t resist the glamour of a fashion show, and it didn’t hurt that Mad Tom stuck up signs advertising it right out as far as the motorway.

  Father Fenlon offered to MC and, given his experience speaking in front of crowds, I couldn’t turn him down. He’ll keep things moving, too, and stop any small children invading the catwalk. He’s good at that. I tried to cajole him into wearing a tuxedo, but he said he’ll stick to the collar if I don’t mind. Fair enough, I said.

  The BGB Gaels camogie team are on modelling duty, and Sharon spent the whole afternoon spray tanning them until they turned a rich mahogany. There was a bit of a stand-off between her and Triona from Crops
and Bobbers backstage about the hair, but they sorted it out between them, with Sharon saying she’d do make-up then since she’s only a blow-in. I had to remind them that a charity event was no time for rivalry, but they assured me that it was all very good-natured. Like I don’t have enough to be worrying about.

  ‘If it tastes even half as good as it smells you’ll be doing well, Aisling.’ James Matthews is outside in the carpark on pig-on-a-spit duty, rotating it slowly per Carol’s instructions. I was going to make use of that pig if it killed me. Filan’s donated 300 baps and the local ICA guild has provided enough coleslaw to sink a very big ship. If I learned anything at BallyGoBrunch it’s that you can never have enough coleslaw. They go mad for it around here.

  ‘We were fierce lucky with the weather anyway,’ I say, looking up at the cloudless sky. Someone is watching out for the Morans because the forecast was for twelve hours of rain.

  ‘I’m going to go back to the house to get the rest of the salads, pet,’ Mammy says, walking past on her way to the car. She has plates of hardboiled eggs and rolled up slices of ham all laid out under cling film ready to go. And a few lettuce leaves for a bit of token green. Carol has six buckets of potato salad chilling in the Mountrath’s massive walk-in fridge. Her secret ingredient is chives – very swish.

  Back in the function room, Maeve Hennessey and Dee Ruane are putting goodie bags on the chairs in the first two rows. That was another brainwave of mine – a VIP section, so we could charge twice the ticket price: €20 instead of €10. Sadhbh donated a load of CDs, T-shirts and miscellaneous shite from Flatlay, and Elaine got Colette Green to give us a case of her new scented pantyliners. Majella nearly died when I told her. What Maj doesn’t know is that Colette felt so bad after Elaine told her about the fire that she’s also donating two tickets to her Style Roadshow in Ballybunion for the raffle. What an absolute dote! We also have a €50 voucher for Cantonese City, compliments of the Zhus; an overnight stay plus dinner in the Ard Rí; a full pre-NCT service from Filan’s Garage; ten bales of briquettes from Filan’s Shop; and refreshments for up to 100 guests when you buy a wake from Filan’s Funeral Home. I think the heifer, donated by Paddy Reilly, will steal the show, mind.