Be Careful What You Wish For, page 33
Helen searched Molly’s eyes, ignoring the bus flashing its lights behind them because her hatchback was blocking its laneway.
Molly covered one of the hands on the steering wheel with her own. ‘I’ll say that again in capitals. HE’S YOUR BROTHER.’
‘It’s not too late to do a three-point-turn and go home,’ panicked Helen. ‘Maybe if he doesn’t see me at the airport he’ll realise I’ve changed my mind.’
The bus driver leaned on his horn as he pulled out past the green Golf.
‘From what you’ve told me you’ll have to face him sooner or later, Helen. Collect him, bring him to my flat – it’s empty until Sunday night now – and thrash out whatever needs sorting between the two of you.’
Helen nodded, trance-like. Molly jumped out into the street, then bent back through the passenger door towards Helen.
‘Remember, Patrick’s not the only one who loves you, Helen. I love you too. And I don’t want to preach to you but, God knows, I’d hate to see you do something you’ll live to repent.’
CHAPTER 24
Helen raced through Departures towards Arrivals. Her car was parked illegally and she needed to enter and exit the airport like a boomerang. She cut a determined path through the obstacle course of suitcases and baby buggies leading towards the escalator. Just before the stairs carried her downwards, Helen’s eye was caught by a substantial blonde woman with a hairstyle that was either old-fashioned or ultra-modern, for it was a circlet of plaits at the crown of her head. As she watched, the woman laid her forehead against a man’s and his arms snaked around to encircle her, fingers stroking the exposed neck beneath the golden plait. Helen smiled and then tensed: the man was Fionn.
She lost sight of them then, for the escalator was carrying her down to a floor below the lovers. Molly will be desolate, she thought, and then Molly was banished from her mind because Patrick was standing at the foot of the escalator watching her as though he knew she’d be arriving at precisely that moment.
‘Helen.’ Despite the distance still between them and the babble from milling crowds she heard her name clearly. Her heart acquired the properties of a combustion engine. She stepped off the escalator, gravitating towards his eyes; Helen had often heard of the look of love but never encountered it before now.
Patrick opened his arms and she hurtled into them.
In the car, as they drove to Blackrock, he angled sideways to watch her. The Friday afternoon traffic build-up was starting ever earlier and the journey was interminable – or maybe it just appeared that way to Helen, twisting first one hoop and then the other in her ear as the tailback stretched through Drumcondra. Patrick, by comparison, was blissfully unruffled. By nonverbal consent they avoided the usual small talk that marks the conclusion of a journey: did you eat on the plane? Did your flight leave on time? Did you manage with hand luggage or were you obliged to put a bag in the hold? Which left a mass of gaping space to fill. Helen found herself telling Patrick about seeing Fionn and Helga at the airport and how devastated Molly would be.
‘It’s her apartment we’re borrowing, she’s the journalist, isn’t she? Excessive-looking – all curves and curls. If you were an artist you’d want to paint her, but only with a new set of oils. Doesn’t she come from Fermanagh?’
‘Derry,’ Helen corrected him. ‘Nobody comes from Fermanagh. It’s all lakes and no people.’
‘Never been there. Visited the English Lake District, though.’
‘Shame on you.’
‘It was lovely,’ Patrick protested.
‘So’s Fermanagh. It’s not pockmarked with dreary steeples at all, despite Churchill’s verdict. It’s two-thirds under water and –’ she reflected – ‘spiritual, for want of a better Word. Full of ancient monuments, carvings inscribed in ogham script from pagan times and round towers from the Christian era. Although it’s said the locals clung on to their old ways long after Christianity was introduced.’
‘How do they know?’ Patrick was scrolling through the music stations on the radio.
‘Statues of the old gods were found in hallowed places, a classic case of hedging your bets. They probably prayed to a Síle na Gig as well as Our Lady.’
Helen and Molly had gone to see one of these primitive fertility symbols in situ – many have been moved to museums to protect them from the elements. She overlooked a river bridge in County Tipperary and they’d marvelled at her exaggerated vulva, which she held open as though it were a gateway. Which it was, the portal of life. The Síle na Gig, crudely hewn in rock but graphically representational in its celebration of birth and rebirth, had silenced both of them with its potency. Then Molly had remarked that their Celtic forebears certainly weren’t prudish. Helen opted not to mention any of this to Patrick.
‘Anyway,’ Patrick was also thinking about Molly, ‘I understood she wasn’t keen on her ex, Fionn. I thought she was just putting in time with him.’
‘She’s more enamoured of him than she acknowledges but there’s an impediment – Molly’s set on getting married,’ explained Helen.
‘To anyone in particular or just for the sake of it?’
‘There’d be grounds for imagining it’s only for the dress and the honeymoon,’ agreed Helen, ‘but Molly’s more complex than she pretends. Fionn’s not really a contender right now because he’s still married. To someone else. And he looked extremely married from what I saw at the airport. But to tell you the truth I’m not certain marriage is what Molly needs. You’re supposed to be faithful and make certain vows when you say “I do” but she isn’t one of life’s naturally constant people. She’s always imagining herself in love and that’s fair enough when you’re single but when you’re married it’s not so simple to say “I undo”.’
‘Is it fair enough to go around on a serial falling-in-love spree?’
Helen switched traffic lanes in the hopes of overtaking a dilatory An Post van and considered. ‘Not at thirty-two it isn’t. It shows a certain lack of control over your emotions. Too much control, however, is equally inappropriate; believe me, I know.’ Lines materialised on either side of her mouth.
Patrick lowered the radio as the opening bars of Patsy Cline’s Crazy came over the airwaves and reached for the place where Helen’s shoulder joined her neck.
‘Control can be jettisoned.’ He said it matter of factly as he massaged. Helen turned left by the Auld Triangle and risked a glance at him, changing gear. He wasn’t even looking at her. He seemed to be counting the storeys in the Georgian houses on his side of the road.
By the bridge at Connolly station she was ready to punctuate the silence again.
‘Anyway, she has a Greek god to console her.’
‘Wouldn’t the consolation verge on the theoretical then?’
‘He’s not really a god. But he’s not a geek either. He’s about seven years younger than she is and works in her local off-licence to supplement his student grant.’
Patrick whistled softly. Helen thought the tune could be Yankee Doodle although equally it could be The Girl From Ipanema. She wasn’t adept at recognising songs.
‘She’s not going to break her heart over Fionn with a younger man on the scene,’ he remarked.
‘Suppose not,’ agreed Helen, far from convinced.
‘Seven years is a fair-sized gap, all the same.’
‘There’s three years between us,’ Helen pointed out.
‘Irrelevant.’
‘Is it?’
He laughed without any evidence of mirth. ‘Compared to the other barriers we’re facing it is.’
Helen felt darkness closing in on her. How could her emotions seesaw so violently from ebullience to woe in the space of a few miles? Patrick turned the radio back up and resumed stroking the knots at the base of her neck.
‘Are you disappointed about Westport?’ she asked.
‘No. It was always about seeing you, where was irrelevant. An apartment in south Dublin, a hotel in the west of Ireland, I don’t mind. So long as I have my s –’
‘You were going to say “sister”,’ she interrupted, borderline hysterical.
‘So long as I have my sweet Helen by my side.’ His fingers kneaded more forcefully.
‘You weren’t going to say sister?’
‘I don’t think of you as my sister.’
‘I don’t think of you as my brother either.’
Patrick’s smile blazed out. ‘I do believe we’re making progress. Now, how much further to your mate Molly’s place?’
‘We’re here.’
Helen led the way through the foyer.
‘I hope we bump into her neighbour Elizabeth. She’s –’ Helen fumbled for an appropriate description – ‘a character. Makes Molly seem two-dimensional by comparison.’ She turned the key in the lock, almost overpowered by the scent of flowers. ‘This apartment has seen some action. If her walls could speak they’d be X-rated.’ She caught Patrick grinning the wrong sort of grin and wished she’d considered the comment’s implications.
She led the way into the kitchen. ‘Coffee, tea or something stronger?’
‘How about a pair of strong arms around your waist – or is that unacceptably brash?’ He lifted her a few inches off the tiled floor.
‘I thought we were going to talk,’ she objected half-heartedly; to her disappointment he took her at her word and replaced her on the black-and-white tiles.
‘Tea and talking it is. I take mine –’
‘White, no sugar,’ she finished for him.
‘You do an excess of tea-drinking in this country,’ Patrick observed while they were waiting for the kettle to boil.
‘That has the ring of a man who’s put some distance between himself and us.’
‘I’m long enough over the water,’ he shrugged. ‘I don’t feel English but neither do I feel particularly Irish any more.’
Helen produced Molly’s rooster teapot and scalded it.
‘I’m saddened by that,’ she observed.
‘You see me as having gone over to the enemy camp?’ The last time she’d heard him use that barbed note he’d been speaking to Geraldine.
‘They’re not the enemy.’ Helen’s tone was no-nonsense. ‘People are people. I simply think it’s a shame that someone belonging to me has so little sense of his own identity that he feels neither fish nor fowl. Would you start believing you were a monkey if you set up house in a tree?’ She slapped the teapot on the table between them and forgot to select the nearest approximation to matching mugs in Molly’s pair-free universe.
‘I’m not particularly interested in notions of nationality,’ shrugged Patrick. ‘It’s every man for himself out there. What has Ireland ever done for me?’
‘What have you ever done for Ireland?’ she retorted.
Patrick changed the subject. ‘I’ll pour the tea – I don’t think I’ve ever seen a chicken teapot before. What is it with your friend and the farmyard paraphernalia? There’s a wall clock with fluffy yellow chicks instead of numerals, and, sweet Lord, I think I see a chicken toast rack beside the kettle.’
Helen prepared to meet him halfway. ‘Molly has a minor mania about chickens. She says it’s her rural genes asserting themselves – just because she was reared in a city doesn’t mean countless generations of country forebears can be dismissed. Bizarre – but convenient when it comes to buying gifts. If I see anything with a hen on it I snap it up without hesitation and store it in my present box until the next birthday or Christmas.’
‘What’s a present box?’ Patrick bit into a fig roll and smiled his lazy smile, the one he must use on Miriam too. Helen banished the thought.
‘It’s an oestrogen thing. Women buy gifts when we see something we like and then keep them for months until we find the right person to give them to, unlike men who purchase specifically for the occasion.’
‘Women are strange beasts.’ Patrick was on his second fig roll.
‘It’s a way of spending money without frittering it.’ Helen added more biscuits from the packet to the plate.
‘You’ve lost me there.’
‘Sometimes you have this irresistible urge to spend, generally when you can least afford it, so it’s damage limitation if you buy a present for someone you’d have to give a gift to anyhow, whether for their birthday or a house-warming.’ Helen spelled it out patiently for those with learning difficulties.
‘And did you buy Molly the teapot?’
‘No, I think that was a birthday present from her godmother. Anyone who knows Molly is aware of the chicken fixation. I can claim credit for a particularly funky rooster that squawks cock-a-doodle-do when your eggs are boiled. Once for soft-boiled, twice for hard.’
Patrick shook his head, dazed. ‘I tend to dole out book and record tokens for presents myself.’ A hoarse note edged into his voice. ‘Helen, I watched the minutes tick past all week until we’d meet and now I can’t believe we’re discussing chickens.’
‘Better than counting them, surely.’
He laughed. ‘In case this weekend turns pear-shaped, which it won’t because I believe in the power of positive thinking, I have a favour to ask up front.’
Helen waited, misgivings stirring.
‘I’d like a photograph of you. I brought my camera with me.’ Patrick conjured up an Instamatic from the tartan overnight bag at his feet. ‘It won’t bite,’ he reassured her as she all but cowered into her chair. ‘No need to fear white man’s magic. I don’t remember you being so camera-shy.’
‘I don’t like the way I look in photographs.’ Helen folded her arms around her body, cradling the elbows. ‘You must have loads of me. What about the graduation pictures? What about all those snaps Mammy took during the annual fortnight in Tramore?’
‘If I was looking for a photograph of a skinny girl in shorts with occasional ringlets but more often a pudding basin haircut I’d ask Geraldine for one. She’s keeper of the family albums. Ditto a photograph of a still skinny girl in mortar board and gown. What I want is a photograph of a beautiful woman in the prime of her life wearing a cream linen trousersuit and a gold necklace that would keep a family of six for a month if it’s real.’
‘It’s not,’ said Helen.
‘I’ll buy you necklaces studded with emeralds and rubies in Ecuador or Paraguay or wherever we wind up,’ said Patrick. ‘And if I can’t find emeralds and rubies I’ll glue green and red buttons onto the front. You won’t mind, will you?’
Helen was laughing now, her arms no longer forming a stockade across her front. ‘Not a bit, Patrick, I might even prefer them. You’ll have to buy heat resistant glue, though, I wouldn’t want my buttons to fall off if I were wearing one of the necklaces to a smart dinner.’
‘No problem, my love. Now are you ready to face the lens?’
‘Do I have to?’
‘A quick click and it will be over.’ He stroked her under the chin. ‘One photograph, surely that’s not too much to ask?’
Helen hovered between feeling cherished and apprehensive. She caught her reservations by the ear and decided to choose the flattered option. ‘I’ll need to comb my hair first.’
‘Absolutely not. I prefer you slightly dishevelled, it’s more natural.’
‘Natural sucks. Now do you want this photo or don’t you?’ Patrick nodded. ‘In which case I’m going to the bathroom to spend however long it takes making myself look natural. I may be some time.’
Safely behind a locked door she ran a desultory comb through her hair and then sat on the lavatory seat for a breather. This wasn’t going according to plan. Come to think of it she didn’t have a plan. Perhaps that’s where she was going wrong. Concentrate on what you’d like to see happen and then go for it, she exhorted herself. Helen screwed her eyes tight shut and tried to project an image of herself living in Ecuador with Patrick. No pictures materialised. Then she attempted to visualise the two of them shopping for groceries, painting the spare room, choosing furniture. Still no pictures emerged. Finally she had a stab at imaging the two of them making love. Now she had pictures, dozens of them, each more beguiling and disturbing than the last. Helen knuckled her fists into her eyes, heedless of the mascara rings that would follow, and forced a sob back into her gut. Up it welled again. But no tears accompanied it, just a succession of dry, racking heaves.
‘Helen.’ Patrick knocked on the door and rattled the handle. His voice sounded panicky. ‘Helen, open up.’ She held her breath, sobs suspended. ‘Helen, come out or I’ll kick the door down. Don’t shut me out, speak to me. There’s two of us in this.’ The pleading in his voice turned to grit. ‘That’s it, I’m breaking the door down. It’s hardly more than plywood anyway.’
‘No!’ she screamed, then hesitated, taken aback by her own vehemence. ‘No,’ she said more moderately, ‘we can’t vandalise Molly’s property. I’ll come out.’
Helen clicked open the lock and faced him. He took her in his arms and she hung limply against his chest.
‘I thought I could do this,’ she said.
‘You can.’ He lulled her like a child, murmuring into her hair.
She noticed some of her black mascara was smeared on his mint-green shirt front and wondered what Miriam would make of that.
After a time Helen pushed him away. ‘I’m fine now.’ She walked ahead of him into the living room and slid on to the floor with her back to a sofa. ‘I think we should decide what we’re going to do with the rest of our lives, Patrick.’
He nodded. She saw – what? – resignation? lurking in the corners of his mouth. He approached to join her on the rug but thought better of it and sat on the sofa opposite.
The buzzer sounded; they looked at one another with consternation. It rang again more insistently, as though someone was leaning on it with their full weight.
‘Does anyone know we’re here?’ Patrick mouthed.
‘Only Molly, and she’s on her way to Deny,’ Helen whispered back.
The buzzing stopped but they continued to hold their breath. Just as they were relaxing, an authoritative pounding bullied the front door. Whoever had been ringing the buzzer was now outside the apartment.
