Leaving
Leaving
‘IT’LL BE GOOD FOR YOU,’ FRANCES SAID. ‘TRAVEL broadens the mind. I’d like to have seen a few different places, but it wasn’t done in my day, not for women anyway. You’ll always have a bed here if you need it.’
‘Thank you, Frances. I’ll miss you.’
‘Come and see me when you’re home on holidays.’
‘I will,’ Ellen promised.
‘London?’ her mother said, frowning. ‘What put that into your head? I thought you liked the bookshop.’
‘I did . . . I just felt like a change.’
‘But you know nobody in London.’
Ellen let a beat pass. ‘Claire’s coming too.’
Her mother regarded her in dismay. ‘Oh no – I was hoping you’d get away from her.’
Ellen smothered a stab of anger. No point in fighting now, not when she’d be gone soon. ‘I know you don’t like her, but she’s my friend. We’ll be fine.’
No comment. ‘It’ll be far more expensive than Ireland. I can’t afford to pay London rent.’
‘You won’t have to – I have savings. I’ll be OK till I get sorted with work.’
‘Exciting,’ Joan said, ‘but mind your bag on those underground trains. Seamus’ cousin had her wallet taken last summer – it was so crowded she hadn’t a clue who did it.’
‘Big change,’ Danny said. ‘I hope you’ll still make my graduation.’
‘Of course I will. I’ve said it to Frances.’
They’d managed to paper over the cracks his approach, and her rejection of it, had caused. They still met up on Wednesday nights, and often at the weekend too, and if she sensed a new small caution between them, she figured they’d get past that too, in time.
She hadn’t told him about Ben. She’d told nobody apart from Frances. It was too raw to talk about, the wound still too open to probe.
‘Every good wish,’ Miss Fogarty said when Ellen was finishing up on her last day at work. Miss Fogarty was Ben’s replacement, a very different kind of manager. Nothing accidental about her, with her tailored suits and clipboard. No discounts on books at any time of the year, and no secondhand section either: she’d soon put a stop to that.
‘Take care,’ Edwin said, looking mournful. ‘Drop in anytime you’re back in Galway.’
‘Some fine bookshops in London,’ Jasper said. ‘Very fine indeed.’
Ellen intended to visit them all, every single one, particularly Marks & Co. at 84 Charing Cross Road, the one she most wanted to see. Helene Hanff’s book had prompted lots of tears.
In the last week of July she turned twenty-one. Two days later, she and Claire took the Magic Bus to London