The Importance of Being Aisling

by Emer McLysaght

  Emer McLysaght

  and Sarah Breen

  * * *

  The Importance of Being Aisling

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Acknowledgements

  Follow Penguin

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen conceived the character of Aisling in their sitting room in 2008, when they began to observe the many traits, characteristics and quirks of a very particular type of Irish girl: one they identified around them and one they identified with.

  Oh My God, What a Complete Aisling was an instant sensation in their native Ireland and the Number One bestselling adult fiction title of 2017.

  Emer McLysaght is the former editor of the Daily Edge and has worked extensively in journalism and radio.

  Sarah Breen is a journalist whose work has appeared in Stellar, Image, U, the Irish Independent and The Gloss.

  THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING AISLING

  Praise for Oh My God, What a Complete Aisling

  ‘Both Aisling and the novel have a great big

  thumping heart’ Sunday Times

  ‘The year’s funniest book’ Hello

  ‘Comparisons with Bridget Jones are spot on’ Independent

  ‘There aren’t enough words for how much I love it’

  Marian Keyes

  ‘Will have you shedding a tear as well as laughing

  your socks off’ Fabulous

  ‘You’ll laugh, you’ll cry … an utter ray of sunshine’ Red

  ‘Sweet, funny, moving, perfect’ The Pool

  ‘Bursting with clever one-liners’ Sunday Express

  ‘A riot of a read, but with plenty of depth, too’ Heat

  ‘Hilarious’ BuzzFeed

  ‘Brilliant … you can’t put it down’ Sunday Independent

  ‘Funny and touching’ Good Housekeeping

  ‘Aisling is an absolute gem of a character’ Sun

  ‘A runaway success’ BBC Radio 4 Front Row

  ‘My unofficial autobiography’ Aisling Bea

  ‘It’s not just comic, there’s a real heart to it’ John Boyne

  ‘I laughed non-stop and genuinely didn’t want it to end’ Lucy Vine

  ‘One of my fave novels of the year’ Louise O’Neill

  To mná na hÉireann, especially India and Esme.

  The future is safe.

  Prologue

  ‘Does it have any scaffolding around the bust?’

  The dress is gorgeous but I’m looking at the €450 price tag wondering how it could possibly cost so much. It’s an awful lot to pay for something you only wear once, although I suppose the pictures will last forever.

  ‘Excuse me, madam?’

  Happily Ever After is the poshest bridal shop in Dublin and the sales assistant – Grace, according to her name badge, but I’m sceptical – has been looking down her nose at me since I pushed the doorbell. I think it’s because I’m wearing tracksuit bottoms and my Ballygobbard Gaels hoody, but it’s important to be able to whip your clothes on and off at speed in these places. A good tip I picked up in an online wedding forum.

  The shop is very swanky altogether – everything is pink: they know their audience – and we have the whole place to ourselves. I was delighted to get a last-minute cancellation – normally you have to book an appointment six months in advance.

  ‘She’s wondering if there’s any corsetry,’ Sadhbh calls out from behind the pink curtain of the fitting room. Thank God she’s here to translate. I’m not the best in these situations, but Sadhbh’s no stranger to the luxury boutique circuit and knows all the lingo.

  ‘Ah, I see,’ ‘Grace’ says tightly, as we enter our second and final hour of shopping. ‘Not in this one, but if Aisling is looking for corsetry I can certainly show her some exquisite gowns.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I say, beaming and taking a sneaky photograph of the tag of the dress. You can get them for half the price online once you know the style number. Another tip I recently picked up – those forums alone are worth the price of broadband. ‘A bit of corsetry would do me the world of good since the wedding is a week after Christmas.’

  Majella ambles over with a glass of prosecco in each hand and a black dress draped over her arm. ‘Now hear me out …’ she says, spraying crumbs – she’s been at the free pink macarons – all over the pink carpet.

  ‘You’re grand, Maj,’ I say with a grimace, putting the black dress back on the rail and wondering if she knows me at all. I’m not a goth!

  The curtain of the fitting room flies open and Sadhbh steps out onto the raised platform wearing a floor-length, slate-grey dress. She looks like something out of a magazine – the figure on her. I don’t know why she insists on draping it in those shapeless sacks and kimonos. I can’t help it, I start crying – she’s just stunning.

  ‘Ah, Ais, not again,’ she says, lifting up the dress and teetering over to where me and Maj are sitting on the pink velvet couch. In the corner of the room I catch ‘Grace’ rolling her eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ I say, patting my cheeks. ‘It’s just you’re going to be the most gorgeous bridesmaid. Just faboo, Sadhbh. I think that’s the one. Do you like it?’

  ‘I like the colour – I’m just not sure about this,’ she says, pawing at the cowl neck which I thought was very classy and sophisticated. She twirls again in front of the mirror.

  ‘Can I make a suggestion?’ ‘Grace’ calls out from where she’s pouring out more Prosecco. Majella is keeping her busy. ‘Would you consider the two bridesmaids wearing dresses in the exact same colour, but different styles?’

  It’s like a lightbulb goes off over my head. Why didn’t I think of it? Just the right amount of cool and edgy.

  ‘Absolutely!’ I shriek. ‘That sounds very … funky. But also classy. Doesn’t it, Sadhbh? Would you be on for it?’

  ‘You know me, Ais, I’m easy,’ Sadhbh says, retreating into the fitting room. ‘It’s up to you.’

  ‘Grace’ smiles a tight little smile and heads off, nodding, to another rail of grey dresses. ‘We get a lot of girls like yourself in here, Aisling. Lots of Aislings. In my experience, the idea of the bridesmaids wearing different styles in the same colour always goes down well.’

  ‘I can see why,’ I call over. ‘It’s a brilliant idea. Just brilliant.’

  My phone buzzes in my Michael Kors and when I dig it out John’s picture is flashing up on the screen. I immediately cover it with my hand – I know he can’t see out of the phone or anything but the very idea of a man being in a bridal shop puts me on edge. It’s a sacre
d space.

  ‘Hi,’ I whisper, standing up and heading for a corner. I don’t want the dresses to even hear a male voice.

  ‘Ais,’ he replies. ‘I know you’re busy shopping but I was just wondering if you got Mammy a present. From me, like.’

  John and I have been together eight years – well, a bit less if you include the little unexpected break we had recently – and for the past eight Christmases I’ve bought a pair of slippers, wrapped them and put ‘To Mammy, love John’ on the label. Why would this year be any different?

  ‘Under the tree,’ I sigh patiently. ‘With the baby Jesus wrapping paper.’

  There was a time when I thought John’s helplessness was adorable and his reliance on my knowledge of his mammy’s slipper preferences was romantic, but I have to admit, it’s getting a bit old.

  ‘Now I have to go,’ I say and hang up. Then I take a deep breath, plaster on a smile and turn around. ‘Right, Grace, what do you have for me in grey with a nice bit of scaffolding? Nothing too glam, mind – we don’t want to upstage the brides.’

  ‘Elaine and Ruby don’t actually care what we wear, remember?’ Sadhbh laughs from behind the curtain.

  She’s right, of course. If our housemate and her fiancée had their way we wouldn’t be here at all, but I couldn’t let them get married without having bridesmaids. Lesbians or not, weddings have rules – and I know every single one of them.

  Chapter 1

  A bead of sweat drops down the back of my neck as I get down on my hands and knees one more time to check. Maybe I was wrong the first three times.

  ‘Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty, fifty-one.’ I’m sucking the numbers in through my teeth like a teacher doing a headcount on a bus, praying to God she hasn’t left anyone behind at Clara Lara. Maybe I’ll just stay under the tree and never come out. Or at least until this afternoon is over.

  Fifty-one presents. Fifty-three people for Secret Santa and fifty-one presents. Two useless articles haven’t bothered their holes coming in today to put something under the tree. Probably decided they were going to treat themselves to a day at home seeing as it’s the Christmas party tonight and generally seen as a bit of a doss around the office. It’s not a doss if you’re head of the Christmas Party Social Committee and took it upon yourself to organise Secret Santa. Donna used to do it, and even though I don’t miss her scraping the porridge off her spoon with her teeth beside me every morning, I do miss her at this very moment. She used to swing wildly between calling it ‘Kris Kindle,’ ‘Kris Kingle’ and ‘Kris Kringle’ instead of simply ‘Secret Santa,’ which nearly drove me to distraction, but she was militant about making sure everyone who signed up had their presents under the tree in time for the big swap. Losing her and her uncanny festive organising during the recent scandal at PensionsPlus was probably the biggest casualty of the whole debacle. Well, that and the millions of euro that went missing in a fecked-up transaction, but it’s not millions of euro I’m missing right now: it’s two presents. And every eye will be on me after lunch when the big exchange is due to happen. What will I do?

  Standing up nonchalantly beside the tree I cast a furtive eye around the office to see if there’s anything lying around I can wrap up as stand-in presents. I had planned on getting a curly blow-dry at lunchtime for the party later. I have a lovely lace dress I got in Dorothy Perkins and I remembered to nab a pair of ‘sandal toe’ American tan tights in M&S yesterday (€8 for a pair of tights! Only it’s Christmas I would have left them there) to go with my heels. Now I might have to forego the blow-dry to go and buy two presents so nobody is left empty-handed. Is there anything at all that might do?

  My eyes fall on a promotional baseball cap on a desk over at IT. Could I pass that off as a gift? Could I Tippex over the gaudy lettering? What about the bottle of Ouzo somebody in Accounts brought back from a week in Mykonos? Although why you wouldn’t just bring giant Milkas is beyond me. I have been known to buy my holiday Toblerones and Milkas in Tesco. I’m not paying airport prices! I would never bring back a sticky bottle of undrinkable poison though. At least make it a nice Pinot Greej or a West Coast Cooler duo gift set if you’re going to arrive in with something that isn’t chocolate. Anyway, I don’t think I’ll get away with passing the ouzo off as a Christmas present. I’ll have to fly out now at lunch and panic buy some things for €10 or under. I don’t even know who they’re for! And I don’t have time to go through the list and mark off the names that are missing from the assortment of wrapped bits under the tree. The stress!

  ****

  If I’m not mistaken Declan Ryan is actually wearing his giant novelty Santa tie. You press a button on the back of it and Santa’s beard falls away to reveal he’s showing his arse while a tinny version of ‘Jingle Bells’ plays. Not my proudest moment, present-wise, but after sweating around the Dunnes food hall up the road and emerging with the most neutral things I could find (a bottle of wine, an abnormally large sleeve of After Eights and an eight pack of AAA batteries) I panicked and bought the tie from the Bits ’n’ PCs phone and computer shop on the way back to the office to pair with the After Eights. Well, I say phone and computer shop but you can buy an assortment of things there while you’re waiting to get your screen fixed. And you can send a fax, if the fancy takes you. I’ve never had to get my screen fixed, of course. My trusty flip cover means my phone is safe at all times. I wouldn’t be getting it done anywhere dodgy anyway. Sure doesn’t that void your insurance? And they’d probably be out the back stealing your contacts and sending nudes and what have you.

  Anyway, Declan seems thrilled with his tie. He’s swinging around there on the dancefloor flashing the arse to anyone who’ll look. Siobhán from HR was equally thrilled with the wine but understandably baffled by the batteries. I think she suspects they’re from me because I had to present them to her from under the tree in the absence of her actual Secret Santa. My ‘oh ho, a little elf must have brought this in for you specially’ didn’t fool her. I’d be thrilled to get batteries if it was me. So handy for remotes.

  Notably absent from the party, and the two people with presents back under the tree with their names on them, are Donal from IT and Marie from reception. I’ll be presenting them with receipts for the wine, After Eights, batteries and arse-tie tomorrow.

  ‘Will we dance, Ais?’

  Sadhbh swings past me, swigging a glass of red and holding out her hand. She got a new colour put in her hair last week and even though she’s my housemate I still get a fright every time I see her, although I think I hide it well. Grey. What twenty-nine-year-old dyes her hair grey? Sometimes I think she has a screw loose. But since she went from HR executive on the floor above me in PensionsPlus to my best Dublin friend, I’ve gotten used to her hipster ways. For the night that’s in it she’s put some purple through the ends of it and she looks gorgeous as usual. That’s Sadhbh for you. She’d look good in a plastic bag, which I’m fairly sure I’ve seen her in. You’d never think we’d get on so well to look at us but opposites attract – isn’t that what they say?

  We had to do drinks tokens this year since the free bar last year landed three people in hospital after a particularly raucous rendition of ‘Fairytale of New York’. People get too giddy with free drinks and go mad ordering double brandies and fancy gins, frantic the tab might run out. Besides, I was told by the powers that be that the budget was to be reined in after the money scandal. The hotel ballroom and dinner were already booked, so there was nothing we could do about that, but the four drinks tokens were received with not an inconsiderable amount of grumbling earlier this evening. It hasn’t stopped the entire Escalations team dragging an unsafe-looking human train up and down the dancefloor to ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’, poor old Des, the long-suffering team leader, clinging onto the back for dear life.

  Sadhbh had wondered if I wouldn’t pass the organising off to someone else, given all I had been through recently with Daddy’s death, and minding Mammy, and with the organisation of Elaine’s las
t-minute hen party on top of it. I was glad of the distraction and staying busy, and I’m always at my calmest in hen-planning mode, believe it or not. I’ve been dreading Christmas, though. Absolutely dreading it.

  Elaine tried to get away without having a hen at all, but I was determined to squeeze one in before her New Year’s Eve wedding. I still can’t believe it took me so long to realise her and Ruby were a couple right under my nose. I was living in Elaine’s swanky apartment for months and never really wondered why Ruby was there for breakfast five times a week. I just thought they were great pals who shared a Netflix account. In hindsight it was fairly obvious they were together together. Majella, my best friend from Down Home who lives over in Phibsboro, still slags me about it, although she didn’t cop it either and she was a regular at our Friday Night Wine Downs. So much for her famous gaydar. Anyway, they were getting away without a hen over my dead body! Of course I wasn’t a bit surprised when she insisted she didn’t want one. Disappointed, yes, but not surprised. In the year I’ve known her I don’t think she’s been to a single one even though I have reason to believe she was invited to three. Imagine turning down an invitation to someone’s hen? One of them was her first cousin too. I wouldn’t be able to live with the guilt. I was born and raised on hens – as far as I’m concerned a proper send-off for the bride is just as important as the Big Day.

  It took a while, not that we had that long anyway, but I eventually talked her into it. Even Sadhbh, who’ll do anything to get out of ‘organised fun’ (her words), did some cajoling because she could see I was up to ninety over it. We’ve been officially designated bridesmaids. Elaine was all ‘I’m not having bridesmaids’ but I told her that was unacceptable and dragged Sadhbh around every bridal shop this side of the Shannon until we found our dream dresses. Well, my dream dresses. Then when we left the shop I ordered them straightaway from China. They arrived perfect – I think it was my proudest achievement to date, even though Elaine said we could just wear jeans for all she cared. Imagine! We’re lucky, though – we could have had a scenario similar to Eleanor Bolger’s wedding last year when she insisted on teal multiway dresses for her four bridesmaids and her busty cousin nearly took the priest’s eye out. They looked good in the pictures, which I suppose is all that matters, but the cousin spent the day tucking herself in and shooting daggers at Eleanor. Anyway, as Elaine’s housemates and friends we’ll naturally take on the duties, and I was born to bridesmaid. Bring on the table plan, to be quite honest.