The Seven Secrets of Happiness

by Sharon Owens

  ‘Hear, hear!’ Jasmine said eagerly. ‘Won’t it be weird to have a cup of tea where we don’t have to go running for the kitchenette every time Theodora arrives at the door? Honestly, I think I’ve developed a phobia of little old ladies.’

  ‘Yes, I know what you mean,’ Ruby replied, laughing. ‘Isn’t it great not to have anybody standing over us at long last?’

  ‘It is.’

  Filled with hope and a creeping sense of excitement the two women quickly hung up their new stock in the freshly painted shop. Ruby arranged some of the nicest outfits and accessories in the window along with a few of her crisp new carrier bags. Jasmine vacuumed up the dust created by the packing boxes and then folded all the leftover cardboard into bags for the recycling lorry. By lunchtime they were ready to turn the lovely vintage door-sign to open.

  ‘Here goes,’ Ruby trilled, cracking open the champagne and pouring some into two tall pink glasses.

  ‘Here’s to new beginnings!’ Jasmine said, clapping her hands and admiring the luxury armchair again. ‘Here’s to the most stylish boutique that Belfast has ever seen!’

  8. Ravenhill Road

  As December approached, Tom Lavery thought again of Ruby O’Neill. Or rather he allowed himself to think of her without feeling guilty about it. Not that she’d ever been very far away from his thoughts during the eleven months that had passed since he’d first spoken to her. And shaken her hand on the doorstep of her lovely home on Ravenhill Road. But as the Christmas decorations went up again around the city he couldn’t help wondering how Ruby would get through her first Christmas on her own. He knew from bitter experience that from now on everything wonderful that had once reminded Ruby of something happy would probably only remind her of how much she had lost.

  Despite all that, Tom half hoped that Ruby would order a fresh tree again, so he could at least call by and wish her a merry Christmas. Or just say hello, even. Merry Christmas might be stretching it a bit, given the circumstances. But no order appeared on the list at the garden centre. And when he drove past her elegant house on Ravenhill Road one day on his way to deliver some topiary tubs to a nearby restaurant he was dismayed to see a young couple coming out of the house instead. They pulled the front door shut behind them and walked happily down the short tiled path to the street. The woman had a small pregnancy bump and the man was very protective and careful of her. They were holding hands. Tom slowed down and glanced in through the bay window. The pink rose-patterned wallpaper was gone from the sitting room. In its place were some large modern prints and a couple of tall chrome lamps. In that instant Tom knew that Ruby had sold her house and moved away. And his heart was pierced by yet another painfully sharp arrow of loneliness.

  Christ, would you pull yourself together! He sighed loudly. She wasn’t even your friend or anything. You meant nothing to her. Five minutes after you walked away from the house that night she probably forgot you ever existed. Come on now, get real.

  Still it’d been comforting somehow to think of Ruby pottering around in her pretty pink house. Tom sorely missed a feminine presence in his life. And even one as remote as Ruby O’Neill’s had been something to think about during the long lonely nights in his isolated cottage on the Camberwell estate. Cheery Mrs Kenny and her tasty leftovers from the kitchen were the nearest things he had to a family life these days. But he didn’t like to hang around the café at Camberwell too much in case he might get drawn into a harmless conversation about gardening with some of the visitors. God, he was such an oddball nowadays, he thought to himself. Breaking out in a cold sweat if anyone cornered him and started asking about plants.

  ‘Well, I never claimed to be the life and soul,’ he said aloud. ‘Is it my fault if the majority of the people in this fucking country could talk the leg off a table? Is it my fault if I don’t want to go spilling my guts and telling everyone about my personal life? Maybe I’m the normal one and they’re all too nosy and pushy.’

  However, just as he was sinking deeper into his dark mood, he spied the pink and white awning outside the clothes shop a little further up the road. He drove alongside and read Ruby’s name on it and he understood at once what had happened. Ruby hadn’t moved away from Ravenhill Road altogether. She had only moved on a little bit. She must have bought that dress shop. He was wondering what she did for a living. It must be the same Ruby O’Neill. Well, good for her!

  Tom duly delivered his consignment of topiary (six squirrel-shaped ivy plants in mock-pewter containers) and then decided on the spur of the moment to park the Land Rover and go for a gentle stroll along the street. Just to stretch his legs, he told himself. Not to be an old nosy or anything like that! No, just to prove to himself that he wasn’t turning into a nutty anti-social recluse. Even though he knew in his heart that he had turned into a nutty antisocial recluse years earlier.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he muttered. ‘I’m fine.’ And then he decided to shut up in case anyone saw him talking to himself on the street.

  However Tom’s heart leapt as he passed the window of Ruby’s shop and shyly glanced in. Without noticing he was doing it, he stopped walking and just stood there, his hands clenched tightly in his pockets with sheer nerves.

  ‘Oh my God,’ he whispered to himself.

  There she was. Casually sipping a cup of tea or coffee, and smiling at something the other girl was saying to her. That must be Ruby’s friend Jasmine, by the looks of it. Tom remembered her from the Belfast Telegraph. The shop was a pastel cave of femininity with lots of delicate mohair sweaters and embroidered coats on padded hangers. And fluffy slippers and dainty hats and beaded scarves in the window! (Not the type of thing that his late wife Kate had worn at all. Kate had lived in jeans.) But it was very pretty and sparkly all the same. Ruby reminded Tom of a magpie with her sleek black hair and her elegant white face and her obvious attraction to glittery things.

  Suddenly Ruby turned her head and glanced in Tom’s direction and a flicker of recognition crossed her face. Jasmine turned also and peered right out at him. Ruby set her cup down on the counter and smiled at Tom. She even raised her hand and managed a friendly little wave. Jasmine’s eyes were wide open with curiosity. Tom waved back as best he could with his heart beating wildly.

  Then he began to blush furiously. His face, his hands and even his toes were flushing and uncomfortably warm. He felt as if he was flirting with another woman behind Kate’s back. What an eejit he was for even coming here today! Ruby would think he was following her. Or maybe coming in to buy something, in his tatty old gardening clothes! He absent-mindedly reached out and touched one of the window boxes as if he’d been admiring the delicate winter plants in it and not Ruby herself. But it was no use pretending anything now for Ruby was walking towards him. Dear God, she wasn’t going to invite him into the shop to meet her friend, was she? The state of him in his oldest clothes!

  Tom’s courage deserted him like a flock of startled starlings. He turned on his heel and fled back down the street and round the corner to his waiting Land Rover. By the time Ruby had come out of the shop door and down the street to look for him, Tom was speeding back towards Camberwell with his heart in his mouth.

  You damn fool! he chided himself as he left the city limits and took the turning for Camberwell. That was a clever move, I must say. Well done, mate! Now she’ll think you’re a stalker and a hopeless one at that. Leering in the window at her and then running away like a kid knocking on doors. Get back home, for God’s sake, before you do any more damage. You’re not safe to be let out, so you’re not.

  ‘Who was that?’ Jasmine asked Ruby when she came back into the shop.

  ‘Oh, it was nobody,’ Ruby muttered uselessly, knowing full well she was about to be interrogated.

  ‘It was somebody,’ Jasmine said quietly. ‘I saw him looking at you. He knew you, Ruby. And you knew him. And he was quite fetching as my mother would say. Come on and tell me. I want a name at the very least.’

  ‘Honestly, Jasmine, he was nobody sp
ecial. Just this guy who brought my Christmas tree last year, that’s all. I don’t know him at all.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ Jasmine smiled. ‘Just the handsome gardener, huh? Lady Chatterley’s lover, and all that jazz? Now, I see.’

  ‘No, miss, you don’t see anything,’ Ruby said firmly.

  ‘Why did you go outside then?’ Jasmine asked.

  ‘To be sociable. To say hello,’ Ruby replied.

  ‘Okay, to be sociable,’ Jasmine said meaningfully. ‘Whatever you say.’

  ‘I don’t think he remembered me anyway,’ Ruby added. ‘Or, if he did, he only wanted to nod hello. He didn’t want a big long chat. Sure he legged it when he saw me coming. Probably thought I was going to try and sell him something. Or ask him to move along and stop cluttering up the footpath.’

  ‘Probably,’ Jasmine agreed, her eyes twinkling with mischief. ‘Yeah, that was it. He was afraid you were going to ask him to move along. Because everybody knows that shopkeepers do actually own the pavement outside their shops!’

  ‘Cheeky cow!’

  ‘Are you getting a Christmas tree this year, Ruby, I wonder? Perhaps that’s what he was going to ask you before he bottled it?’

  ‘Oh no, I don’t think so,’ Ruby said quickly. ‘It’s far too soon to be getting back to all of that, I should think. Besides, there’s not room for a real tree in my flat. Not a decent size of a tree anyway.’

  ‘I might get a real tree this year,’ Jasmine said then. ‘There’s more than enough room in my flat. Thirty foot long, my sitting room is! Where did you buy yours last year?’

  ‘The garden centre at Saintfield,’ Ruby said casually before disappearing into the kitchenette to fetch a duster.

  ‘Is that right? I might just pop up there after work,’ Jasmine said, as if to herself.

  ‘He doesn’t work there in case you’re getting any bright ideas,’ Ruby called out from the kitchenette. ‘He’s only their supplier.’

  ‘Right. Where does he work then, this mystery man of yours?’ Jasmine wanted to know.

  ‘I’m not telling you, sweetheart! Even I’m not that stupid,’ Ruby added, smiling to herself as she delayed meeting Jasmine’s eye by tidying up the cleaning cupboard for a few minutes.

  ‘Ruby dear, I can find out where he works easily enough,’ Jasmine said stubbornly.

  ‘I’m sure you can,’ said Ruby. ‘You’re very resourceful.’

  ‘We should keep him in mind. He looked pretty handsome to me. A pretty handsome, if slightly older, man, admittedly,’ Jasmine said casually. ‘Just older enough to be sexy, mind. Not too much older…’

  ‘He’s nice enough,’ Ruby agreed, momentarily forgetting to be discreet. ‘I like his long nose. Even though it is a tiny bit crooked in the middle. He has nice eyes too. Kind eyes. He looks as if he might be a nice sort of person, don’t you think?’

  Jasmine’s matchmaking tendencies suddenly went into overdrive.

  ‘Maybe he’s got a tiny wee crush on you?’ she ventured.

  ‘Oh no, I doubt it,’ Ruby said, snapping back into defence mode.

  ‘Why wouldn’t he have a crush on you? You look just like Juliette Binoche since you got your bob cut. And he’s got that arty, dishevelled look down to perfection. You’d be perfect together when you think about it,’ Jasmine said, getting slightly carried away.

  ‘Oh, Jasmine, you’re a hopeless romantic,’ Ruby sighed. ‘Arty and dishevelled, indeed! He’s a gardener, you poor eejit.’

  ‘Somebody has to be romantic,’ Jasmine countered. ‘Somebody has to go on believing in happy endings… Right! He was a bit scruffy, this mystery man of yours, we can’t deny that, but I bet he scrubs up well. And you’re pretty tall too so you’d look fine together.’

  ‘It’s all very lovely, your little scheme, but it’s not going to happen,’ Ruby said firmly, coming back into the room and standing on a chair to dust the chandelier. Even though it didn’t really need dusting but she was feeling too fidgety to sit down.

  ‘I know, I know. I’m running away with myself here, and it’s far too soon for you to think of falling in love again,’ Jasmine said gently.

  ‘It’ll always be too soon for me to fall in love again,’ Ruby replied calmly. ‘Anyway I’d be hopeless at dating and all that stuff. I was so used to Jonathan, you know? I never even looked at other men in that way. I think my romantic radar or something that’s necessary in my brain for fancying a new man has shut down.’

  ‘Maybe that’s true,’ Jasmine sighed. ‘But you never know.’

  ‘Jasmine, I think we have a customer,’ Ruby said as a well-dressed woman rang the doorbell.

  ‘Okay, I get the message,’ Jasmine muttered, buzzing her in. But all the rest of that day Jasmine couldn’t help wondering who Ruby’s admirer might be and if there was any chance at all that Ruby might actually consider the possibility of falling in love again one day.

  9. The Velvet Handbags

  Ruby and Jasmine were laboriously carrying the wicker hampers upstairs to Ruby’s flat. Ruby felt it was time they took up residence in the corner of her new bedroom. And also Jasmine needed to clear some space in her apartment so she could put up a few Christmas decorations. She didn’t say anything to Ruby, but she had a lot of socializing and partying to catch up on this year since devoting the previous Christmas to nursing Ruby through her bereavement. And Ruby didn’t say anything to Jasmine either, but it was a huge step for her to be moving Jonathan’s things into her new home for the first time. It was almost like admitting to herself that he wouldn’t be coming back, that these things of his were only keepsakes now, and not Jonathan’s own private possessions, waiting for him to come home again and claim them.

  Unwrapping everything carefully, Ruby examined them once more and then placed them lovingly in the bottom drawer of her brand-new armoire. They fitted perfectly.

  ‘What’s this?’ Jasmine asked, as one parcel split open revealing a dark red evening bag with a fat velvet ribbon for a handle.

  ‘Oh, it’s just something I made to pass the time. You know, on the nights I couldn’t sleep after the funeral,’ Ruby replied, emotion welling up in her chest at the sight of it. ‘It’s a little handbag.’

  ‘But this is so pretty,’ Jasmine said enthusiastically. ‘I love the satin lining.’

  ‘I made seven of them,’ Ruby admitted shyly.

  ‘All the same colour?’

  ‘All the same design but different colours. One dark red, one midnight blue, one jet black, one baby pink –’

  ‘One pale gold, one apple green and one deep purple,’ finished Jasmine, discovering the rest of the treasure beneath several layers of soft tissue paper.

  ‘Silly of me to make seven evening bags that I’m never going to use,’ smiled Ruby.

  ‘You might use them some day,’ Jasmine said kindly.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘It’d be a shame to just leave them in a drawer though,’ Jasmine said, tidying up the bows on the front of the bags and placing them in a neat line on Ruby’s bed.

  ‘What else would I do with them?’ Ruby asked, reaching to put them away again.

  ‘Sell them in the shop?’ Jasmine suggested suddenly.

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t do that,’ Ruby protested.

  ‘Why not? It’s exactly the type of thing we sell.’

  ‘But we don’t sell handmade things.’

  ‘Well, we do, sort of. Everything is made by somebody, somewhere.’

  ‘But I don’t think these are good enough,’ Ruby said firmly.

  ‘Are you kidding? They’re fine. They’re lovely and I think they should go straight into that big glass case by the window, with your lovely new labels attached to them.’

  ‘No, really –’

  ‘Shush!’

  And with that Jasmine swiftly collected up the seven bags and went hurrying down the stairs before Ruby could stop her. Within five minutes she had all seven bags nicely stuffed with balls of the softest tissue paper, neatl
y labelled with the price and on display in the glass case. The velvet bags looked sumptuous and rather decadent resting there under the tiny, rainbow-effect spotlights.

  ‘One hundred pounds each?’ Ruby said doubtfully when she came downstairs a short while later. ‘Fifty quid would have been plenty.’

  ‘Nonsense, Ruby O’Neill, would you ever stop being so bloody humble, please? This is an exclusive fashion boutique, not a bargain basement. That’s a very reasonable price considering all the effort you must have put into them.’

  ‘Okay! Don’t have a fit! They look quite pretty, I suppose,’ Ruby agreed slowly, ‘when you see them nicely displayed like that.’

  ‘Yes, indeed they do. Now let’s have a cup of tea to celebrate,’ Jasmine said, nipping into the kitchenette to brew up. Yet again.

  ‘The power to drink tea on command is going to your head,’ Ruby laughed. ‘No wonder you’re never out of the loo.’

  ‘Yeah, well, we won’t have a minute to spare once the Christmas rush kicks off,’ Jasmine said sheepishly. ‘So we might as well get all the tea we can into us now. Build up a good store of caffeine.’

  ‘I hope we’re rushed off our feet,’ Ruby said then. ‘I hope we won’t have time to eat or sleep or talk or even think, we’ll be that busy.’

  And she wasn’t only thinking of the money.

  ‘It’ll get better, Ruby,’ Jasmine promised.

  ‘Will it?’

  ‘Sure. The world is full of merry widows and widowers, or so my dad says. And he knows everything about everything.’

  ‘Maybe. But I’m not your average merry widow. I loved my husband so much it took my breath away sometimes. I still can’t believe he’s gone. Some days I forget he’s dead and I think he’s just away on business or that he’s left me for another woman or something. It’s stupid, I know, but I can’t quite accept it still.’

  ‘I know. Maybe it would help to just remember the good times? That you loved him and that he loved you? So many people seem to live for years and years and never really love anybody. Never even really care about anything that’s important.’