Dinner Party

by Sarah Gilmartin

  ‘Wha?’ He ducked down to her level.

  ‘Get back in,’ she said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just get in!’

  He sat into the car and shut the door.

  ‘How about we go to my place and order pizza? Have some wine.’ She smiled at him and started the engine. ‘So I can tell Mammy you’re a committed alcoholic and all.’

  He grinned at her. ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Let’s do it.’

  A double-decker bus loomed in her rear-view mirror—an urban whale with a deep, blasting horn. She put on her flashers and pulled away as quickly as she could.

  The apartment was in darkness when they got in. Kate switched on the hall light and held a finger to her lips. It wasn’t a hall, really, just a small space for shoes and coats. They snuck into the living room and closed the door. Ray left his rucksack in the corner beside the dead spider plant. The orange security light from the swimming pool building across the street shone in the long rectangular windows, turning the leather couch a strange green until she switched on the reading lamps. Ray moved a couple of Diya’s work tops off the cushions and sat down.

  Kate drew the roller blind. She gave a quick smile to the statue of the countess in front of the swimming pool. She’d started to think of her as a friend, which almost seemed like a normal thing to do in comparison to some of her past imaginings. She’d even christened the little dog statue at her feet.

  ‘Good old Copernicus,’ she said to Ray.

  Ducking in behind the dining table, she reached for the shoe-box on top of the cube-of-cubes bookshelf that had taken herself and Diya two weekends to assemble.

  ‘He was a great dog,’ her brother smiled. ‘The best dog.’

  ‘We all loved him.’ She sat at the table, took the lid off the box and rooted through the menus.

  ‘Except Mammy,’ said Ray.

  ‘Mammy loved him too. I used to catch her giving him treats when she thought no one was watching. You hungry, good-for-nothing mutt, she’d say, and then she’d make him give her the paw.’

  ‘Is that where he learned it?’ Ray said.

  ‘It’s where he learned everything,’ said Kate. ‘He’d never do a tap for me.’

  ‘Except lie all over you. You were inseparable about the house. Myself and Peter used to joke that he was your real twin.’

  Kate gave a loud, raucous laugh that was not unlike a bark.

  ‘See?’ said Ray.

  ‘Poor Elaine,’ she said. ‘She’d kill you.’

  ‘Seventeen years.’ Ray took off his runners. ‘Isn’t that nuts?’

  Kate felt her throat constrict. She nodded, continuing through the menus. There were at least five for Domino’s but none for the wood-fire place on Dame Street. She put back the box and reached for her handbag.

  ‘I have it here,’ said Ray, bringing over his phone.

  ‘How did you know which place?’

  ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I always know.’ He did their mother’s squinty eye.

  Laughing, Kate took the phone. ‘There’s a bottle of white in the fridge. You know where the glasses are?’

  Ray saluted and headed for the kitchen. She could hear him stomping his way down the corridor and she wondered how someone could make so much so noise in their socks. She hoped he wouldn’t wake Diya. It wasn’t that her friend would mind—she was great like that, always up for the chats, able to adapt, to bend to the demands of the day—but rather that Kate wanted to have her brother to herself for once. She’d learnt something about family this evening, even if she couldn’t name it exactly, just a vague sense that it was important to have Ray here, to talk to him like a human being, to make an effort with him like you would with some stranger at the water cooler in work.

  ‘Ta-da!’ He came back with the bottle of white and two mugs. ‘No clean glasses,’ he said. ‘Scummers.’

  ‘Sssh,’ she said. ‘Diya.’

  ‘I think we’re safe. Her door was open.’

  Kate remembered then—the Halloween table quiz in the Ferryman. There was a strong chance if they’d won, or if they hadn’t won at all, that they’d go to Coppers. She checked Ray’s phone. It was gone eleven. ‘We better order,’ she said. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Pepperoni.’

  She scanned the list, though she knew already. ‘There’s no pepperoni.’

  ‘Meat,’ he said. ‘Sausage, salami, ham, whatever.’

  ‘They have that exact one.’

  As he filled the mugs, she put the order through online: a large spicy chorizo pizza and a starter of chicken wings. Then she went into the kitchen to heat the plates.

  When she came back to the living room, Ray made space for her on the couch.

  ‘Did you go medium or large?’ he said.

  ‘Large,’ she said. ‘And wings for the craic.’

  ‘Good woman.’ He cupped his chin in his hand and looked at her.

  She waited.

  ‘So, what’s the latest in work?’ he said. ‘How’s Red Sole Rachel?’

  She looked straight at him, into the flecked green of his eyes.

  ‘Thanks, Ray,’ she said.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For not making a big deal out of it. I just want everything to be normal. I want to be normal. And I’m getting there.’

  ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I always know.’

  It was less funny this time. She had a flash of her mother saying goodbye after dinner, fumbling for Kate’s hand and then bringing her close into a taut, promising embrace.

  Ray took another glug of wine and made a face.

  ‘What?’ she said.

  ‘It’s no Sancerre, I’ll tell you that much. You’re lucky Liz isn’t here.’

  He gave a twinkly smile and she knew it was OK to go with it. ‘Liz knows her wine,’ she said.

  ‘You mean she’s a wine snob,’ said Ray. ‘And she’s proud of it too.’ He moved over on the couch. ‘You know, she went looking for that Sancerre after your dinner party. The very same one. Went to three off-licences and a supermarket before she found it.’

  ‘Why didn’t she just call me?’ Kate said.

  ‘You weren’t—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You weren’t exactly in the best frame of mind.’

  ‘You mean the brownie?’

  ‘I mean the lot of it.’

  ‘Well,’ she said. ‘I’ve no idea what wine it was, anyway. I only remember that it was warm.’ She checked her phone to make sure it wasn’t on silent.

  ‘I can’t believe you managed to get a dinner up that night,’ he said. ‘You looked like you were going to faint from the moment you opened the door.’

  The wine went down the wrong way and she coughed.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Ray sat forward. ‘Do you want a slap on the back? A kick up the arse?’

  She laughed, which made it worse. Ray went to his rucksack and took out a plastic gym flask. She sipped at it until she felt better. He poured them both more wine, leaving only an inch in the bottle. She wondered if they were done talking about the dinner party.

  ‘You’re all right now,’ said Ray. ‘I hate when things go down the wrong way.’

  Kate left the flask on the table and put on a playlist on her phone. ’80s rock anthems—the scratchy, rumbling guitar of ‘Welcome to the Jungle’.

  ‘Will you still be able to hear the delivery guy?’ Ray frowned.

  ‘You sound like Peter,’ she said. ‘Stop worrying.’

  Ray smacked a hand off his thigh. ‘Peter the secret romancer. Did you suspect?’

  Kate shook her head.

  ‘And Mammy knowing it all,’ said Ray. ‘I can just picture her in her blue dressing gown, peeking out the blinds. Can’t you see it?’

  ‘I can’t believe she managed to keep it to herself. Peter thinks she’s changing.’

  ‘A leopard,’ said Ray, raising his eyebrows.

  ‘A leopard in a royal blue dressing gown.’ />
  The two of them howled laughing.

  ‘I wonder what she looks like,’ said Ray.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Your one. Serena. It’s hard to imagine him with anyone. Except Mammy.’

  ‘Ah, stop, Ray,’ said Kate. ‘He’s only forty-two.’ The number had stayed with her. Why had they never done anything for his fortieth, or his thirtieth? For his next birthday, Kate would throw him a party.

  ‘I wonder if they’ve shagged,’ said Ray. ‘Can you imagine Peter—’

  ‘Stop it! Come on. He deserves to be happy. Aren’t you happy for him?’

  ‘I am,’ said Ray, looking towards the curtains. ‘Of course I am.’

  In the slump of his shoulders, she could see his own losses cloud in around him.

  ‘It’s OK, Ray,’ she said.

  ‘Wha?’

  ‘I know you’re happy for him.’ She made a face. ‘Ser-eena. I’d say she’s a looker.’

  ‘You think?’ Ray grinned. ‘Like Mammy?’

  ‘No, I’d say she’s different. Something else entirely.’

  ‘Hopefully,’ said Ray. ‘Or he won’t live it down.’

  She pointed a finger. ‘You’ll be nice—either way.’

  The chorus of ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ was cut off by her phone ringing.

  ‘Hiya,’ she said, picking up. ‘No, we’re the next block down. No. Opposite the leisure complex.’ She listened to the delivery guy list a number of locations that were nothing to do with her. ‘Can you see the statue of the woman and the dog?’ He gave another rush of detail down the phone. ‘Yes, that’s the dog I mean. I’ll be down in a flash.’ She hung up.

  ‘Good old Constance,’ said Ray. ‘Still helping out Dubliners a century on.’

  Kate picked up her handbag and asked him to get the plates from the oven. ‘The light will be green,’ she said.

  Ray rubbed his hands together when she came back into the room. He took the boxes and hunkered on the ground beside the low-slung table. There were newspaper sheets spread out on the clear glass surface. As he went to open the pizza, she noticed the smudged print on his fingers.

  ‘Wash your hands,’ she said, tearing off a sheet of kitchen paper from the roll.

  ‘Too hungry.’ He gobbled half a slice in one go. ‘Hot, hot,’ he said.

  ‘You’re a pig.’ She put the playlist back on, leaving her phone on the armrest.

  Kate looked at the pizza, a vast circle of oily white and red, the cheese all melty in pockets. She went for a knife but there was no need. The slices broke away easily. She felt the old resistance as she picked one up, the flour from the dough coating her fingers, but she brought it quickly to her lips and took a bite, another bite and another, until it was gone.

  ‘Sgood,’ said Ray.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Kate, though she hadn’t tasted much at all. She went back for a second slice. Ray was already on his third. She tried to go slower with this one, but it was hard to do. Mindful eating didn’t seem to work for Kate. She just needed to eat and not think. If there was a voice inside her head talking to her about food, she knew now to ignore it. This was the task. There was no second guessing or see-sawing allowed—no thinking necessary at all. And distraction worked too.

  ‘When do you think we’ll meet her?’ Kate wiped her fingers on the kitchen paper and finished her wine.

  ‘Peter’s bird?’ said Ray.

  ‘Buurd,’ she said, wagging a finger.

  Ray shrugged. ‘Soon, no doubt. Mammy will want a dinner, a fuss.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Kate. ‘She seemed to think it was the most natural thing in the world for her to just move into Cranavon. There wasn’t a hint of a tantrum.’

  ‘She’s afraid she’ll be left alone,’ said Ray. ‘That’s what it is. She’s old—and getting older.’

  It was true. They both stopped eating and looked at each other.

  ‘What if…’ said Ray.

  ‘Don’t say it.’

  ‘What if Peter moves out?’ Ray gnawed on a crust.

  ‘I don’t think he will—the farm. Or if he does, it won’t be far.’ She pictured her mother sitting at the oak table alone, staring out the window at the fields like she used to do when Daddy was late. What did it mean to have no one to wait for?

  ‘You know,’ she said, ‘I think Mammy would be OK. Sometimes I think she’s better on her own. She only gets in moods with other people.’

  Ray tucked into a fresh slice.

  ‘And you know what?’ she said. ‘I kind of get it. People can be exhausting.’ She reached over and turned down the music. ‘I’m going to try and visit more.’

  ‘Yeah?’ he said. ‘Brave.’

  ‘I’ll keep it nice and breezy. Go down for a day, maybe a night. But regular, like.’

  ‘Really?’ Ray held up the wine bottle, offered her the remainder.

  She covered her glass and he poured it into his own.

  ‘Well, I’ll try,’ she said. ‘I mean, she’s not going to be here forever.’

  ‘Hurrah!’ Ray held up his glass.

  ‘Seriously, Ray. One day she’ll be gone. And then there’s nothing.’

  ‘Then there’s peace,’ he said. ‘Peace and quiet.’

  ‘Or else there’s not.’ She couldn’t explain it to him, not right now, maybe someday. She couldn’t really explain it to herself, just had an inkling—some wizened shadow of the future—that there was no ending when it came to family, only beginning, and beginning again.

  Instead she said, ‘Family is important.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Ray, ‘I’m almost getting teary.’

  She picked up one of Diya’s shaggy cushions and tossed it at his face.

  ‘Mammy will outlive us all,’ he said. ‘She’ll hang in there for the sympathy.’

  They laughed. Kate left her last slice of pizza in the box. She was full.

  ‘Four children,’ she said. ‘Imagine. Peter’s right—it’s some job. I can barely look after myself. You know, a lot of the time, Mammy did OK.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Ray. ‘But I will thank her for this evening. I was texting Liz about tonight and she said we’ll get back together if only to spite her.’ He roared laughing. ‘Liz always had her measure.’

  ‘Jesus,’ said Kate. ‘Remember that Christmas?’

  Ray covered his head with the cushion, emerging with a grimace.

  ‘You and Liz will work it out,’ said Kate. ‘I’m sure of it.’

  He nodded and looked away.

  She let him be.

  ‘I’m going to go,’ he said, already getting up. He wiped crumbs off his tracksuit and took a neon yellow jacket from his rucksack. She walked him to the door, offered to call a taxi.

  ‘Gonna stroll,’ he said. ‘Get some air.’

  He gave her a quick hug and turned to leave.

  ‘Bye,’ said Kate.

  ‘Thanks for the pizza,’ he said. ‘I needed it.’

  She closed the door and went back to the living room, surveyed the mess, which was not a mess at all but an empty container of wings and a cardboard box with a slice and a half of pizza leftover. In their poky, windowless kitchen, she put the full slice on a plate, covered it with tinfoil and left a note for Diya.

  Eat me, she wrote, and afterwards, a smiley face.

  In bed, she left on her old polka-dot reading lamp and began to doze in the easy orange light of the room. She felt the evening sliding inside her, like the disjointed middle of a dream, so many remarkable things she wanted to remember but they were whirling up, getting ready to leave. And they were jumbling, the images, the faces: Peter standing tall with his news of the future, and Ray pulling his chair closer, and then their mother, her mother, the metallic sheen of her eyes and the clawed hands of all that worry and hurt. Kate could see herself too, could see the four of them now sat around the table, existing in the same space together. Surviving. Really, she thought, they were all strange, troubled individuals but beside each other, they were very clearly
a family. You could not call it anything else. It was all they had, and it might be enough. This was something she could imagine her father saying. Perhaps he had said it once. As she drifted, she could hear the odd car speed down the street outside. It was half twelve and she’d be tired for work tomorrow, but it would be a rich, comforting kind of tiredness, so unlike the hollowed-out feeling of sleepless, hungry nights. It would be a tiredness in her body rather than her soul. Of all the anniversaries of her sister’s death, this was her favourite, which was a weird way to think, perhaps, though she knew Elaine would get it. Her sister, who would always be her sister, wherever she was. She turned in to the wall and pulled the duvet tight around her, her head sinking into the pillow, her breath warm against it, in and out, warm and trickling, and so alive.

  Acknowledgements

  To my editor Laura Macaulay and all the team at Pushkin, for their enthusiasm and hard work in getting this book out to the world. To my agent Sallyanne Sweeney, who does her job with such skill and grace. To my fellow students of creative writing, and all my teachers on the UCD MFA 2019, particularly Anne Enright and Gavin Corbett, for their help and engagement with early drafts of this book. To Claire Keegan, for her brilliant writing workshops. To Frank McGuinness, Sinéad Gleeson and Lucy Caldwell, for guidance and encouragement along the way.

  Thanks to Susie Orbach for her books Hunger Strike and Bodies, to Laura Freeman for The Reading Cure, to Dr Jennifer Gaudiani for Sick Enough: A Guide to the Medical Complications of Eating Disorders, all of which helped to inform the novel. To the Arts Council of Ireland, for a literature bursary that gave me time to redraft this book. To Martin Doyle of the Irish Times and The Stinging Fly’s Declan Meade, for giving me the chance to read so many books and stories. To my teachers over the years who passed on their love of writing.

  To friends who have helped me with this book and earlier writing, Fionnuala McInerney, Colin Corrigan, Stuart Cross, Joanne Murphy, Mikey Stafford, Kieran Nolan, Paddy McKenna and Paula McGrath. To Jane Lanigan, for her expertise on the horseriding world. To Henrietta McKervey, for her considered feedback and good humour. To Sheila Purdy, who is one in a million as a reader and a friend. To my two families, the Gilmartins and the Bavalias, for all the support and generosity down through the years. Lastly to Sunil, for living with a writer, and for the free hugs.