Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
‘H as he done a runner?’ Una laughed down the phone.
‘I don’t know. His bag has gone and the front door was locked – I hadn’t even noticed the key through the letter box until I stood on it.’
‘Didn’t he leave you a note?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Jesus, Pearl, you’ve really done it this time.’ Una sighed.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, you must have scared the poor guy off.’
‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘All that praying!’
‘Shut up.’
‘Something must have happened to make him leave without saying goodbye?’
‘I even made soda bread for breakfast.’
‘Jesus,’ Una muttered again.
‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘You might as well stick a four-leaf clover on your head and do the Irish jig waving the Irish flag.’
‘That’s harsh.’
‘You’re twenty-seven, Pearl, not sixty-seven!’
‘He’s a tourist.’
‘Ah, don’t be daft. He’s a bloke looking for a good time before he goes back to the other side of the world. Let’s face it, you didn’t give it to him, and so he’s gone.’
‘So I was meant to sleep with him?’ I said, affronted.
‘You were meant to have some fun.’
‘I drank whisky, I never drink whisky.’
‘Exactly.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You drank whisky and you went to bed, alone, and now he’s gone and you’ll be going to bed alone, again, like you always do.’
‘You’re being a shite friend.’
‘I’m just telling you how it is, that’s a good friend.’
‘You’re trying to make me sleep with a random man.’
‘I’m trying to make you let your hair down.’
‘I don’t want to let my hair down,’ I said stubbornly.
‘Why the hell not?’
‘Because the last time I listened to you, I singed it.’
‘I’m not talking about your actual hair.’ Una sighed sarcastically.
‘I know you’re not.’
‘Good.’
‘Good.’
‘Bye then.’
‘Bye.’
* * *
One hour later, when I had finished hoovering and cleaning up from the night before – not that there was much to clean up because I’d done most of the cleaning while I baked the bread – Jack came back.
He stood at my front door with a screwdriver in his hand and I stood there speechless.
‘Your handle needs tightening,’ he said and I nearly passed out from the beat of my own heart as it hammered at my chest.
The first thing I did was text Una, after I’d cut Jack a slice of my bread, to tell her he was back and that I’d given him some and that he’d loved it. I left out that I meant the bread so that she would think I’d slept with him and I didn’t reply when she sent a load of open-mouthed emoji’s back.
I’d thought long and hard about what Una had said during my hour of cleaning. It wasn’t that I wouldn’t sleep with Jack, but he hadn’t exactly tried to – even after a drink – so how could I? I wasn’t going to jump on the guy if he wasn’t interested. I wasn’t Carmel. He’d had two chances and not taken either of them, and I had begun to wonder if I had imagined our kiss from Friday night after the pub.
Jack told me he had been to the garage to check on his car and borrowed Mr Dutson’s screwdriver to fix my door handle. Mr Dutson told him it should be ready by Monday afternoon and so I had one more night with Jack, one more night to prove Una wrong.
It was only sex. I wouldn’t have to see him again or think about it at all if I didn’t want to… Only I knew that I would obsess over it for the rest of my life. And who knew, maybe he would want to see me again, maybe he would stay longer and we’d have a full-blown fling. That would show Una.
‘So what happens in sleepy Drangan on a Sunday?’ Jack asked once he was done with the door.
‘It’s quiz night in The Tally,’ I said, a little too enthusiastically.
I usually went with Una. She liked to think she had all the answers and I was happy to let her, even if it meant we never won.
‘Are you any good?’
‘Not bad.’
‘Fancy it?’ he said with a grin that made my heart race.
I didn’t need to think about my answer.
‘Let’s do it,’ I said.
I picked up my phone and punched my message to Una.
I need those condoms back…
* * *
My grandmother was full of sayings. If she felt a mess she was a right ruddy wreck . If someone made a fuss of something it was a hullabaloo. If someone hurt her they could go and boil their head (she said that a lot to Una when Shaun did everything but with Carmel). Another one of her favourites was I feel like a dead duck when she felt rough and she’s a real banshee when her next-door neighbour, Peggy Cary, moaned a lot – mostly about the crows in her garden that appeared every morning at the same time, even though she never fed them.
My grandmother was my best friend. We used to pick apples in the orchard that she owned with my grandfather across the road and make apple pies with them when we got home. We had a great routine. I’d climb the trees and shake their branches and she’d wait below for the apples to fall. She’d bring her basket and a flask of tea and I’d pack us both cheese and pickle sandwiches, then we’d pick the forget-me-nots that grew in bright blue bunches and she’d tell me how her lost love used to leave them for her on her doorstep before she married my grandfather.
On the way home, we’d collect sticks from the lanes to light her fire. I suppose you might say it was picture perfect, only I’d missed out the bit about me having to count the apples before they fell to the ground, which was impossible and extended our day by about two hours.
My grandmother used to tell me that I’d make myself mentally ill with all my habits, (that’s what she called them) but I reassured her that I was mentally ill anyway, so it didn’t matter.
My parents sold the orchard after she died but I still went up there sometimes just to feel like it was still ours, even though Peggy Carey had bought it and flattened all the forget-me-nots with her car that she parked there. I used to hope that the apples would fall and break her car window the way she had broken the flowers.
There were a few hours to kill before quiz night. A few hours with Jack and I had to make them count. But what was fun in Drangan for a tourist? I couldn’t take him apple picking because I’d never be able to do it without counting on repeat. I’d wanted to ask him to pick wild mushrooms with me but I was too scared to follow through in case he said no.
When she was alive, my grandmother said that any man who picked wild mushrooms would be the man for me. When I’d asked her what would happen if I met him in the summer when the mushrooms weren’t out, she’d promised me she’d leave me a sign, and I’d held her to it ever since, even though I had no idea what that sign would be.
A dead duck, maybe?
Or a boiled head?
Or a banshee?