Chapter 2
The following day, while walking to my lunch date with Mom, I called my brother Johnny.
‘Howdy. What’s happening, K? Congrats again on the gong.’
‘Thank for the flowers,’ I said.
‘I was gonna send roses, but you know, they are verboten in the Daly family. Still no idea why.’
‘Granny Annie is allergic to them. I think. Anyway, in much bigger news, I’m one of the top ten attendees at my gym. So, life goals and all that.’
‘Wow. You’re really killing life.’ He paused.
‘So, how are you and Michael?’ I kept my voice as bright as possible as I was learning to do when things got awkward as they often did these days.
‘Couldn’t be better. I’m doing Oprah Winfrey’s fruit garden and Keanu Reeves’ courtyard…’
‘You’re name-dropping again. Remember how I told you it was off-putting and you’ll scare away any of your last remaining friends?’
But he just laughed. That was the thing about Johnny. He seized every day of his life, doing things on a whim and so his whole life kept evolving. He had flown to California for a weekend trip and had met Michael, set up his business and never left.
‘Oh,’ he said, as an afterthought, ‘and we’ve just been approved for adoption.’
‘Adoption?’ I went cold. My little brother was going to be a parent before me?
‘Yes! Isn’t it exciting? We had to do so many tests and so many interviews and the paperwork was endless. But, in the end, we were told we were going to make wonderful fathers. And she’s arriving next week. We’re calling her Miss Daisy. And she’s adorable. She kinda pirouettes when she’s excited.’
‘Miss Daisy has four legs, I presume?’
‘Yes, of course, you didn’t think I meant a human? You know I can’t stand actual babies. But you’ll be her fairy godmother, okay?’
‘Of course.’
‘Are you going to Dad’s wedding?’ asked Johnny.
‘Of course. But it’s not until December.’
‘He’s asked me to be his best man.’ He paused. ‘I mean, I’ve been his best man three times now. Do you think I’m a bad omen?’
I laughed. ‘One of us is. Maybe it’s me.’
‘It’s definitely one of us. Anyway, talking of bad omens, how’s Milhouse? Still insufferably boring?’
‘Johnny, you only like people if they are talkative because it means you don’t have to put the effort in.’
‘True enough,’ he said.
Johnny might find Milhouse on the boring side, but he was used to his partner Mike – an exhibitionist extrovert who wore head-to-toe pink and had a voice so loud you could still hear it in your head hours after saying goodbye to him.
‘You have the opposite problem, Kerry-Anne,’ he went on.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You don’t talk. You clam up. You won’t talk about Caitlin…’
Why did everyone want me to talk about her? And what business was it of theirs whether I did or didn’t? I was getting on with life, just like I had promised her. Everyone else expected me to stop and have some kind of breakdown, which I refused to do.
‘Johnny, I’m fine…’ I insisted for the millionth time.
‘Are you, though? Really?’
‘I’ve got to go. Mom’s waiting for me.’
‘Give her my love. Tell her, I’ll come back soon for a visit. Maybe next week, once I’m done with Oprah…’
‘Bye, Johnny. Love you.’
‘Bye, K. Remember, feelings are—’
But I ended the call, irritated by Johnny’s criticism of me.
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to think about Caitlin, I did.
All the time. It was just that it wasn’t good to think about her, because I would begin to spiral, wondering if there was more I could have done and then I would think about how much I missed her, and I definitely didn’t want to do that because I might start crying and might not be able to stop.
The waiter had placed Mom at her usual table, halfway along on the side wall of Le Caprice, so she had a full view of everyone coming in and leaving and who was with whom and all that.
‘Darling!’ As a stylist, she was obviously always immaculately dressed, a trait inherited from Granny Annie.
She had long given up on Johnny, who had refused to wear a tie past the age of eight and now only ever wore shorts and flip-flops.
‘Toes have no place in society, Jonathan,’ she had said.
‘Mom,’ he’d told her, ‘people have toes. Get over it.’ But she hadn’t quite given up on me and still bought me silk scarves or the aforementioned uncomfortable shoes.
Mom had married our father when she was in her very early twenties and then began a life of marrying and divorcing.
She had a succession of awful boyfriends, all identically dressed in button-down shirts and polished loafers, with expensive college educations and with absolutely nothing to say.
Johnny used to call them the Knights of the Living Dead.
Mom and Granny Annie brought us up as a joint effort, really, and Granny Annie, having sold the paper mill by the time Johnny and I came along, was the one who cooked proper dinners for us, read us bedtime stories and brought us away every summer to her beach house.
‘Hi, Mom.’ Kissing her, I slipped into the chair. ‘You look amazing. As always.’
She was fifty-seven and had caught the early wave of treatments and tweakments and had been injecting and plumping for the last two decades. Mom’s long-term clients were women exactly like her who saw ageing just as another challenge to overcome, like the patriarchy or a Boston winter.
‘And you look like the best small new business accelerator,’ she said, smiling. ‘Or whatever it is.’
‘Something like that. And thank you for the flowers.’
‘Freesia. My favourite. Johnny said he sent Californian poppies, which is adorable of him, isn’t it?
But he’s so proud of his big sister, as we all are.
’ She paused. ‘But I’m so relieved you won.
I was so worried that Mitzi’s son was going to win your category.
I sent her a commiseration text this morning.
But you’ve heard about Audrey, I presume?
’ Mom sighed. ‘He’s some kind of European prince.
Moldovan or something. According to Mitzi, his family had to flee in the war and live in exile which she is claiming to be unbearably romantic. ’
‘Romantic? I doubt they were thinking that at the time. Maybe unbearably terrifying?’ I nibbled a breadstick. I hadn’t eaten since my 7 a.m. banana and I tried to work out how many calories might be in one nibble of breadstick. Not many, anyway, and so I nibbled again.
‘The wedding is going to be magnificent.’ Mom sighed again. ‘Mitzi’s asked me to dress her. Five mother-of-the-bride outfits, including a going-away suit.’
‘Five? Will she have body doubles? Stunt Mitzis?’
‘There are multiple events.’ Mom shook her head. ‘She’s going to be even more insufferable.’
‘Well, you’re going to have to get married again, Mom. What? For the sixth time?’
Mom gave me a look. ‘Fifth. But my marrying days are over. Unless George Clooney comes on the market again. Or George Stephanopoulos.’
‘What about Howard?’ Howard was Mom’s current squeeze, a weak-chinned man who Johnny said looked like the Dracula uncle in The Munsters, all widow’s peak and teeth.
Mom rolled her eyes. ‘Howard and I have split up. He was beginning to show his age.’
‘He was sixty-five, Mom.’
‘Yes, but that’s no excuse. He’d begun to wear slippers and you know how I feel about slippers.
Aesthetically, they are disastrous and they encourage shuffling.
’ She turned on her most winning of smiles.
‘But, honey, it’s your turn. You know we’ve spoken about it and I wondered if you and Milhouse had talked.
If you were to give me a date, I could book the hotel.
Provisionally, of course, and then when Mil proposes, we’re all ready to go… ’
‘Definitely not.’
‘It’s just called being prepared,’ she insisted. ‘Perhaps I could just pay a deposit at the Waldorf? Or the Bartlett compound at Cape Cod?’
‘I’m not sure how keen he is on being married.’
‘Really? But you’re perfect. He’s so lucky to have you. Does he not see that?’
‘He’s not in touch with his feelings,’ I admitted.
‘Oh, well, that’s a good thing. You don’t want someone who cries all the time.’
‘Well… I sometimes wonder if he has any emotions at all.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t let that stop me,’ said Mom, breezily.
‘He’s distant. He’s not around that much. He has his own life.’
‘Well, that sounds healthy. And it’s normal for a man. They don’t like being on a leash.’
‘I’m not even sure if he has a sense of humour.’
‘Again, healthy. You don’t want one of those annoying types who laugh too much and too loudly.’ She shuddered. ‘You can’t outrun your life, you know. Sometimes you have to face reality and stop pretending that you have all the time in the world. When I was your age, I was on my third wedding.’
‘I need to catch up.’
She gave me a look. ‘All I’m saying is one minute life stretches ahead of you and the next, it’s all over. Or nearly all over.’
‘I’m aware of that fact, Mom.’ Of course I knew that. I’d spent the entire last two years thinking nothing but about how life can be snatched away.
She gave me a sympathetic smile. ‘You know better than anyone. But you promised me you’d think about it, and maybe it’s time to drop a few hints to Milhouse?’
I changed the subject. ‘Have you seen Granny?’
Mom nodded. ‘We had breakfast together. She says she has finished that book you gave her.’
‘I’ll call in later.’
‘I bought her a very nice silk scarf,’ said Mom. ‘Not that she needs another silk scarf, but we all need our little vices.’
‘She’s where you get your glamour from.’
‘My mother would have been a better stylist than me,’ admitted Mom.
‘But being a young girl from Ireland, she would never have done anything so frivolous. Just hard work, that’s all she knew.
’ Mom smiled, just as her phone rang. ‘Mitzi, honey! Darling! We were just talking about you. Kerry-Anne said you looked stunning in the sequins. Didn’t I tell you?
And yes, to drinks later. Yes, we do need to catch up.
And I’ve already begun a mood board for your wedding wardrobe.
I’m calling it, Power Mother of the Bride.
I’m thinking metallics; with your colouring, you’re going to stand out.
We’ll talk later. Love you, Mitzi.’ Mom put the phone down and gave a shrug. ‘Friendships are complicated.’
But at least Mitzi was alive.
‘Shall we order?’
I had a salad with a side of fries, just to make me feel a little better.
But Mom was beginning to work on me, and perhaps she was right. Perhaps it was time. It would be nice to be married and have someone with whom to build a future and have children.
If Caitlin was here, she’d tell me what to do.
But she wasn’t, nor was she coming back, and I would have to navigate life without the one person who told me what she thought and always had great advice.
Perhaps if I was to be married, it would be a distraction from life and all the things I didn’t want to think about.
Sometimes, I felt as though I was floating around in space and would never find firm ground again.
If only someone would reach up and pull me down and tell me everything was going to be all right.
But obviously I was fine and I’m not one for sympathy or concern, especially when I keep telling people that it’s Caitlin’s mom I was most worried about.
She was the one who was really suffering and, in the hierarchy of grief, mine wasn’t top tier.
I was only her best friend. Some of the best conversations of my life were those last ones I had with her, talking about us and memories, and books and films, and why I should stay blonde and not go mousey and why we will always love Titanic and why Rose could have made room for Jack.
They were treasured times, in a weird way.
But at the end, she made me promise not to be sad about her dying.
‘Don’t waste a second being miserable,’ she insisted.
‘I want you to remember the fun we had.’ We’d met in First Grade and bonded aged nine, over a love of Judy Blume books, and would sign all our notes to each other ‘Kerry-Anne The Great’ and ‘Caitlin The Great’.
Everything reminded me of her, it wasn’t just the street in Boston where that bar was we once went to or a book in a bookshop she had recommended to me, or seeing someone with the exact same colour hair.
That was hard enough. It was the fact that everyone wanted to talk to me about her.
How are you doing? they would ask. Or, It must be hard after…
Or, How did the memorial go? Or, Caitlin would have loved this whatever, wouldn’t she?
And the thing was, I didn’t want to talk about her to anyone and I didn’t want to remember her.
But my mind had other ideas and kept forcing memories to the front of my cortex, like the fun we always had and how we used to laugh so hard, our knees would buckle beneath us.
Or the time she dressed up as Wonder Woman for Halloween and was convinced she was able to leap large distances and fell down the stairs but jumped up, completely unhurt.
And she was always reading three or four books at a time.
When she was in the hospice, she said, ‘Finally, I can read all day!’ And we’d laughed and every day I brought her in new books, until she had a teetering pile of them.
The last book she was reading was her favourite of all time, Persuasion by Jane Austen.
When she died, I brought it home. It’s still there, in my wardrobe, along with the cashmere blanket I had given her in an attempt to make that hospice bed more cheerful (spoiler: I failed).
I didn’t want to remember any of this. I wanted to forget all about her.
And perhaps marriage would be the perfect distraction.
Mom was right. Life does slip away. But it was time to catch hold of it before it did.
Marriage might just get me out of this funk I seemed to be in.
I was going to call Milhouse as soon as I returned to the office.