“Either that or the grief for your dad has sent her completely doolally,” he offered with a smile and I suddenly wasn’t sure which version of events I would prefer to be true.
I had left the fancy dress from earlier aside, despite Sam’s protests that it made me look amazing, and had slipped into something a little more comfortable instead – some jeans from my suitcase, a fitted white T and a scarf from the shop he insisted I wore to make me look a little glam. “Fake it till you make it,” he said, adding, “I know that sounds very Gok Wan and probably makes me sound more of a raging homosexual than I really am, but I like to see you look a little more confident, cousin – and if you can’t feel it right now then you can at least look a little more glam.”
I’d fixed my hair, put on some fresh make-up, slipped my feet into a pair of pumps and grabbed my cardigan from the end of the bed.
Sam drove me to the restaurant my mother had been assured would meet our supposed exacting standards. We didn’t feel that we had to correct anyone by telling them we had no exacting standards and, with the exception of my father’s funeral, I couldn’t remember the last time we had eaten out.
My mother was standing, fidgeting with her hands, at the door of Brown’s Restaurant as we pulled up.
“You know you can get me any time,” Sam reminded me as I kissed him on the cheek and stepped out of the car.
My mother looked more diminished than I remembered even though it had been barely twenty-four hours since I had last seen her. She looked tired – perhaps even more tired than on the nights she had sat up by my father’s bed, mopping his brow and adjusting his morphine through the night. She looked, well, vaguely lost and I felt the tables turn between us and I knew it was time for me to be the mom and her to be the child who needed a little bit of reassurance.
“You should have told me,” I said, stepping out and hugging her. “You should have been able to tell me.”
“I didn’t know how,” she muttered, allowing me to hug her. “I know I’ve been very foolish, Annabel, I know I have hurt you. I just didn’t think – I was so caught up in everything and I needed to be here and somehow I thought I would find the words but they never came and before I knew it we were on the plane and it seemed real and scary and I didn’t know how.”
“One word at a time, Mom,” I said, trying to hold back the mixed bag of feelings which were coursing through me. “Let’s get a seat, and then just one word at a time.”
* * *
“Your father and I never had secrets,” my mom said while we waited for our bottle of wine to be brought to the table. “I don’t want you to think I ever betrayed him, Annabel. I never did.”
I didn’t speak. If the truth be told, I wasn’t sure I could speak.
“I loved your father very much but, and I know this will be hard for you to hear, he was gone from me a long time before he died. We knew that, him and I. We knew as he got sicker that what we always had had changed irreparably.”
I felt tears sting at my eyes but I pushed them back, aware that the waitress would arrive soon with our bottle of Sauvignon and I didn’t want to make yet another public show of myself. I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
“I know you probably think who am I to carry on like this – at my age? That I should have more sense about me, that when he died a part of me should have lain down and died with him. And it did, you know, and it won’t ever come back. There isn’t a night since he died that I haven’t cried myself to sleep – but it won’t bring him back. Your dad and I knew this. He told me, pet – he told me that when he was gone I was to look for Ray. I was to look for him and get the closure I never had all these years. That doesn’t mean to run off with him into the sunset – it just means to close the book on what happened all those years ago.”
“So what did happen all those years ago, Mom? You loved him. Presumably he loved you too – and what, it just didn’t work out? That happens, you know. What I don’t understand is why you have held on to it all these years.”
“There’s a part of you, Annabel, that always holds on to the first time you said goodbye. Especially when you didn’t realise you were saying it at the time. Yes, I loved him. I loved the very bones of him – he gave me a confidence I never thought I could find. We were, I thought, a perfect match and we were bound for our happy ending. You know how you just know it’s meant to be? When you don’t have to question it? When you don’t have to force it? You don’t even have to think about it all that much – it’s just there. It’s just who we were. It was never meant to end – not the way it did anyway, and perhaps I have been a silly old woman to hold on to it all these years. But I never got to say what I needed to say.”
She fished in her bag and pulled out a small sheaf of letters – old, crinkled, yellowing. “I never got to tell him I’m sorry. That’s all I ever wanted to do. I broke his heart, Annabel. I broke his heart and I never got the chance to explain – not properly.” She handed me the letters. “I don’t expect you to take it all in – not straight away. But it’s there – these are the letters I wrote after he went back to America. They were sent back to me . . . return to sender . . . unopened. I just wanted him to know I was sorry.”
I handled them – they were now open – she had obviously reread them over the years. I wanted to hand them back to her straight away – felt as if I was seeing something I shouldn’t be. But she was insistent as my hand pushed them back towards her.
“It was never simple, Annabel. And this? It isn’t about love – not really. Not love now. I’m not silly, I’m not some hopeless romantic. I know what real life is like, Annabel.”
She spoke in hushed, rushed tones as if she was telling me off, as if embarrassed at the same time, and I supposed this was awkward for her – discussing her love life with me.
She took a deep breath. “Ray wanted me to go with him to America. We were to be married. He had organised my passport. He had given me money for a dress – a beautiful lace dress which I never dreamed I could have owned. We had so little, Annabel – I don’t think you will ever understand how little we had. And he promised me the world – and I believed him. I believed more than anything that he could deliver it. But it was me who backed out. And when I went to find him it was too late. I don’t want it to be too late again. All this time – all these years – I’ve regretted not being able to tell him – not properly. I never explained and he must have felt so betrayed. I want to make that right, you know.”
I sat with my hand on the letters, wondering what full story would unfold in the reading. If it wouldn’t have been deemed rude, I imagine I would have opened them there and then and started reading.
My mother’s expression had become closed again – she was back to staring at her menu intently and, while I knew she wasn’t taking in any of the words swimming before her, I also knew she wasn’t going to be drawn further. The answers were in the letters, she’d said.
So first I had to try and get through dinner, even though my appetite had disappeared and my mouth was dry. The conversation would no doubt be stilted – how can you talk about the niceties when there is a giant big letter-shaped elephant in the room? I glanced at the menu in front of me, resolving to choose something light, preferably something which could be eaten quickly – hopefully my mother would do the same and we could both leave the awkwardness of this situation behind. I allowed the waitress to pour my wine, relieved to have someone else break the ice with something alcoholic. I nodded politely to her but she left all too soon. There is only so much small talk you can make with someone who clearly has other tables to serve and is under pressure in a busy restaurant. She left and I looked at my mother who sipped gingerly from her glass – following the first sip of wine by taking a sip of water. You know, just to make absolutely sure she didn’t get drunk.
“So,” she said, “how are you finding Sam? He seems a nice boy – well, man, I suppose. Is he looking after you?” My mother spoke in a sing-song voice with an air of forced jollity as if w
e hadn’t just discussed her almost-fifty-year-old heartbreak, my father’s death or how poor she had been growing up.
“He is, Mom,” I said, realising it was better now to just play her at her own game. “He’s lovely, very welcoming. We’ve really hit it off.”
“Auntie Dolores never stops talking about him – how he makes her so proud. She just wishes he would settle down. Too old to be living the bachelor life. It’s time for him to get married.”
I gulped from the large glass of wine which had been put down in front of me. I decided it was best not to bring up the whole Sam-being-gay thing – one awkward conversation was enough. I simply nodded as if I agreed.
“Then again, don’t you think it’s about time you did too?” She looked at me intently over the menus. “You and Craig. You’ve been together a long time. Isn’t it time you . . . well . . .”
“Peed or got off the pot?” I offered.
“No need for crudeness, Annabel,” she chided.
“Mom, I don’t think I can have this conversation with you now. My head is too busy. Just too busy.”
“Life has taught me a lot of things, pet, and it’s taught me regrets are hard to live with. That’s all I’m saying.” She put her menu down, gestured to the waitress that she was ready to order and adopted her sing-song voice again. “So, tell me about the shop!”
Chapter 14
I have nowhere else to write to but to here. I know you won’t read this but still I hope, Ray, still I hope.
* * *
Derry, November 1959
Today was the day he was going to show her the flat. She had kept it secret from everyone – even Dolores. If there had been talk of a sailor’s love nest she had feigned interest as if it was all news to her. Although her sister was always one to encourage her to live a little and push the boundaries, Stella wasn’t quite sure if Dolores would see this as one boundary too far. They would be the talk of the town if anyone found out – and yet to her it was all innocent. She and Ray had spent so much time walking the streets, sneaking kisses in the movies when the lights were down and being under the watchful eye of all around them. This would just allow them the chance to be a little closer – to have time together, somewhere warm, somewhere cosy, somewhere private.
* * *
Ray had warned her it wasn’t much. “Not more than a room really but it’s dry and, when the fire is going, it’s warm too.” He had blushed as he spoke. “You know, one day, Stella, I hope to give you more. What do you want? The porch swing? The picket fence? How many bedrooms? Name it – I’ll get it for you. A big garden? A pool in the yard? Somewhere for the kids to play?”
She had held his hand as he talked, walking through the smoky streets, the late autumn rain beating off the ground and bouncing up, making her feet wet – and she could see it all now. Like something she could only imagine – something she had seen in the movies. She wasn’t quite thinking of Tara from Gone with the Wind but perhaps the Bailey house from It’s a Wonderful Life. She imagined living in a town just like Bedford Falls, close enough to the big city of Boston but quaint enough, with a strong community. Somewhere like home. Somewhere with a front gate and a neat lawn and maybe two bathrooms. Somewhere where there was no damp in the corners of the room and where it was warm enough to leave your coat downstairs even on a winter’s night. Somewhere where every room was the good room. Ray made her believe she could have that and more than that – he made her believe she deserved it.
This flat, she thought, as he turned the key in the door and held it open for her, was just the first step towards that. It was just a stepping stone.
He hadn’t been wrong when he said it was basic. It was little more than a box – and a cold box at that. She shivered as he went straight to light the fire which had already been set in the hearth. One stark, bare light bulb attempted to light the room. Two sash windows covered with heavy brown curtains faced out onto the street. A rickety table with two mismatching chairs sat by the wall while a single bed stood opposite, dressed with some thin blankets and a couple of cushions. A kitchen area, if you could even call it that, was against one wall: a small sink, a gas stove and a single cupboard providing the sum total of the provisions. A small sofa, which had seen much better days, sagged in front of the fire, the imprints from the seemingly considerable backsides of the previous owners quite obvious. The flames from the kindling licked around the coal, begging it to come to life.
It was as stark as it came but yet there were touches of homeliness too – signs that Ray and his men had tried to make it a little cosier for their girlfriends. There was a small wireless on a small table beside the decrepit sofa. On the table by the window a small vase contained a few flowers. The kettle on the stove was clearly new and beside the sink sat several new cups and a box of unopened tea. The place, while far from glamorous, was at least clean, Stella noted with relief.
“I know. I know. It’s not much. It’s not what you deserve,” Ray said. “And it’s a shared bathroom, down the hall. But we cleaned it – bleached the life out of it and there is no one else on this floor right now.”
Stella took off her coat and walked to the kitchenette where she filled the kettle with water, lit the gas ring and started to make tea. Turning to face Ray – a thought that this could be her life crossed her mind, standing in a kitchen making a cup of tea for the man she loved and seeing him so eager to make her happy. She felt a warmth creep through to her very bones that was most certainly not caused by the small fire in the room.
“It’s perfect, Ray,” she said, walking towards him and taking his face in her hands.
She looked into his eyes. Okay, this wasn’t Bedford Falls. Not yet anyway. This wasn’t the porch swing and there was certainly no pool in the yard. There wasn’t even a yard. But he had the Hollywood looks of a leading man and a twinkle in his eyes that let her know he loved her.
She kissed him then, a soft passionate embrace free from the watchful gaze of others. She felt his hand on the small of her back and felt the longing in the quickening of his breath. She pulled back, stroking his cheek and was surprised to feel that there were tears forming in her eyes. Stella Hegarty had never believed she could fall so completely and utterly in love. But more than that she had never thought anyone would ever love her back and certainly not in the way Ray did. She looked deep into his eyes and kissed him again, this time a little deeper, and she felt him pull her a little closer. It was only the whistle of the kettle letting them know that tea was ready that jolted them apart.
As she poured the two cups, her hands shaking a little and her breath still caught in her throat, she thought to herself that nothing that could happen in her entire lifetime could ever make her any less his.
* * *
They managed to escape to the flat once or twice a week and each time it became a little harder to leave. Stella knew it was play-acting – really. Yes, they had their plans and they talked of the future but she knew every time she entered that room and lit the fire, or made the tea or cuddled on the sofa, they were acting at something that wasn’t quite theirs yet. There was something unspoken in each meeting even though she could talk to Ray in a way that she could never talk to anyone else.
Each kiss became a little more dangerous. Each touch became a little bit more charged. Each moment together made her fall deeper and deeper in love with him. She started to fear their meetings almost as much as she longed for them, knowing that all their good intentions could easily be thrown to the wind at the wrong moment. It would hurt her mother enough if she found out Stella was sneaking off to the flat at all – but if they made one wrong move, if God forbid she found herself pregnant – it would finish her mother off altogether.
Ray never pushed her. He never overstepped the mark but she knew it was what he wanted. If she was completely honest with herself it was what she wanted too. Each time she was with him it was harder to resist.
* * *
Molly Davidson wasn’t the first of the facto
ry girls to marry a marine. But somehow her wedding imprinted on Stella’s mind like no other. Molly was eighteen – a natural beauty with an infectious laugh. She always arrived at work perfectly groomed and somehow managed, even after a long day over the smoother, to leave with her hair still completely in place. She had glossy dark hair which Stella secretly coveted. Her own hair was more of the flyaway kind and while she could tease it into submission it never quite had the Irish-beauty sheen of Molly’s. She would make a beautiful bride and excitement was almost fever pitch as she waited for her papers to come through so that she could marry her beau before he returned to the States.
There was talk of little else in the factory and the week before her wedding she invited her girlfriends to her house where her mother was to throw a going-away party of sorts. As Stella arrived, Dolores by her side, Molly was almost giddy with excitement.
“Girls, you have to see all the bits and pieces I have for going away. David says I won’t need all of it but my mammy and daddy and my aunts and uncles have been so kind. Come and see.”
She led the Hegarty girls upstairs to the room she shared with three other sisters, where a large battered suitcase was sitting open on top of her bed. She started to pull out dresses, shoes, skirts and blouses. Then came the towels and the tea towels and the bed sheets for her marital home. Her own little dowry. Stella noted that even when all the items were back in the case, there was still room for more.
“Mammy has told me off for packing everything already,” Molly said. “Says I’m jumping the gun and I’ll have nothing to wear for the next week but sure I can just wring out my clothes at night and hang them out beside the fire. I like to see it all packed, makes it seem real, you know? This time next week I’ll be a married woman and on my way to Boston, USA. I can barely believe it!”
The First Time I Said Goodbye Page 12