Thirteen Stops

by Sandra Harris

  “What are you then, my knight in shining armour?”

  “If you want me to be, I will.”

  There was a silence. Then she said: “Graeme, have you by any chance ever seen the film Pretty Woman, with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere?”

  He shook his head. “Should I have? Is it any good?”

  “Christ, no. Don’t bother with it if you ever come across it. It’s a . . . it’s a load of old bollocks. Not realistic at all.”

  “I’d better make a note of it so.” He looked worried. “To remind myself not to watch it.”

  To her amusement, he tore a page off a notepad on the coffee-table and wrote on it in giant capital letters: ‘PRETTY WOMAN: DO NOT WATCH. RUBBISH!!!’

  “I’ll Sellotape that to the television later, just to be on the safe side. Just in case, you know? In the meantime, I’ll make some more coffee while you think about my offer.”

  He got to his feet, stuck the pen he’d been using behind his ear and disappeared into the kitchen with the tray of empty coffee mugs. “Better still,” he went on when he returned again a minute or two later without the tray, “why don’t you make the coffee for both of us? I can’t possibly hire you anyway unless I’m confident that you can make a decent cup of coffee. I take mine very hot and strong, with only a splash of milk and two lumps of sugar. And don’t forget the biscuits – from the tin.”

  “Fine by me,” said Vicky, getting up and going into the kitchen, glad of the chance to be alone with her thoughts for a few minutes.

  The kitchen was covered in yellow Post-It notes. On one cupboard was a note that said clearly in big bold capital letters, PLATES, and on another, CUPS. On the cutlery drawer was a note that said KNIVES, FORKS AND SPOONS. On the wall above the kettle was a larger Post-It where someone had clearly written down the instructions for making tea, starting with FILL THE KETTLE WITH WATER, THEN SWITCH IT ON. Beside this were instructions on how to make coffee in the cafetière which was standing on the counter, also beginning with FILL THE KETTLE WITH WATER, THEN SWITCH IT ON. On the counter there was a tin labelled BISCUITS and another labelled CAKE: TO BE EATEN BY THE 19TH AT THE LATEST.

  Vicky swallowed hard as she blinked back the tears that were starting behind her eyes. Andrew wrote notes like this too, or she helped him sometimes by writing them herself. He still had the instructions for tying his shoelaces or, more likely, the laces of his battered trainers, written on a yellow Post-It note stuck to the end of his bed. He didn’t need it any more, strictly speaking, but he liked the comfort of knowing it was there. “In case I forget,” he’d told her with one of those grins that made her whole being light up with happiness.

  She filled the kettle with water and then switched it on. As she rinsed out the mugs and then the cafetière, she thought about Graeme’s proposition. Imagine if she did, in fact, become his personal assistant in a thriving little business. Imagine being able to talk openly about her job in front of the other mothers at Andrew’s school, without having to tell blatant lies about what she did for a living. Imagine, too, going to night-school, doing her Leaving Cert and actually getting it! She’d felt inferior to other people for so long, simply because she’d left school at sixteen to push a pram and live in a council flat, like people probably expected of her just because she came from a poor family.

  She’d been blessed with good looks, which she still had now in her early thirties because she took care of herself, but good looks didn’t last for ever. If she had some sort of a qualification, she’d have something to fall back on and at least be able to say that she’d achieved something with her life. Although Andrew was, and always would be, her biggest and brightest achievement.

  She spooned a generous amount of coffee into the cafetière, added water, put on the lid and left it to infuse. And wouldn’t Andrew be so proud of her! He was always saying he was proud of her anyway for being such a good mother to him, but he knew how much it had affected her to leave school without having done the Leaving Cert. At the time of her pregnancy, she’d practically sprinted out of the school doors with relief and joy that her time there was over. But she’d had plenty of time to reflect over the years that followed, years in which she felt she’d been looked down on by everyone she’d ever met because she was only a single mother whose child’s father was in and out of jail for various petty crimes. What she wouldn’t give to be able to hold her head up for once. Never to have to be Maroon again but only ever Vicky, just Vicky, Andrew’s mum who was studying for her exams!

  She was so damn tired, she wasn’t thinking straight, that was the trouble. Her life and Andrew’s had been one long struggle. What would it feel like to hand over the reins to someone else, she wondered, to let another person take care of her for once, even in a small way? She’d thought that Tommy would take care of her and Andrew but that had ended in catastrophe. The way she felt right now, she had a good mind to take Graeme up on his offer. Why did she always have to be so damned independent, doing everything the hard way? Couldn’t she let someone give her a helping hand for once? Could she not take a chance for once? Maybe she should be across the hall in that sitting room right now, biting Graeme’s hand off in gratitude.

  “How’s that coffee coming along?” Graeme called out.

  “Ready in a jiffy!”

  Vicky poured the coffee, chewing on her lower lip, something she always did when she had a decision to make.

  The work side of things could all be ironed out easily enough, but what about the romantic side? If she worked side by side with Graeme every day, they’d end up in bed together for sure. They were just too attracted to each other for that not to happen. What would happen to their working relationship then? Would Graeme want her out of his house and his business after they’d done the dirty deed? And imagine if he didn’t, and they went on to have a full-on, proper male-female romantic relationship? She’d have an autistic boyfriend as well as an autistic son. And after today, she already kind of felt as if she was destined to be surrounded by autistic males whichever way she turned. How would she cope? How would Andrew cope? He was always saying that he’d like her to meet someone decent, but he probably felt safe saying it because he knew that there was no real chance of its ever happening. How could it? She was never going to meet someone that she’d like enough to want to put him ahead of Andrew. It might be a different matter, though, if she brought home an actual flesh-and-blood male for her son to meet. The whole thing was just messed up. It was better not to change things. It was better to leave them the way they were. Wasn’t it?

  “Don’t forget the biscuits!” Graeme called out. “There might be some ginger ones left!”

  “Okay – just coming!”

  Vicky opened the tin marked BISCUITS. There was a yellow Post-It note inside. She read it, then peeled it off the biscuit package and turned it over and over in her hands thoughtfully. When she eventually brought in the coffee and biscuits on a tray, the crumpled Post-It note was in the pocket of her skin-tight leggings. She was keeping this one.

  “I can give you both my answers now,” she said.

  STOP 7: MILLTOWN

  Carl and Tara

  Carl got on the Luas at Milltown, after first buying a ticket to Brides’ Glen, where he lived. He’d spent a fairly unsatisfactory morning looking at two possible premises for his brother Graeme’s graphic-design business, which was still only at the planning stage. And the way he, Carl, felt right now, knackered, irritable and temporarily carless, he had a good mind to tell Graeme to shove the whole thing up his arse and find his own bloody business premises. But, of course, there were reasons why he couldn’t – wouldn’t – ever do that. The Great Autismo (his affectionate nickname for his extraordinarily intelligent sibling, who enjoyed practising his magic act as a way of unwinding) was his little brother. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for him. Even now, when Graeme had properly put the cat among the bloody pigeons and no mistake.

  “Excuse me,” said a large lady with two overfilled shoppi
ng bags as she heaved herself into the seat beside Carl.

  He forced a polite smile to his face as he squished himself up against the window like a fly, but inwardly he was heaving a huge sigh. Why did the fat ladies always want to box him in like this? It was bad enough that he already had two schoolboys sitting across from him with their long gangly legs and their loud music that he could hear perfectly well even though both boys were wearing earphones. Their fancy designer trainers probably cost more than he earned in a week. Tsk tsk, kids today. Carl sighed again, out loud this time. Maybe he was just getting old. Too old for public bloody transport, anyway. The sooner his car was back from the garage, the better. Probably cost him a bleedin’ fortune as well, but it’d be worth it not to have to ride this fucking sardine-can on wheels every bloody day. And people were always telling him how great the Luas was! He tried scrolling down his phone to distract himself, but Facebook just wasn’t doing it for him today.

  “Please move down the tram,” said the automated female voice whose other more useful function was to inform the passengers of the different stops along the way. What a posh sexy voice she had, Carl thought, wondering briefly if there was a real woman behind the voice and, if so, what she would look like in lingerie with her hair undone, draped artistically over his bed. Jesus! He must be sex-starved indeed if he was fantasising about having it off with an automated voice. Clearly, he was no longer suited to a bachelor existence. Carl Groves, you knobhead!

  Disgusted with himself, Carl forced his mind away from Sexy Robot Lady and back to thinking about Graeme’s bombshell. They’d all been gathered around the table the other week for Sunday Dinner as usual – Dinner With A Capital ‘D’ – when Graeme had decided to just lob it into the middle of the table like a fucking unexploded hand-grenade and watch complacently while it went off. Mum and Dad had nearly had heart attacks, especially Mum.

  “Oh, by the way, gang, I’m getting married,” he’d announced, as casually as if he’d been declaring his intention to change his brand of toothpaste. That was the autism, though. Graeme always announced things, whether catastrophes or triumphs, with the exact same level of deadpan-ness, in the same monotone voice he used for all declarations.

  But, as far as his family was concerned, this one was a catastrophe for sure.

  There had been a dead silence round the dinner table. Carl’s wife Karen (they were separated at the moment but she was still to all intents and purposes his wife) had paused with her wineglass halfway to her mouth, and it took a lot to get Karen to stop drinking at the Sunday Dinner Table.

  Dad had asked Graeme worriedly, “Is this a joke, son?” while Mum had paused in the act of cutting up her meat to stare across at Graeme as if he’d suddenly developed stigmata in the middle of his meal. Even the kids – his and Karen’s – had shut up for a minute.

  “Are you fucking serious?” Carl had demanded, breaking the silence.

  “Fucking fucking fucking!” echoed six-year-old Lauren, swinging her legs in delight.

  “Lauren, stop that!” Karen had expostulated. “Now see what you’ve done, Carl!”

  She was always thrilled to get a chance to score points off him anyway, but she was never happier than when his sub-par parenting was being publicly called to account once more.

  He’d pointedly ignored her and said to his brother, who was calmly spearing a bit of broccoli with his fork, “Well, are you serious or what?” (The broccoli, by the way, was the main reason Carl hadn’t been surprised to hear that his younger brother was autistic. Nobody normal ate broccoli. Certainly no one normal who didn’t have a gun to their head ate it willingly and, what’s more, with every appearance of enjoyment, pronounced it delicious and asked for seconds. Graeme wasn’t just autistic. He was fucking nuts, he had to be.)

  Graeme nodded, as calm and self-composed as ever.

  “I’m deadly serious,” he said.

  “To a woman?” Carl said.

  “Yes, of course to a woman.” Graeme was not in the least ruffled. “You’re only saying that to rattle me. You know perfectly well that I’m as straight as you are.”

  “Who is she, son?” asked Mr. Groves, looking even more worried now he’d established this wasn’t a joke. “Have we met her?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Graeme. “Unless you’ve ever used the Stilettos Kiss-A-Gram Agency and Massage Parlour, have you, Dad? Their number used to be in all the phone boxes until they took them down. The boxes, I mean. Not the cards. Although I suppose the cards had to come down too when the boxes did. Now they mostly leave their cards in the Chinese takeaways and places like that. I found mine one night I was getting an egg foo yung, actually.”

  “You’re marrying an escort?” Carl had stared at his younger brother in disbelief. “You must be off your trolley. A fucking prostitute?”

  “Daddy said it again!” squealed Lauren delightedly. “Fucking fucking fucking!”

  “You’ve really done it now!” hissed Karen at Carl from across the table.

  They’d stopped seating Karen next to Carl at the Sunday Dinner Table since the time she’d stabbed him in the hand with her fork while pretending to be going for the potatoes. He still had the scar to remind him of that happy day.

  Now a red-faced Carl turned to face her angrily and said, “Can’t you just shut up scoring points off me for a minute? Can’t you see that this is serious?”

  “What’s a Fucking Pwozzy-Tute?” asked five-year-old Georgie innocently.

  “It’s a woman who has sex for money,” snapped back Carl without thinking.

  “Carl!” expostulated Karen and his mother together.

  “He’s only five years old!” added his mother.

  “Well, then,” said Carl testily, knowing he shouldn’t but unable to stop himself, Graeme had given him such a shock, “it’s about time he learned that life isn’t all hugs and kisses and Postman fucking Pat.”

  “Fucking fucking fucking!” echoed Lauren blissfully. “Fucking fucking fucking! Fucking fucking fucking!”

  “Lauren, please!” begged Karen – then, when Danny, their four-year-old, howled, “Georgie, did you just kick Danny?”Georgie shrugged, as if to say that it was a matter of complete indifference to him what his feet decided to do, under the table and independently of his body.

  “Who is she, son?” Mrs. Groves said then, looking at Graeme distraught, as if she’d only just realised that her baby wasn’t in nappies any more but was a hulking grown man of nearly thirty-one.

  “I’m delighted you asked.” Graeme reached across to the potato bowl to help himself to more roasties. “Top-notch spuds today, by the way, Mum. Where’d you buy these?”

  “Never mind the fucking spuds,” growled Carl. “Who is this tart?”

  Graeme’s cheeks coloured hotly. “She’s not a tart, and I’ll thank you not to refer to her as such.”

  “Well, who is she then?” Carl, feeling distinctly in need of a pick-me-up after the shock of hearing that the little brother he adored was taking a wife none of them had ever met before, had a swig of his wine, draining his glass.

  “Her real name is Vicky,” Graeme said with a note of pride in his voice. “Her escort name is Maroon because she has these lovely purple stripes in her hair. She’s a really interesting person. I think you’d love her like I do, Mum and Dad, if you met her, which I hope you will do.”

  “How long have you known her?” Carl expertly corkscrewed open the bottle of wine he’d brought with him as a courtesy gift and poured himself a big hefty glass without offering it to anyone else. He knew he was behaving badly but he didn’t care. After another shitty boring week at work, Sunday was meant to be his day of rest, goddammit, his day for relaxing and seeing his kids in a normal family environment. This was all too much to take in at once.

  “Let’s see now,” said Graeme, seeming to count back in his mind. “Friday, Saturday, Sunday, yes, three days. We met on Friday.”

  “Friday just gone?” spluttered Carl.

&nbs
p; “Since Friday?” Dad choked on his meat and Mum had to pound him vigorously on the back.

  “You’ve only known this woman since Friday?” Carl asked.

  “Well, yes, since Friday.” Graeme looked surprised himself at all the surprise his family was expressing about the only-having-met-her-on-Friday thing.

  “How old is she, Gray?” Karen was staring with open curiosity at her brother-in-law.

  “She’s about thirty-three.” Graeme seemed as happy as Larry to get a chance to answer questions about his fiancée. “She was very young when she had Andrew, about sixteen I think, if I remember what she told me correctly.”

  “She has a teenage son? Where’s his father?” Carl was speaking ominously quietly. He always spoke quietly when he was about to explode. And who could blame him? This situation was fast becoming farcical.

  “Well,” Graeme said, “he’s been in and out of prison since Andrew was born, so he might be there now for all I know. On the other hand, he might not be. I really don’t know. I’d have to ask Maroon. I mean, Vicky. I’d have to ask Vicky. I still keep calling her Maroon by accident because that’s what I knew her as at first.”

  “How did you propose, Gray?” Karen asked him, taking a bigger than usual (and that was saying something) swill of her wine.

  Carl glared at her. Was she trying to stir the shit or what?

  Graeme, however, just smiled, as if remembering something pleasant. “Well, you’ll probably think that I’m a hopeless romantic for doing this, Karen. I put a yellow Post-It note with the words ‘MARRY ME, VICKY’ on it in the biscuit tin, so that when she went to take out the biscuits to go with our coffee, she saw my note.” Then he added proudly, “I took her to buy the ring on Saturday. Yesterday, I mean. It’s a really stunning big diamond. I was going for something a bit subtle, myself, but Vicky had her heart set on this really flashy one so we got that one instead.”