by Melissa Hill
An incredibly petite young woman with a shock of curly red hair tied up in one of those messy, yet incredibly fashionable ‘half ponytails’ came inside. She had a very chic pair of Chanel sunglasses perched on the top of her head, and as she took a moment to look around; Nina could feel the energy pulsating off of her.
‘Ella, what a great morning it is!’ she trilled. ‘So, did you hear the news? Guess whose coming home this weekend? There is a big welcome home party and awards do being planned at Clancy’s and I was just on my way over there to see the set up, but I had no breakfast so I said I’d pop in to grab a pastry and I….’ the redhead stopped mid-sentence and stared at Nina. ‘Nina Hughes! Oh my gosh! Speaking of homecomings …’ She lunged forward and pulled Nina into a tight embrace.
‘Trish. Wow, I hardly recognised you. I wasn’t sure if you still lived here actually.’
‘Well you would have known if you’d ever bothered phoning or maybe dropping an email,’ Trish chided half-heartedly.
Nina winced. ‘I know, I’ve been awful. I did mean to – ‘
‘Not to worry. Sure, we’re both as bad as each other. I was in Cork for a good while but I’m back now, oh about …two years now, isn’t it Ella?’ she said and the older woman nodded in affirmation.
‘So tell me all. I want to know everything you have been doing since the last time I’ve seen you. It’s been years. What have you been up to? How’s Galway? How long are you here for? Are you staying with your dad? How is he, I haven’t seen him in ages…’ Trish didn’t take a breath.
‘Wow you really haven’t changed a bit,’ Nina laughed. ‘Don’t you ever come up for air?’ Trish just grinned and Nina briefly recalled their shared history. She and Trish were the same age and had been one of the few friends Nina had as a child when she visited Lakeview. She couldn’t remember when she had seen her last, but even then, the encounter wasn’t in Lakeview but in Galway. Trish had been up there for something – she couldn’t remember what – but regardless, they had met up for dinner and a few drinks. It was great night and a funny memory and right then, Nina couldn’t understand why they hadn’t stayed in touch recently.
‘Nina just got in yesterday. She’s staying with her father for a little while,’ Ella replied, giving Trish the simplified version of what Nina had just told her. She turned to Nina. ‘When Trish gets her breath back, she’ll be able to tell you that she works for the Lakeview News now. If you can believe it, she is quite the interviewer when she allows her subjects to talk,’ she added wryly, and Trish flushed a shade of red that just about matched her hair.
‘Fantastic. So you did end up a writer after all,’ Nina said, recalling how Trish used to love making up stories in her youth.
‘Well, the local rag isn’t exactly Pulitzer-winning stuff, but I enjoy it,’ Trish told her. ‘And even though we’re not celeb-central around here, things are looking up,’ she added excitedly.
When Nina and Ella both looked blank, she went on. ‘Well, you’re not going to believe this but Ruth Seymour’s coming home! The press release came in during the week.’
Of course, the actress. Nina had almost forgotten that she’d also known Ruth Seymour from her visits here.
‘I’ve heard all about the show. Isn’t it mad to think that we all played together years ago and now she’s this huge Hollywood star?’
Trish wrinkled her nose. ‘Hollywood Star or not – she puts her pants on the same way I do,’ she giggled. ‘That’s if she remembers to wear any at all.’
‘Trish!’ Ella gasped shocked, and Nina smiled. ‘Although I read heat magazine too and I do think that botox or not, she’s a bit past the scraps of clothes she’s been wearing lately.’
‘What age is she?’ Nina asked. ‘She has to be at least thirty.’
‘Twenty-five according to the press release,’ Trish confirmed with a chuckle. ‘Does that mean we get to be twenty-five too? I do hope she realises she is attracting a swarm of press to her hometown, and someone might pull her birth certificate,’ she added her eyes sparkling mischievously.
‘Now, now, don’t be spiteful,’ Ella warned. ‘And don’t you be stirring up trouble just because you have access to records for that project you are doing.’
Trish went on to explain to Nina how she was currently in the process of putting together a photographic history of Lakeview. ‘I’m publishing it for charity, so I get access to all the town’s records to compile it.’
‘Sounds interesting,’ Nina replied, thinking it was a very good idea indeed. The town was steeped in history, having been the site of a major republic rebellion a hundred years before. And seeing as it had changed immeasurably since even the last time she had seen it, it would be nice to have the changes down through the years documented.
‘Anyway,’ Trish continued. ‘The town has arranged to give her a Lakeview Person of the Year award – I know; as if we have this huge pool to choose from,’ she giggled, seeing Nina’s amused look. ‘There’s going to be a huge party at Clancy’s Hotel. You should come along. Everyone acts as if the queen is coming. Although I suppose it is very cool to think that someone from Lakeview, someone we know, is now so famous.’
‘Will you get to interview her?’
‘Yep and I can’t wait, for the sake of my career if nothing else,’ Trish smiled. ‘I would like to move on to one of the nationals eventually.’
‘Of course,’ Nina agreed, and no one better than Trish to do so. ‘Well when you do, do you think you can ask her a question for me?’
‘Of course, what’s that?’
‘What it’s like to spend her days on set snogging Troy Valentine?’
Trish threw her head back and laughed aloud. ‘You must have been reading my mind! Well look, I’d better grab this pastry and get going. Oh, Nina it’s brilliant to see you back. Having you home will be just like old times. You should come to the awards thing with me and we’ll drink loads of champagne. I’ll give you a call later to arrange the plans, OK?’ she said, before breezing out the door.
‘Sure,’ Nina agreed, although Trish’s words had ruined the light-heartedness of the moment and brought her screaming back to reality.
Ella was off serving customers, and deciding she’d already taken up enough of her time, Nina left some money on the counter and stood up to leave. Ella gave a friendly wave as she left but once outside, the weight of all Nina’s problems returned. It was nice to feel just normal and carefree for a moment with Trish and Ella she thought, sighing. And while she’d be happy to go to Ruth Seymour’s official homecoming with her friend, there would be no champagne for her.
Nina couldn’t well be partying it up and drinking bubbly in Clancy’s hotel, not when she was twelve weeks pregnant.
Chapter 5
Back in Dublin, Jess worried over what had happened at Emer’s. She felt hurt and betrayed that her so-called best friend would lie in order to keep her away from her Happy Families party.
So now that Emer had a child and Jess didn’t, it was easier to just cut her out of her life? Why? What difference did it make, and why should it make a difference at all?
It certainly made no sense to Jess anyway, and she couldn’t believe that Emer seriously felt the need to purposely leave her out of the celebrations. And to think she even offered to baby-sit.
Earlier that day, Emer had tried her best to smooth things over when her neighbour left, by being overly chatty and offering to share the bottle of champagne she’d been so reluctant about before.
‘Oh, go on then, you’ve twisted my arm,’ she’d said cheerily, as if nothing at all had happened.
‘No, it’s fine, maybe you should just keep it for your next party,’ Jess murmured, before eventually making her excuses and leaving.
While she’d tried her utmost not to betray her feelings about the situation, it was difficult. On the one hand, she felt a bit silly for being so upset about it, but on the other there was no question that she had been deceived. By someone who was supposed to be
her best friend, the person with whom she’d shared pretty much everything over the last fifteen years. Well, clearly Emer wasn’t interested in sharing her new life with her, Jess mused unhappily, not while she remained childfree in any case.
And that wasn’t on the cards, not yet anyway. She and Brian would like to have children someday of course, but the time wasn’t quite right. Granted they’d been married for seven years and together for over ten, but somehow the idea had never really occurred to them. Their careers probably had a lot to do with it; Brian was away so much with the executive travel agency he managed, and Jess had been working her way up the corporate ladder at Piccolo.
Thinking about it now as she moved through their Dublin townhouse, she wasn’t quite sure why they’d never thought seriously about going down that route; goodness knows enough of their immediate circle had done it. Emer and Dave, Deirdre and Kevin, and many of the other couples they socialized with.
Or used to.
Jess knew Brian would be an amazing dad and she hoped she’d be a good mother, as she adored babies and liked spending time with children; Emer’s little Amy being a case in point. Yet, she’d never really pictured herself as a mother, for some reason feeling that there was plenty of time for that and when the time came, she’d know about it. After all, there was a time in every woman’s life when she just knew, wasn’t there? Although perhaps this line of thinking was fine when you’re twenty-four but not so much when you’re thirty-five.
It was strange but still Jess associated settling down and starting a family as something older more mature people did, and didn’t feel she and Brian were quite at that stage yet. Her maternal instinct hadn’t yet kicked in, and because of this, babies still didn’t really feature in their plans
Why not? Was there some other subconscious reason that she hadn’t considered?
She went to the bedroom and stripped off her clothes, changing into a pair of pyjama pants and an old t-shirt and tying her fair hair into a ponytail.
She looked around the bedroom she shared with her husband, realising that the normal sense of calm that she got from this tranquil place with its bright interior and luxurious fabrics was not apparent today. She tried to see it through Emer’s eyes, suspecting that her friend might note the room for its beauty, but would possibly deem it lacking because the floor wasn’t strewn with toys.
Then a sudden bubble of defensiveness rose up inside her. Why should she be feeling undermined by this? She had a fabulous career, a wonderful husband who loved her, and an all-round great life. She was happy with her own choices, happy with her life as it was. At least, she was until this weekend.
She wanted desperately to talk to Brian about what had happened, and on any other day would have phoned him immediately, but at that moment he was thirty-thousand feet above sea-level on his way back from Singapore. He’d be home later and they could talk about it then.
Jess sighed, wishing she didn’t have to wait. She needed to talk to someone, needed to share what had happened and reassure herself that she wasn’t just imagining things; that her friendship with Emer really was in jeopardy.
In the open wardrobe, her eyes rested on a DVF dress that her friend Deirdre had admired last time she’d worn it. Of course, Deirdre! No better woman to talk to about this, and who being both a friend of hers and Emer’s would be able to shine a light on it. She too lived in Lakeview, and was also a mum to two small toddlers, something which as far as Jess could recall had never had any negative bearing on their relationship.
Feeling slightly heartened at the thought of being able to discuss her worries with a sympathetic third party, Jess reached for the bedside phone, and dialled Deirdre’s number.
The phone rang seven times, and Jess was beginning to think that her friend wasn’t home when finally, on the eighth ring, Deirdre picked up.
‘Hello?’ she gasped, and Jess noted how frazzled she sounded.
‘Deirdre, hey it’s Jess.’
‘Oh hello there!’ she replied and as Jess heard the genuine warmth in her voice, she began to feel more at ease.
‘How are you? Just thought I’d phone and say –’
‘Boys, I said NO! Hold on Jess, it’s World War Three here.’ Deirdre didn’t wait for Jess to respond; instead she placed the phone down on whatever surface must have been closest and went off to scold one of the boys for doing something … with a frog apparently. OK, Jess thought with a smile, whatever that was about, she really didn’t want to know. Finally, all seemed quiet again and Jess waited for her friend to get back on the line.
‘I’m sorry Jess,’ Deirdre groaned. ‘Both boys are in a mood and I’m being referee all day.’
‘No worries,’ Jess said, easily. ‘I can imagine.’ Although she couldn’t, not really.
‘So how are you?’
‘Well …’ Jess wasn’t quite sure how to broach the subject without feeling like an idiot. ‘I’m having a bit of a crisis actually.’
‘Crisis – you?’ Deirdre said with a faint laugh as if the very idea were preposterous. ‘Ah let me guess, you can’t get those new season Choos in your size?’
While she might have been joking (and almost certainly was), Jess’s heart sank afresh at the idea that her friend would think her so shallow that the only crisis she could possibly have was a wardrobe one. It wasn’t as though Jess was some bimbo airhead with nothing to do but shop all day. She was a professional businesswoman with an important job and a full team under her remit.
But realising that she was liable to be touchy just now, she resisted the urge to remind Deirdre so. ‘Ah, no nothing like that,’ she chuckled. ‘No, this is actually about Emer.’
‘Oh?’
‘Well, I called down to Lakeview earlier with her birthday present and –’
‘Ah blast it – I forgot her birthday was today. I wouldn’t mind but we were only talking it about a few days ago and …sorry go on,’ Deirdre said, the rest of her sentence trailing off.
Jess duly filled Deirdre in on her afternoon with Emer, from the offer and subsequent refusal to babysit, Emer’s outright lie about her plans, to the arrival of her neighbour and the truth coming out.
Deirdre listened silently at first as she took in the story, and hearing herself recount it, Jess felt surer than ever that she had been hard done by.
‘So you see, it’s not so much that I’m upset she didn’t invite me, more that she felt the need to lie about it,’ she said in conclusion. ‘Although I suppose I am a bit miffed about that too, especially when she knew I was at a loose end.’
‘I know what you mean,’ her friend replied, and Jess immediately started to feel better; sensing she had an advocate.
‘So what do you think?’ she urged. ‘Am I right in being totally cheesed off? Not to mention pretty hurt.’
There was silence on the other end of the line. ‘Well …you see, this is a bit of a tricky situation. I understand you being mad, but I have to admit I kind of understand Emer’s side of it too.’
‘Really?’ Jess said, sitting up straight in bed. Emer’s side? ‘What do you mean?’ Then something Deirdre had said hit her. ‘I wouldn’t mind but we were only talking about it a few days ago …’
‘Wait a minute, were you there last night? Did you go to the party too?’
‘No no I wasn’t there,’ Deirdre said quickly, and Jess started to relax again, happier in the knowledge that she wasn’t the only one who had been excluded. ‘I mean … we were invited, but we didn’t go in the end. Dougie had a bit of throat infection during the week so I thought it better to not infect any other children just in case.’
Jess blinked. ‘Oh, so I guess I am the pariah then. None of you want me around because I don’t have any kids of my own.’
‘No. Of course, not,’ Deirdre soothed. ‘Look, it’s just … well I think Emer thought that it wouldn’t be your thing, or Brian’s if he came along too. I mean, why would you two want to be around the lot of us and our kids?’
�
��Yes, but ‘the lot of you’ are my friends. At least before you all moved to the country and started playing happy families.’ She was trying her utmost not to sound bitter or insensitive but she couldn’t help it. Clearly they weren’t worried about being insensitive towards her.
Deirdre sighed into the phone, ‘Look Jess, we are still your friends, but you can imagine how it is …’
‘Well I honestly can’t, so why don’t you tell me?’ Jess had no idea why she was being so petulant with Deirdre, this wasn’t her fault, although her friend seemed to only be perpetuating her earlier theory about how breeders and non-breeders shouldn’t mix.
‘Look Jess, think about it – I suppose it’s about the interest level really. Emer and Dave’s would have been full of kids toys, nappies and screaming children and if I didn’t have kids it wouldn’t sound remotely like fun to me. It’s like last week when she and I were in Dublin shopping and were laughing about how these days we spend most of our time in kid’s stores and …’ Deirdre cut herself off, too late, realising her slip.
But Jess picked up on it immediately and felt a fresh wave of betrayal. ‘You and Emer were here in Dublin…?’
Deirdre sounded chastened. ‘We were going to ask if you wanted to meet up but –’
‘Hey don’t worry about it,” she said quickly, but again this hurt. There was a time when she and the girls did everything together – in fact Jess had originally introduced Deirdre and Emer to one another but since they’d moved to Lakeview it seemed the two women had paired off and left her behind. Now, even when they did come back for a visit or a shopping trip they couldn’t be bothered including her.
‘Honestly, we just didn’t think you’d be interested. And we know how much you love the whole trying on shoes and personal shopper stuff …’ Her sentence trailed off as if to suggest to this kind of thing would be way too tiresome. ‘Of course, we had the kids with us too, and when you’re not used to it, it can be a bit manic so …’