The Carmel Sheehan Story

by Jean Grainger

  ‘Maybe you’re right. It’s just there’s a lot going on at the moment.’

  ‘Isn’t there always? Anyway, if you ever want to talk, you know where I am.’

  ‘Thanks, I really mean it, thank you.’ She looked at his kind face and wondered, ‘Have you got kids, Oscar?’

  He grinned, ‘Yes, three. Twin girls from my first marriage, Ellie and Daniella, and while I was a total nightmare, my ex was a trooper. Not only that, she never turned them against me, which she could so easily have done. I would have deserved it, but I have a great relationship with them. They stay with me at weekends and we try to co-parent as much as possible. They’re thirteen now, so they can be challenging, but they are great and I adore them. And I also have a two-year-old son with my partner, Caroline, he’s called Teddy and he’s fabulous. How about you?’

  ‘Me? No. My ex had two daughters, twins as well, actually, but they really missed their mother so they never took to me I’m afraid. They have an aunt they’re close to, so I wasn’t needed. Your kids are so lucky, having you as a dad; I bet they’ll grow up really happy confident people.’

  ‘I hope so. We are all doing our best to lay the foundations of that anyway. It’s so important to build kids up in childhood; otherwise, life can be very hard. My mum was accused once of giving me and my brothers a superiority complex, and she explained that there was a very hard world out there only too willing to knock the confidence out of anyone, and so if the sense of self-worth wasn’t built up at home, then what did you have to fight with? Of course, I was a total plonker, obsessing about money and deals and thinking I was so important, so maybe it backfired a bit, but I’m reconciled to that now. It took time though, Carmel, and a lot of self-examination to get to here. I don’t know your background, apart from the bit you’ve told me about growing up in care and an unhappy marriage, but it sounds to me like you need some investment in yourself. See someone, talk to them, work this stuff out for yourself; we all deserve to be happy, Carmel, but it’s something generated inside, the outside world can’t provide it. Money, success, power, even other people can’t make us truly happy, we need to find that in here.’ He pointed at his chest and Carmel knew he was right.

  ‘Thanks, Oscar.’ She stood up and he drew her into a hug. Normally, physical contact like this with anyone except Sharif made her squirm; she never knew what she should do in return, but this time, she just relaxed. She’d been hugged more in the six months she’d been at Aashna, than in the forty years before that.

  ‘I never got a hug, as a kid. Or as an adult, now that I think of it.’ The words were out before she even realized it.

  Oscar sighed but didn’t let her go. ‘The wonderful thing about this life we’ve been given, Carmel, is we can change it. We can reinvent ourselves as often as we want to. It’s not easy, we need to let go of a lot of nonsense that hurt us in the past, but it can be done. If I can go from an arrogant city broker, obsessed with power and status and things, to the man I am today, then you can be a happy fulfilled woman who believes she is worthy of someone’s love. Regret and guilt are two of the most pointless emotions. The past is over, it happened and nothing we can do will change it, but we can decide to not let it be our future. It’s a long road ahead, but you can do it.’

  The moment was interrupted by her phone ringing. It was Marlena on reception.

  ‘Hi, Marlena.’

  ‘Carmel, I’m so sorry about this but someone is here demanding to see you; I told her you’d call her if she left a number but she’s most insistent. Can you come up?’ Marlena, usually unflappable, sounded harassed.

  ‘Sure. I’m on the way.’

  ‘Thanks for the advice, Oscar, I’ll do it. I better go, someone is looking for me. Marlena sounded a bit stressed, some of these sales people can be very pushy.’

  ‘See you, Carmel, nice to chat.’

  She hurried across the grounds towards the large glass reception area. It was beautiful inside, with tropical plants thriving in all the heat and sunshine captured by the glass-domed roof. She’d become accustomed to sales reps coming and trying to sell various products to Aashna House and she surprised herself at how forceful she could be in return when people were too pushy.

  She went in the back and stopped dead in her tracks.

  ‘Carmel. So, this is where you’ve been hiding.’ Julia’s words dripped icy disdain as she stood squarely in front of her.

  ‘Julia…How…I wasn’t expecting…’ Carmel could hear the tremor in her voice.

  Her sister-in-law looked at her as if she were a very slow five-year-old. ‘You sent a letter, or at least some solicitor did? Or do you not recall the tiny matter of your husband and family in Ireland? Did you just expect us to pay up and walk away?’

  Visitors and various staff members were milling around and Carmel really didn’t want to have this conversation here, in public.

  ‘Em right…can we go to my apartment…it’s not far…to talk…’ she was sweating and could feel the rivulets of perspiration running down her back.

  ‘Yes. Let’s go to your apartment, Carmel.’ Julia’s tone suggested the idea of Carmel having an apartment was highly suspect. Carmel didn’t dare catch Marlena’s eye as she quickly exited reception. Not a word passed between them as she walked towards the residences. Panic was rising up inside her.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ she told herself as she almost sprinted back. ‘She can’t make you do anything, she can’t force you to go back. You’re a grown woman with her own right to live wherever you want…’ However often she told herself that thought, she wished she could believe it.

  It took three goes to get the key in the lock, but eventually, she managed it. She opened the door and Julia walked past her into the lounge. Carmel caught the look of surprise in Julia’s eyes at the beauty of her home. The oatmeal sofas, the flat screen TV, the lovely rosewood dining table, and the high-gloss fitted kitchen with French doors out to the courtyard were a far cry from the 1970s time-warp that was Bill’s dreary farmhouse.

  ‘Can…Can I get you a drink, tea?’ Carmel knew she was coming across as pathetic but she couldn’t help herself. She should throw her out, not be offering her tea.

  ‘No. I don’t want anything.’ Julia spoke slowly, taking everything in.

  Thank goodness, she’d put the framed photo taken in France of herself and Sharif in the bedroom. A couple they’d struck up a conversation with offered to take it, and it was a really nice one. Nadia had got it framed for them as an engagement gift. Carmel felt a knot of anxiety rise up like bile within her as Julia’s eyes rested on the ‘Congratulations! You’re Engaged’ cards on the shelves beside the TV.

  ‘So, whose hospitality are you encroaching on now? This is clearly not your apartment, whatever you may want me to believe, and I doubt that any couple, recently engaged, wants you hanging around.’

  Carmel knew she should say something, something to defend herself from Julia’s scathing remarks, but she just couldn’t. She busied herself with cups, despite the rude rebuff of her offer of a drink. Hands shaking, she dropped a mug from the countertop, where it smashed on the floor.

  Julia’s look said it all. Typical Carmel, can’t do anything right.

  ‘So, are you going to explain yourself, what you are trying to do over here in this Godforsaken place?’

  If anywhere was Godforsaken, she wanted to yell, it was the miserable farmhouse on a lonely bit of a farm in Birr County Offaly. Aashna was beautiful, and even Julia could see that. For some reason, the insults about Aashna were more cutting than those directed at her.

  Carmel brushed up the shards of mug in silence, her head down, and opened the bin.

  ‘You seem to have your feet firmly under the table here anyway, however you’ve managed it. It’s very sterile, though, no personality.’ The suggestion was clear that Carmel was behaving deceitfully, hoodwinking some innocent with her imagined tale of woe.

  After years of living with Gretta’s knick-knacks and ornaments
, Carmel loved the bare surfaced simplicity of the apartment. Sharif, too, was not a collector of things, his clothes, his washing things, and a few books were all he owned really. He loved his clothes, she found that so funny at the beginning, he had a style all his own, but whenever he bought something new, which he did often, he donated something else to the charity shop on the high street.

  Julia’s inquisitive and judgmental gaze stopped to rest on an Islamic painting hanging beside the French doors. Nadia brought it back from Karachi, from her parent’s house when they died. When she gave it to Carmel, she explained that where she had placed it was the Qibla, the place where Muslims would pray in the house. She knew that Sharif wasn’t religious, but they were delighted to accept the gift. When Nadia asked if she’d object to it being up in their living room, she had explained that people often had religious paintings or statues in their houses in Ireland as well, even if they weren’t religious at all. Sometimes, they were family heirlooms or just a tradition. Sacred Heart pictures, crucifixes, images of the Virgin Mary were common in Irish homes and so she was happy to have this symbol of Sharif’s culture in theirs. Besides, she loved the blue and white geometric designs, it was soothing to look at.

  ‘It’s from Pakistan,’ she managed to say, as Julia’s eyes rested on the picture.

  ‘Really? It looks like something the children would do in school. Pakistan, you say, and what might one ask, would you know about Pakistan?’

  This was it. She had to summon up the courage to tell her the truth.

  ‘Sharif Khan, the doctor who runs this place, is from there.’ She was disgusted at herself. Why couldn’t she have said, Sharif, my fiancée, owns it, his mother gave it to us as a gift? Because she was pathetic, that’s why.

  ‘And does this man allow you to live here, in return for working in this hospital, or whatever it is?’

  ‘Yes, I am the Events Manager here.’

  ‘Pah!’ Julia barked. ‘You are in your eye, the manager of anything. Listen to me, Carmel Murphy, I know what you are, I’ve always known what you are, and you might have fooled these eejits over here, thinking you’re all sweetness and light, but I know your game.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, I don’t have a game…I don’t want…’ Carmel began.

  ‘Oh, don’t you now? Is that why you sent a solicitor’s letter to my brother, demanding half of our family farm? Because you have no plans, is that it? You must think I’m a total simpleton.’

  ‘I did not demand anything, I saw the letter myself, the solicitor was simply asking to start divorce proceedings, and so he wanted a valuation of the land and so on, it’s standard practice…’ Carmel wished she felt as confident as she sounded. She was nervous when the solicitor sent it, despite him explaining that this was perfectly routine.

  ‘Standard practice! Listen to yourself, standard practice indeed. That is our family’s land; it has been in the Sheehan family for four generations and you think a nobody like you, born out of dirty carnal sin, is going to take it away from us? Do you?’ she spat.

  ‘But, Julia, it’s Bill’s farm anyway, not yours. We’ve had this conversation already. Bill and I will come to an arrangement…’ Carmel was trying to be reasonable.

  ‘Bill will do no such thing! Not while I have breath in my body. You tried to kill me once, I won’t forget that; you’re lucky I didn’t go to the guards but you caused enough drama I didn’t want to add to poor Bill’s problems. That land was my mother’s, my father only married in, it is as much mine as it is Bill’s and I won’t stand by and have our land carved up to pay off a gold-digging tramp.’ She grabbed Carmel’s arm and squeezed.

  ‘Julia, let me go…’ Carmel’s arm was really hurting; the woman was surprisingly strong.

  ‘Get your hands off her immediately!’ Sharif ran into the apartment and Carmel shook her off and ran to his arms, knocking Julia off her feet in the process. The situation would have been funny if she wasn’t so shaken. Julia fell backwards over the arm of the couch and was looking most undignified, legs in the air, as she tried unsuccessfully to right herself. She fumed as her skirt rode up and her thick brown tights and beige corselette were on display.

  Sharif made no effort to help her up.

  ‘I have no idea who on earth you are, but get off my property this moment or I will call the police and have you arrested for assault.’ Carmel had never seen Sharif so angry. Fury glittered in his dark eyes and his voice was cold as steel.

  He kept his arms around Carmel, protecting her.

  ‘And who do you think you are? You will do nothing of the kind.’ Julia was struggling to right herself. Eventually, she was upright, but two red spots of fury glowed in her cheeks. She had been humiliated and Carmel knew this wasn’t going to be taken lightly.

  ‘I was speaking to my brother’s wife, and if you knew what she had done, then you’d not be so quick to defend her.’

  ‘Oh, you must be the dreaded Julia. I am Dr Sharif Khan.’ Carmel noted the look of shock on Julia’s face that Sharif knew who she was.

  ‘Oh, I’m sure she’s made up plenty of lies about me and poor Bill to make you feel sorry for her and give her a job and a flat. She’s good at that, taking advantage of people’s generosity. But it is all just that, total lies, and if she thinks we’re going to take this lying down, her sending solicitor’s letters and threatening Bill, well then, she has another think coming. I’d say you should check who you have as a lodger, or as a cleaner, or whatever she is because little Carmel is not the sweet innocent she’s pretending to be, I can tell you that.’

  Sharif stared at Julia.

  ‘Carmel, my fiancée,’ he emphasized the word deliberately and watched the news penetrate Julia’s self-righteous indignation, ‘told me about you, and how you treated her. How you constantly criticised her, how you tried to dictate her every move. How you’re so greedy you’re determined to get that scrap of land and all this concern for Bill is a joke, you just have your eye on what you’d like to get when he dies. And she told me about Bill, treating her more as a slave than a wife. She has told me everything and I know she is telling the truth…’

  ‘Oh, she has a right eejit made of you…’ Julia was dismissive.

  ‘Get out of our home.’ Sharif was cut-glass icy.

  ‘Your home, ha! That’s a good one…shacked up with this…’ She looked Sharif up and down, trying to think of a racist word to describe him.

  Sharif moved so he was almost toe-to-toe with Julia. His six-foot frame towering over her tiny one.

  ‘Go on, say it. I dare you to show your true colours. You are a twisted, bigoted, old harridan, but you can’t hurt her anymore because she is free, free of both of you.’

  Julia pointed her finger at Carmel, each word dripping hatred and vitriol. ‘You’ll come crawling back, madam, you mark my words, and you’ll get the door slammed in your stupid, sponging face. He’ll get sick of you when the novelty of a white woman in his bed wears off. He’ll get sick of you scrounging off him, and he’ll see through you, just as everyone who ever knew you did…you better call off that solicitor and don’t even consider seeking a divorce. That land is Sheehan land and it’s staying Sheehan land, do you hear me?’

  ‘That’s enough!’ Sharif shoved Julia towards the door. ‘Get out, you venomous woman, and as for that brother of yours, tell him he is pathetic and that he will never hear from Carmel again. All dealings from now on are to be through our legal teams and, believe me, ours will be seeking just recompense for the years of unpaid slavery Carmel has done for your family. You can wave goodbye to that little farm and if you, or he, ever appear here again, I will have you arrested for trespassing, threatening behavior, and assault.’

  Giving Julia a nudge in the back, he shut the door behind her.

  Carmel tried to stay strong, but she dissolved into tears. ‘I’m sorry, Sharif, I had no idea she was coming. I was hopeless…’

  ‘Hush, my love, it’s all okay. She’s gone.’ He
wrapped his arms around her once more. ‘They can’t hurt you anymore, not really. I know they are awful but they have no power over you. You’re a free agent, free to live where you choose, with whomever you choose. Now, did I go too far, threatening to take the farm? It’s your business what you do; we don’t need their money but what they did to you was wrong.’

  ‘No, you were right. I’m not going to be bullied anymore. Let her stew. I don’t want anything to do with the stupid farm but it’s worth it to rattle that old crow. Sharif, I should have told her about us, but I just couldn’t. I feel terrible, like I was denying you or something, but I wasn’t, I just…’

  ‘It’s okay. She knows now anyway. Look, we’ve sent them packing and hopefully, that’s the end of it. You weren’t exaggerating when you described her. She even looks like the wicked witch in the fairy stories, all thin and pointy features and long greasy hair. She must have left her broomstick outside.’ He grinned and was happy when she returned it. ‘I know she freaked you out by just showing up, and if she ever does that again, just beep me and I’ll come, but let’s just put her behind us, okay? Marlena buzzed me, saying she looked a bit mad and you seemed shaken, I’m so glad she did. Bill and Julia are from another life, and they’ve no place in this one.’

  ‘Okay.’ She smiled weakly. ‘I’m just going for a shower. I feel like I need to…I don’t know… wash her off me or something.’

  ‘Sure. I’m not going out again, so I’ll cook something, shall I? And try not to picture Julia upended on our couch.’ He gave her a grin and she smiled back. Maybe it really was going to be okay.