The Guesthouse on the Green Series Box Set 2

by Michelle Vernal

  So, here she was having to walk around with a packet of doggy treats in her coat pocket at all times. Sure, she’d been like the Pied Piper of Howth Harbour in a red coat the other day as she’d set off down the pier with an entourage of cocker spaniel, Labrador and feisty Dalmatian in tow.

  Pooh looked up at her now with his head cocked to one side. ‘You’re not going to make me choose you know. So, you might as well accept that Donal’s going to be a part of my life. Just like the girls are going to have to do the same. I’m seeing him tonight for your information. We’re going out for dinner.’

  Pooh whined.

  ‘And it’s no good whining, so cop on to yourself.’ She retrieved her coat from where it was hanging in the utility room.’ Pooh padded after her wanting guarantees she wasn’t going to get sidetracked by an afternoon episode of Emmerdale or the like. ‘There’s no one I can talk to about Donal either, except you,’ she said to him as she slid into the red parker and zipped it up. ‘I’m not the girl who sat giggling with her friends over the peck she’d fended off from Beanpole Brown anymore. He tried his luck after taking me to the cinema, you know. I’m a widowed woman, Pooh, of a pensionable age so I am.’ She headed toward the front door. ‘I don’t have those sort of conversations with Rosemary or Marian or my golfing girls and I certainly couldn’t have them with Rosi, Aisling or Moira.’ The thought of the look on any of their faces were she to ask their advice as to what she should do when Donal tried to have his way with her made her chortle. ‘So, you’re it,’ she said, venturing out and shutting the door behind them.

  Chapter 2

  The restaurant Donal had booked them into was an Italian place in Raheny which had been garnering good reviews. It was halfway between where he lived in Drumcondra and where she lived in Howth. Maureen insisted on driving herself to meet him even though he’d offered to pick her up. It would have made for a long round trip and she was worried it’d be painful for him to sit for so long. Pooh’s poodly teeth were sharp and had indeed made their mark. She hadn’t wanted to risk another encounter between them just yet either. Not until she felt she was making headway with this positive reinforcement doggy treat business.

  It wasn’t the best night to be out and about, she thought, hunching over the steering wheel as the windscreen wipers worked overtime. She could feel her little car getting buffeted at the lights but she managed to find the bistro without too much trouble and was grateful for the easy car parking behind the restaurant. It was not the night to be walking miles. The car slid into a space and she locked it before wrapping her coat around her and walking briskly to the entrance of Amalfi’s. That the restaurant was dimly lit registered first as she stepped inside. This was a worry, insomuch as Rosemary Farrell had gotten a bout of food poisoning from a Mexican place she’d gone to with her daughter. It too had been dimly lit and Rosemary was adamant the lack of lighting was to hide the lack of hygiene.

  Maureen gave a tentative sniff. It certainly smelt appetising and not at all like the sorta place where cockroaches would be lurking, she decided, inhaling the warm, yeasty aroma of pizza dough.

  Her coat was whisked away by the maître d’ who lacked the flamboyant welcome she so enjoyed whenever she frequented, Aisling’s Quinn’s bistro. She was introduced to their waiter for the evening, who was about as Italian as she was with his red hair and freckles. His name, he said, in broad Dublin tones, was Antony. She fancied he’d made that up and his real name was Seamus, which suited him much better, as he led her over to the table where Donal was already seated. She put a hand up to her hair hoping the biting wind hadn’t undone all her hard work with the hairdryer earlier. She was aiming for a soft wave not a Farrah Fawcett flick.

  Donal was old-school in the manners’ department, like Brian had been, and he stood up seeing her approach. His bearded face broke into a smile and his eyes lit up in a way that made her feel special. She turned her cheek and his lips, soft and warm, brushed her skin, his beard tickling her and giving her goosebumps—the good kind. He was looking very handsome in a white shirt and navy trousers. The crisp line down the middle of each leg didn’t escape her notice and the thought of him thinking she was worth the effort of ironing them pleased her.

  ‘Maureen O’Mara you look a picture, and you smell wonderful. Tell me again what your perfume’s, called,’ he boomed, and Maureen saw a few heads turn their way. Donal didn’t give a flying toss what others thought of him and she admired this quality amongst others in him.

  ‘Arpège,’ she said, straightening her dress and feeling pleased she’d taken the young girl’s, who needed a good meal inside of her, advice. It was what was called a wrap style.

  ‘It’s very flattering around here,’ the girl in the Howth boutique whose window display she often admired when walking Pooh, had said, patting her own non-existent midriff. Outside a plaintive whining had begun and Maureen had had to excuse herself in order to tell Pooh to quieten down or he’d be getting none of the treats she had in her pocket because his behaviour wasn’t falling into the positive reward realm.

  ‘I’ve had four children, you know, and one of them was over ten pounds,’ Maureen replied on her return, patting her own middle. ‘So, think on—’

  ‘Ciara, and I’ve no plans for children. I’m too young.’

  ‘Or lunch or dinner either, by the looks of you.’

  ‘I’m naturally thin.’

  Maureen didn’t trust anyone who was naturally thin so when Ciara held up a dress and said, ‘Well now, this will be perfect for you then. It will streamline you where you need it.’ She’d been sceptical even when Ciara had taken a big sucky-in breath to demonstrate where Maureen needed streamlining.

  ‘I can see your ribs, young lady. Does your mammy not make you breakfast?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t do breakfast. I’m a coffee on the go, girl.’

  ‘Well I’m a mammy and I say you need to eat your breakfast. It’s the most important meal of the day and there’s a bakery next door where you could get yourself a nice egg sandwich for your lunch, too.’

  Donal interrupted her reverie. ‘I’ve not seen you in that colour before, it’s lovely on you,’ he said, waiting for her to sit down.

  ‘Thank you.’ Maureen smiled as Antony held her chair out for her. Electric blue wasn’t normally a colour she’d wear but Ciara had assured her it looked well on her. She’d felt like living dangerously and so she’d splurged, on the condition Ciara got herself a sandwich from next door for her lunch and ate a bowl of porridge before she left for work the next morning. They’d shaken on it.

  Maureen sat down and Donal did the same. The waiter flapped around with her napkin and she resisted snatching it from him and telling him not to be making such a performance of things. It was an oversized hanky to be placed on the diner’s lap, not a rug you were after beating.

  ‘I hope you’re hungry?’ Donal beamed as he was handed the drinks menu. He pulled his reading glasses from his shirt pocket and inspected the list.

  ‘I am, it smells wonderful in here.’ Maureen beamed back. ‘Very garlicky.’

  Donal knew she was partial to a red and he knew a thing or two about wine because he’d done a night school class on wine tasting so Maureen was happy to sit back and let him order. They agreed a garlic bread to share as a starter would be lovely.

  ‘How’s your erm...’ she lowered her eyes to the red chequered cloth covering the table, the candle flickering between them casting shadowy light across it.

  ‘Grand, there’s only a bit bruising there now.’

  ‘He’s very sorry, you know.’

  Donal laughed that rumbly belly laugh of his. ‘I’m sure he is.’ It was said in a tone that said he didn’t believe a word of it. ‘You know, Maureen, I had a punch in the nose from the fella my Ida was courting before me for making eyes at her when I was a young fellow but a bite on the arse from a jealous poodle, well I have to say that’s a first.’

  Most of the restaurant’s patrons looked their way upon
hearing this. They went back to their meals when Maureen began to chatter about her day. ‘I had a lazy morning catching up on my chores followed by a spot of shopping and then this afternoon I went to my watercolour painting class after which I took Pooh for a walk down the pier.’ She’d not be mentioning the ten minutes or so of stargazing at her own face she’d done in the bathroom mirror trying to see herself through Donal’s eyes.

  ‘How’s the self-portrait coming along?’

  ‘Grand.’ Maureen was pleased with it. She felt she’d captured her essence and yes, so what if she’d shaved a few years off and given herself a lovely big head of hair like her favourite actress from Ballykissangel, Dervla Kirwan. Better that than the modernistic style Rosemary Farrell was after painting. She said it was reminiscent of Picasso’s style only in watercolour and she thought she might give it to her daughter who had a big birthday coming up. Maureen thought it might finish her off, poor love, ripping off the paper and being confronted by a face that would drive rats from the barn, but she’d kept that to herself.

  ‘I hope it’s going to be hanging on my wall.’

  Maureen giggled. ‘Ah, you don’t want me looking down at you from your wall when you’re trying to watch the tele.’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind having you keep an eye on me.’ His grey eyes danced.

  She blushed and was grateful for the flickering candlelight as she changed the subject. ‘I had a postcard from Aisling today. She wrote that she and Quinn are having a whale of a time over there in Sweden, only she doesn’t write it like that. Every sentence starts with ‘my husband and I’ like she’s the Queen.’

  ‘Newlyweds.’ Donal commented with a smile.

  Maureen smiled back, acutely aware of his knee resting against hers under the table. ‘They’ve seen the Northern Lights and fed Reindeer. They’ve even been on a sleigh ride pulled by doggies.’

  ‘Huskies.’

  Maureen nodded and then frowned. ‘I still don’t know why you’d want to have your honeymoon somewhere you’d have to wear more layers than an onion has skins but my girls always have to rub against the grain.’

  Donal winked. ‘I’m sure they’re finding plenty of ways to keep themselves warm.’

  Maureen’s face grew hot in a way it hadn’t since she’d gone through the menopause. She could have done with the big fan she’d carried around with her for the best part of a year, like a genteel lady from Victorian times, now, to hide coquettishly behind. Only back then there’d been nothing genteel about the way she used to rattle the bottle of Vitamin B6 tablets her doctor had prescribed to settle her hormones whenever someone in the family was annoying. It was a warning to them they were entering into what she called the danger zone. All that rattling and fan beating had been very exhausting.

  She was saved from having to answer by the arrival of the wine. It was a rich, ruby red colour which Donal assured her after going through the palaver of swirling and then tasting the tiddly amount Antony poured into the bottom of his glass, was a warm, oaky flavour. ‘That will do nicely,’ he said, and when their glasses had been filled and Antony had disappeared, he turned his attention to Maureen. ‘Now then, I wanted to talk to you about a luncheon date for when your Aisling and Quinn are home and have got their breath back. What do you think to us going to Johnnie Fox’s over there in Wicklow; the seafood’s very good I hear?’

  Maureen sat up straighter in her chair. ‘Oh, look here comes the garlic bread.’ It was only a temporary diversion she knew but it would give her the chance to gather her thoughts because she knew what was coming next.

  The herby, buttered bread was placed in front of them and they each helped themselves, taking a bite while it was steaming hot.

  Donal waggled what was left of his loaf in Maureen’s direction. ‘As I was saying. What do you think to Johnnie Fox’s? I’d very much like our two families to meet. I feel as though I’m sneaking around behind their backs and I’m too old for that sort of carry on. I’m very proud to be seen out and about with you, Maureen, and I don’t want to have to make excuses to my girls as to where I’m going and what I’m doing any longer.’

  It was the most masterful she’d heard Donal sound and her legs went weak under the table. He reminded her of Daniel Day Lewis in her favourite role of his Last of the Mohicans only with the look of Kenny Rogers about him. She quashed the image of Donal rampaging through the Irish countryside in a loin cloth and concentrated on her garlic bread so as she didn’t have to meet his eyes.

  Donal had told her his girls. Louise and Anna had taken to ringing him constantly since Ida had passed despite having busy lives of their own to be paying attention to. She’d had a heart attack at the wheel of her car and mercifully nobody else had been killed but it had come as such shock to them all losing her all of a sudden. Even now, four years later, his daughters wanted to know where their dad was and what he was doing, in case. He’d told them his heart was perfectly fine and he wasn’t going anywhere but their sense of security had died along with their mother. It was a sad state of affairs and if he was learning to live again then they needed to learn to do so too. ‘They like to think they’re looking after me the way their mother would have wanted them to but Ida would have wanted me to get on with things and she certainly wouldn’t have wanted me to be reliant on our children.’ Maureen had listened carefully to what he’d said and come back with the reply that children never see their parents as adults with needs and wants of their own. ‘They’re Mum or they’re Dad plain and simple, she’d said.

  ‘So, Maureen, lunch?’ Donal pressed once more.

  There was no getting out of it. Maureen could tell by his serious expression she’d not be able to stall or skirt around the edges of what he was asking. She put her bread down and rested both hands on the table, her wedding ring glinting under the light. He was right, she knew he was. The girls had begun making wisecracks that she was stepping out with Liam Finnegan, yer man missing his two front teeth who busked on Grafton Street by whistling Irish Rovers hits through the gap. How everybody knew his name, Maureen didn’t know, but they did. He’d probably been in the papers at some point in time but either way the joke was wearing thin because every time she’d seen Moira of late, she’d taken to whistling My Old Man’s a Dustman just to annoy her. She was far too smart for her own good that one.

  ‘Johnnie Fox’s for lunch it is. Sure, the craic’s mighty there.’ The atmosphere in the well- known pub would be good even if it was frosty at their table.

  Donal was pleased. ‘I’m sure they’ll all get along great guns.’

  Maureen wished she had his confidence.

  ‘I’m partial to lasagne myself what about you?’

  ‘I like the sound of the ravioli, Donal.’

  They ordered their main course and while they waited for their food, Donal told her about a gig he had coming up at the end of the month. His Kenny Rogers tribute band, The Gamblers would be playing at a seventieth birthday bash in Clontarf. ‘The birthday girl’s favourite songs are Islands in the Stream and We’ve got Tonight which don’t sound the same with fat Davey doing the duet. Maureen, can you perchance sing?’

  ‘I can hold a tune.’

  ‘How do you feel about being Dolly and Sheena to my Kenny?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know, Donal.’ Maureen hadn’t expected that and her mind was racing. She’d thoroughly enjoyed herself at Aisling’s hen night doing the karaoke, skirt tucked into her knickers aside. Everybody had said she’d been very entertaining.

  ‘The band needs you. I need you.’

  Well now, she could hardly say no to that, now could she?

  Chapter 3

  Maureen put a teaspoon of bicarbonate soda into the glass and poured warm water on it. It fizzed up like a mini volcano and when it had finished hissing and spitting, she drank it down, banging the glass down on the worktop like a tequila slammer. Not that she’d ever drink tequila again, not after Aisling’s hen night. She caught sight of her grimacing face in the reflection
of the kitchen window as she swallowed the bitter tonic. It was horrid but it would save the tiramisu she’d shared with Donal against her better judgement, coming back to haunt her in the wee hours. She never slept well when she partook of too much rich food. There was another reason she didn’t think she’d sleep well and that was because for the first time in a very long while she’d been kissed. Properly kissed.

  Her index finger went to her lips and she smiled to herself, staring into the inkiness outside. Donal had settled the bill despite her protestations that she was a modern woman and, in the end, they’d agreed that she would treat him to that new Tom Hanks film everybody was raving about, Cast Off on Thursday. Would they sit in the back row of the cinema and would his arm slide around the back of the seat before he kissed her in the cinema like they were young ones? It was how he was making her feel, like a young girl who was experiencing flutterings in places she’d thought had long since stopped beating their wings. Donal McCarthy had put a spring in her step and brought a glow to her skin. He was better than any youth elixir or fancy serum, Moira was so fond of.

  They’d wandered out into that fierce weather and he’d wrapped his strong arm around her, protecting her from the elements. Her coat had flapped around her calves as they’d made their way around the back of the restaurant to where they’d parked. She wasn’t in a hurry this time because she liked the solid weight of his arm around her and the warmth she could feel of his body as their coats rubbed against each other. They’d stopped beside her car and Donal had turned her gently toward him. There’d been no time to ponder what she should do and she’d instinctively closed her eyes and tilted her head back, losing herself in the sensation of his warm, soft lips on hers. It had been gentle, searching, tender and yes, there’d been the promise of something else to come in that kiss, but not yet. She hadn’t wanted it to end but the burst of laughter and sudden flash of light as one of the kitchen hands stepped out of the back door of the building to cart a bag of rubbish over to the bins saw them break apart.