“I haven’t given anything away, Ruby. In fact, I’m getting an excellent price for it considering that it’s only a two-bedroomed cottage. I talked them into giving me substantially more than they intended, I think.”
Donal and Luke eyed each other and let out slow whistles whilst I looked around me in disgust.
“Well, you know something, Mammy,” I said tersely. “There are just some things that money can’t buy. I can’t believe that you’ve just given up and given in like this. I wouldn’t have allowed them to force you out. You could have stayed here quite happily. What about the shop? You’ve established yourself now. Are you prepared to lose what you’ve worked so hard to create?”
“It’s not about winning or losing or being forced or giving in for that matter. I’ve done what I think is right and what will most benefit everyone. This way I can go and look for another house and perhaps build a shop that will totally fulfil my requirements. That’s not ultimately why I’ve decided to move though. My main reason is because I want to help you and Luke. You deserve to have a proper wedding and, from seeing Luke’s work, if I gave him some money he could set up his own photography studio and you’d have peace of mind. I know you have your savings but you’re my only child, Ruby, and I’d like to see you settled and happy and I know that’s most certainly what Daddy would have wanted had he been here. All this is lovely,” she said, raising her arms in the air gesturing around at the cottage, “and ordinarily I wouldn’t have thought about leaving it but right now I think it would be for the best.”
“So you’re telling me that I am the reason why you’ve lost all sense?” I was trying to stop shaking as I spoke. “Well, guess what, Mammy, I won’t take a penny. We’ll still have a nice wedding and Luke and I will continue to make ends meet. You do what you want but never again let me hear you saying that you’ve made this foolish mistake on my behalf. There’s still time to change your mind, you know. Nothing has been signed yet so it’s not too late.”
“Why are you being so obstinate? What difference does it make to you where I am? I was burgled in this house. Tied up and left lying for hours on end. Has it ever crossed your mind that perhaps that might also be part of my yearning to get away from here? It wasn’t a nice experience and it doesn’t conjure up any happy memories. I think a new start for everybody is just what the doctor ordered.”
“Have your new start if it’s what you want but I don’t want any part in it.”
The silence in the car was threatening to engulf me. Luke was lost in his own thoughts (as well as apparently being completely fed up with people being unreasonable. Whoever they were.).
Frankie and Owen had also left to go home at the same time as us and were probably sitting in silence as well. The only difference would be that they would be too wrecked to speak after having an all-night shagfest with no rugrats to disturb them.
Frankie had given me a guided tour of the room which she and Owen were sharing after I had walked up to the hotel (post-argument with Mammy) in a fit of temper which would have resulted in Judith being choked if only I could find her. The room was beautiful and tastefully decorated with period furniture and sumptuous bed linen in warm colours. From the window, a breathtaking view of the Monroe estate where stags and deer continued to roam was visible with the mountains in the distance. An en suite bathroom with a whirlpool bath, matching his and hers dressing gowns and a fluffy pile of towels completed the decadence and made me want to throw up in annoyance. Obviously, the hotel was doing well on its own merits. There was absolutely no reason clear to me for Judith to be so covetous of my mother’s home. Why did she need it?
We had left Mammy’s cottage first thing and were now halfway down the road and approaching the border which would lead us back into Northern Ireland and I couldn’t get there quick enough.
Nobody had slept a wink during the night as the kitchen seemed to be a thoroughfare for those who thought that warm mugs of milk and nips of brandy were going to help them sleep. Mammy was obviously upset because I had been so annoyed with her.
Luke and Mandy were up half the night discussing their parent situation and, after Mandy had gone to sleep, Luke nearly wore a hole in Mammy’s rug pacing about and, as for me, well, my head was well and truly fried with everything that was going through it.
I didn’t know what I was most upset about: the fact that Mammy was threatening to sell the cottage, the fact that Judith, the cow, was going to get her way or the fact that Luke’s parents had just gone and unceremoniously dumped themselves on everyone without prior warning.
“Are you hungry?” Luke enquired as we approached the border town of Lifford where there were several nice eating establishments that we usually stopped at.
I folded my arms and continued to stare mutinously out the window.
“Am I to interpret that as a ‘no’ then?” he asked in a sarcastic tone.
“Interpret it whatever way you want,” I sighed. “I just want to go home. As far as I’m concerned hell will have frozen over before I ever set foot in Donegal again.”
“For feck sake, Ruby, you can’t go saying –”
“Luke, do me a favour and don’t tell me what I can and can’t say or do. Everybody around me seems determined to do whatever they want regardless of how I think or feel, so I’m just going to do the same.”
“You better not be including me in that, Ruby,” Luke growled.
“Whatever,” I said. “Just drive.”
We arrived home less than an hour later and I was glad to be able to get out and stretch my legs and get away from Luke who had heavy-breathed like a nuisance caller and driven like a raving lunatic the rest of the way home. It was just a hunch but I think he may have been a little bit pissed off with me and I suppose I couldn’t blame him. I knew that he thought I was being unreasonable but I couldn’t help that. I was reacting to the whole situation in the only way I knew how, and if that happened to upset a few people along the way then so be it. I checked my phone again and saw that Mammy had left yet another message in my voicemail. Without listening to it, I pressed delete again and threw my phone into my bag which I hung up under a pile of coats at my back door. (Because obviously if I hid it, it would disappear and never annoy me again.) I had also clocked up several missed calls from Gabriel which I had also chosen to ignore as his high-pitched ramblings would have got on my last remaining nerve and rendered me entirely useless.
Luke had gone out for a walk (which was obviously a clever and cunning plan to escape from me) and I had retired to our bedroom and partaken in a ritual that women everywhere will understand. As I was sad, I went in search of something that would make me feel even worse and then sat on the end of my bed and let fat tears of frustration, anger and disappointment plop onto my jeans. I gently fingered the birth certificate which was beginning to fall apart from too much handling.
“If you want to make this up to me, Georgina, you’d better start now,” I whispered. “Please pray that things will start working out for your child before she finds herself estranged from her adoptive mother and no longer caring about a wedding-reception venue. The way things are looking there will be no bloody wedding as my future husband doesn’t appear to want to speak to me.”
Chapter 51
I lay back where I was and fell asleep. When I awoke, startled and squinting to adjust my eyes to the darkness, I was still holding tightly to the old and crumbling certificate.
My eyes were stingy and sore and I had a crick in my neck. The house was eerily quiet, Luke was nowhere to be seen and I had never felt as alone in all my life. I sat up, rubbed my head and prepared to go downstairs.
Even beneath the multitude of coats I could hear my phone beeping to alert me to the fact that I had a message or ten. Mammy wouldn’t give up easily and I knew that she would probably be worried sick about me so I decided to give her a ring.
“So you are alive then,” she greeted me.
“Just about,” I croaked.
“I
spoke to my solicitor earlier and couldn’t really understand what he was talking about.”
“Complicated, selling a cottage, is it?” I asked.
“No, smartarse, actually it’s quite simple when you’re told that you’re not allowed. Lord Bartley Monroe certainly ensured that the owner of the cottage was going to take their position seriously. The solicitor explained that it was stipulated that the cottage must always remain intact as a home and must never be sold in order for anyone to gain profit. Therefore I would be going against the terms and conditions of the contract if I sold it.”
I took a moment to digest her words. “You mean that you have to –”
“Yes, I have to stay so Judith won’t get her way after all. I’ve been trying to let you know all day, seeing as it appeared to be such a bone of contention with you but as usual you do like you always do and blank me as if I don’t exist.”
“I wasn’t blanking you. I was sleeping actually if you must know. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“Who did?”
“How are you today?”
“Wonderful, dear. Never been better, considering that I’m now going to be faced with the task of telling Judith that I can no longer sign on the dotted line. Safe in the knowledge that I also won’t be in a position to help you either, I’m in great fettle altogether. I might have a party to mark the occasion. Fancy coming down? No, that’s right, I just remembered, I’ll have to organise for hell to get rather cold for you to show your face around here again.”
“I’m sorry it didn’t work out and that you didn’t get what you wanted, Mammy, but maybe it’s for the best. You don’t know what Judith was planning to do with the cottage. She could have had it buried within a matter of days and you can’t tell me that you wouldn’t have been upset if that happened.”
“It would have been hers to do with as she pleased, Ruby. I’d have been sad to see anything happening to it, of course, but it would have been out of my hands then.”
“You sound like you’d have been glad to be rid of it. Why?”
“Because with the money I could have got for it I could have booked a grand hotel for my daughter’s wedding and set her husband up properly in his career,” she snapped.
“I don’t need you to worry about us, Mammy. We’re perfectly capable of looking after ourselves, you know.”
“I always knew you were capable of looking after yourself, Ruby. I was never suggesting that you weren’t. I just wanted to make life a bit easier and more comfortable for you, that’s all. I know that none of this has been easy for you and you don’t half like telling the world when you’re annoyed about something. I’m glad that at least Gabriel had the courtesy to stay with me for a while this morning before he went up the road.”
I could feel myself starting to prickle with annoyance and indignation but was determined not to let her words rile me.
“Yes, he’s very fond of you, Mammy. Not having a mammy of his own obviously makes him appreciate you.”
“I’m glad somebody does,” she sniffed.
I opened my mouth to make an excuse as to why I had to suddenly drop the phone like it was burning me but was too tired to think of one.
“I have to go, Mammy. I’ll speak to you soon. And in case you were in any doubt, I do love you. I just hate to see people being taken advantage of.”
I had dozed off on the sofa and was just waking up when I heard the front door opening and Luke padding quietly into the house.
“I’m awake!” I shouted from the living room.
He didn’t look at me when he entered the room but I knew he’d been crying nevertheless. He sat down heavily and I roused myself and went and joined him.
“I’m sorry if I annoyed you, Luke. I didn’t mean to take things out on you. God knows you have enough to worry about. Where’ve you been?”
“Mandy and I have just spent the evening together. We’ve been trying to work out what to do about our parents and have made a few decisions.”
“Am I allowed to ask?” I said tentatively.
Luke took a deep breath and I could see that he was having difficulty speaking.
“Mandy wants to call a truce with them,” he said. “She was too young to remember most of the crap we were subjected to or else has blocked it out. I think her childhood has been put in a box in her brain with a big ‘never to be opened’ sign on it. I was like a mother and father to her as I always looked after her but I think she’s just dying for a normal life and would like to give them a chance to make amends. They’ve been on the phone constantly to her, apologising and asking for the opportunity to make up for lost time, and she seems to think that they might be serious. Who knows, maybe the fact that we didn’t fall at their feet when they arrived and wouldn’t take them in has woken them up to the fact that they’ve really hurt us and we won’t forgive easily.”
“How do you feel about it?” I asked, rubbing his shoulder. “Would you like to start again with them?”
“I’m scared, Ruby. Really scared. I don’t think I could face being rejected all over again but for the sake of my little sister I’ll give them a second chance. Life’s just too short.”
I knelt down in front of him and took his hands in mine.
“If I can do it so can you,” I said simply. “Let there be new beginnings all around.”
Chapter 52
“Stick the kettle on, darlin’. I think we might need a wee cup of coffee to start seeing straight again!” Luke shouted with great bravado.
“You can have coffee if you want but I’ll be having another beer,” his father said, going and opening my fridge door and rooting through its contents like it was his property.
“We haven’t got any,” I said loudly.
“We haven’t got any coffee?” Luke repeated after me in a stupid slurred voice that was accompanied by bloodshot eyes and eyelids that were blinking slowly.
Luke was one of the great unfortunates in this world who was totally and utterly incapable of holding his drink. He became instantly stupid and started stumbling over his words and over-pronouncing things which annoyed the crap out of me.
“No. We haven’t got any beer,” I said to his father.
“Run along to the off-licence, there’s a good girl,” Fred instructed me whilst patting me on the bottom.
I grabbed his hand, twisted his arm up behind his back and leaned him over the kitchen table until he was out of breath, panting and begging for mercy.
“Don’t you ever touch me again and if you want beer go to the off-licence yourself and buy it and drink it somewhere else, you big ignorant oaf!”
“Do all guests get physically assaulted upon arrival or is that a welcome saved especially for me?”
“Just you,” Luke and I answered in unison.
“We were just out for a few drinks there,” Luke said, rather unecessarily.
“Really? I thought you’d gone to Mass to pray for divine intervention and a miracle.”
It had been a week since Luke had made the decision to give his parents a second chance and after a stilted and awkward phone call they had arranged to meet up tonight to have a ‘nice chat’. I was willing to give his parents another chance if he was big enough to do so but I hadn’t expected Luke and his father to land into me legless. His parents were currently staying with Mandy as they preferred being in Belfast to Swiftstown (happy was not the word for my reaction to this arrangement).
“And you couldn’t have had ‘a nice chat’ over a cup of coffee and been sensible? You had to go to the pub and get rat-arsed.”
“We didn’t do anybody any harm,” said his father. “Everybody’s entitled to a wee drink, you know. You should try having a few yourself. Might loosen you up a bit. You’re very tense. Is something the matter?”
“Nothing that a one-way ticket to the moon wouldn’t feckin sort out,” I muttered whilst flicking on the kettle and putting two heaped teaspoons of the strongest coffee I could find into a mug for Luke, who
had just sat heavily on a chair and was starting to drool and doze off, and there was absolutely no way that I was being left on my own with his father. I could do without being taken up on a murder charge at this moment.
“Here, drink this,” I said as I handed Luke the mug which he promptly spilt over his leg before shouting that I was trying to scald him.
“And what am I drinking then?” his father enquired, squinting at the wine rack that was empty except for a solitary bottle of champagne that Frankie had given me to mark my engagement and he certainly wasn’t getting that.
“Plenty of water in the tap or I can scald you – sorry, what I meant to say was, I can make you a cup of coffee as well.”
Luke’s father began to pace around like a demented dog who had lost its tail and I half expected him to start shaking with alcohol-withdrawal symptoms. Luke had often talked about the way his father used to behave and it made me sick to my stomach to think about it. As a teenager he could never invite friends over as he was too embarrassed by what his father might say in his permanent drunken stupor. He was a tradesman of sorts when Luke was very small but soon decided that lying around drinking all day and working on developing the biggest beer-belly in the country appealed to him more than earning an honest living for his family. I wanted to forget all of that and start afresh, but his current behaviour was irritating me beyond belief and I couldn’t stop the images from creeping into my mind.
“I’ll just stand here and talk to myself then, shall I?” said the arrogant prick who then proceeded to answer himself. “‘Yes, Fred, I’d love to get you a drink because I’m marrying your son in another eight months and I have you to thank for him being so well equipped in the trouser department.’”
“Luke, wake up now,” I commanded the figure who was now slumped in the kitchen armchair and snoring like a tractor with a broken engine.
Of course there was no movement as he was pissed as a fart and totally unresponsive or at least he was until I kicked him in the shins and made him yelp.
Anyone for Me? Page 28