“Poppy explained the whole thing to me. That thingamajig she does – Ayur-something.”
“Ayurveda,” Helen sighed.
“Yes, that – the Indian medicine thing. Apparently we all have different body types. She did the quiz on me – I’m a Vata type, which is space and air, so I can’t help it. It’s my dosha!”
“Airhead more like,” Helen laughed. “Maybe I’ll have that glass of wine after all. It’s a good excuse for JD and me to walk back tomorrow for the car. Unless of course the wine has actually been sitting there for a week.” She eyed Mary for confirmation.
“It’s been in the fridge, sure it’s grand. Honest to God, your generation would never have survived in my day.” Mary was glad Helen had opted for the wine – it might make it easier for her to hear what she had to tell her.
“Ah, the old days, Angela’s Ashes style,” Helen mimicked. “Ye’d no electricity or running water – the forgotten West of Ireland, left behind in the Stone Age.” She squinted an eye and pushed out her chin.
Mary laughed at Helen’s one-man performance. “Maybe I’m a little inclined to exaggerate,” she admitted, “but it was rural Ireland, we had no fridge, the toilet was an outhouse at the end of the garden and I had four brothers, remember.”
“Bless – the Fitzgerald clan. Those were the days when the men were men and the sheep were afraid,” Helen continued with her Wild Man of the West impersonation.
“Helen Devine – wash your mouth out!” Mary said, but mother and daughter both doubled up with laughter.
“So this is where the party is!” Poppy arrived at the back door, as she had done since she was a child.
Mary wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. “Oh, there you are, love. I was just explaining that dosha thing to Helen.” With that, the two of them burst into laughter again, leaving Poppy a little bewildered.
“Glad I provided the entertainment, though I’m not sure I know how,” Poppy said, enveloping them in the scent of musk as she walked past. She gave Helen a hug. “So, are you all set for the morning? We need to leave here before eight to give us time to set up. It is so good to have you home!” Poppy tried to sound convincing and gave Helen her most dazzling smile, to cover up the fact that Helen hadn’t actually agreed to help her out the next day.
“Are you doing a car-boot-sale thingy again, Poppy?” Mary said, barely suppressing her amusement. No matter how much Helen loved her slightly hippy, eco-warrior friend, she hated it when Poppy roped her into one of her less-than-glamorous cash-producing schemes.
Helen’s face registered horror, as memories came flooding back of haggling with a six-year-old over eighty cent for a one-legged, black Barbie that once belonged to Lily. The child, relentless, had beaten her into submission, acquired the doll for fifty cent and had even got Helen to throw in an extra pair of doll-shoes, the point of which was lost on Helen, considering the doll had only one foot.
“What have I agreed to do now?”
“The Mind Body Spirit Fair, in Temple Bar. I thought you’d man my stand while I’m doing the massages . . .” Poppy’s voice trailed off.
“Oh right, of course.” Helen was relieved – at least it was an in-doors city-centre venue, which meant an abundant supply of decent coffee and relative warmth.
“You are the bestest mate ever, Helen, thanks a mil. We’ll have fun! There are free yoga classes, I’ll make sure they let you in,” Poppy tapped the tip of her nose in a “mum’s the word” fashion, “and Indian head-massage. If that’s all a bit pure for you, we can go for a drink afterwards.”
“Massage and cocktails, now that sounds like my kind of day. I may skip the yoga though.” Helen raised her mug in salute, having decided the tea was the least likely option to give her food poisoning, but she had checked the expiry-date, just in case.
Mary laughed. “You two are a match made in hell, do you know that? Will ye ever grow up and settle down at all?”
Poppy and Helen looked at her in shock. “Heaven forbid!” they chorused.
The conversation switched to Hong Kong and Helen started to rummage through the goodie bag of trinkets she’d brought back as gifts.
Mary realised the news she was so anxious to tell Helen would have to wait – for now.
Chapter 22
Poppy drove along the seafront road from Raheny towards Helen’s house in Howth. She’d nudge Helen into her early weekend start, offering caffeine and carbohydrates. She reckoned one of the cafés was bound to be open, even in this sleepy town. Alas, she was wrong.
She pulled into a car-park to do a U-turn. As her trusty Mini Cooper nosed back onto the road, it stalled. Restarting the ignition, she noticed a “To Let” sign hanging from the old stone building on the opposite side of the road. What a beautiful setting for a holistic centre! She checked her watch – she was already running late. “No time to daydream now, Poppy,” she said aloud and pressed the accelerator, to get back to reality. That’s when the second sign of the morning grabbed her attention – this one had the inviting word “Café”. Poppy didn’t remember it being there before.
“Thank you, Dahlia!” Poppy tapped the dashboard of her old car, in praise. “Government Scrappage Scheme, my backside! We’ll go to the knacker’s yard together, old girl.” Poppy climbed out of the small car, in which she’d managed to fit a fold-up table, a massage chair and boxes filled with paraphernalia required for her day ahead.
“Ciao, bella!” a thin man called out to her. He sat on a windowsill of the building, available for rent, next to the café. He had an espresso in one hand, a cigarette in the other.
Poppy approached him. “Hello, please say you are open?” she said with a grimace and looked at him with pleading eyes. Although his face was fresh, his eyes were wise and as dark as deep pools of chocolate.
“Domani, principessa.” He blew smoke in the opposite direction before he stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette.
Poppy looked at him blankly.
“Tomorrow, I open for the first time. But, as you can see, I test the equipment, make sure everything work okay. Would you like to try?” He raised the small cup.
“It must be my lucky day,” Poppy said, entering the small Italian shop. The aroma of fresh bread baking caused her stomach to growl.
“I hope everyone has that reaction to my shop – you like it?”
“Excuse me.” Poppy patted her stomach. “I love it. It’s little Italy.”
“Grazie, grazie. Now, you must tell me the truth about the coffee. I make sure the machine is set up right, although the secret is all with the barista. What can I get you?” He went behind the counter.
Poppy pulled out a heavy wooden bar-stool. “Coffee, please – black. And one for takeaway.”
“One or two shots?” He stood waiting – handle at the ready.
“It’ll be a long day – go on then – make it two!”
“And the takeaway, is it for your daughter?”
The question took Poppy by surprise.
He smiled. “Ah, but you don’t remember me! I am the waiter from Antonio’s.”
The penny dropped. He had looked familiar. He was their waiter the night Lily announced she was a lesbian. He looked different now in his paint-splattered jeans and T-shirt.
“Yes, I remember now. You look different without your clothes on – I mean the white starched shirt and tie. I thought you were Spanish?” Nice recovery, Poppy.
“No, I am Italian. No worries – everybody thought that. I was working in a Spanish restaurant after all.” He handed Poppy a weighty white cup.
Poppy blew the top of the liquid to part the caramel-coloured froth – underneath: black gold. She took her first sip. “Umh, this is really good! You can make that two takeaways!”
He beamed, pleased at her approval.
“So, you’re working in both places now?” Poppy asked.
“No, I finish in Antonio’s, just last night. I had to keep working, help make my dream real.” He waved his arm at the small interior.
“So, this is your place?”
“Yes, me and my partner. I am Angelo.” He extended his hand.
“Poppy. Pleased to meet you, Angelo.” She shook his hand. Had he been referring to a business partner or a life partner, she wondered.
“‘Puppy’ – what a beautiful name – like the flower.”
“It’s ‘Poppy’.” She laughed at Angelo ’s pronunciation as she climbed off the stool. “I’d better get going.” She fished for her wallet.
“No, no charge.”
“But then I won’t be your first customer.”
“Yes, you are and this way you’ll have to come back again.” Angelo shrugged, holding his hands out as though saying Mass.
A warm feeling coursed through Poppy, she wasn’t sure why. She often felt uncomfortable taking things from people, even though in this case she knew it was only coffee. Her wallet contained forty euro in notes, and then some change. “Tell you what, Angelo, this is an Irish tradition.” She handed him a twenty. “For luck.” She nodded, encouraging him to take it. She had enough left for parking today and probably wouldn’t have time for lunch anyway.
“Really?” Angelo hesitated, and then smiled broadly. “Thank you, Puppy. My place will be a big success!” He climbed onto the bar’s draining-board. High up, he wedged the note halfway behind his café’s name – Il Panorama Café.
Poppy she watched her lunch money be immortalised behind the slogan: Enter a stranger – leave a local.
Poppy walked back to her car loaded down with the two takeaway coffees and samples of Angelo’s fresh-baked bread. “You take it,” he’d said to Poppy, “I’m just testing the oven – this will go in the bin. Tomorrow I will bake a fresh batch.”
She placed the coffees on roof of the car as she unlocked the car door. As she sat behind the wheel she realised what she’d been doing but she couldn’t help herself – even as she turned the key in the ignition, she was still doing it – grinning like a Cheshire Cat.
Chapter 23
Helen spread organic cotton over Poppy’s makeshift stand. She had begged it off a supplier a few seasons ago. She stood back to admire her handiwork. The fabric looked much better as a tablecloth than a nightdress.
“Okay, Poppy, tell me what I have to do today.” Her eyes darted around the hall. Other stallholders were setting up. Many appeared to be wearing tie-dye T-shirts, and tie-dye trousers – on the same body: the designer in her balked. It also become apparent there was a lot of facial hair on display.
“Just be yourself, tell them what I do, hand them a leaflet and ask if they’d like to join my mailing list.” Poppy smiled, her arms outstretched as if it was all child’s play.
“Ah, right, see here’s the thing, what exactly do you do? You’re always on some course or other. You pick up new qualifications as often as other people pick up dry cleaning.” She waved her hand in front of her face. “What’s that smell?”
“Incense, obviously, get used to it, there’ll be a lot of it around today. I’m trying to cut back on massage and counselling, concentrating instead on Ayurveda and teaching meditation.” Poppy stared at Helen beneath lowered eyebrows. Helen had asked her to teach her how to meditate months ago, but had kept putting it off.
“I know I should be doing it. But it’s one of those things, isn’t it? You put it off until you reach crisis point. A bit like going to the gym after you’ve gained ten pounds.” Helen fanned out Poppy’s business cards on the table.
The first of their neighbours for the day had arrived. They bowed to Helen and Poppy but didn’t speak. This suited Helen just fine.
“Okay, the Ayurveda thing is: Vata – air-heads. Pitta – hot tempered. Kapha – need to lose a few pounds. Have I got it right?” she asked.
“I tell you what, why don’t you leave the explaining to me?” Poppy waved to a guy with a shaved head, bar a ponytail which hung from the nape of his neck. He had something painted on his forehead and along the length of his nose.
“You know the strangest people, Poppy Power – apart from me, that is. What am I again?”
“A Vata-Pitta, creativity with passion.” Poppy smiled at her. The corner beside them was filling up fast, as its occupants arrived in dribs and drabs. “Remember, Helen, the true purpose of meditation is to find out who you really are.”
“Eh, you’re Poppy Power.”
“Very funny. I think an easy way to explain it is that meditators make better choices. They start to notice coincidences – synchronicities – throughout the day. There’s no such thing as coincidence – the more you notice them, the more you know you’re in Dharma.” Poppy stood back and looked at the stand from the perspective of the public.
“Dharma?” Helen thought Dharma was the part-title of an old sit-com.
“Your life purpose – we all have one. We just have to figure out what it is. Synchronicities show us the way.” With that, the main doors opened and people started to flood in.
“It’d be easier if I had a sample, something I could physically show them.” Helen’s brow furrowed with worry, then she looked like she had a light-bulb moment. “Come to think of it, I did experience an unusual coincidence when buying a book on synchronicity! It was recommended to me by a stranger.”
“Go on . . .”
“Well, I saw him at the airport check-in, and then I bumped into him again in the bookshop. The thing is, he had an odd-looking briefcase that caught my eye.” Helen twisted the small gold ring on her little finger as she spoke. “It didn’t fit with the rest of him – with his image.” She looked to see if Poppy could follow what she was saying.
Poppy was nodding like a spring-headed dog in a car rear window.
“Well, I had this nasty experience in a bar in Hong Kong. I’ll tell you about it another time, I don’t want to talk about it now . . . but anyway just after that I spotted the man from Heathrow, or rather I spotted his straw briefcase, just as he was going out the door of the bar.”
“Please tell me you went after him?” Poppy asked, barely breathing.
“Yes, but he had disappeared. I didn’t see him or his straw case during the rest of the trip so it must have meant nothing. It was just a coincidence.”
“Nonsense, of course it meant something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. You’ve got to learn to trust the Universe, Helen, have faith.”
“You lose me when you start talking about the Universe, Poppy.”
An elderly lady carrying a large plaid shopping bag approached the table. “What free stuff have you got?” She pushed the leaflets around the table, looking for something to claim.
“A smile,” Helen beamed at her.
The woman stared, open-mouthed, her nose screwed up and lips pursed.
“And a ‘positive thought for the day’ card – from The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success. Let’s see – today is Saturday – The Law of Dharma. How apt.”
The woman scowled and grabbed the card from Helen before shuffling off to the next stand.
Poppy reached up and put her arm around Helen’s shoulder. “See, you’re a natural!”
“Give me knickers any day.”
The Mind Body Spirit Fair was in full swing. On the stand beside Poppy’s, a group of people wearing orange robes sat on cushions. Each of them held a different instrument, from cymbals to drums. More of them appeared to arrive every few minutes. They began their musical chorus of chanting and drumming: they had a lot of drums. To begin with, Helen found it rather soothing but by lunchtime, they still hadn’t stopped. They had a relay of volunteers to ensure continuity of the beat and of course the chanting – “Hare Hare Krishna Krishna”.
It was going to be a very long day.
Helen answered the phone on the first ring.
“Hi, it’s me. I’m ready to leave the city now – I’ll unload the car tomorrow. What do you fancy this evening?” It was Poppy. She had sent Helen home at four o’clock, saying she’d manage alone. The show had q
uietened down, bar a few stragglers and Helen had looked like she was losing the will to live.
“Oh, Poppy, I forgot to tell you, I’ve a date with Keifer.” Helen yawned to emphasise she had no intention of going out.
“Keifer?”
“Sutherland.”
“Don’t tell me, Helen, you’re staying in on a Saturday night, watching psychopathic murderers?”
“Yes, I think of it as a healthy way to release my dark side. So I don’t actually cause bodily harm to my fellow commuters on the Tube. Anyway, that’s what God invented Sky Plus for – I’ve a whole two weeks of quality programmes to catch up on.”
“But it’s Saturday night.”
“Exactly, amateur night on the town – the last thing I need is to feel like I’m old enough to be everyone’s mother.” Helen adjusted a cushion behind her head while balancing her mobile between her shoulder and ear. She stretched her legs along the dark purple couch. In perfect harmony, her Golden Retriever mirrored her action, on the deep-pile carpet. She had positioned everything just perfectly to be within reach of her horizontal position on the settee. The circular glass and stainless-steel table was within arm’s reach. On it, the remote control, a cordless phone (although the only one who ever rang her on the land-line was her mother) and a bottle-cooler containing a bottle of New Zealand’s finest. She placed the wineglass on the table as softly as possible – it made the all too familiar clink sound.
“You’re drinking wine already, aren’t you?” Poppy was dismayed to realise she was competing with wine.
“I just opened it a few minutes ago,” Helen said defensively. “Besides, I’ve had a tough week – I may not even have a job on Monday, after snogging the boss and running away. On top of which I’m refusing to run away with him to join Eden Hong Kong. He may well show me the door. I need to chill out.”
“Meditate then, don’t sit and drink wine at home. Alone.” Poppy cringed internally at her own double standard.
“Jeez, all this time I thought you were telling me to medicate. If you’re so concerned with my mental state, come over, and then I won’t be alone.”
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