Wise Follies

by Grace Wynne-Jones

  ‘Just what?’

  ‘Oh, I dunno. Pre-wedding nerves or something. Please forgive me.’

  He leans over and gives me a quick kiss on the cheek. Then he gets up. ‘Of course I do,’ he says. ‘Look, I’d better go now. I promised the lads I’d meet them for a pint in O’Driscolls.’

  As I watch Eamon leave I know he’s keen to get away. When we marry I think he will often want to meet ‘the lads for a pint in O’Driscolls’. But then again, many men do.

  ‘You’ll be glad to know I’ve given Eamon a thorough vetting on your behalf,’ Mira calls out from her room as I watch Eamon’s car leave. ‘I know you’re still a little doubtful about this wedding, Alice, so I gave him a little ESK quiz.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I frown.

  ‘I tried him out on Empathy, Sensitivity and Kindness. He came through it with flying colours.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘I’m so pleased you’re marrying him, Alice,’ Mira says as she returns to the sitting-room. ‘He’s special. Quite a find.’

  ‘I’m glad you think so,’ I say, trying to smile gratefully. It’s becoming rather clear that Mira is far more delighted about my wedding than I am. I can’t quite account for it. Maybe she’s enjoying ‘romance’ by association. And if she is, she can’t be quite as confirmed an eccentric spinster as she claims.

  I go to my room and pick up a letter from Matt that I have not yet opened. I rip open the envelope and gaze gratefully at his large, even handwriting. ‘So pleased you’ve decided to exhibit your paintings at James’s studio,’ it says. ‘I’m getting the invitations printed. They’ll be ready by the time you come back from your honeymoon. Did you get the set of dinnerware we sent you? James designed it especially. It’s got small tropical fishes on it – I told him you like them. He sends you his love, and I do too.’

  I look at the note numbly. I’m remembering how the small fishes in Laren’s bedroom used to remind me of hope. How it can glint and sparkle at you suddenly, at the most unexpected moments. I stare dully out the window.

  Oh, how I wish it would glint and sparkle at me now.

  Chapter 30

  I am getting married in seven days’ time. We’ve already had the rehearsal. Two hundred people are coming to the wedding. Some of my cousins are even flying in from Boston. Eamon’s house is jam packed with expensive presents. The cake’s been made and iced. Mrs Peabody has bought herself a most elaborate hat and even Annie has been persuaded to attend. Matt and James are coming too. I haven’t invited Liam. I don’t really know him well enough and anyway he’s been a bit cool with me over the last few days. I don’t know why. Perhaps he’s getting pre-wedding nerves too. I should tell him about the ‘Rescue Remedy’ I’ve bought. It’s in the ‘Bach Flower’ range. I take four drops of it in water at regular intervals. It does seem to help a bit, and I need it. Especially after what Eamon told me yesterday. He said he’d just heard that he, that is ‘we’, might be posted to Colombia before Christmas. It’s a year-long assignment.

  I must say being in some far-flung location with Eamon, and perhaps a newborn baby, does not seem at all enticing. Though I may have admired the cosmopolitan folk I saw in the arrivals area of the airport, being forced to join their number has an entirely different feel to it. Mira, however, exclaimed ‘how exciting!’ when I told her. Apparently she’s always wanted to go to South America. In fact one of the reasons she took a TEFL course was because she planned to spend some time abroad, only she somehow ended up teaching English to foreign students here.

  I asked Eamon if he could tell his employers that he didn’t want to go to Colombia, but he said he’d already discussed this with them and they’d insisted. Then, when I suggested that I myself could stay in Ireland he got rather angry. ‘My work takes me all over the world, Alice,’ he said. ‘You’ve said you want to leave the magazine. You said you like travelling. I thought you’d enjoy coming with me. What’s the point of getting married if we’re going to be separated half the time?’

  ‘Yes, indeed, what is the point of our getting married?’ I almost replied. It certainly didn’t make much sense to me anymore, apart from the fact that I may be pregnant. My periods still haven’t arrived. I’m trying not to think about it, though I did wander into Mothercare the other day. I’ve always wanted to buy a pair of those tiny woollen bootees. I get quite dewy-eyed when I see them. The tiny pants and cardigans looked so endearing too. ‘What are you doing in here? It’s silly,’ I told myself. ‘My periods are probably late because of all the excitement. And anyway, Eamon’s using contraception now so it’s highly unlikely that I need these particular items just yet. But if I do I should buy them before I go to Colombia.’

  Colombia … I didn’t even know where it was. I had to look it up on the map. I can’t believe Eamon and I never discussed the possibility of him being sent abroad. We don’t seem to have thought the whole thing through at all. But since I am now pretty much stuck with the situation, I am desperately seeking distraction. And that is one of the reasons I’m going to interview Laren MacDermott today.

  I’m having a quick cuppa before I head off to see her. I’m using one of the deeply flawed mugs I made at pottery class. Their shape is nice and they’re a very pleasing colour. If you’re only looking for what’s wrong with things you won’t notice what’s right. I know this because I see now that there’s a lot of good things about the life I’ve been leading. I wish I’d seen this before. It would have helped me wait – wait for the man, the marriage that’s right for me … if it ever came my way. And even if it didn’t, I probably could have come to terms with being single. Found its many and ample compensations. I think being single would be far better than being trapped in a loveless marriage, which is a situation I will probably find myself in. After all, the main thing Eamon and I have in common is that we are lonely, but ‘Great marriages cannot be constructed by individuals who are terrified by their basic aloneness’, I read in The Road Less Travelled. I finished reading it the other day. ‘The only way to be assured of being loved is to be a person worthy of love, and you cannot be a person worthy of love if your primary goal in life is to be passively loved,’ it said on another page. I wish I’d read it earlier.

  I think these last few months have really changed me. I’ve been searching so hard for answers and am only now beginning to wonder if I’ve been asking the right questions. What Matt said to me some time ago is right. If you watch your life closely enough it will guide you. Show you what you need. You have to do it with an open mind – not one full of prerequisites and prejudices. In some ways the little girl I used to be was wiser than the woman I am now. She lived in the moment. She wasn’t peering at the past or glancing fearfully at the future. She’s still there in a way. I think she’s watching the preparations for this wedding with great anguish. I’ve tried to comfort her, but she won’t listen. I don’t think she trusts me any more.

  I prayed last night. I knelt by my bed and asked for guidance. ‘Please, please help me, whoever you are,’ I said. ‘Send me some sign. Some signal. What am I to do? Surely I can’t call off the wedding now – everything’s been arranged. I may be pregnant.’ There was no reply. It was like phoning James Mitchel.

  I’m walking to Laren’s apartment – she lives nearby. As I do so I look to see if I can glimpse the kingfisher Annie saw the other day. She just got a glimpse of blue as it flashed by her towards the river. We haven’t had a kingfisher in these parts for quite a while. Quite a few people have mentioned it. It’s also been spotted on the top of a tall tree by the University Botanical Gardens – the place I wrote about some time ago. I look and look, but I don’t see it. Oh well, maybe another time.

  Laren lives in an apartment in a tall Georgian house overlooking the sea. I press the button marked ‘LB’, state my identity, and she buzzes me in. I’m rather nervous. I hope we find we have something to talk about. Oh well, at least I’m interviewing her so I can ask her questions.

  La
ren is waiting for me in the doorway. She’s wearing a red tracksuit and is looking surprisingly normal. ‘Hello, Alice!’ she says warmly and throws her arms around me. ‘It’s great to see you.’

  ‘It’s great to see you, too,’ I say, my voice slightly muffled by her hug.

  ‘It’s just like old times,’ she exclaims happily.

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ I say, wishing it was the truth.

  ‘Come in. Tell me all the gossip,’ she says, taking my jacket.

  ‘No. No – I want to hear about you,’ I say quickly, anxious to deflect her curiosity. ‘How did the tour go?’

  ‘Fine,’ she says. ‘I’m glad to be back though. It’s nothing like as glamorous as you’d think.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘There’s too much travelling and sitting in hotel rooms eating junk food. It can get a bit claustrophobic, being cooped up with the same people. The most exciting bits are the concerts.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say, rather disappointed. Somehow the idea that Laren was leading an incredibly exciting, glamorous life had cheered me recently. Now I find she was probably pining for her Dublin apartment all along. I’d even begun to find her weirdness rather intriguing. In fact, I was rather hoping she’d greet me in a bodystocking and be wearing piles of make-up, but instead she’s looking quite like her old self. She hasn’t uttered one expletive since I arrived. Even her hair is tied back sedately. It’s nothing like the expensive crow’s nest that aided her camouflage at that concert.

  She ushers me into a large, sparse sitting-room. The colours are stark – mostly black and white with rips of red and yellow. There are many cupboards and no clutter. The framed posters on the wall seem to be of mangled machinery. As Laren goes to make us some coffee I peer at them and see they are, in fact, sculptures. There is a skylight in the middle of the room with a dusky glass table and two striped deckchairs beneath it. As Laren disappears into the kitchen I place my small expensive tape recorder on the table and then pick it up again to make sure I’ve got the blank tape in on the correct side. I check my bag for extra batteries and hunt for my biro. I turn to the list of questions in my notebook and am about to read them when I see a large aquarium partially obscured by a rampant cheese plant. I go over and peer into it. Terrapins. At least twenty of them resting on rocks and small logs and small stones. Some are partially submerged by water. They are staring at nothing stonily.

  ‘Milk?’ Laren asks.

  ‘Yes, please. No sugar.’ I pace the room, making notes. Though I hope Laren and I will get a chance to have that ‘proper chat’ we spoke about, I also need to try and do a decent profile of her and people like these kinds of details. ‘No curtains or books,’ I scribble in shorthand. ‘Deckchairs. A cello by the window…’ I pause and look at the large solemn instrument. Somehow I find it hard to associate it with Laren. ‘Huge batik cushions clustered tidily in a corner,’ I note. ‘Large palm tree lamp. Silver-framed photos of Ava Gardner, Ginger Rogers, Betty Grable and Greta Garbo on a white shelf. A large teddy wearing sunglasses.’

  ‘Is that the same teddy you had when we were in school?’ I call out, hoping for some slight trace of continuity.

  ‘No. A fan gave him to me in Japan. The other had no attitude.’ She laughs as she says this and sashays in from the kitchen with two large navy blue mugs. I sit on a striped deckchair as she places them on the glass table. Laren then reaches for a large cushion and lies down on it.

  ‘God, I’m tired,’ she groans, lighting a Gauloise. ‘Hand me that mug of coffee, will you?’

  I pick it up carefully – it’s full to the brim. Suddenly this afternoon seems too full in its own strange way, as though something might spill.

  We sip our coffee in silence for some moments. ‘Oh dear, I shouldn’t have come here,’ I think. ‘We’ve nothing to talk about. Maybe I should turn on the tape recorder and get on with the interview.’ Just as I’m reaching for my notebook Laren turns to me and gives me a mischievous smile. ‘So, have you found your Wonderful Man yet, Alice? Remember how we used to talk about him in my room?’

  ‘Indeed,’ I smile. ‘I rather wish we’d talked about something else.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well,’ I say, remembering some of our classmates, ‘it might have been more character forming to join the Girl Guides, like Fidelma Higgins, or become infatuated with ponies like Sophie Brennan. And the clarinet seemed to do great things for Paula Clark.’

  ‘Paula’s living in Bulgaria now.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, she’s running a restaurant with a woman called Gertrude. They’re lovers. She came to one of my concerts and told me all about it.’

  ‘Oh.’ Some months ago this news would have astounded me, but now I find it doesn’t. ‘Does she still play the clarinet?’ I find myself asking.

  ‘I dunno, Alice, she didn’t say.’

  The radio is on in the background as we speak. I listen and hear that a woman has rung in to discuss the photograph on the cover of the telephone directory. The photo includes a close-up of a hand and the woman says the nail-varnished index finger looks like a woman’s, but the thumb seems different. ‘It doesn’t seem to have nail varnish on it and is bigger. Could it be a man’s?’ she enquires.

  ‘The things people ring up about!’ Laren gives a hollow laugh as she turns off the radio. Then she grabs the telephone directory from a shelf. We look at it. The hand’s proportions are indeed rather strange. ‘It’s probably just the angle,’ Laren says. ‘That can happen sometimes with photographs.’

  ‘Yes, that’s probably it,’ I agree. ‘But then again, they could have used a toe nail from the Loch Ness Monster.’ We both chortle a bit at this, our awkwardness fading. Silliness is a great breaker of barriers. Suddenly it does feel a bit like old times, being here with Laren.

  ‘You never told me if you’d found your Wonderful Man,’ Laren says, as she sits back on her cushion.

  ‘No, I’m afraid I haven’t found my Wonderful Man, Laren,’ I reply. ‘But it doesn’t really matter because that romantic stuff only lasts four years anyway. My father told me that years ago, and I’m beginning to suspect he’s right. It’s just nature’s way of making people procreate.’

  ‘Mmmm –’ Laren sighs. ‘But it’s fun, isn’t it. That passion. That – that wonder.’ She stares at the ceiling for a moment and then turns to me cosily. ‘There must be someone who stands out, Alice. Some man in your life who was special.’

  ‘Yes, a number of them did stand out, Laren,’ I smile wryly. ‘But not quite in the way I’d hoped for. Do you want to hear about the transvestite, the bigamist or the bisexual?’

  ‘Well, I have a certain fondness for transvestites,’ Laren says. ‘For example, Eddie Izzard is deeply fanciable, though I’m not sure what category you’d put him into. That’s probably why I like him.’

  ‘So you want to hear about Ernie then?’

  ‘No, I want to hear about your favourite man, Alice,’ Laren says, correcting me firmly. As she says this she looks like a young girl again. Curious. Eager. She was always asking me questions like that when we were teenagers. Wanting to know my favourite pop song or brand of jeans or film star. It was one of our hobbies, naming our favourite things. They changed quite regularly, so the answers were rarely predictable.

  ‘Apart from my family, you mean?’ I ask. Clarification is important with these questions. Almost imperceptibly we seem to have drifted into the past, into our old ways. I half-expect Laren’s mother to appear at any moment to offer us some biscuits.

  ‘Yes,’ Laren confirms.

  I stare into my mug of coffee. I can hardly believe the answer that has come to me, but it seems entirely true. ‘This may seem very stupid, Laren,’ I glance at her cautiously. ‘But I think “my favourite” wasn’t even a man yet. He was a boy. A boy called Aaron.’

  ‘Oh yes, Aaron,’ Laren says, slightly disappointed I think. Maybe I should have answered her with an anecdote. Given her some outlandish reminiscence
of a wild affair with Brad Pitt. ‘You used to speak about him at school,’ she adds, speaking softly now. ‘He and his family emigrated to Australia, didn’t they?’

  ‘Yes, they did, when I was twelve,’ I say, amazed that my eyes have started to mist. I reach into my bag for a hankie. ‘This is ridiculous, Laren,’ I say, bashfully. ‘I’m being far too sentimental.’

  ‘No, you’re not,’ Laren pats my shoulder comfortingly. ‘He was special. A soulmate.’

  ‘He’s married with a family now,’ I sigh. ‘Funnily enough, he’s living in Alice Springs. I got his address some years ago and we wrote some letters to each other. It was nice, but it wasn’t the same.’

  ‘We can have more than one soulmate you know, Alice,’ Laren says consolingly. She seems so gentle now. So different from the woman who strode about so outrageously on that stage. ‘One day you’ll find another Aaron,’ she says. ‘Someone who shares his qualities.’

  As she says this I realize the only person I’ve met who reminds me even slightly of Aaron is Liam. This realization is so unexpected that I clench my hankie tightly in my hand until it becomes a damp, tight ball. He has the same playfulness, the same humour, the same way of noticing things. But he’s too young for me and he’s marrying Elsie and…and he wears leather patches on his jacket. Yes, he’s obviously not for me.

  ‘Remember that woman in your village who said you’d marry the man next door?’ Laren suddenly asks disconcertingly. As she says this I take a deep breath and look at her. It’s obviously time to tell her about Eamon.

  ‘I’m not marrying the man next door, Laren,’ I say. ‘Actually, I’m marrying a man called Eamon in seven days’ time.’

  ‘Gosh!’ Laren exclaims, looking at me with startled eyes. ‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

  ‘I dunno, we sort of got sidetracked,’ I mumble. ‘We’re having a posh reception at Cassidy’s Hotel. Here, I’ve brought an invitation with me.’ I hand it to her. She stares at it for some time.