Chapter 13 #2
Lingering over a delicious bowl of seafood chowder with warm soda bread and feeling bolstered by good food and the festive atmosphere around town, Mary steeled her nerve to finally look at Greg’s messages.
There were a lot of them, but they all said basically the same thing.
He was sorry for how things had happened, he knew he’d handled it badly, but he was caught off guard by Juanita turning up like that and couldn’t think straight.
He hadn’t been fair to her, he was sorry, he hoped she could forgive him.
She thought of a dozen bitter, scathing replies, but couldn’t summon the will to send any of them.
There was one from this morning saying he hoped she’d have a happy Christmas, despite everything…
She tossed the phone aside angrily, tears pricking her eyes.
Yeah, thanks a lot, Greg. Not much chance of that now, thanks to you.
She felt deflated again as she loaded up the car and drove back to Inch.
As she got out of the car her phone pinged with a message and she seethed when she saw that it was Greg.
He must have seen that she’d read his messages and was hoping she’d reply to him now.
Well, he could go hang. She shoved her phone back into her bag and stomped into the house feeling weary and defeated.
At least she’d see all her friends at the pub tonight, she consoled herself, as she opened the door.
And dinner at the O’Sullivans’ tomorrow would be nice.
She wouldn’t let Greg ruin Christmas for her completely.
She was determined to keep her spirits up and have a nice time despite him and Evan.
She was surprised to hear voices in the kitchen as she opened the front door.
‘I don’t know,’ Evan was saying. ‘I just don’t feel—’
She stilled in the doorway, cocking an ear.
Evan being… loquacious? Talking about his feelings?
She wanted to hear this. She closed the door softly, straining to hear as she unwound her scarf and hung up her coat.
She stashed the bag containing Evan’s sweater under the coat stand, then picked up the rest of her shopping and tiptoed slowly down the hall towards the living room.
The other person was talking now, their voice a low murmur.
She could tell it was a woman, but it was impossible to make out what she was saying.
She stopped halfway down the hall, waiting for Evan to speak again.
‘Okay. Thanks, Sheena. I appreciate it.’
Sheena! Damn, she’d missed a call from her mother. She darted the rest of the way down the hall.
‘I’m here!’ she called as she pushed the living room door open with her shoulder. But she was too late. Evan had already closed out of the Zoom screen, ending the call.
Evan looked up at her, startled. ‘I didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Was that Mum?’ She nodded at the screen. ‘I, um… thought I heard her voice.’ She didn’t want to admit outright that she’d been eavesdropping.
‘Yes, it was.’
‘Is everything okay?’ She pulled her phone from her pocket, wondering if her mother had been trying to reach her, but there were no missed calls.
‘Is there some problem at your place?’ she asked as Evan stood and took some of the bags from her.
They lifted them onto the counter and he began unpacking the groceries alongside her.
‘No, she just called to chat,’ Evan said from the depths of the fridge as he put the champagne in to chill.
‘To you?’
‘Yeah.’ Evan closed the fridge door. ‘You have a problem with that?’ he asked, frowning.
‘No, of course not. It’s just a bit…’
‘What?’
‘Well… weird. I mean, you don’t even know her. What does she have to talk to you about?’ What was she saying? It was as if she’d never met her mother. She could talk for Ireland to just about anyone, and would.
‘Just… stuff. You know, this and that.’
‘Yeah.’ She smiled wryly. ‘I know my mother. Sorry.’
‘You don’t have to apologise for her. I like her. She’s a nice lady.’
‘She is. But where do you get off talking to her? She’s my mum. First you take over our house and now you’re moving in on my mother!’
Evan laughed softly, his eyes lighting up like she’d said something funny. ‘Just because she’s your mom, doesn’t mean you own her.’
‘I know that,’ Mary said sulkily. ‘What were you talking about anyway?’
‘None of your business.’
‘It is if you were talking to my mum.’
‘Nope. That’s not how it works.’
He remained maddeningly tight-lipped as they put away the rest of the shopping. She’d been so preoccupied with the idea of him chatting to her mother that she hadn’t thought to be surprised that he was helping her.
‘Cup of tea?’ he asked her when they’d finished.
‘Good idea.’ She moved to switch on the kettle, but he waved her away.
‘It’s cool, I’ll make it.’
‘Oh! Okay.’ She sat and watched him suspiciously as he made tea and poured two mugs.
‘Thanks,’ she said when he placed one in front of her on the table. ‘I’ll take this up to my room.’
‘No need for that,’ he said, as she made to stand. ‘You can stay. You don’t have to go hide in your room.’
‘What’s got into you?’ she asked as he turned back to the counter.
‘What do you mean?’ He frowned at her over his shoulder as he opened a cupboard.
‘Why are you being nice all of a sudden?’
‘I’m always nice.’
She threw him a sceptical look, but he’d turned back and was rooting in the cupboards.
‘What are these?’ He turned to her, holding up a packet of Chocolate Kimberley biscuits.
‘You won’t have had one of them before, will you?’
He shook his head.
‘You haven’t lived, my friend. They’re a very important part of an Irish Christmas.’
‘What are they exactly?’
‘Soft ginger biscuits with marshmallow in the middle, covered in chocolate. It’s hard to describe – you’d have to taste it.’
‘Hmm. Shall we?’ He shook the purple packet, eyebrows raised.
She nodded, smiling. ‘Yes, please.’
He brought the packet of biscuits to the table along with his own mug, then sat beside her. They both took an individually wrapped biscuit from the pack. Evan unwrapped his and eyed it suspiciously before taking a bite.
‘Your first taste of a Chocolate Kimberley,’ Mary said. ‘This is a big moment in a young man’s life.’
She watched as he chewed thoughtfully, his eyes on her. Then his lips spread in a grin. ‘Oh my God,’ he mumbled out of the side of his mouth.
Mary smiled back at him. ‘Right?’ She peeled hers open slowly, savouring the moment, breathing in the chocolatey smell. Evan had finished his in two big bites and was already reaching for another.
‘Hey, don’t eat them all at once. This packet has to last us until the day after Christmas at least.’
‘I could go out and buy more? Are the shops still open? Maybe we should get some to bring to the O’Sullivans’ tomorrow.’
She narrowed her eyes at him. What had come over him? Why was he being so cheerful and talking about going to the O’Sullivans’ as if he wanted to? ‘You didn’t answer my question earlier.’
‘What question?’
‘Why are you suddenly being friendly and nice?’
‘I told you, I’m always nice.’
She raised her eyebrows at him.
‘Okay, maybe I was a bit of a grumpy asshat when you first got here—’
‘Maybe? A bit?’
‘Fine, I was definitely a one hundred per cent grumpy asshat, all right? I admit it.’ He held his hands up. ‘You weren’t seeing me at my best. It just threw me, you turning up like that when I was expecting to be here alone. I’m sorry, okay?’
‘Okay.’ She smiled. ‘But that still doesn’t explain this sudden change of—’ She stopped, a sudden realisation hitting her like a punch.
He’d been talking to her mother. Shit! What had she said?
Had she told him about her break-up with Greg?
Was he being nice to her now because he pitied her? ‘What did my mother say to you?’
‘Just stuff about what’s happening at the apartment mostly, and what they’ve been doing in New York.’
‘Did she say anything about me? She did, didn’t she?’
‘Not everything is about you, you know.’
‘I know that. I also know my mother. She said something, didn’t she? About me?’
He shrugged, looking uncomfortable. ‘She may have mentioned something—’
‘What?’
‘Just that you were going through a rough time.’
Phew! At least she’d kept it vague and hadn’t gone into the humiliating specifics.
‘With your boyfriend dumping you just before Christmas and all,’ Evan elaborated.
Oh great. Thanks a lot, Mum. ‘So she made you feel sorry for me? You’re being nice to me now out of pity?’ This was mortifying. She’d almost prefer he’d go back to being hostile to her.
‘No.’ He sighed. ‘She just said she hoped we were getting along and not to take it personally if you were a bit unfriendly to me.’
‘If I was unfriendly to you?’
‘She made me realise that it’s not all about me, you know?’
Yeah, she knew. That was pretty much her mother’s mantra.
Many times as teenagers Mary and her siblings had wailed, ‘I can do what I like; it’s my life!
’ at their mother, only to be told: ‘It’s your life, but you’re not the only one in it’.
Mary smiled. ‘Did she say that you may very well be the main character of your own life—’
‘But not to forget you’re a secondary character in other people’s,’ Evan finished.
‘And you can be a good one or a crappy one. Yeah. I guess she got me to see it from your perspective. I mean, you’d come home expecting to have a nice Christmas with your family, surrounded by people who care about you – comfort and joy and all that. And instead you got… me.’
‘The original inspiration for the Grinch.’ She laughed.
‘To be fair, I wasn’t very understanding myself.
I mean, you’d come here to mope all by yourself with no one to bother you or take you out for a nice Christmas dinner or feed you Chocolate Kimberleys, or even care if you jumped off a bridge – the Yuletide dream, basically!
And then I show up. Your worst nightmare, right? ’