Falling Softly

by Maria Duffy

  ‘Right,’ she said, heading upstairs. ‘You ask them while I’m gone. I should be back around six so any time after that suits me.’

  He stared after her as she disappeared into their bedroom. It was bound to happen sometime. He and Holly were going to have to face each other, no matter how awkward it might be. But the day loomed ahead of him and he needed something to take his mind off things. And he knew just the person to help with that.

  ‘Honestly, Josh,’ his mum said, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. ‘Those kids of yours are a scream. I don’t know how you keep a straight face in class.’

  ‘Oh, it’s not all fun, you know. There’s a lot of responsibility in teaching kids of that age.’

  She was still laughing at his stories. ‘I know that, love. And you’re brilliant at it. The kids are lucky to have you. And on that note, I think I’ll head off. Erica and Simone are coming over to play bridge later so I’ve got to go to Tesco for some nibbles.’

  Josh walked to the door with his mum. He’d rung and asked her over to lunch earlier and he was very glad that he had. They’d spent a pleasant hour chatting about his job and her slightly eccentric bridge friends and between them they’d laughed almost non-stop.

  ‘It was good to see you,’ said Josh, kissing his mother on the cheek. ‘Drive home safely.’

  ‘I will, love. And thanks for lunch. It was a lovely surprise.’

  Suddenly she was almost knocked off her feet and Josh had to grab her arm to steady her. ‘Mum! Are you okay? And Simon! How did you get out?’

  ‘Sorry about that, Josh.’ Mr Fogarty rushed over to retrieve the dog. ‘I opened the door to put something out in the bin when he must have seen you and made a run for it. Are you okay?’ He turned his attention to Josh’s mum.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said, bending down to pet an excited Simon. ‘He’s gorgeous. I’ve been thinking of getting one myself.’

  Josh raised an eyebrow. He’d often tried to talk her into getting a dog. He thought it would be great company for her. But she’d always refused, saying she didn’t want the hassle.

  ‘Really?’ said Mr Fogarty. ‘And where are my manners. John. John Fogarty. Number forty-four.’ He stretched out a hand to shake hers.

  ‘Maura,’ she said, and Josh noticed how her eyes lit up. ‘And, yes, Josh is always trying to persuade me to get one.’

  ‘Well, if you’re serious about it, give me a ring and I can put you in touch with some breeders.’ He took a pen and a piece of paper out of his jacket pocket and wrote his number down. ‘You need to be careful who you buy from and I have a few friends who could help you with that.’

  ‘Thanks very much,’ she said, stuffing the paper into her handbag. ‘I’ll definitely bear that in mind.’

  There was an awkward moment when they all stood in silence looking at each other until Mr Fogarty finally spoke. ‘Well, it was nice to meet you, Maura. And sorry again about Simon.’ He tipped his cap and took the dog by the collar to lead him inside.

  ‘Bye, Mum,’ said Josh, kissing her lightly on the cheek. ‘I’ll give you a buzz over the next few days.’

  He waved until she disappeared around the corner then turned his attention back to his precious lights. It would be dark soon enough so he wanted to make sure everything was in place before he switched them on. But minutes later he was distracted by the sound of approaching footsteps. His heart almost leapt out of his chest when he saw it was her. It was Holly. And she’d seen him. Oh God. He was rooted to the spot. She knew he’d seen her so he couldn’t rush inside and pretend he hadn’t, but how was he going to hold a conversation with her? What would he say? The decision was taken out of his hands as Holly took her earphones out and walked towards him. His only consolation was that she looked just as uncomfortable as he felt.

  ‘Hello again, Josh,’ she said, standing about a foot away from him. He was glad she didn’t come nearer. Even at that distance, he could sense her body close.

  ‘Hi, Holly. Have you been out?’ Of course she’d been out. He was such an idiot.

  She nodded. ‘In work. I finish up early on Saturdays.’

  ‘So where do you work?’ It dawned on him that this was a totally new Holly – one he knew nothing about.

  ‘In the veterinary practice down the road.’

  ‘You’re a vet! I always knew you’d end up working with animals. Even when we were really little, you used to say you wanted to live in a house with hundreds of cats, dogs and rabbits.’

  She flushed and gave a nervous laugh. ‘I remember. But I’m not a vet – just a receptionist. But it’s great. I love working there. And you?’

  ‘Primary-school teacher at St John’s. Sixth-class boys. My dream!’

  ‘You’re saying that sarcastically,’ she said, her brown eyes boring into his. ‘But I bet you love it. You were loving the teacher training when we … when we …’

  They both fell silent. He could tell she didn’t want to finish the sentence. When we were together, was what she was going to say. Josh really didn’t want the conversation to go there. To get into the reasons why they’d parted. It was all in the past and they needed to move on. He tried to lift the heaviness in the air with humour.

  ‘I do love it, actually. I shouldn’t say this, but having the summer off is fabulous.’

  ‘I bet it is. What do you do with your time for two whole months?’

  ‘I try to be as productive as possible. I actually went to Cape Town last summer on one of those house-building projects for charity.’ He watched her carefully. He and Holly had often talked of doing something like that together.

  ‘Oh.’ Her voice dropped. ‘I regret never having done that myself. Maybe I still will someday.’

  ‘It was great,’ he said. ‘Very rewarding. Although Stephanie said she couldn’t think of anything worse.’

  ‘Stephanie,’ Holly said. ‘Is that your girlfriend?’

  He nodded and felt awkward all over again. ‘She’s out at work at the moment. She’s a model and an actress.’ He wanted to take back the words as soon as they were out.

  ‘She must be very beautiful.’

  What could he say to that? Beauty is only skin deep? It’s what’s on the inside that counts? She’s no more beautiful than you? He never thought he’d see the day when things between him and Holly were so awkward. They’d spent more than half their lives together, for God’s sake. Surely it had to be easier than this. Maybe he was wrong in trying to avoid speaking about the past.

  ‘Holly,’ he said, watching as she shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. ‘Do you want to talk?’

  ‘What do you mean? We’re talking now, aren’t we?’

  She knew what he meant. ‘I mean properly talk. About you and me.’

  ‘There is no you and me, Josh.’ He noticed how the words caught slightly in her throat and she wasn’t looking him in the eye.

  He tried again. ‘I mean about back then. If we’re going to live across the road from each other, surely we need to find a way to move forward and not have the past hanging over us.’

  ‘Nothing is hanging over me, Josh.’ She glared at him. ‘The past is the past and I’m looking forward to a lovely future now with my fiancé.’

  She practically spat the word fiancé out and he knew she was trying to hurt him. But they were past all that. ‘I know what you’re saying, Holly. And I’ve moved on too. But we’re living across the road from each other so for the sake of our sanity, I don’t want things to be awkward between us.’

  She leaned against the pillar and sighed. ‘So what have you told Stephanie? Does she know our history?’

  ‘Not fully. She never really wanted to know many details from my past so she just knows we were together for a while when we were younger.’

  She nodded and smiled. ‘Same with David. We both had history when we got together so we agreed that there was no need to drag it all up. I told him you and me were close in the past. But we were just kids.’

  ‘Step
hanie wants you both to come over tonight,’ said Josh, watching her carefully. ‘She left me with orders to go and ask you.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘What do you think? We can’t keep avoiding each other.’

  She stood up straight and it was as though a spell had been broken. ‘As you say, we can’t keep avoiding it so why don’t we drop over for a while? We’ve talked now so let’s just move on.’

  She held his gaze for a moment longer than was necessary and he saw everything in those eyes. No matter how much she talked about moving on, she, like him, was still a little stuck in the past.

  ‘Okay,’ said Josh reluctantly. ‘Let’s say seven o’clock?’

  ‘That’s fine by me.’ She turned to leave. ‘I’ll see you then.’

  Josh watched her walk off but then she stopped halfway across the road. She turned around and looked at him, and his heart began to beat faster. It was like a slow-motion scene in a movie and his mind was trying to guess what was going to happen next. He thought, for just a second, that she was going to run back into his arms. But then he realised that he was being ridiculous.

  ‘Josh,’ she said, so softly he could barely hear. ‘Congratulations. I hear you’re going to be a daddy. I’m very happy for you. I know it’s what you’ve always wanted.’

  She disappeared into her house and Josh stood looking across at the closed door. Yes, it was what he’d always wanted. But hearing the words coming from her lips was like a knife to his heart. He felt tears sting the backs of his eyes but he fought the urge to cry. He pictured a scared seventeen-year-old Holly crying her eyes out. ‘Don’t worry, sweetheart,’ he said. ‘Someday we’ll have a whole house full of kids and this will be a little less painful.’ She looked at him and laid her head on his shoulder. ‘I hope so, Josh. I really do.’

  Chapter 15

  January 2001

  ‘What are we going to do, Josh?’ Holly said, sticking her hands down further into her pockets to fend off the bitter cold. ‘I … I just can’t get my head around it.’

  He sat forward on the park bench and put his head into his hands.

  ‘Josh. Say something. What are we going to do?’

  He looked at her then, his face pale and worried. ‘I honestly don’t know, Hols. How could this have happened? We were being so careful.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, her voice catching in her throat. ‘But we knew the risks. We just need to decide what happens now.’

  ‘What do you want to happen?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘I’m not sure. But maybe it doesn’t have to be such a bad thing. It was always in our plan – it’s just happened a little earlier than we would have liked.’

  ‘Holly! We’re only just eighteen years old. I’m in college and you’re working full time. How will we make it work?’

  She snuggled into him. ‘I don’t have all the answers, Josh. But I know this. I love you more than anything in the world, and if this baby is a product of that love, we’re all going to be just fine.’

  The sound of the doorbell startled Holly and a little bead of sweat trickled down the back of her neck. When she’d told David earlier about the invitation from Josh and Stephanie, he’d insisted that they should be the ones to host the evening, since they’d suggested it first. She would have preferred to go across the road because then she’d be in control of when to go home. But having them in her house meant that, no matter how uncomfortable she felt, she’d have to wait until they decided to leave. She opened the bedroom door slightly to listen to the voices downstairs.

  ‘Come in, come in,’ David said, in his deep, cheery voice. ‘Welcome to number forty.’

  ‘Thanks,’ came the voice of a woman, who Holly assumed was Stephanie. Her voice seemed to have a Cork lilt which, for some reason, Holly hadn’t been expecting. She didn’t hear Josh’s voice, but then again, his was soft and understated. There was the sound of laughter before the voices became a dull murmur and Holly assumed David had ushered them into the sitting room. She was dreading the thought of sitting down with Josh and his girlfriend as though it was a normal situation. Speaking to him earlier had been awkward. She’d listened to how happy he was – how he loved his job and how his life was sorted, with a beautiful girlfriend and a baby on the way. Holly hadn’t even been able to tell him about losing her own job. She hadn’t wanted to seem like a failure.

  Suddenly she heard footsteps on the stairs and realised she still wasn’t dressed. She’d already changed six times and applied and removed her make-up twice. She knew it was stupid, but she just wanted to look right. Stephanie, she assumed, was a glamorous woman, given the job she did, so Holly wanted to make an effort. But she didn’t want to look like she was trying too hard either, so she just couldn’t decide what to wear. God, she was such a bloody mess.

  ‘Holly, what’s keeping you?’ David’s face appeared around the door as Holly was flapping around in her knickers and bra, and he didn’t look happy. ‘Come on, will you. I don’t want to have to entertain them on my own.’

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, grabbing a black pencil skirt from a hanger. ‘I stubbed my toe on the leg of the bed and I was trying to get it to stop bleeding.’

  ‘Give me a look,’ he said, walking into the room. ‘There should be plasters in the –’

  ‘No!’ She immediately took a step back. Why did she tell such stupid lies? ‘It’s stopped now so just give me two minutes and I’ll be down.’

  He sighed but relented. ‘Okay, but hurry up.’

  Now multiple beads of sweat were trickling – not just down the back of her neck but under her arms too. She felt like screaming. But if she didn’t hurry up, David would be back up the stairs in a moment, so she rushed into the en suite, gave herself a quick rub down and applied some more deodorant. It would have to do for now. She teamed the black pencil skirt with a grey top from Penneys, not too casual, not too dressy, and stuck her feet into a pair of grey heels. Even though her make-up was a bit of a disaster, because she’d run out of one foundation and had to continue with another which was a different colour, she had no time to fix it again. So she dusted a bit of powder over it, prayed for the best and headed down to meet their guests.

  ‘Ah, there she is,’ said David, looking relieved. ‘I’ve poured you a glass of wine, Holly. This is Stephanie. And I think you already know Josh.’

  She nodded at them both. ‘Hi, Stephanie, Josh. Glad you could make it.’

  Stephanie stood up to greet her properly and Holly immediately envied her waif-like figure. She was also annoyingly beautiful. They kissed each other on the cheek and Stephanie floated back to her seat. Everything about her was elegant and polished and Holly felt like a baby elephant beside her. Thankfully Josh didn’t stand to kiss her and just waved his greeting from the armchair.

  ‘So how long have you lived here?’ said Josh. ‘It seems like a decent sort of street.’

  David was quick to answer. ‘Just over two years for Holly – a little more for me. I bought this place before we even met so she moved in when we started to go steady.’

  Holly cringed at his use of ‘go steady’. It was like something her mother would say. But Josh didn’t seem to notice and continued, ‘I hear the pub down the road is decent too. What’s it called? O’Mahoney’s or something?’

  ‘O’Malley’s,’ Holly said, finding her voice. ‘And, yes, it’s a great spot. We should go down some evening.’

  Everyone looked at her and she could feel the redness start at her neck and creep up her face. ‘I mean all of us. Not just both of us. I mean we should all go down to O’Malley’s some evening.’

  ‘Sounds good to me,’ said Stephanie. ‘It’s great to have a pub like that so close. In our last place, we had to drive to the nearest one.’

  Holly found herself watching Stephanie enviously. She was relaxed and self-assured, everything Holly aspired to be. She also had the face of an angel and Holly couldn’t help thinking she looked too young for Josh. But Holly’s eyes were esp
ecially drawn to her stomach, which was just slightly protruding through her white T-shirt. She was wearing a pair of skinny jeans too and looked like she’d just walked out of the pages of a catalogue for trendy maternity wear.

  ‘So have you met any of the other neighbours yet?’ David asked, taking a sip of his drink.

  Josh smiled. ‘Just one. Some old guy. Said he lived in number forty-four. John, I think his name is.’

  David nodded. ‘John Fogarty. Nice enough man. His dog is a bit of a nuisance, though.’

  ‘Oh, I met Simon too,’ said Josh. ‘Beautiful creature.’

  Holly smiled enthusiastically. ‘He is gorgeous, isn’t he? He’s exactly the sort of dog I’d want if we were getting one.’

  ‘Well, that will never happen,’ said David. ‘I’m not keen on dogs at all, if I’m honest.’

  Holly had to bite her tongue. She didn’t want to argue in front of their guests but she hated how David was so firm in his opinion about getting a dog. It was a contentious issue in the house and Holly had often been tempted to just rescue a dog from the Dogs Trust and bring it home before David even knew what was happening. Thankfully Stephanie chimed in and changed the subject.

  ‘So when are you two getting hitched? I hear you got engaged recently.’

  David sat forward and nodded. ‘Yes, only a few weeks ago. And we haven’t set a date yet but we’re hoping to in the next few days. It will probably be summer 2017.’

  ‘Summer?’ The word came in a high-pitched tone from Josh’s mouth and he looked like he wanted to disappear. Everyone looked at him and he cleared his throat. ‘Sorry, I’m just surprised you said summer because Holly –’

  ‘I mentioned winter to you today, didn’t I?’ said Holly, quickly interrupting him. ‘We really haven’t decided for sure yet.’ She knew what he was going to say. She and Josh had spoken so often about getting married. In their plans, it would always be winter and there’d always be snow. Nothing else had ever been an option.

  David threw her a quizzical look. ‘But I thought we’d ruled out winter because of the cold and the possibility of snow and ice?’