Chapter 32
PATRICK
In front of the wall of the kitchen garden, at the end of the top lawn, beyond the beds of roses and in the shade of a willow tree, there were rugs and low benches.
A bar had been set up, a long table, covered in a white tablecloth placed under a large parasol.
Grace was mixing the raspberry syrup with Prosecco to make her Cliff Toppers and beside her Rosie was adding ice and extra raspberries.
Grace said something, making Rosie laugh.
Patrick gazed at her, wondering quite how hard it had been for her to manage a hotel on her own.
Obviously, she had a good team, but she seemed to be running everything on her own.
And as for the brother-in-law, Laurence, he was a liability.
But Patrick was well used to family members who were a liability. He had the prize-winning one.
And there he was. His father was standing to one side talking to another guest, one of Niamh’s uncles.
He could hear his voice. ‘…the Cork team are playing well this season,’ he was saying.
‘But when Johnny Barry took that puck to the head and Phelim Murphy grabbed his hurl and whipped the sliotar straight into the goal, I knew Tipp was done for…’
Niamh’s uncle looked confused. ‘Rugby’s my game,’ he said, in a booming voice. ‘Leinster man, me. Season ticket. Just back from Perpignan. Great game. D’you see it?’
Sandra was standing beside them slightly awkwardly and, again, Patrick felt sorry for her.
He recognised something in her, something which he understood.
He was about to go and talk to her when Teddy, Rosie’s father, joined him, carrying a tray of glasses filled with what looked like Aperol spritzes.
‘Fancy a drink?’ said Teddy. ‘It’s called a Cliff Topper, apparently, made with honey from our bees and raspberries from the garden. Now, I’ve had a sip, and it’s pretty good.’ He smiled at Patrick. ‘Would you like one?’
‘Yes, please.’ He sipped it. ‘Delicious.’
‘The girls are so good at all these ideas,’ said Teddy.
‘Full of them. They bring such life to a place, they really do. I don’t know what I’d do without them all.
And now we have Grace brightening the place up with the bunting and the rushing about.
And then my grandchildren, well, they’re like little rockets.
Never stop. It’s Granddad this, Granddad that…
’ He shook his head, smiling. ‘I’m a lucky man, I really am.
’ He turned just as someone took two glasses from his tray.
‘Of course. Enjoy them! Slainté!’ He turned back to Patrick. ‘Anyway, enjoy the afternoon.’
Kate was standing behind him. ‘I’ll have one of those, please,’ she said, taking a glass. ‘Thank you very much.’
Teddy nodded. ‘Well, I’ve leave you to it.’ He smiled at them both, and moved on.
Kate leaned into Patrick. ‘Someone is screaming because a bee dared to hover a bit too close.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘I love bees, don’t you?’
Patrick nodded. ‘Of course…’
‘I can’t bear people who scream when one comes near, can you?
They’re good for biodiversity, I always tell them.
’ She smiled at him. ‘The same with spiders. I’m always the one who is asked to remove spiders from rooms. And I always use my hands, scoop them up…
’ She mimed removing an imaginary spider.
‘And out it goes. Fear isn’t in my DNA.’ She laughed.
‘I’m an adrenaline junkie. It’s my poison.
What about you? You like OD-ing on adrenaline? ’
‘I’m not a major fan,’ he admitted. She was holding his gaze again, following his pupils with hers.
It reminded him of playing hurling when he was at school, when you had to mark another player, staying close to them, anticipating their next move.
Disconcertingly, she was marking him with her eyeballs.
‘Really? I would have thought you would be. Off-trail mountain biking, kitesurfing, ice caving…’
‘Ice caving? Do you mean ice carving?’ He could see her with an electric chainsaw hacking away at some gigantic block of ice.
‘No, ice caving,’ she said. ‘We did it in Norway, where you cut through the glacier where there are these tiny passageways and you have to push yourself through, the breath is squeezed out of you, and all you can think about is the million tonnes of impacted ice that’s on top of you.
’ She flicked her head so her hair bounced around her shoulders as though on springs.
Kate was nice, with good hair, great teeth, like the small white Lego bricks.
They were oddly fascinating. And although it was now clear to him that he had no interest in anyone but Rosie, he wasn’t being realistic.
This time in Ireland was perhaps a full stop, a final curtain, a chance to say goodbye, properly, as friends, and he could properly move on because the memory of her had stopped him from fully committing to someone else.
Surely it was time to make an effort and find someone else interesting and attractive?
Who wouldn’t want someone with an ability to crawl through a glacier?
Kate placed a hand on his arm. ‘You went swimming earlier, apparently? You should have told me. I adore swimming.’ Was she was going to tell him about the time she swam with piranhas?
And true to form… ‘Have you ever been close to a shark?’ she said.
‘Last summer, a group of us were in Aruba and they had this tank, more a cage, really, and they said we could go down…’
Rosie was moving through the guests, topping up everyone’s glasses from the pitcher.
He heard her voice over the sound of everyone else’s.
‘You can buy an ice cream after your swim at the Forty Foot,’ she was saying.
‘He does this amazing sea salt one and a Irish brown bread flavour…’ She laughed at something.
Patrick tuned back into Kate.
‘…And so it was one of the most exhilarating things I’ve ever done. I came out feeling invincible. You know that feeling?’
‘Not regularly.’
She laughed. ‘You’re so funny. But Seán was telling me about your bar in Boston.
It’s really a restaurant, isn’t it?’ Her eyes were fixed on his, as though she was trying to hypnotise him.
He wished she wasn’t trying so hard. He liked Kate but he didn’t want to talk about Fitzgerald’s, not here.
Fitzgerald’s was more than a bar, it was part of him. But how could he explain that to Kate?
‘I bet the ice carving was cool,’ he said, inanely.
‘Caving.’ She looked a bit annoyed now. ‘And yes it was cool. And I bet your swim earlier was cool.’
‘Literally. I was so hot…’
She blinked at him for a second or two. ‘Yes,’ she replied, slowly, as though her batteries were running out. ‘You really are.’
Oh, for God’s sake. He might be looking for love, but it wasn’t going to be with Kate. He quickly downed his drink. ‘And you, what did you do this morning?’
‘Oh, I was with Niamh, trying to organise a few last-minute things. Filling the party favours, that kind of thing. Checking the place names. It’s not easy organising a wedding. When I get married, I am going to pay someone to do it for me.’
‘Sounds like a very sensible plan.’ He looked around at everyone, really looking for Rosie, but she’d disappeared. Seán, however, was crawling on the ground, with Isabelle and Killian on his back.
‘Oh, here’s Brian and Sandra,’ said Kate, turning to greet Patrick’s father and stepmother. ‘Are you both having a lovely time?’
Brian looked a little drunk, thought Patrick. He had that swimmy, glazed expression in his eyes, his face red from the sun, his bald head shiny. ‘I’m looking for some proper drinkzzz,’ he said. ‘None of this orange shite…’
Kate looked a little taken aback. ‘It’s my favourite drink,’ she said. ‘Everyone loves an Aperol spritz. It’s the perfect summer drink…’ She looked at Patrick for backup. ‘Don’t they?’
He shrugged, motioning towards his father. ‘Obviously not.’
Kate took this as a personal slight and turned to Sandra. ‘Do you like them?’
Sandra nodded. ‘They are very nice. Like Red Lemonade. Remember that? You used to be able to buy big bottles of it. We’d take it down to Garretstown Beach and it would be as warm as tea by the time we were allowed to drink it, and there was always a mouthful of sand to go with it…
’ She smiled nervously at them. ‘I don’t think they’re allowed to sell it any more… ’
Brian was looking at her as though she’d gone mad. ‘Sell what?’
‘Red Lemonade. The EU banned it, I think. It was all E-numbers and carcinogens and all sorts…’ She smiled again, and Patrick again felt his heart go out to her.
All this time, he had blamed her, but she was just someone caught up in his father’s charms. She’d made a mistake falling for him, she knew that now.
She deserved better. He knew his mother never blamed Sandra either, and wouldn’t hear a bad word from the boys about her.
And he admired her valiant effort of small talk under trying circumstances.
‘I remember that,’ he said. ‘It was delicious. And it was better served boiling hot on Garretstown Beach.’
Sandra suddenly smiled at him gratefully.
‘That’s because you culchies are from Cork,’ said Kate, laughing. ‘We wouldn’t drink that shite up here in Dublin. We had proper drinks, like Coke and 7 Up and Sprite.’
‘I need another drink…’ said Brian again, looking around.
‘I think you’ve had enough, Dad,’ said Patrick, evenly. ‘You look like you’ve been on it for some time…’ He turned to Sandra, who nodded.
‘He’s got a bottle in the room,’ she said, quietly.
‘I think you need to sleep it off.’ Patrick used the tone of voice he used for particularly obstreperous customers, the ones who had drunk so much that they forgot not only where they were but who they were.
The men with the big expense accounts and big wallets who then couldn’t handle their drink.
Patrick always thought of their wives and girlfriends and pitied them.
His mother had lived with someone determined to drag her down, and now Sandra was the same.
‘I’ll bring you to your room,’ he said, fixing Brian with a look.
‘Come on, walk with me.’ He reached for his father’s elbow, hoping to steer him away from the guests and into the hotel. ‘Have you got the key, Sandra?’
But Brian shook him off. ‘Get your fecking hands off me, big man. Get them off me!’
Suddenly, everyone in the garden stopped talking, turning to look at Patrick and Brian.
Patrick smiled, stood back, his hands up in surrender. ‘No problem. It’s all grand.’
Seán was beside him. ‘What’s going on?’ he said, quietly. Kate had moved away, but Sandra, as though she realised that this was her problem, and one she couldn’t ignore, stayed.
‘Brian, come on,’ she said.
‘Dad’s drunk,’ said Patrick to Seán, quietly, but their father had heard him.
‘It’s a fecking wedding, is it not?’ he said, angrily. ‘We’ve driven all this way, have we not? Left Cork and come to Dublin for my son’s wedding and we’re not allowed to drink? Is that what ye’s telling me?’
‘No, you’re allowed to drink and get drunk,’ said Seán. ‘But not be aggressive. That’s not on.’
‘Sleep it off, Dad,’ said Patrick, calmly, icily.
‘No harm done. Get yourself to bed. And we’ll say no more.
’ He went again to take Brian’s elbow, but this time Brian swung back so violently that he lost his balance and staggered before falling on Sandra.
The two of them fell to the ground. Patrick saw Rosie standing close by, her eyes full of concern.
She ran to help Sandra, pulling her to her feet, brushing off the grass from the back of her dress, smiling broadly.
‘Are you okay? Do you need anything?’
Behind them, Grace was racing over with a fold-up deckchair, the two children, bless them, carrying a cushion each.
Brian held up both arms. ‘I am fine! I am fine!’ He swivelled between them as though playing the buzz game where you can’t touch the sides, and then he made his way along the grass, a little unsteadily, and back towards the hotel.
The other guests were trying to look away, and pretend it wasn’t happening, so as not to embarrass them further.
Patrick’s blood was pumping so hard. His head was about to explode.
He could feel the sweat on the back of his neck, his palms were sticky.
He thought, I am still that sixteen-year-old.
All these years of adulthood, being in charge, being my own man, and nothing’s changed. I am still under his control.
He looked up and met Rosie’s eyes.
‘Sorry,’ he said to her.
‘For what?’
‘Hope that wasn’t a scene.’
‘We’ve had worse.’ She smiled at him. ‘Don’t worry.’
He turned to Sandra, who was sitting on the deckchair, Isabelle and Killian on either side of her.
‘We’re looking after our guest,’ said Isabelle. ‘Would you like a drink of water?’
Sandra nodded, still a little shaken, and Killian ran off to bring her one back.
Patrick kneeled down beside her.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. Her voice was almost breaking. ‘I am so sorry. I’ve been so stupid.’
The rest of the wedding guests had resumed their talking, the diversion over. Patrick’s hands were trembling. He had a choice, either face what he had been running away from or keep running – and yet he knew that, if he chose the latter, he’d have to keep running forever.