As soon as we heard the door close, I said, ‘What a gorgeous man.’
‘He’s brought a great deal of happiness into my life,’ Mum said. Her smile was one I hadn’t seen for a very long time. She seemed brighter and happier than I could remember. ‘I never thought I could ever…’ She stopped.
‘Ever what?’
‘Feel like that again. Now,’ she said, changing the subject abruptly, ‘would you like some more tea before you go and meet Bronagh?’
‘No, I’d better start getting ready,’ I said. ‘I don’t think it’s a late one because she’s going out later. She didn’t expect me home.’
5
Roberto: How is it? It’s awful, isn’t it? You don’t have to tell me. All the adrenaline has leached from your body and you are now a comatose shell… a body with no soul. How much are you missing London? Too much to quantify?
Me: Missing you but not London. Not yet, anyway. I’ve only been here precisely six hours. Don’t worry, I’ll be bored soon. Off to meet Bronagh for a drink later. What are you doing?
Roberto: Watching Murder She Wrote. Eating cereal.
Me: Try to include a few vegetables. Or an apple.
Roberto: Vegetables? Never! The very idea. Am going to spend the next month you are away mainlining highly refined carbohydrates. You will return to my nutrient-deficient shell and feel v guilty.
Me: I am ordering you a weekly organic vegetable box. Eat that daikon.
Roberto: Love you. Give Bronagh my most ardent love. Tell her not to keep you though.
The village of Sandycove is a long curving line of shops, pubs and cafés with a church at one end and, in the middle, a crossroads, one way leading to the sea and the harbour and the other way leading up to Sandycove Avenue, one of my favourite roads in the whole village, especially when it blossoms with pink in spring.
It was a bustling place but not Hackney-busy. Here there was a sense of people quietly and quickly getting on with their lives, or sitting with a coffee outside, or walking dogs, or doing the shopping. I was sure that in a few days I’d be dying to get back to London, bored senseless and desperate to see different faces, rather than the same ones you saw all the time. But… I’d actually forgotten how much I liked it.
It was a Saturday evening and the village was looking its very best. There were more hanging baskets than ever, spilling over with purple lobelia and orange nasturtiums and the shops were painted in bright colours, their names above in curlicued gold. There was Bernard Murphy the butchers, Adrian’s newsagents, Janet’s bakery, The Island pub, Betty Boyle’s boutique Nouveau You… and, of course, Nell’s, Mum’s shop. As I walked past, I looked inside, where a young woman – long blonde hair, wearing a fuchsia-pink trouser suit and smiling broadly – was serving a customer. Had to be Jessica.
But there we so many new shops as well: a lovely flower shop called The Garden, a hipster café Albatross and, just as I crossed over, there was a cool-looking deli called James’s. I had seen it before, but I’d never taken the time to look inside properly. I peered in through the glass to see a long oak counter running the full length of the shop, floor-to-ceiling shelves, glass jars of spices and tins of Italian tomatoes and packets of pasta. There were shelves full of wine and a large cheese-and-cold-meat cabinet at one end of the shop.
Someone was closing up for the day as I peered in, a black Labrador stretched across the doorway while the man fiddled with the lock. He stood up, smiling with recognition.
‘Olivia?’
‘James!’ We’d been in youth orchestra together, years ago, just a couple of chairs away – him bassoon, me clarinet. But he now had a full beard, shaggy hair and was wearing a pristine checked shirt tucked into jeans, like an Appalachian going to a wedding. ‘How are you? It’s so great to see you!’
‘You too, Olivia,’ he said. ‘I heard you were coming back.’
‘I’m not exactly back,’ I replied. ‘I’m only here for a few weeks to help Mum out while she’s on crutches.’
‘Ah, right. Well, welcome home for a bit, anyway.’
I looked up at the shop. ‘This must be yours?’
He nodded. ‘Opened last summer and we’re doing well. I had my own food truck for years, festivals and events. Did a few weddings, parties, corporate things, and then I managed to get a bank loan and open a shop.’
‘It’s a big move,’ I said, impressed.
‘Well, I was ready to settle down… and Sammy here had had enough of travelling, hadn’t you, boy?’
‘Hello, Sammy,’ I said, giving the dog a stroke. ‘He’s beautiful.’
‘He is,’ James agreed. ‘But he’s slowing down, the poor thing.’ He leaned and stroked the top of the dog’s head, who stared up at him lovingly. ‘Don’t know what I’d do without him.’
‘So the shop’s going well?’
‘It’s going really well,’ he replied. ‘I make a different dish of the day every day. It was paella today… you should come pop in.’ He paused. ‘By the way, it’s you I need to thank for this…’ He waved towards the shop behind him. ‘I always admired you doing your market stall. You used to talk about it at orchestra. I remember thinking I really wanted to run my own business. The year you left for London… when was that?’
‘Ten years ago…’ Was everyone going to mention or allude to Seasalt? Would I have to hold up a sign?
Please don’t mention Seasalt! It’s over and done with!
‘Right, well, that year I got the food truck, making my lasagnes and my chillies. Did it for a few years. Without doing that I wouldn’t have had the confidence to go to the bank, and all this wouldn’t have happened.’
There was a shout behind us. ‘Olivia!’ Bronagh was running towards us, waving. ‘OLIVIA!’
‘BRONAGH!’ I laughed, holding my arms open and she ran into them.
‘Oh my God,’ she said, hugging me. ‘It’s so good to see you!’ She stood back as we both grinned at each other. ‘Looking fabulous.’
‘So are you!’
Bronagh was tall, with black-framed glasses and shoulder-length hair which was pushed to one side. She had a towel under her arm, her hair still wet. She only wore navy, black or white and on first impressions she was terrifyingly put together and assured and successful – but she’d been like that since she was thirteen when we met for the first time in Mrs Madden’s French class. She now ran her own architecture practice which was between the new flower shop and Albatross café.
‘I can’t believe you’re home for a MONTH,’ she said. ‘It’s amazing.’ She smiled at James. ‘Isn’t it great?’ she said, laughing.
‘Yes, Bronagh,’ he humoured her. ‘It’s great.’
‘Been swimming?’ I said to her.
‘Of course!’ She grinned at me. ‘Can’t get enough of it. It’s the only way to get my body to feel anything these days. Even cold. Come on, let’s go and have that drink. We can sit in the courtyard. It’s such a beautiful evening. God, I love June.’
‘Bye, James, great to catch up,’ I said.
‘You too, Olivia. I’ll see you here for my paella…’
‘It’s incredible,’ said Bronagh to me. ‘He’s a culinary genius.’
‘Or my chickpea stew… that’s Monday.’
‘Deceptively delicious,’ said Bronagh, slipping her arm through mine. ‘Bye, James, see you later.’
And we began to walk to The Island, the pub we’d been going to since we were teenagers.
‘Finally,’ she went on, ‘we can go for proper drinks again. I’m sorry I’m meeting Paul later, but it was all arranged before you told me you were coming home. Now, were you serious when you said that you won’t be working and won’t be worrying about calls from London?’
‘I promise,’ I said. ‘I’m entirely focused on being here for the next few weeks. Obviously, I’ll be working in the shop during the day, but my evenings and weekends are totally free.’
‘Okay, so I am thinking drinks in The Island. Walks on the seafro
nt. Yoga on Saturday mornings. I’ve got it all planned out.’
‘How is work?’ I asked. ‘How is the wonderful world of architecture? Still having meetings with men with pointy beards and yellow spectacles?’
She laughed. ‘I think you are referring to Hans,’ she said. ‘And yes, last time I spoke to him on Zoom his beard was still pointy, but, in a major plot twist, his glasses were green. But we’re busy. Two university libraries on the go, one in Berlin and another in Limerick. And then there is the Ballinasloe community centre and the ecolodge on the Faroe Islands. But they are still only in discussion stage.’
We were standing right outside The Island. ‘Shall we go in?’ she said. ‘I’ve been dying for a drink all day.’
The pub hadn’t changed at all, still the same decor, with glass buoys and lobster nets and old front pages framed showing great sea disasters of old. The only thing that was new was the fact that a group of women in one corner were drinking cocktails.
‘Cocktails?’ I said. ‘Since when did The Island get fancy?’
‘Since they got new staff,’ Bronagh said. ‘Matt’s the new barman and he came back from Toronto with all these new ideas. They even do tapas here on a Friday night. You go and sit in the garden and I’ll bring the drinks out. I’ll get two margaritas… all right with you?’
‘If you’re twisting my arm. Go on then.’
The garden was a small courtyard with four long tables and benches, there were ferns and banana plants and acer trees in pots, giving a jungle feeling to it all. Above, the sun was still shining. I could hear the birds singing and, as I went to sit down, I felt that feeling as though I was on holiday. A proper holiday, not just visiting home, like I was truly on a break. Irish weather is, as everyone knows, a heady mix of horizontal rain, bleak and buffeting winds and short patches of sun. July and August are as unpredictable as the winning lottery ticket; you could easily have months of torrential rain as much as you could have blazing sunshine. But May and June rarely let you down and are the only times when the weather can be relied upon to deliver.
Going to sit down, I edged past a man sitting with his back to me, a cup of coffee and The Irish Times laid out in front of him and a teeny-tiny Yorkshire terrier asleep on the bench. Sandycove was no magnet for handsome men, but this one was striking, like a young Daniel Day-Lewis. Not, of course, that I was interested. I was, however, a sucker for a sweet dog and as I slid past, just as my hand hovered near his head ready to pet him and coo over his cuteness, the dog’s eyes shot open and he suddenly transformed into a snarling, miniature wolf.
‘Oh my God!’ I shouted, snatching my hand away, nanoseconds before those horrible jaws clamped down.
‘I’m so sorry.’ The man stood up, the dog in his arms – now looking as though butter wouldn’t melt. ‘Are you all right?’
The man was taller than I’d thought so I had to angle my head to forty-five degrees to look into those brown eyes. He looked around my age, maybe slightly older, and was wearing jeans and a blue shirt, sleeves rolled up.
‘It was my fault,’ I said, relieved to have an untouched, intact hand. ‘He was asleep and I woke him up. I’m the same in the mornings.’
‘Pablo needs to learn better manners,’ he said.
‘No, I do,’ I replied, prolonging the conversation. ‘I invaded his personal space. There he was, having a nice dream, and I disturbed his slumbers.’ I tried to laugh, thinking he would laugh as well, but he was already sitting back down again, as though finished with our conversation. The dog had hopped back onto the bench and had settled down again.
Bronagh came towards me, carrying two margaritas. ‘I was just thinking, finally, someone sane to talk to.’
‘Sane-ish,’ I said.
‘Oh, we don’t want perfectly sane,’ she said, sitting down. I was aware that the man had looked up briefly and seemed to be listening. ‘Perfectly sane is boring. Sane-ish is all I require.’ She grinned at me, and then looked over at the man. ‘Oh, hi Will,’ she said. ‘Good day?’
He nodded. ‘I was on a few calls,’ he said. ‘You?’
‘Grand. Been swimming lately?’
‘Yesterday,’ he said. ‘And it was cold… I mean, it’s June and the water still isn’t warm. But Dermot is insisting on going again. I’m heading down there now.’ He got to his feet, picking up his paper and bag. ‘Come on, Pablo,’ he said, as the dog hopped off the bench to the ground and they left.
‘Who is he?’ I asked.
‘A handsome devil,’ she said, ‘that is who he is. Every straight woman or gay man in the village is after him.’
‘Mr Handsome Devil, Sandycove.’
‘Well, he’s actually Will Butler. Dr Butler. He’s just opened up a surgery in the old chemist’s. Remember Dermot Butler, a year ahead of us in the boys’ school? It’s his older brother. I think he was the studious type, he was too busy reading books to be out and about. Why… do you like him? Being of sane-ish mind, I assume you do.’
‘No, just curious.’ He was too aloof for me and, after Jeremy, I was done with complicated men. However handsome they were. ‘Anyway, he’s the owner of an evil dog. What’s that saying, judge me not by what I say, but by what my dog does?’
Bronagh laughed. ‘But dogs can be tamed. Even vicious lapdogs. Never judge a dog by its snarl.’ She held up her glass. ‘Anyway, welcome home.’ She held up her glass. ‘I am so glad to see you.’
‘Me too,’ I said.
‘Here’s to Maribelle,’ she went on. ‘And to thank her for giving you this extended holiday!’
I had an image of Maribelle in a white dressing gown, drinking carrot juice, desperate to get back to London, and I hoped she was doing okay. ‘To Maribelle! So, how is Postman Paul? When will I finally get to meet him?’ Bronagh and Paul had been going out with each other for the last few months.
‘Probably never,’ she said, shrugging. ‘We’re just two mismatched people spending a minuscule amount of time together keeping the cold hand of loneliness from knocking on the door. It’s not going to last much longer, nice as he is.’
‘But nice is good, isn’t it?’ If I was ever going to get involved with any male ever again, then nice was going to be top of my list. ‘What’s wrong with nice?’
‘Nothing,’ agreed Bronagh. ‘I like nice. But Paul is so nice he wants me to share his Star Wars obsession. He knows every character and every storyline and God knows what else. And, at first, I thought, yes great. It’s good to be interested in different things. I mean, he thinks buildings are just buildings.’
‘They’re not?’
‘No, they’re not. They are everything…’ She laughed again. ‘Please don’t let me start talking about buildings. I realise that we building enthusiasts are not easily understood by the general population.’
‘Opposites attract,’ I reminded her.
‘But I think we’re like two magnets repelling each other. I just have to find the right moment and tell him.’
‘Talking of which,’ I said. ‘Jeremy and I are over. He got together with his ex-girlfriend Cassandra and she very kindly called to tell me.’
‘Really?’ She shook her head. ‘What an idiot.’
‘Cassandra or Jeremy?’
‘Both.’
‘But it’s fine,’ I said. ‘I’m fine. He had a few eccentricities that I am quite glad to be rid of.’
‘Like what?’
‘He didn’t own a single pair of jeans.’
Bronagh froze in motion, her margarita millimetres from her lips. ‘Didn’t own a single pair of jeans? What kind of monster was he?’
‘And he ironed his socks, and he had never eaten baked beans… not even as a child.’
Bronagh’s face was grave at the mention of these heinous crimes.
‘It gets worse,’ I said. ‘He hates fish. Doesn’t consider it food. And, as far as I can tell, he’s only ever read two books in his life. One of which was The Tao Of Pooh and the other the theory driving test book.’
‘I know.’
We looked at each other with a muted horror. Bronagh was making me feel better already, as she always did. But even as I spoke, London and Jeremy and the office already seemed so far away. It was as though I had moved on, just by moving away.
Bronagh held up her glass again. ‘Here’s to lucky escapes.’
‘To lucky escapes,’ I echoed. ‘I don’t know why I put up with it six whole months,’ I said. ‘I have decided to work on my spinster habits. Must take up knitting.’
‘And witchcraft,’ said Bronagh. ‘Isn’t that what single women are meant to do? I am going to buy myself a black cloak and sweep through the village uttering curses at everyone, terrifying all the men. Luckily, I already have Mies van der Rohe as my familiar.’ Mies was her small, black, aged cat, named after Bronagh’s favourite architect. I smiled at her, thinking how much I’d missed our chats; phone calls and FaceTime weren’t the same. ‘By the way,’ she said, ‘would you like to come to my parents’ anniversary party next Saturday?’ She released a long sigh of despair. ‘I’m dreading it and it would be nice to see a friendly face. Moral support, that kind of thing.’
Life's What You Make It Page 4