Two paintings had caught my eye. One entitled Lost and the other one called Missing You. I realised once I studied them that they were of the same child who had been depicted in the picture I had got for Christmas – only that had been a happier one featuring outstretched arms and a smiling little girl.
Chapter 63
After people had been given the opportunity to mingle and walk around the room, Aisling, who had been meeting and greeting people downstairs, came up and asked for everyone’s attention.
“I would like to welcome you all to Monroe Manor where tonight we are delighted to unveil our newly restored art room where we plan to exhibit the works of some of our favourite Donegal artists.”
A round of applause came after that and then Aisling silenced everyone again with her hand.
“Of course, that’s not the only thing we’re here to celebrate because as most of you know there is going to be a wedding here at the weekend and not just any wedding either as the bride and groom happen to be good friends of mine.”
Everyone looked in the direction of Luke and me as I stared at the floor and blushed furiously.
“Ruby also happens to be the most enthusiastic appreciator of art I know, so this room is in her honour and from now on will be known as Ruby’s Art Gallery.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered as my eyes filled with tears.
“You deserve it all,” Mammy said as she hugged me.
“What room are you naming after me then?” Luke demanded, to much giggling. “I want my own room.”
A large crowd had turned out to celebrate the opening of my very own room but the person who I most wanted to meet hadn’t come.
“Maybe she didn’t get the messages,” Luke suggested.
“Or maybe she’s out of the country or away on business or something,” said Mammy.
“Listen, don’t worry about it,” I said happily. “I’m more than happy with the way things have turned out. I couldn’t have been any more surprised or privileged. What an honour to have my name in conjunction with such talent! If you don’t mind I’d like to have another walk around before we leave. I spent so much time talking to people earlier that I didn’t get a proper opportunity to look at the exhibits.”
I took my time and gazed at each individual picture, still not daring to believe that I could now do it any time I wanted as these wonderful pieces of work were exhibits in a hotel which my mother now owned (seriously, if you had said this to me a year ago I would have been recommending that you be locked up for being mad).
Frankie came and linked arms with me and I put my head on her shoulder.
“There’s something very special about you, Ruby Ross. Everyone says it. Even people who don’t know you were saying it tonight.”
“Well, obviously they don’t know me very well then, do they? Ferocious Ruby with the bad temper –”
“And the heart of gold.”
Mammy had just come into the room and was beaming from ear to ear. “You’ll never guess! Sarah Larkin just rang to see if it was too late to drop by and see what we’ve done.”
“That’s just the icing on the cake then,” I breathed. “This is the most perfect night ever.”
“Ahem!” Luke said noisily. “I think maybe your wedding night might be your most perfect night. It’s not too far away and I don’t want too much to have to compete with.”
“She’s here!” Aisling shouted from the bottom of the stairs.
I turned and looked again at the beautiful paintings that Sarah had created and my excitement grew tenfold. I couldn’t wait to see her. Then my eyes fell on another painting, which I hadn’t noticed before, that was untitled.
“Where did this come from?” I asked in confusion. “It wasn’t here before.”
“It was one that we forgot to put out earlier,” Mammy explained. “I think it was hidden behind a crate and we didn’t see it until we were tidying up.”
The picture was of the same child, but younger, with her rosy cheeks and red ringlets and she was laughing and looking up with large beguiling dark eyes. It was simple yet so detailed and painted with so much expression that I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
“Do you like it?” a softly spoken voice with a Donegal brogue asked.
I heard Mammy and Luke gasp and saw Frankie’s shocked expression before I looked into the face of the stranger who was addressing me.
The brown eyes that looked intently at me nearly took my breath away.
“I do. I like it a lot,” I said, noting that Sarah wasn’t wearing her hat tonight and that her hair which was the colour of burnished copper was cascading down her back.
“I drew it many years ago. It’s a picture of my daughter. I had to let her go but I’ve never forgotten her. I changed my name, you see. I had to start a new life and didn’t want anyone knowing who I was. It was complicated. My sister . . .” Her voice trailed off and she seemed unable to speak.
She nodded towards the painting and, pointing, drew my attention to the initials that were there . . . GD.
“It was an early painting, you see, that I never had any intention of showing, done before I became Sarah Larkin, but I decided some time ago that I wasn’t going to hide my early work away any more.”
“Did you ever find your daughter?” I asked, slowly looking into the eyes that mirrored my own.
The words hung in the air until Sarah slowly reached out and took my hands in her own. It was electrifying, the result of feeling the inextricable bond between mother and child that was like an invisible cord forever linking them.
“I never lost her,” Sarah replied quietly. “She’s always been with me in my heart.”
Epilogue
Frankie and I stood outside the front of the picturesque country church. Gabriel had just closed the doors lest our entrance be spoiled by anyone seeing us before they were supposed to.
“I’ve never seen you look so beautiful, Ruby,” Frankie said, trying to keep her emotions in check.
“Don’t you dare cry. The beautician will have a heart attack and Gabriel will kill you if you look like a startled panda walking up the aisle.”
“I won’t – but look at you! Rose Malone is worth her weight in gold. Something very special happened the day that your finger was drawn towards her in the phone book.”
I looked towards my reflection in the glass-panelled door and still couldn’t believe that it was me. My hair had been shaped and cut in a feathery style which framed my face and gave me cheekbones that I never knew I had and my headdress was a pearl tiara which was inset with rubies (naturally).
My dress was exactly what I wanted but not as I had ever pictured it to be. It was made from cream satin and had a rounded neckline which was edged with Victorian lace and the bodice, which had roses with ruby insets liberally scattered on it and was laced with ribbon at the back, accentuated my waist beautifully whilst the stiff skirt flowed out from beneath and ended in a small train which was also trimmed with lace. I wore drop pearl studs in my ears and was proud to wear the same mother-of-pearl cameo necklace that Mammy had worn the day she had married my father. Cream roses which had diamanté and ruby-coloured stones interspersed through them completed my outfit whilst on my feet I wore cream satin kitten heels which Gabriel had got specially covered in lace for the occasion.
Frankie’s bridesmaid’s dress was made from colour-altering fabric which had shades of both green and purple in it. It was halter-neck in design with a band of roses dipping to a V shape at the waistline and sculpted her figure perfectly whilst elegantly flowing to the floor with a slight train at the back. Her flowers were also cream and had green and purple diamanté throughout. She wore shoes that had been covered in the same fabric and her hair had been curled softly at the back and decorated at the front with ornate clasps.
Carly who was my flower girl and dressed in the same material as her mother, with her hair pinned and curled, stood beside Frankie brimming with pride and dancing with excitement.
&
nbsp; My ‘big day’ would be perfect. I could feel it in my heart. The only thing missing was my daddy. I missed him more than ever and wished that he could have been part of it all. I knew that he would have been very proud of me and that he would approve wholeheartedly of my decision to marry Luke who not only was proving to be the perfect partner but also was extremely protective of my mother. I hadn’t got around to asking for details about my birth father but was willing to take things one baby-step at a time and so far that philosophy was working well for me.
I breathed deeply as I heard the music change and knew that Gabriel would be opening the door any second as he had done during our rehearsal the evening before.
As I had anticipated, he appeared soon afterwards and waved us in with a flourish. I could see Luke standing at the altar with Owen by his side whilst my two ushers, Robbie and Donal, stood reverently at the back of the chapel.
I watched as Carly walked up the aisle with Frankie following her, treading in time to the dulcet tones of Chris de Burgh. Then it was my turn. At the base of the altar I was encircled from either side and as I glided towards my future husband in all my finery I felt enveloped in love.
I looked at the sea of faces that were smiling and nodding encouragement and could have burst with happiness. On one side I saw Ella, who was sporting a rounded tummy and Hammy who was holding Baby Celia Rose whilst Ben, who looked very handsome in his suit, Angelica, who looked fabulous in a red dress, and Frankie’s parents looked on proudly. Mandy stood at the other side of the church, glowing with pride, beside her parents who so far looked sober and happy to be there. I also spotted Aisling and Darryl who were busily taking photographs.
When we arrived at the altar Luke took my arm and kissed me on the cheek but not before I looked to my right and left and tenderly thanked the two women who had both been instrumental in making me into the person I was today.
Tears of happiness coursed down my mother’s cheeks as she kissed me and Sarah looked equally as emotional as she squeezed me reassuringly and then let me go, only this time it wasn’t for good. This time she would be waiting for me, to share in the rest of my life.
“Who gives this woman to this man?” the priest asked.
After looking at each other and exchanging looks of mutual respect, Isobel and Sarah answered confidently, their eyes brimming with love: “We do.”
THE END
If you enjoyed Anyone for Me?
by Fiona Cassidy why not try
Anyone for Seconds? also published by Poolbeg?
Here’s a sneak preview of Chapter One.
Chapter 1 Anyone for Seconds?
It was the cold and frosty month of January but instead of being miserable because I suffered from SAD and depressed because as usual I was broke, I was rather pleased with myself. The source of my pleasure was the fact that I had just recently met the man of my dreams. His name was Owen Byrne and he was a lecturer at the college where I’d been temping as Public Relations Officer for the past two weeks. He was tall with brown hair and he’d got that distinguished sexy look that only a man who wears glasses can carry.
He said that someone advised him to get contact lenses and I told him no way, that I thought his glasses suited him. I think he was rather surprised by my conviction, especially when I made him take his glasses off, studied him, walked around him as a vulture would circle an object of prey and then said “Definitely not” in a purring voice.
I’ve always been rather obvious when it comes to my feelings. My mother used to chastise me as a teenager when I’d come home from the discos and tell her that I’d met “Him”.
“Frankie McCormick, will you stop wearing your heart on your sleeve?” she would say sternly, hands on hips, wearing her floral dressing gown and trying to inconspicuously (not one of her stronger attributes) smell my breath lest the demon drink had passed my lips. “Men don’t like that sort of desperation. It makes them want to run away and hide.”
Personally I didn’t think my mother was qualified to talk about what men like or don’t like. She’d had the same one for forty years, therefore had been out of the running for quite a long time. Things had changed substantially since my mother was dancing the two-hand reel and Daddy was walking her to the end of her lane.
Getting back to Owen though. He hadn’t been hiding from me. In fact, the other girls in the office had been telling me that he’d been asking subtle questions about me.
“Was Frankie with you when you went for a drink last week?” he reportedly asked Ruby, my stalwart companion and best friend.
“No, she had to go home. No baby-sitter, you see.”
“She has children?”
I was told that this was said with more than a little intonation of surprise.
Ruby proceeded to tell him about my “experience” which she peppered with expletives. She was not my ex-husband’s biggest fan. Sometimes I thought she disliked him more than I did.
Ruby is best described as being an eccentric fun-loving dynamo with a heart of pure gold. With spiky bright-red hair and a temper to match she’s easy to spot. We’d been friends for about twelve years. It was she who put in the good word for me which enabled me to get my job.
Ruby said that Owen then clammed up and wouldn’t divulge any details apart from saying he was a single father. She made a big deal of letting him know that I was on the market as well.
I had made the mistake of telling Ruby that I thought that Owen was rather attractive. Okay, who am I kidding – I think my exact words were that he was “a total screw” and that “given half the chance I’d love to put all six foot two of him in my pocket and take him home to be my willing slave”.
Ruby is one of those people however who is as subtle as a bag of flying boulders and, stopping short of telling Owen that I would straddle him bareback without a saddle, she let him know in no uncertain terms that I liked him.
“She had no baby-sitter last Friday night but I’d baby-sit for her if I thought that she would have a good night out with a man who would treat her well,” she said coyly.
“Do you know any men like that?” Owen reportedly asked with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.
“From personal and disastrous experience, no, but Frankie is one of these tiresome girlies who insist on seeing the good in people and likes to give them the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise. She loves the Clark Kent look. Men with glasses make her all hot and bothered.”
When she told me what she’d said I smacked her around the head with the paper plate that held my soggy salad sandwich. (It was Monday – the one and only day I am ever on a diet.)
“Rubbeeeee!” I admonished, cringing at the thought of what he must be thinking of me
“Frankie, men are stupid creatures who need things pointed out and spelt for them. They don’t do well with this female habit of trying to drop hints.”
“Well, no one could ever accuse you of trying to do that,” I muttered.
“Straight to the point; that’s me.”
I couldn’t stay cross with her for long though, especially when Superman himself, minus his cape and manky-looking Y-fronts, came to ask if he could take me out. He took my number and promised to phone me that weekend.
It was Friday and I left the office waving goodbye to him with my heart pounding.
I’d already convinced myself that it wasn’t going to happen. (It’s a method of self-preservation when you’ve been hurt, you see.) You tell yourself that you’re not worthy, that he’s only doing it to be nice and that he’ll come up with a suitable excuse as to why he couldn’t phone. Ruby told me that he had a daughter so I’d already painted the scenario that one of her legs would fall off or something equally dramatic would happen to completely eradicate me from his mind.
“Bye, Frankie,” he called in a friendly voice. “I’ll chat to you tomorrow night.”
“Sure,” I said in a cheerful tone, still wondering what his excuse would be on Monday.
It was Satu
rday morning and I was up with the lark. The children were downstairs watching what they call “the funnies” on television and I could hear them giggling in high-pitched voices as somebody got a bucket of gunge dumped on their head from a great height.
I was changing the beds and as usual finding nine-year-old Ben’s toy cars everywhere. No matter how often I told him not to leave them lying around I always inevitably ended up standing on one of them (in my bare feet of course, so that it hurt more). His room was an explosion of red in honour of his beloved Liverpool. I hate football but got an intense kick out of the fact that he supported an opposing team to his father and could never be swayed no matter what Tony (die-hard Arsenal supporter) said to him.
I picked up his dirty football kit and put it in my linen basket. He played for the Swiftstown under-tens and wore his blue and white colours with pride.
Carly’s room was much tidier. It was pink and decorated with brightly coloured wall stickers and hanging mobiles. Her DVDs of Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast and other fantasy princesses were neatly stacked at the side of her little white TV and her High School Musical poster had pride of place above her bed. She loved singing and I could hear her warbling in her six-year-old voice as I descended the stairs, grubby duvet covers in hand.
“Muummeee!” she shouted as she put her arms around my neck and swung. She was tall and gangly for her age with a head full of blonde curls and was as light as a feather.
Everyone always jokes that there must have been a mix-up at the hospital where Carly was concerned as we are nothing alike. I am five feet tall and not a centimetre more and have a bit of a spare-tyre thing going on around my middle. My blonde hair is not really blonde but everyone told me that it suited me the first time I got it highlighted so I keep getting it done. I have large eyes and am blessed with long eyelashes and buying the latest mascara is my favourite hobby as I like enhancing the good features I have. I am also told that I have a lovely smile but equally that I can deliver the foulest looks on the planet when the mood takes me.
Anyone for Me? Page 34