Two Fridays in April

by Roisin Meaney

  As he drinks, his tail gives an occasional flick to and fro. He’s company of sorts: if she wasn’t heading out again she’d let him stay a while, but as soon as the saucer has been licked clean she nudges him towards the door with her shoe.

  ‘Go on – out you go.’

  He blinks up at her, offended. He plants his paws on the floor, refusing to co-operate. She has to slide him across the tiles and bundle him out as he mews hoarsely in protest.

  ‘I know you’re cross, but I’m in a hurry. See you tomorrow.’ He’ll be back: he won’t hold a grudge as long as there’s something on offer.

  Thank God the rain has stopped. Not a bad evening now, dry and calm, a few thin slashes of pink cutting the grey out of the sky. Might give them a better day tomorrow. It’s far from warm, but the green coat keeps her reasonably snug. Her knee is complaining again – she walked a bit more than usual today – but the bus stop isn’t far, just the end of her road.

  The bus is early for once: she’s barely landed when she sees it rounding the corner of the green. Good, she could do with a sit-down. She clambers on, pulling herself up the steps with the rail. ‘Take your time,’ the driver says. He’s young enough to be her grandson, looks like he’s barely out of school. He hardly glances at her pass, knows well she’s entitled to it.

  She takes a seat by the window, in front of a man eating an enormous sagging pizza slice. The herby, cheesy smell wafts tantalisingly in the air, sending saliva gushing into her mouth and reminding her again that she’s eaten hardly anything since breakfast.

  But she’s not a fan of pizza, or any of those other things they didn’t grow up with – pasta, rice, noodles, hard-to-pronounce grains that come from God knows where. Give her a couple of slices of bacon or beef and a spoonful of veg any day, healthiest food you can eat.

  Susan used to do a lot of that stuff: pizza with garlic bread, bowls of pasta, herbs and spices, cheese that smelt like a teenage boy’s well-worn socks. Finn used to wrinkle his nose when she produced the cheese, but she’d laugh and say he didn’t have to eat it.

  Mo didn’t taste a mango till she was well over forty, or a pomegranate. Wouldn’t give you tuppence for either of them, prefer a nice Cox’s Pippin or a juicy orange. Melon isn’t bad though; the creamy-coloured one, not the pink watery thing.

  Daphne’s been known to serve up something like quiche or lasagne, but she never tries to be too way out. Finn wasn’t a fussy eater growing up, cleaned his plate whatever Mo put on it. Just as well: she’d have had no patience with a child pushing his dinner aside.

  A loud, prolonged belch erupts behind her. She waits for an apology, isn’t too surprised when none comes. Manners a thing of the past – not the done thing any more to show consideration for your fellow human beings.

  The bus climbs a hill and rounds a bend. It pulls to a stop just outside the school where George teaches, and as new passengers clamber on, Mo watches cars manoeuvring into the parking spaces in the school grounds, and remembers Daphne saying something about a concert there tonight, otherwise George would be at the dinner too.

  He’ll be on Easter holidays after today, two weeks of no work on full pay. Two weeks of youngsters kicking a ball in the street outside Mo’s house, booting it into her front door every so often just to annoy her.

  She sees a woman she recognises emerging from the passenger side of a silver car, opening the rear door to unbuckle the belt of a child who bounds out, something dangling from one of his hands. Mo recognises the teddy his mother bought for him in the charity shop this morning. Small world: he’s probably in George’s class.

  A man gets out at the driver’s side, another familiar face. Mo watches the three of them walk towards the school entrance, the little boy skipping along between the adults. So the guard and the counsellor are a couple: small world indeed.

  Before they reach the door the little boy points suddenly upward, and Mo follows his finger to find two kites in the sky, pulling and diving along with the breeze. She wouldn’t have thought it was windy enough for kites; maybe it is, higher up. She’s never flown a kite; presumably there’s a bit of a skill to it, keeping them up like that.

  The pizza eater leaves his seat and ambles down the aisle, pausing to hitch his trousers over his substantial hips. No sign of the packaging his food must have come in – left on his seat, no doubt, for someone else to dispose of.

  The bus meanders through the city, picking up and dropping off as it goes. When it has passed the stop before Daphne’s Mo reaches up and pushes the button on the pole by her seat. Getting off, she thanks the driver as she always does, and he gives her a cheery wave before pulling away.

  She covers the short distance to the corner and turns at the shop that sells the Macaroon bars Daphne buys her. They’re not her favourite: she liked them one time, but now the coconut gets trapped under her plate. Still, the thought is what matters, and they never last long when Mo adds them to the plate of break-time biscuits in the shop.

  She walks up the road, quickening her step when she gets to the point where it happened. She hates passing it, but the bus leaves her with no choice. At least she was spared seeing him there, unlike Daphne. Every morning they drive past it, Daphne and Una. Every morning they’re reminded.

  She stops in front of the house, rests against the gate to catch her breath. She recalls Finn buying it, a single man still, a few years before he took up with Susan. Got a bank loan for it that scandalised Mo: how on earth would he ever repay it? Looking back, it wasn’t that big at all, not compared to the huge mortgages people had to get afterwards, when house prices started to go mad. Finn was lucky: he got in before all that.

  She remembers helping him to paint it: she could do so much then, all the energy in the world. Didn’t cost her a thought to spend the afternoon up a stepladder running a roller to and fro across a wall after a morning of doing the books in the shop with Leo. Gave a hand in the garden too, shopped with Finn for shrubs, helped him to put them down after they’d cleared the weeds away.

  And she’d donated things for the house: an armchair, a kettle, a rug for in front of the fire. A few cups, a saucepan, a frying pan. Most of them have gone now, have worn out and been replaced, but the chair, she’s glad to see, is still in the kitchen.

  She pushes open the gate. She walks up the path and rings the bell.

  Daphne is dressed in jeans and a jumper, a pair of thick grey flecked socks bunched around her ankles, her hair pulled into a heap with a big tortoiseshell slide. You couldn’t say she’d made much of an effort.

  She makes no comment on Mo’s made-up face; maybe she doesn’t notice. She waits until Mo is in the kitchen before she drops the bombshell.

  Mo can’t believe it. Una not eating with them? Not bothered turning up for her own birthday dinner? Worse, Daphne doesn’t appear particularly put out. On the contrary, she attempts to defend the girl, implying that they should feel sorry for her.

  Mo sips the sherry that’s poured for her, fuming. The idea of marking this day with anything other than sorrow is abhorrent to her – but she’s there. For Una’s sake, she’s shown up. More fool her – and more fool Daphne for splashing out on a big cake: no doubt it’ll be far too rich, have Mo awake with heartburn half the night. No sign of it, must be in the fridge. It can stay there for all she cares.

  The sherry slides down, its heady sweetness welcome, hitting her empty stomach before moving up to drift around in her head. Despite her annoyance, she can feel herself relaxing. Oh, she knows Una’s not a bad girl; she wouldn’t have realised the ingratitude of her actions. Mo will rise above it, she won’t allow it to ruin the evening.

  She fills a jug with tap water when Daphne asks her to. She puts cutlery on the table, takes out serviettes and salt and pepper. She drains her sherry glass, wondering if she’ll be offered a refill. For once, she wouldn’t say no.

  She remembers the first alcohol she ever tasted, the day Leo went into the home. She remembers seeing his room for the first
time, the room she knew would more than likely be his last. The single bed, the floor that you might think was wood if you’d never seen a real wood floor. A painting she didn’t recognise – a river, a boat, a humpbacked bridge – on the dull green wall. Why did institutions so often seem to favour green as a wall colour?

  But it was the single bed that broke her heart. The days of them sleeping side by side were over; she was never again to lie in the dark listening to the rhythm of his breathing, never again to wake in the morning within the warmth of his arms. As she and Finn removed his clothes and put him into pyjamas, she kept up a ridiculous cheerful monologue, determined not to let him see how broken-hearted she was, even though he was pretty much gone beyond noticing by then.

  On the way home she asked Finn to drop her at the shopping centre. I need to get a few things, she told him. He said he’d wait; she insisted he left her there, said she wanted the walk. When his car had vanished she went into the off-licence – the first time in her life she’d stepped through its doors – and walked slowly along the aisles before settling on a small bottle of Baileys. The ad on telly was nice, and she had a weakness for cream.

  On the way out of the shop she stopped. She turned and walked back in, and went straight to the counter. Twenty Benson & Hedges, she said, reaching a second time for her purse.

  Back home she put Leo’s beloved Mozart on the CD and poured an inch of the drink into a glass. She dipped in a finger and brought it to her mouth; it tasted of fiery chocolate. She eked it out in tiny sips as the music washed over her. When the glass was empty she held it suspended above her mouth and waited for the last precious drops to roll down and fall onto her tongue.

  Every day, she resolved, she would do this. Every evening after dinner, Baileys and music would be her consolation. Just an inch, she wouldn’t overdo it – and a single cigarette every day. Every morning, the time she’d always enjoyed them the most.

  She’s tried sherry too, just for a change. She likes both, but Baileys feels more special. She’d prefer a Baileys now, but sherry is what Daphne always offers, so sherry it is.

  The bottle is offered again and she extends her glass, noting her daughter-in-law’s white face, her tired eyes. The first anniversary has taken its toll – but maybe once they’re over it, things will pick up. If Mo has her way, this time next year could see them in a very different place.

  Towards the end of the meal – which it has to be said is perfectly fine – Mo decides to broach the subject. With Una not here, it’s the ideal opportunity.

  But it doesn’t go well. ‘I’ve been thinking,’ she says – and straight away she observes the wariness that comes into Daphne’s expression. Resistant already, before Mo has even begun. Sure enough, Daphne refuses even to contemplate resurrecting the shop, making it clear that she thinks the whole notion is cockeyed, and that Mo must be out of her head to be suggesting it. Within minutes they’re glaring at one another across the remains of their dinner.

  Mo isn’t altogether surprised, but she remains resolute. She’d known Daphne wouldn’t jump at the idea – it would mean a big change for all of them, and a lot of work, and not a small degree of risk – but she can’t be allowed, she won’t be allowed, to dismiss it out of hand. She must be persuaded that they need to reclaim the premises that Leo had worked so hard to acquire, and that had provided a livelihood for Finn in his time.

  So she persists with her arguments, she pushes her case – maybe pushes a little too hard. At any rate, she achieves nothing. By the time they’re finally out of words, the room is crackling with tension. Mo’s head begins to thump – the sherry, or maybe the whole fraught day, taking its toll. And just then Daphne’s phone, sitting by her plate, begins to ring.

  She looks at the screen. ‘I have to take this,’ she says flatly, and something tells Mo that it’s Isobel calling. She pictures the orange dress in the café earlier, the blue scarf slung over a chair. The failed mother drinking red wine – and quite possibly awaiting an illicit assignation. She feels a sudden dart of sympathy for Daphne, regrets badgering her today of all days. Blundering in, as ever.

  Left alone, she begins to clear the table: might as well do her bit to make up. She tips open the lid of the bin to scrape the last of Daphne’s dinner into it – but what she sees makes her stop short. She sets the plate on the worktop, retrieves the box and frowns at the intact cake she discovers inside. This has surely come from a supermarket shelf, not a bakery – what happened to the other? And why on earth was this one thrown away before it was even cut?

  She checks the fridge and opens presses, but finds nothing else. Daphne must have changed her mind and cancelled the bakery order – but it still doesn’t explain what this one was doing in the bin. She takes it from its box, finds a plate for it and gets a knife to reposition the pink icing that has slid sideways. Daphne, no doubt, will explain when she reappears.

  Getting on for nine o’clock, and still no sign of Una. Something will have to be said when she appears, birthday or no birthday.

  ‘Four euro in Mulligan’s,’ Daphne says. ‘I never got to collect the other.’ And then she goes on to tell Mo why.

  The news of the theft knocks her sideways: that lovely little red car stolen, today of all days. Again she feels remorse for her earlier haranguing – but Daphne makes little of the whole business. Most stolen cars turn up was what the guards had told her, she says. Expect some damage, they’d said.

  She also seems to have forgotten their argument – or decided to put it behind them. She tells Mo to collect the other cake, bring it to the charity shop for the tea break. A nice gesture, particularly after their harsh words. Nobody in the shop will care that it’s a day old. Mo will tell them there was a mix-up: Daphne and herself thought the other was collecting it, bakery closed by the time the mistake was discovered. She’ll say Una wasn’t a bit upset, on a diet like all teenage girls, just as well pleased without it.

  She’ll get them to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ in the back room – they’d enjoy that.

  They finish the washing-up, the atmosphere somewhat easier between them. The subject of what to do with the shop will have to be revisited, but Mo is content to leave it alone for the present. The seed has been sown: it’s enough for now.

  As Daphne stows the roasting dish under the sink, the doorbell rings.

  ‘That’ll be Una now,’ Mo says.

  ‘No – she has her key. It’s Dad. I told him to call around after work.’

  ‘I heard there was cake on offer,’ he says, when Mo opens the door to him.

  ‘You heard right.’ Better not mention it was fished out of the bin. ‘And your timing is perfect; we were just about to cut it. Come in.’

  He wears grey trousers that bag at the knees, a jacket the colour of porridge, and shoes that go with neither. His rapidly vanishing hairline and the brown-framed glasses that perch halfway down his long nose lend him a vaguely academic air.

  He holds a package wrapped in proper gift paper, gold stars on dark blue. Box of chocolates, Mo guesses. The safe bet: he’s not a taker of risks. Could well be why his wife walked out, wanting someone maybe with a bit more of an edge to him.

  But during the scatter of years they’ve known one another Mo has warmed to him. He’s solid, he’s completely dependable – and from what she can gather he raised Daphne practically on his own after Isobel left. No help to speak of from his older sisters, both living in Munich with their pair of German husbands. And his parents, by the sound of it, not much better, miles away on a farm on the other side of the country, occasional visitors at best.

  His in-laws did pitch in a bit, apparently – but they were the parents of the woman who’d abandoned him: can’t have been an easy alliance.

  ‘I’m afraid Una isn’t here,’ she tells him, as he wipes his feet carefully on the mat inside the door.

  He looks at her in astonishment. ‘Not here?’

  ‘No – she’s decided to skip her birthday dinner. She’s eating at a
friend’s house instead.’ She gives him a what-can-you-do look.

  ‘Well,’ he says, and she waits for more as he slips off his jacket and hangs it up, but no more comes. Playing it safe again, not wanting to say the wrong thing.

  Daphne meets them at the kitchen door. ‘Where’s your car?’ is the first question he puts to her, and Mo sets out cups and cuts the pink cake into slices as Daphne recounts her story again.

  Twenty past nine: surely not long more till Una shows up.

  But she doesn’t show up.

  By half nine, pitch dark outside, they decide to ring her – but when Daphne tries, the girl’s phone goes unanswered. Mo feels her earlier annoyance returning: in the middle of some antics with the pals, too busy to bother with home.

  Turns out Daphne doesn’t have a phone number for the pal Una was having dinner with. Turns out she doesn’t even know her last name. Mo does her best to hide her incredulity – talk about careless. Wouldn’t that be the first thing you’d make sure of with a child in the house, that you had numbers for all the pals? Finn would have had them, that’s for sure.

  But she says nothing, keeps busy trying Una’s mobile phone while Daphne rings the principal of the school – the principal! – and manages to get the information she wants. And that’s when the real worry sets in.

  Turns out she hasn’t been seen all day, not since Daphne dropped her off at the school before nine o’clock this morning. Turns out she claimed in a text to be at home sick today, but a check of her bedroom finds it empty.

  She’s missing. They stand in the kitchen, trying to decide what to do.

  ‘We should phone the guards,’ Daphne says, making no move to phone anyone, looking as if she might throw up at any minute.