‘Asleep?’ she sniffed. The mere suggestion of it was insulting. She had paced back and forth all night until she finally stretched out on the sofa around 4 a.m. She might have dozed for a second but that was the extent of any sleep that she had had. Besides, even if she had fallen asleep, she’d had her phone beside her all the time, even when she had gone to the toilet. He could have, if he had wanted to, phoned her at any time and she would have answered.
‘I suppose not.’ He said.
‘More like you didn’t want to talk to me. For fuck’s sake, Liam, Louise rang me, why couldn’t you?’ From what Louise had told her there were a lot of things that she needed to know.
‘It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk to you, Alex.’
‘Well, for a start Liam, what the hell were you doing in the house with Jenny on your own?’ She paused.
‘I don’t know, the kids had gone out… why?’
‘Why?’ She waited intently, repeating his question. This was the one piece of information that Louise had told her that had interested her most – not the fact that Jenny was dead, not the fact that he hadn’t told her what was going on, but that he had lied to her or at least been dishonest by omission. The volume of her voice increased a couple of notches. ‘Because you moved out of here to be with the kids… to be with the kids, Liam, they weren’t even in the fucking house!’ Questions were queuing up inside her head and she sank back onto the sofa fighting the urge to fire them at him.
‘It just happened that way, Alex, it wasn’t as though I had planned it.’ His voice sounded strained and cracked under the intensity of having to answer for himself all over again. ‘Look, I know… I should have rung, I’m sorry, I just wasn’t thinking straight, sorry. Really I am, love, I’m so sorry,’
‘Look, we can talk about it when you get home.’ She resigned herself to waiting to see him face to face before she asked him any more questions. Her voice was softer, the angst of earlier somewhat dissipated by his apologies and the comfort of knowing that he was finally on his way home. Even though she would never have admitted it out loud, she was relieved that Liam’s ex-wife was in fact dead. Her relationship with Liam, and by extension his children, had been overshadowed by Jenny and her illness the entire time she had known him. The dynamic had always been strange, one that there was no precedent for. At least now, one way or another, when everything settled down, their lives would move forward. She knew it was ridiculous to feel jealous, but she couldn’t help it. Maybe if she had ever met Jennifer Buckley, she would have felt different, but the opportunity had never been there.
‘Well, about that…’ Liam hesitated. He had a way of enunciating his words slowly when he was uneasy with what he was about to say. Alex inhaled in anticipation.
‘What about that?’ Alex interjected. ‘Let me guess.’ Her anger was building like a Jenga tower. Every block that was removed making her a little more unstable and even more likely to topple over once it was replaced in a new position. ‘You’re not coming home.’ She saved him the awkwardness and blurted out what she expected he was about to say.
‘It’s just the kids, Alex, I have to be with the kids, I can’t leave them on their own. Not this morning anyhow,’ he pleaded. She loved Abbie and Josh too, even though she rarely got a chance to show it, but she would have loved to have been that special person whom they could have turned to at times like this. But she wasn’t. Liam, because of the tension between Josh and himself, had kept her at arm’s length from the family. As far as Josh was concerned, she was merely his dad’s mistress, who he was made to socialise awkwardly with every second Sunday. It didn’t surprise her that she was, yet again, left out.
‘Yep, okay.’ She drew a long breath and shrugged. Maybe she would go over to Louise’s after all.
‘Alex…’ He was rounding the junction at the entrance to Oakley Drive. ‘I’m so sorry about all of this, I know this is not what you signed up for.’
‘Don’t Liam, it’s all okay.’ A flare of anger flashed up her spine at having let him off the hook once more. He was right. This wasn’t what she signed up for, taking second place, never in pole position, waiting with bated breath to see whether or not she was going to be included going forward. They should have, in hindsight, had a proper discussion when he first mooted the idea of moving back in with Jenny and the kids but they hadn’t. Realistically speaking, when were they ever going to be together? Was he going to sneak out of the house back to the apartment to be alone with her when the mood took him as though she was something to be ashamed of, a guilty secret? Was that what their relationship was reduced to? ‘Well actually,’ she added, ‘it’s not okay but that’s not the priority right now.’ She breathed slowly, trying to ignore the rise of adrenaline that was threatening to make her hang up on him. ‘The priority has to be the kids today,’ she agreed. ‘So, get them sorted first… but we will need to have a think about how this is going to work in the future.’ She paused, silently pleased with her assertiveness and defiance. ‘We should have actually discussed it before you moved out, and things do need to change if we want it to work for all of us.’
‘We will love, I promise you.’ He paused while he took the keys from the ignition, having parked in the driveway outside the front door. He had hesitated about where he was going to park, considering Sarah had made a big deal about him parking there the day before, but with Jenny gone, his car being in the driveway didn’t make any difference and besides, who the hell did Sarah Barry think she was? Calling him a selfish prick! How was he supposed to know about Jenny’s aversion to parking on the road. He wasn’t to know that Jenny hated the idea that the neighbours would see her every move as she inelegantly transferred from the passenger seat to the wheelchair? Sarah had been a complete bitch and if Jenny, Abbie and Josh hadn’t been in the room when she had had a go at him, he would have told her so.
‘Alex…’ He pressed the screen on his phone to disengage the hands free and placed the phone to his ear as he stepped out of the car. ‘I do love you, you know that, don’t you?’ There was a silence at the other end of the line as the car door clunked behind him and the gravel crunched underneath his feet as he made his way towards the front door.
‘I can hear that you’re already there.’ She said.
‘I am…’ He glanced at the front door disappointed that she had avoided his question. ‘I’m just thinking out loud here.’
‘Yeah?’ she said
‘How about you come over to the house later?’ According to Louise, he was to expect a visit from the forensic division and he definitely wouldn’t want Alex in the house while that was going on. He also wanted to phone his solicitor and it was probably wise that she wasn’t there for that either. ‘Maybe early evening?’ he suggested. ‘I know Abbie would be happy to see you and I would too.’ He didn’t have to make any reference to what Josh’s sentiments might be, they both knew he’d have an objection.
‘To Oakley Drive, Liam… Jenny’s home?’
‘Well, yeah,’ he said unsure.
‘How would that look?’ she said quietly.
‘It’ll look like you care, that you are here to check on us, see if there is anything you can do for Abbie, for Josh. It doesn’t have to be for long.’ Alex had been in the car with him once or twice when he had been dropping Abbie and Josh home and she had even waved hello to Jenny once from the car, but she had never been brought inside the family home. Was it too soon?
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, it’s perfectly reasonable…’ He thought for a moment. ‘If it makes you feel better, why don’t you come at dinner time and bring some food, that’s what people do at times like this, isn’t it?’
‘I suppose.’ She said. He could have left it as it was. Alex at the apartment waiting for him to return and he at the house looking after the children, but he was stuck somewhere in no man’s land, the space between wanting to be with her and knowing it might not be a good idea. Josh wouldn’t like it, that was for sure.
<
br /> ‘I’ll bring dinner over then,’ she said.
‘Good.’ He’d tell the kids in a while, besides, there were bound to be visitors in and out all day offering their condolences once word got around. He pointed his key fob back towards the car to lock it, took three deep breaths before he turned the key in the front door.
The decision to move back into Oakley Drive had been a challenging one and he had struggled with the idea of leaving Alex behind but what choice did he have? He was their dad, it was his time to step up, to look after his kids. Jenny had done it without him while being terminally ill, he could hardly have said no because he didn’t want to leave his girlfriend. In hindsight though, he should have put more thought into how it was going to work, how they were still going to be together while they were living apart. Moving back into Oakley Drive had had its challenges but the worst, he feared, was still to come. No matter which way he looked at it, he had something to feel guilty for.
4.
Sarah watched the shadow of Liam’s car darkening the window from Jenny’s downstairs room and waited silently as he placed his key in the front door and pushed it open to walk inside. He had given his original key back to Jenny the day he’d moved out two years ago and Jenny had only returned it to him on Saturday when he’d moved back in.
‘Oh.’ Liam blinked rapidly when he saw her standing inside the room, edging her way towards the threshold. ‘You’re still here.’ His voice was neutral, devoid of any gratitude. Between the intense questioning that Louise had put him through at the station and then getting an earful from Alex on the phone, he wasn’t in the mood for another confrontation. He hoped Sarah wasn’t either.
‘Of course.’ She drew a breath. ‘Where else would I be?’ The smile on her face didn’t match her tone but Liam pretended not to notice; another faceoff with Sarah Barry, or anyone for that matter, was the last thing he wanted. It would have been bliss to just arrive home, have a shower, doze on the sofa and wake up to a breakfast that Alex had made for him but he knew that the only thing salty that he was going to be tasting was Sarah’s attitude towards him. ‘I could hardly leave the kids on their own,’ she answered. Liam let it slide. Throwing a dig or a veiled jibe his way was like a sport to her and Liam had lost count of how many points she had racked up.
‘Where are the kids?’ he asked, placing his keys on the hall table and noticing the opaque film of condensation that had clouded the hallway mirror. He had only mentioned to Jenny yesterday how ineffective he had noticed the bathroom fan was. He didn’t remember it being that bad when he had lived there before.
‘They’re up in their rooms.’ Sarah hurried into the kitchen unable to look him in the eye and he followed two steps behind her. He could have asked her how they had been or whether Abbie had cried any more or whether Josh had opened up, but he chose not to. He didn’t want her to think she was closer to his children than he was.
‘Okay, thanks for bringing them home and for waiting with them.’ The tension between Liam and Sarah was inevitable. Sarah had been by Jenny’s side longer than he had ever been and even though it was he and Jenny who met, fell in love, got married and had children together, it was Sarah who had been Jenny’s constant person all along – so when his and Jenny’s marriage had started to break down, it became Sarah’s fight as well, only Sarah wasn’t half as forgiving as Jenny had been. He closed his eyes briefly in shame.
‘Abbie’s had some toast but Josh wasn’t hungry, said he’d get something later.’ There was a half empty glass of water with mouth marks on the rim and Sarah made an animated task of running it under the tap, squeaking a cloth around it to make it shine, placing it upside down on the draining board to drain and then re-wiping the surface that had already been wiped. The task was just enough to distance herself from having to look at him directly in the eye. Liam could tell that there was an argument milling around her head. The type of argument that there would be no coming back from. If Jenny had been there, she would have quenched the tension between them by now. ‘I have to ask…’ he knew she couldn’t help herself. ‘Why did you go to the Garda station?’ She pulled a tea towel from the hook to dry her hands.
‘I told you at the hospital, they needed more detail about Jenny’s death.’ Liam paused to rub his eyes. The detail of everything that had happened was dragging down his eyelids and he would have liked nothing better than to just keep them closed, to keep the true picture of what happened at the end of their marriage out of focus, but his subconscious kept careering towards memories that he would have rather forgotten. He flung back the door in an attempt to shoo them away.
‘Jenny’s suicide,’ she corrected and paused. His eyes followed hers as she threw a fleeting glance towards the hall door and in his mind’s eye he could picture her handbag on the hall table with her car keys beside it from when he had come in moments ago. ‘Or are they concerned that it wasn’t in fact a suicide?’ Her voice was firm, professional, as though she were in court. He watched her as she moved closer to the hall door.
‘What the fuck are you saying, Sarah?’ His chest inflated as he stood by the patio doors.
‘I’m saying, I think it’s strange that Jenny’s not yet even cold and your priority is to get yourself to the Garda station, make out that it had nothing to do with you.’
‘It had nothing to do with me, Sarah.’ He gritted his teeth and Sarah sniggered incredulously. He took a step closer and lowered his voice so Josh and Abbie couldn’t overhear from upstairs. ‘I’ve told you before that what I do with my family is none of your fucking business, okay?’ His hand twitched by his side with temper.
‘None of my business?’ She placed her hand on the hall door handle, her voice a shouting whisper. ‘You were happy enough for it to be my business when you were off shagging your girlfriend and someone needed to be here to pick up the pieces of the life that you had shattered on your way out.’
‘Don’t you dare, Sarah.’ It took all his effort to contain the rage that was bubbling inside of him as she glared at him defiantly. She pushed her shoulders back a little, making herself look slightly larger than she was.
‘You left your wife when she was terminally ill, Liam. You left your children so that you could shack up with some yoke.’ Her eyes squinted into slits. It was as though everything she had ever wanted to say was sitting waiting its turn on the tip of her tongue. ‘Seriously, what type of man does that?’ she spat out in disgust.
‘You know I didn’t know she was ill.’ He moved closer to her slowly, his head jutting forward as though it made his words reach her quicker. Who the hell did she think she was? ‘Just leave it, Sarah, I’m warning you.’ He taunted her with a look, mollified by watching her wrestle her temper into check.
‘You’re warning me?’ She took a step to the side making the space between them wider before she spoke. ‘I think you might forget that it’s me you’re talking to.’
‘Oh believe me, I would if I could,’ he replied, turning away from her and making his way to lean against the dining table. Every word she said infuriated him.
‘And I think you forget—’ she added ‘—that Jenny and I talked about everything.’ It had always been that way, as far as Liam could remember. ‘There wasn’t anything,’ she emphasised, ‘that Jenny and I didn’t talk about, Liam.’
‘I’ve nothing to hide,’ he said defiantly, trying to withdraw from the conversation and divert her from wherever she was making a beeline to. Sarah had been there throughout his relationship with Jenny and there was nowhere to hide. She had been present for the ups and the downs and there were plenty of downs in the last few months he and Jenny had been together. As bad as it was knowing that he had let things deteriorate so badly, it was worse knowing that Sarah had been there every step of the way. He wasn’t proud of the way he and Jenny had argued before he had left, he wasn’t proud of the things he had said and if he could have gone back in time he would have done things differently. He should have loved Jenny more, he should have ho
noured her like he had promised to do in his vows, he should have been with her in sickness and in health like he had promised he would.
‘Yeah, well, I know different,’ she said.
‘Good for you.’ He sunk his hands into his jeans in an attempt to look unfazed. She was looking for a reaction and he wasn’t going to be the fool to give it to her. She had a way of manipulating every situation to suit her argument. ‘And I don’t care what Jenny told you, I’m here for the kids, not that it’s any of your business.’ He stood up again, this time keeping his hands in his pockets so as not to appear too threatening. ‘So the best thing you can do, is get the fuck out.’ He reached his hand out and pointed to the door. ‘Do us all a favour… don’t come back, thank you very much.’ It sounded childish but he couldn’t help himself. Sarah was the type that if you gave her an inch, she’d reclaim the other eleven inches and make a foot out of it, claiming that she was entitled to it all along.
‘You are and always have been a fucking arsehole, Liam Buckley.’ There was pure venom in her voice. ‘I don’t know what happened here last night but I won’t rest until there is justice for Jenny. There is no way that she would have done this, not yet, not like this.’ She shook her head.
‘Well then, it looks like you and Jenny didn’t talk about everything after all.’ He walked towards her, a sneer of aggression on his face as he tried to get her to leave. ‘Maybe she did decide that the time had come, maybe she didn’t confide everything in you. Maybe she only wanted the people closest to her to know what she was about to do.’ He knew the inference of Jenny’s indifference towards her feelings would hurt harder than any of his insults could ever do.
‘Fuck off, Liam.’
‘I would,’ he sniffed and leaned down towards her, the proximity making her squirm, ‘but it’s my house, Sarah.’ His voice was low, determined. ‘You’re the one who needs to fuck off.’
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