Chapter 27
As it turned out Frankie, Ella and Carly ended up going home on the bus on their own after we had visited the man who would be responsible for making my wedding invitations. I had to admit that he was very good and that I loved his work. Luke had decided to come down to Belfast and meet me (grovel and beg forgiveness) and we ended up going back to Café Zen with Gabriel for a drink.
Obviously the place had the same effect on all country bumpkins, as I had to tell Luke to close his mouth and stop dribbling after five minutes of standing in everyone’s way at the door, gawping around him like he’d never been let out before.
“Well, you lot certainly know how to live the high life here,” he said, once we’d got some drinks and sat down. He had regained his composure and looked slightly less shell-shocked by that time.
“It hasn’t been open that long,” Gabriel explained. “I know the guy who runs it and he’s done a superb job on the décor. He enlisted my help in promoting it and I’ve helped to organise a few functions here.”
Luke gave me a knowing look as if to say “told you he was a genius” and smugly continued to drink his beer.
“God, there must be no end to your talents, Gabriel,” I said and he looked at me as if he didn’t know whether or not I was being sarcastic (which was exactly the way I wanted to keep him).
“I hear that you’re quite talented in your profession too,” Gabriel said, addressing Luke. “I know a friend of a friend who runs a little art gallery in Belfast who was very impressed with some photographs you took at the launch of her latest work.”
“Ah yes,” Luke said smiling. “That was a really enjoyable night. Remember, Ruby?”
I nodded. I did indeed remember and had loved every minute of it. There were few things in life that I was truly passionate about but Luke and art were two of them and, as I’d had them both around me that night, I had been in my element.
“I have a little proposition for you,” Gabriel said, leaning in towards Luke and tapping his arm.
Frankie’s mother’s words about my future husband and Gabriel and propositions and what they could consist of suddenly came rushing back to me and I took a firm grip of Luke’s shirt sleeve and roughly tugged him back.
“Owwwww!” he said, rubbing his arm. “I swear to God, Ruby, you are seriously unaware of your own strength.”
“Yep. Wonder Woman, that’s me, and you better believe it,” I said, looking at Gabriel who was wearing a bemused expression.
“Anyway,” Gabriel continued slowly (this time refraining from touching Luke), “I wanted to ask you a favour. I have a friend, Caitlin O’Donnell, who’s an artist based in Letterkenny in Donegal, and she is launching her latest exhibition there in another few weeks and I was wondering if you could do the needful and take some photos for her.”
“Only if I can come too,” I answered before Luke had the chance to utter a word.
“Only if she can come as well,” he grinned. “Yeah, sure, I’d love to do it and we could stay with Ruby’s mother that night.”
I immediately stiffened and lost all interest in the event. I had been trying not to let thoughts of my mother invade my mind as inevitably it resulted in me questioning everything she had ever said or told me and I ended up in bad form.
I sat quietly and tried to gather my thoughts for the next forty minutes whilst taking in everything that was happening around me. A girl had emerged from the same side door from which Gabriel had appeared sporting his stockings and lace, and was belting out a Gloria Gaynor track in a husky voice.
“That’s Gina,” Gabriel explained excitedly. “She works part-time in the pizzeria at the end of the street but has a voice to die for. We keep telling her to audition for The X Factor but she’s determined to stay here. Her mum’s not well, you see.”
I looked around me. I still couldn’t believe what was happening. My life had changed so much in the last few months and now, shock of all shocks, I was sitting at a table in one of the fanciest café bars I had ever seen with my future husband and my wildly dressed wedding planner who turned into the campest man in the world when he was drunk.
“So tell me, Ruby,” he began, flinging his entire self around in the chair and doing the best Kenny Everett impression I had ever seen by wildly throwing his legs around. “How did you find today, sweetie?”
“Rubbbeeeee. Her name is Rubbbeeeee,” Luke slurred whilst leaning over me and waving a straw in Gabriel’s direction. “Cut out that ‘sweetie crap’ or she’ll have your guts for garters or worse she’ll have mine.”
“That’ll be one less thing for me to worry about then, won’t it?” I said. “I’ll have a garter to match my wedding dress.”
The two of them looked at me for a minute and then fell about laughing. (Drunken laughing, I might add, which goes on far longer than necessary and is high-pitched and annoying especially when you’re sober.) I had consumed a few drinks but found that I couldn’t relax because something was niggling me and had been all day, except I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. I had a feeling that it might have been something to do with Rose Malone’s shop.
“I’m going for a walk,” I said, although neither of them was paying any attention to me.
I walked out through the front door and into the night air. I saw a summer seat directly opposite me and decided to position myself there and look into the sky. I was in mid-thought about the day’s events when my phone rang and I registered with some surprise that it was Mandy.
“Hi, Mandy, are you okay?” I answered, remembering the rather bizarre conversation that we’d had earlier in the day concerning her parents.
“I’m fine. Just feeling a bit lonely, I suppose,” she said.
I was shocked. Mandy gave off the aura of being a very popular girl-about-town with a glitzy job that most girls would love (apart from me, that is) except that it suddenly appeared that maybe it wasn’t as glamorous as everyone thought.
“Why are you feeling lonely?” I asked gently. “What’s the matter?”
“Maybe it’s not so much a case of feeling lonely as being alone,” she said.
I could hear the crack in her voice as it began to break.
“Have your mum and dad been in touch again?” I asked.
“They rang this evening,” she said.
I turned my nose up in disgust. Typical. Useless, selfish, good for nothing, lying, cheating, drunken feckers (the list was endless). Could they not see what they were doing to their children? They should never have left in the first place or behaved the way they did, but now that they had gone it would have been kinder to just stay away and not keep rubbing salt into the wounds. Why could they not be content with tormenting the poor Spaniards that had the misfortune to be in contact with them now?
“I’m still in Belfast,” I said suddenly. “Why don’t you come and meet me? I’m sitting on a summer seat outside Café Zen and Luke and Gabriel are inside getting rat-arsed.”
“You’re joking me?”
“I am not. I don’t joke about such matters. I shouldn’t even be leaving the two of them on their own as Frankie’s mother would have you believe that they could get up to all sorts. Luke could be getting propositioned and start wanting to join rival teams as we speak.”
“This I have to see,” Mandy declared. “I’ll be over shortly.”
I hung up and continued to look into the sky which was filled with stars.
Feckin families. Who’d have them? They were all nothing but trouble, I thought. If they weren’t abandoning you immediately after giving birth to you, they were giving birth to you, lumbering you with a rotten childhood and then having the cheek to abandon you. Worse again, however, was them then having the bigger cheek to come looking for you just so as they could embarrass the shite out of you on your feckin wedding day, no less. I moved from my position on the wooden bench and started to walk up and down the street (that is, charge about in a bad temper due to nervous energy created by the mere mention of the dastardly in-l
aws-from-hell).
I had been pacing for around twenty minutes when Mandy was dropped off by a taxi.
“You look all hot and bothered,” she observed.
“Your mother and father and their antics would make anybody feel bloody flustered,” I said hotly. “Tell me exactly what was said.”
“Nothing much. Mammy said that she had bought a new dress especially for the occasion and she couldn’t bring it back because the tags had already been removed.” In other words she had probably nicked it and was now on some Spanish store’s most-wanted list for theft.
“What did your daddy say?”
“He was looking forward to catching up with everyone and having a good old Irish knees-up. He says that the Spanish beer is nice enough but that it’s hard to beat a pint of the black stuff.”
Translated, this meant that he’d like to come to a good old Irish wedding where he’d be fed Guinness by the barrelful, get drunk and behave like an arrogant, obnoxious twat all night.
“And what exactly did they say when you told them that they weren’t welcome and that I’d have Sylvester Stallone on standby to remove them if they appeared?”
“Well, that’s the thing, Ruby, you see. I did try and tell them that you didn’t want them there but they wouldn’t take no for an answer. They say that they want to surprise Luke and that they have a very special wedding present for him.”
The feckers had ignored me and were going to come anyway. Bloody brilliant. Just what I needed to add to what was already turning into a circus. Not only did my wedding planner have nicer knees and wear more make-up than me but now I was going to have to worry about the fact that Luke’s lunatic parents could turn up and give the proceedings a fireworks display that nobody wanted or needed.
“I did tell them what you said,” Mandy said earnestly. “Honestly I did. But you know what they’re like. They’ll suit themselves no matter what.”
“Don’t worry,” I said in a determined voice. “If I say that they won’t be there, they won’t, and believe me I mean it.”
Chapter 28
“Where did you disappear to last night when we were still in Café Zen?” Luke asked, propped up on one elbow and looking at me as we lay in bed late the following morning – after he had managed to sober up.
I had discovered that Gabriel and Luke were quite a mischievous handful when they were drunk and a bad combination to contend with. Luke had booked us into the Holiday Inn near the city centre and after he and Gabriel had howled every verse of ‘Staying Alive’ at the entrance (complete with all the “Ahh – ahh – ahh” bits that were sung at four-hundred-tone-deaf decibels which turned the hotel doorman into a bad-tempered maniac), I had eventually persuaded him to shut the feck up and come inside.
“Hey? Where did you go?” he repeated now when I didn’t answer.
“I went for a walk to chill out,” I said, “and then Mandy arrived and we sat and talked for a while. Thanks for coming down though. It was a nice thought.”
“I just wanted to try and make it up to you,” Luke said quietly. “I didn’t realise that you were going to stumble upon Gabriel in the middle of a drag-queen act and was afraid that you’d never forgive me so I decided to surprise you.”
“And surprised I was.”
“Mandy was in peculiar form last night too. I thought that she would have been in her element and doing her usual celebrity-spotting routine but she seemed totally distracted. There must be something in the air with you women at the minute.”
“She was just tired,” I lied. “It must be very wearying being a professional busybody. You and Gabriel didn’t need us anyway. You must be the new addition to Fifi Von Tease’s act.”
“Yes, I have a vague recollection of using a Corona beer bottle as a microphone,” Luke said sheepishly. “Was I that bad?”
“No, you were bloody worse,” I answered, laughing as he threw a pillow at me while I swung my legs out of bed.
“You have to admit that Gabriel’s not that bad when you get to know him,” Luke said. “He’s very good at what he does and he’s getting me a job into the bargain. If I play my cards right I could get plenty of photography work through the contacts that Gabriel has.”
“Well, I will admit that I’m looking forward to another gallery exhibition,” I said.
“We can take a trip down before the actual launch. Maybe make a night of it. Stay at a hotel where I won’t serenade the doorman – badly and nearly get thrown out – and go and visit a few other places.” “Sounds good,” I said, feeling my excitement mount. “Let’s do that soon. I’d love to get away but just don’t be telling my mother about it or she’ll be insisting that we go and stay with her and I just couldn’t be arsed at the minute.”
Luke opened his mouth and went to speak but wisely changed his mind as I was in no mood to be remonstrated with.
“If that’s what you want,” he sighed.
“It is,” I said. “In fact, I think we should ask Frankie and Owen if they want to come with us as well. I’m not the only one that has had a lot to contend with lately. Frankie hasn’t had it easy either.”
“Why, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” I said, pointing at my nether regions. (Why do women always do that? Between pointing at our crotches when discussing medical problems of a female nature and referring to our bits as “down there” in ominous tones as if they were a million miles away and living on a planet all of their own, men must think we’re mad altogether.)
“Oh right,” Luke said quickly in case I might elaborate further and actually start telling him details. “Of course we’ll ask them along. It’s a long time since we’ve been out with them.”
“Good. That’s settled then.” I finally removed myself from the edge of the bed and went and switched on the shower and got myself a large fluffy towel from the pile beside the bath.
After a basic continental breakfast we went for a walk before going back to the hotel to collect our things and head for home.
The receptionist bade us farewell and asked if there was anything else she could do for us.
“Are you from around here?” I asked, suddenly inspired and seizing the moment.
“Yes,” she said, smiling.
“Have you ever heard of St Catherine’s Lodge?” I asked in the hope that finally somebody might give me a positive response.
She shook her head and looked thoughtful. “Have you any idea where it is?”
“None – although I think it must be in Belfast somewhere but strangely nobody has heard of it.”
“Hold on a minute and I’ll ask some of the others. Some of the older women might know.”
She came back several minutes later with a woman who had greying hair and was wearing a pair of overalls.
“St Catherine’s Lodge,” she said slowly and purposefully. “I used to hear my mother talking about that place but it was known locally as ‘The Baby Convent’ because it was where women went to get rid of babies they didn’t want.”
Her words cut through my heart like a knife and I could feel Luke’s grip tightening on my arm as he looked at me sadly.
“Where is it?” I asked, my voice devoid of all emotion as I was incapable of feeling anything.
“Well, that’s the thing, you see. Nobody ever knew where it was. It was the best-kept secret in Belfast because the mothers who went there never talked about their experiences and their families most likely wouldn’t have known that they were there and, as for the nuns, well, they were bound by the church to keep quiet.”
“Right,” I said. “Thanks for everything. You’ve given me more information than anyone else has and for that I’m very grateful.”
I turned and walked out of the hotel with my legs shaking and threatening to buckle beneath me.
Luke came out quickly after me. “At least it’s something,” he said. “As you said, it’s more information than you’ve had so far which is good.”
“Oh yeah. It�
��s great, Luke,” I said angrily. “I’ve just had it confirmed that not only was I not wanted but that she was so ashamed of the fact that she was pregnant with me that she had to hide away in a convent that’s more elusive than the Scarlet Pimpernel himself!”
“I’m sure it wasn’t that she didn’t want you. It was probably more circumstantial than anything else. It was the mid-1970s, Ruby – girls who got pregnant would have been practically ostracised in their own communities. It’s not like now when every other mother with a pram is a Lone Mother and it’s just accepted. It was a different era back then. Keeping you could have ruined her life.”
“Or her lifestyle. From what I heard it wasn’t so much that she had to give me up. It was more that she didn’t want me in the first place for fear that I’d get in the way of her socialising and her men. I am so sick of this shit. What am I? A bloody masochist. I can’t do this any more.”
I stomped to the car with tears threatening to spurt in a projectile fashion from my eyes.
Twenty minutes later we were driving home with both of us in a sombre frame of mind. Luke was quiet for fear of sticking his foot in his mouth and making my already volcanic mood worse and I was so deep in thought that I had transported myself to a different world of self-loathing and worthlessness.
My phone began to vibrate in my pocket but once I registered that it was my mother I threw it onto the dashboard of the car in a fit of pique and refused to answer it.
“That could be important,” Luke said. “Your mother doesn’t usually ring your mobile, Ruby. You should have answered that.”
“If she wants me I’m sure she’ll leave a message!” I snapped, at which point my phone beeped to let me know that I had a voicemail.
Wearily I lifted it, rang the number for my mailbox and impatiently listened and waited for the mundane message which would consist of my mother asking how I was because she felt guilty. Except that wasn’t what I heard. The message was indeed from my mother but she sounded frantic and frightened.
“Ruby, you’ve got to come and help me. I’m so scared. Please help me, love –” and I didn’t get to hear any more as the phone became muffled and fuzzy as did her voice.
Anyone for Me? Page 16