Tales From A Hen Weekend

by Olivia Ryan

  I’d forgotten what Harry said about coming back this morning, and certainly didn’t realise he was bringing his cousin with him.

  ‘This is Conor,’ Harry introduces him, pushing him forward through the front door.

  He seems to need the push. He’s a smaller, darker version of Harry. At first glance I think they have the same eyes, but it’s hard to say because as soon as we’re introduced, Conor goes red and looks at his shoes.

  ‘Don’t be shy, mate – they won’t eat you,’ says Harry, slapping him on the shoulder.

  Conor laughs but still doesn’t meet our eyes. I think he’s frightened of us. Maybe he’s frightened of girls, full stop.

  ‘Nice to meet you, Conor.’

  He smiles at me shyly and looks back at the floor. This is going to be hard work.

  ‘We were just on our way out,’ says Emily, giving me a warning look.

  I ignore it. I know what her warning look’s all about. It’s about her not wanting Harry and his cousin with us on our last day. It’s about her still not really trusting Harry and certainly not trusting Conor who we’ve never met before and who doesn’t seem to be able to speak.

  ‘Well, we’re only going for a little walk,’ I tell them brightly. At least, I’m telling Harry, because it’s kind of difficult to talk to the top of Conor’s head. ‘Jude’s going to give us a tour of Kinsale. She might not be able to get further than the end of the road with her crutches but we’re taking our chances!’

  The warning look Emily’s giving me is now being accompanied by kicks to my ankles. I’m pretending not to see the look or feel the kicks, although if she kicks much harder I’ll be plastered up the same as Jude.

  ‘Do you want to join us?’ I manage to add to Harry while skipping away from Emily on one foot.

  ‘That’d be great – if you’re sure you don’t mind,’ says Harry, ‘wouldn’t it, Conor?’

  He nudges Conor with his elbow, making him jump slightly and mutter, ‘Yes, grand!’

  What with Emily kicking me, and Harry elbowing Conor, we’re all going to end up black and blue before we get out of the door.

  ‘But I’ve got a better idea,’ adds Harry before we can get any further injuries. ‘Why don’t you all pile into the car, and we’ll have a guided drive around Kinsale. Jude doesn’t look too safe on those crutches yet, if you ask me. I wouldn’t trust her to walk down that hill outside!’

  ‘Well, I’ve been having the same thought meself, thank you very much for caring!’ says Jude, sounding relieved. ‘Only you can’t say anything to this shower here, sure they’ve not an ounce of sympathy for a poor girl with an impediment, they’d have me climbing mountains with me crutches strapped to me back, so they would.’

  ‘Never let it be said, Jude,’ says Harry solemnly, ‘that Harry Cornwell doesn’t have sympathy for people with impediments. Your carriage awaits you.’

  ‘Just come in for a minute, then, while we get our coats and shoes on,’ says Emily with an air of resignation.

  Seeing the speed at which this has been agreed, Jude makes a little squeak of dismay and swings herself off into her bedroom, shutting the door firmly behind her. She’s still in there when Emily and I are ready to go out.

  ‘Come on, Jude!’ I tap on the door. ‘Are you ready?’

  I peer round the door. She’s sitting at her dressing table frantically tugging at her hair.

  ‘Jesus, God, will you look at the state of me? Did I ever look such a mess? I’ve hardly a scrap of make-up on yet, you’ll have to wait…’

  ‘Aw, Jude, leave it out – you look gorgeous. We’re only going for a drive around the town. Come on – if we don’t get going, we’ll run out of time. We’ve got to head back to Dublin this afternoon.’

  She flings her hairbrush down and sighs.

  ‘Oh, to hell with it, then. I’ll put a scarf over me face, shall I not, and if anyone looks at me…’

  ‘They’ll think you’re beautiful, like you always are. Come on, Jude! Stop rabbiting on about scarves on your face. I’m not going home without seeing Kinsale! Let’s go!’

  Hallelujah. I never thought it’d happen – but I’ve just got Jude Barnard out of the door without spending two hours doing her hair and make-up. Definitely a first! Whatever next?

  ABOUT CONOR

  ‘How are you this morning?’ Harry asks me quietly as he holds the car door open for me.

  ‘Numb,’ I tell him flatly. ‘I’m acting like nothing’s happened.’

  ‘Sorry. I don’t suppose you want to talk about it.’

  ‘No, not really. In fact…’ I shuffle across the back seat to leave room for Jude, ‘I think I’d rather hang upside down on a skewer over a barbecue than talk about it at the moment, if you don’t mind. I just want to enjoy my last day in Ireland.’

  Thinking about it now, I’m relieved to realise that I’m actually feeling more angry than upset already. How dare he! Over the phone! What a complete bastard!

  ‘Fair enough,’ says Harry as he helps Jude into the car. ‘Subject closed.’

  There’s not enough room for us all in the car, what with Jude’s leg, so Conor sets off at a jog to meet us down at the harbour. The road into the town centre from Jude’s flat is all steeply downhill and I realise with a pang of guilt how impossible it would have been for Jude to manage it on her crutches. She’d have fallen headfirst down the slope.

  At the bottom of the hill there’s a little square flanked by pretty green, yellow and red-painted touristy shops and dotted with tubs of spring flowers. The shop windows are full of Celtic jewellery, slate paintings and hand-knitted sweaters.

  ‘It’s lovely, Jude!’ exclaims Emily. ‘I can’t believe you live here!’

  ‘Sure it’s a pretty enough spot,’ agrees Jude. ‘Although most of the year you can’t move for the tourists. But when I first moved down here from the city I must say I thought I was in heaven.’

  ‘I’d love to live in a seaside town,’ I say, enviously. ‘I’d open my own little bookshop, and I’d love the tourists!’

  ‘Most of the shopkeepers around here do love the tourists!’ laughs Harry.

  But I mean it. I’m thinking about it seriously. Why not? After all, what’s stopping me, now?

  We park near the harbour, wait for Conor to catch us up, and get out of the car, having decided we’d all benefit from a blast of fresh sea air. Jude announces that she’ll make it to a bench just over the road on the seafront.

  ‘Got to learn to use these frigging things,’ she says, gritting her teeth and struggling to get her balance as we all stand round her in a circle, trying to hold her shoulders, her elbows, her hands, and clucking like a load of demented mother hens.

  ‘Don’t you be helping me,’ says Jude, swinging out across the road at an alarming speed. ‘I have to learn to do it myself.’

  We make slow progress along the harbour side towards the bench. The sea’s the same colour as the grey slate roofs of the town, despite the sunshine. But the clusters of little boats with red, white, blue and yellow sails jostling cheerfully together in the breeze brighten up the scene, as well as our spirits. We’re exposed to the wind along here, and with it the tang of salt and seaweed in the air. Jude wobbles dangerously a couple of times but she’s laughing. She looks pink-cheeked from the fresh air and sunshine, to say nothing of her efforts with the crutches. It strikes me suddenly that she’s always been beautiful, but today, with her hair slightly tousled and her face free of her normal layers of make-up, she’s absolutely stunning.

  Conor’s just behind her when she nearly overbalances completely.

  ‘Careful,’ he says, a bit gruffly and, suddenly and as if he’s been intending to do it all along, he puts his arm across her back, very lightly – a guiding, protective touch – and moves closer to her so that they’re moving along together.

  She doesn’t shake him off; she doesn’t say anything back, or even look at him – but he doesn’t seem to mind. He doesn’t take his arm away. They don�
�t say any more, and they still don’t look at each other, but they carry on like that, silently but closely together – Jude wobbling on her crutches, Conor slowing his pace to hers, steadying her with the almost imperceptible touch of his hand on her back.

  ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’ Emily whispers to me, watching them.

  ‘Mm. Perfect together. No chance of a cross word – or any word at all!’ I whisper back, giggling.

  And then I suddenly feel really mean for laughing, and I find myself crossing my fingers instead. Because actually they do look perfect together. And it’s time Jude had more than a cat in her life.

  ‘Conor’s a nice guy,’ Harry says to me quietly. We’ve reached the bench where Jude has parked herself with Conor still staying close to her, while we lean on the harbour wall and stare out to sea. ‘Doesn’t have a lot to say for himself when he doesn’t know someone, but he’s … well, all those things girls are meant to like, I suppose. Genuine. Decent. Caring. Faithful.’

  He counts these attributes off on his fingers, sighing slightly as he does, as if it pains him to even talk about them.

  ‘Good,’ I say, firmly. ‘If he’s going to carry on sitting that close to Jude, he’d better stay genuine, decent, and all that stuff, or he’ll have me to answer to.’

  ‘You’re very fond of her, aren’t you.’

  ‘Of course! She’s my oldest friend.’

  ‘Girls are so much nicer to each other than guys are,’ he says, with another sigh.

  ‘Well, I’m not arguing with that.’

  He doesn’t reply to this – just continues to stare at the sea, nodding, as if between the two of us we’ve discovered an incontrovertible truth.

  Which, I suppose, we have done.

  ‘I think Jude’s probably had enough,’ I say, watching her leaning back on the bench.

  ‘Yes, I have so!’ she admits. ‘I’m done for! It’s such hard work walking even a few yards with these buggers. Why don’t the rest of you go for a boat trip? I don’t want to spoil your day. I can sit here and enjoy the sunshine.’

  ‘No, we’re not leaving you here on your own – it’s fine; we’ll head back when you’ve had a rest,’ I tell her.

  ‘In fact I’ll go back for the car, and pick you up,’ insists Harry.

  ‘Or I can sit with you, if you’d like it,’ adds Conor shyly. ‘I’ve done plenty of boat trips of Kinsale harbour in me time – sure I’ve no need of another one.’

  I’m not sure which is the bigger surprise – the fact that Conor’s spoken more than one sentence, or the fact that Jude agrees so readily. But we can hardly refuse to leave them now, can we?

  So Harry, Emily and I climb aboard a small pleasure craft that looks as though it’s seen better days, for a half-hour trip around the harbour. Jude and Conor have both said they’ve been on this boat before and it didn’t sink and they didn’t need to bale out, so we’re trusting in their judgement.

  I’m sitting next to Emily at one end of the boat. I don’t know which end. I suppose if I am going to move to the seaside I’ll have to find out about things like stern, starboard and crow’s nest. It’s not all ice creams and peppermint rock, I do realise that.

  ‘I’d really like to move to the seaside,’ I tell Emily wistfully. ‘I mean it.’

  ‘Where? Southend? It’s not quite like Kinsale.’

  ‘I don’t know. Anywhere. When I leave Bookshelf I might find a job somewhere completely different. Kent. Norfolk. Devon. Scotland.’

  ‘Are you serious, then? About leaving Bookshelf?’

  ‘Yes. I don’t think I can carry on working there now, with the situation with Greg. And anyway I think I’d like a new start.’

  She looks at the horizon, swallowing hard, not saying anything.

  ‘But then again,’ I add quickly, ‘I wouldn’t want to leave my friends or my family.’

  ‘As long as you don’t go too far!’ she says, laughing, and linking arms with me. ‘Southend’s far enough. I could come over and walk on the beach with you. We could buy candyfloss and Kiss Me Quick hats, and…’

  ‘You don’t do things like that when you live at the seaside, you daft wally!’ ‘Well, we will! And we’ll buy cockles and whelks and eat them out of those little polystyrene trays, and we’ll walk down the pier, and play the fruit machines and go on the dodgems, and we’ll make sand castles with cockle shells for windows and little paper flags and…’

  Her voice is wobbling a bit. I glance at her and she’s swallowing fast, desperately trying to keep on talking.

  ‘And we’ll always be friends,’ I finish for her, gently, squeezing her hand, ‘Whatever.’

  ‘Good!’ she says fiercely. ‘I should bloody well think so, too!’

  Harry’s leaning back in his seat at the other end of the boat, his legs stretched out in front of him, watching the seagulls circling. The sea breeze is ruffling his hair, and squinting into the sun, which I’m sure always makes me look like a wrinkled old hag with cataracts, has the peculiar effect of making him look better than ever. I catch his eye and he gives me a smile and a wink, and I turn away again, suddenly embarrassed, not to say surprised at myself. What the hell am I doing? Looking at another man, finding him attractive – fancying him – when I’ve just had my whole life ruined by Matt? I’m obviously in shock – that must be it. I’m bound to do, and feel, a lot of strange things right now. The best thing I can do is to keep my head down, keep my thoughts to myself, and not trust my instincts, for the time being. And if I know what’s best for me, I should stay right away from good-looking guys like Harry.

  I’ve got to hand it to him, though – when we get back from the boat trip he insists on running – actually running – back for the car so that he can drive Jude home. Emily goes with them to help with getting Jude in and out of the car. Connor and I are going to walk back. Having decided not to trust my instincts, I don’t want to be sitting in the same car as Harry any more than I have to.

  Conor’s quite pleasant company if you like to be left alone in silence. He seems happy enough as we walk back along the harbour road but I can’t help it – I feel uncomfortable around people who don’t talk. I need to start him chatting, especially if he’s getting friendly with Jude. Tactfully find out whether he’s suitable for her, you know, without being too obvious.

  ‘So!’ I start, breezily. ‘Whereabouts do you live, then, Conor?’

  ‘Oh, just a little way up the coast from here.’ He nods, and goes back to his silent contemplation.

  ‘That’s nice. And you… er… you’re single, then, are you?’

  ‘I am, so. I live with me Mam and me three sisters.’ He turns to me, suddenly, his eyes twinkling with amusement. ‘And if you’re wondering would I be thinking of messing around with Judith, well, I was contemplating asking her out at the weekend if you want to know the truth. But you’ve no need to worry on my account. I’m not like my cousin in any way at all, so don’t you be bothering your head about her on that score.’

  I’m somewhat taken aback by this, and not just because it’s the longest speech I’ve heard from him so far.

  ‘What do you mean,’ I finally force myself to ask, ‘“Not like your cousin” – in what way?’

  ‘Ah, sure you know well what I mean,’ he says with another broad grin. ‘If you’ve known Harry for more than five minutes you’ll have seen what he’s like with the girls, will you not?’

  ‘Not really, no. But I suppose – well, he’s a good-looking guy…’. Whoops – there I go again. Change the subject, change the subject. ‘He’s free, single… I suppose he has a bit of fun with the girls. Can’t really blame him, can you?’

  I think Conor’s probably jealous. You can see why. Harry’s tall, sexy, confident, gorgeous… oh, God, what’s wrong with me? I’m not really obsessing about him being sexy and gorgeous. It’s just my traumatised mind playing tricks. But he obviously has no trouble getting girlfriends, whereas Conor’s quiet and shy.

  ‘Sure ’t
is true he has his fun with the girls, and that’s a fact. To be fair we both have a laugh when he comes over to Ireland.’ Conor blushes and looks away, as if he’s afraid I’ll see pictures in his eyes of the sort of fun they have when Harry comes over. It doesn’t need a lot of imagination. ‘But he’s not the sort of man I’d want any of me sisters to get involved with – except that I know he already has,’ he adds, looking down at his feet.

  ‘He’s been out with one of your sisters?’

  ‘Well, see, Katie, they’ve all had the most enormous crushes on him. Even when they were still little schoolgirls they used to giggle and go red when he walked in the room. Bernadette, the youngest, asked him for a kiss under the mistletoe one Christmas, years ago, when she was only about fifteen, and when he gave her a peck on the cheek, she had her arms around his neck snogging the living daylights out of him before I could pull her away. To be fair even Harry seemed fairly taken aback by that. “I’ll have to watch that one, Conor,” he said. “She’s just a child – I’m not taking advantage of her – not till she’s a few years older at least!”’

  ‘It sounds like he was joking, though – wasn’t he?’

  ‘I thought so too, Katie. Then last year I found out that me middle sister, Bridget – had been sleeping with him.’

  ‘Really? And how old was Bridget then?’

  Must have been a bit older than fifteen, at least!

  ‘Twenty-four, Katie, but sure it’s a shameful thing to think of your own sister… in that situation… I’d have liked him to have shown a bit more respect, her being his cousin and all, if the truth be known.’

  He tails off, looking very awkward, and I feel kind of sorry for him. Without a father, he’s obviously been thrust into the position of responsibility for his younger sisters and it must have been something of a shock to discover that they’d become grown-up women with sex lives. Sex lives that involved his – rather gorgeous – older cousin.