Authors: Marita Conlon-McKenna
‘I know that.’
‘Do you love Matt?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then be honest with him. You can’t hide things in a marriage, it never works.’
‘I know,’ Kerrie said, feeling a huge pang of regret for what she had done. All the deception! Things couldn’t go on between Matt and herself the way they were. They had to be honest and open with each other. If he didn’t want to marry her, he had to tell her!
Little Jamie came in from playing football. He’d cut his knee, and Kerrie wiped his tears, found a big plaster in the medicine box and stuck it on. Later she gave baby Max his bottle and changed him. His chubby fingers grabbed on to her blonde hair as she played with him.
Her sister Martina came back laden with shopping bags from town, and did a fashion parade for them, showing off her new outfits and shoes.
‘These are the first new things I’ve bought since Max was born,’ she said, giving a twirl around the kitchen in her new red dress. ‘Now that Darren’s got work again things are looking up!’
‘You’ll all stay for tea,’ insisted Claire O’Neill. ‘I’ll make my meatballs in tomato sauce for everyone. Jamie loves them.’
Kerrie jumped up and offered to help, cutting up the onions and helping to shape the seasoned balls of minced beef.
‘I don’t believe it!’ teased her mother as Kerrie told her all about her cookery classes, and the kind of things she had learned to make.
After dinner, when Martina and the kids had gone, Kerrie stayed in the kitchen talking to Shannon while her mam and dad sat on the couch together and watched a DVD.
‘Mam says you are working really hard!’ Kerrie smiled. ‘Good girl, that’s exactly what you need to do for the next few weeks … get through the exams and get what you want.’
‘If I want to go to Trinity College or UCD I’ll need to get at least four hundred points,’ her younger sister, with her long dark hair and skinny face, explained. ‘I’m hoping to pick up an A or two in maybe physics or maths or even chemistry. My teacher, Miss Hanratty, says that I’m on track, but I just need to keep going. I want to be like you, Kerrie, and do well!’
Kerrie looked at the big brown eyes and long dark lashes; her sister was so beautiful and so focused.
‘If you need any help with anything, Shannon, I’m here for you. Any help I can give you with revising or going back over things, let me know. I’m still pretty hot at maths, you know.’
‘I just hope I make it into bio-medical science,’ Shannon confided. ‘I’d love to be doing research and finding out things the whole time … it would be a cool kind of job to have.’
‘What about the rest of your subjects, how are they?’
‘OK, I guess. My French is a bit ropy, but I should pass it, and I like Irish, believe it or not!’
‘Do you need any help with the French?’ Kerrie pressed.
‘Maybe.’
‘Well, how about for the next few weeks we get together and go over your French until the exams? It’s one of my favourite languages,’ offered Kerrie.
‘That would be great.’ Her sister grinned.
‘I’m staying here tonight, so maybe we can go through some work after breakfast.’
*
Wearing a pair of Shannon’s pyjamas, Kerrie slept in her old bedroom, which now contained a baby’s cot and changing gear, and a cardboard cut-out of Dora the Explorer stuck on the wardrobe door.
‘Night, pet,’ said her mam, creeping in to give her a kiss. ‘It’s nice to have you here. Sleep well.’
She had slept well for the first time in weeks, and woken clear-headed and refreshed. Going home after a massive family Sunday lunch, she had taken some of the family photos, promising to make copies and return them to her mam the following week. There was a photo taken on holiday in a caravan park in Wexford, with them all running into the waves grinning in the sunshine in their swimming togs; a photo taken in the back garden when Shannon made her first Holy Communion, and one of Kerrie’s mam and dad on their wedding day. She had also discovered Fred, the old black and white teddy bear she’d had since she was about two, on the top of the wardrobe, and had shaken the dust off him and taken him home, sitting proudly in the front of the car with her.
Matt would be home later tonight. She needed to talk to him. They had to sit down and be honest with each other. She had been so stupid, so scared of losing him! Hiding things! Pretending. It was pathetic. But now there could be no more pretending, no more lies. She’d had enough of it!
Kerrie sat on the couch, waiting for Matt to come home, watching the lights of the city below come on. A breeze drifted in from the balcony as she listened to Kings of Leon, one of Matt’s favourite bands. She had Coronas chilling in the fridge, and some food in, as he might be hungry.
She heard his footsteps outside the door, and his key turning in the lock. He looked beat, exhausted, and she hugged him tight, savouring the smell of his skin and sweat and the remnants of his aftershave.
‘Matt, can we talk?’
‘Kerrie, I’m absolutely shattered,’ he said, flinging himself on the couch. ‘Can it wait till tomorrow, or another time?’
‘No,’ she said seriously. ‘It can’t. I need to talk to you tonight.’
He looked wrecked, but she had to talk to him now, before her courage deserted her and the pretence all started again.
‘Have you eaten?’
‘I had a massive meal before I left. You know what Mum’s like.’
‘What about a drink?’
He nodded, throwing his head back on the headrest of the couch. He looked so good: his long handsome face, and scruffy dark hair, and lean legs in their pale chinos, and his pale blue Massimo Dutti shirt. She loved him so much that it hurt.
She fetched two chilled beers from the fridge, and curled up on the chair opposite him.
‘What’s this all about?’ he asked warily.
‘It’s about us … well, it’s about me,’ she said. She could tell that she had Matt’s attention.
‘Matt, you know all the meals and dinners we’ve had since we moved in here?’ she said softly. ‘All the lovely lasagnes and chicken and beef dishes and the banoffi pies and fudge brownies you adore … well, the truth is that I didn’t make any of them. I couldn’t cook, so I bought them and pretended to you that I could.’
‘What?’ he said, perplexed, sitting forward. ‘You didn’t make them, any of them? But I saw you in the kitchen …’
‘You saw what I wanted you to see, for you to get the impression that I was a good cook,’ she admitted. ‘I know it was crazy, but I just couldn’t admit to not being perfect. So I lied to you! And on Tuesday nights I haven’t been doing a course in work since January. I’ve been doing a cookery course in Monkstown. I’m actually trying to learn to cook.’
‘Why couldn’t you tell me?’ he said, hurt. ‘Kerrie, I never expected you to be able to cook, to be perfect! Why would you think that it would matter?’
‘You are right about me … what you said the other day … I wanted our lives to be perfect. I thought that’s what you would expect of me,’ she said, trying not to cry.
‘Cookery lessons on a Tuesday,’ he said, putting his hand
to his forehead. ‘There was I, worried that you were seeing some guy from work, as you always seemed so happy when you came home.’
‘What?’
‘We’ve both been pretty stupid. I should have asked you.’
‘There would never ever be anyone else,’ she said, her eyes welling with tears. ‘How could you even think that, Matt?’
‘Is the big confession over?’ Matt said wearily.
‘No,’ she said. ‘This is only the start of it.’
Matt sat up on the couch, his beer in his hand.
‘Matt, I didn’t grow up in safe middle-class Terenure, in a big house with a garden and my daddy working for one of the banks. I didn’t go to one of those fancy fee-paying girls’ schools … I didn’t just swan into college with the rest of my social set.’ She took a deep breath, trying to control the shake in her voice.
‘My life is the complete opposite. I grew up in Tallaght, on a big estate, and went to Riverfield Community School, one of the biggest schools in the country, with some of the most disadvantaged students. And I busted my guts to get a place in college and drag myself up. I went to America one summer on my J1 – that’s where I got to know Ruth and Christine and Laura and Caroline – and I just hung out with them, and when we got back to college people began to assume that I was part of their gang. We went everywhere together – holidays in Greece, backpacking in Europe – and later, when we all started working, shopping trips to New York and skiing in Austria and France and …’
‘Meribel,’ he said slowly.
‘Matt, I studied so hard and worked so hard … maybe I even began to believe that I was like them. I learnt about art
and literature and architecture and style … All the things to help me fit into the world I wanted to belong to … your world.’
She looked at the expensive wooden floor, noticing the rich colour of the natural wood that had been imported from Canada, the width of each board, the perfect symmetry of it.
‘I’m a fraud, a liar!’ she said despairingly. ‘I haven’t been honest with you. I could understand you hating me. It’s just that I can’t pretend any more … I’ve had enough of it.’
‘I knew about your school,’ said Matt gently. ‘Well, the fact that you didn’t go to Castlemount or St Mary’s or Annefield. Georgina’s best friend and her four sisters all went to Castlemount, and when Georgina mentioned your name none of them had heard of you. Lindsey went to St Mary’s, and Georgina went to Annefield.’
‘You never said anything.’
‘I thought that you would tell me yourself when the time was right. What school you did or didn’t go to makes no difference to me! You are the brightest, most intelligent, girl I know, and that’s what matters.’
‘Oh,’ she said, surprised.
‘And the night we brought your parents to see Paul McCartney your dad let slip that you lived nowhere near Terenure, and that he had as little dealings with the banks as possible and preferred to use the post office, as he used to work as a postman.’
‘My dad works in the sorting office,’ she said, not trusting herself to speak. ‘He’s due to retire next year.’
‘Is there any more?’ pressed Matt. ‘A secret husband, kids, another life I know nothing about?’
‘No.’ She sniffed, tears running down her face. ‘But I’ve let
you down. I should have been there for you … gone to help with your parents if you wanted me to.’
‘Kerrie, I can’t blame you for not wanting to come down to Moyle. Georgina and Mum had a massive fight, and Ed says they’ve blown his inheritance … the lazy shit.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Listen, I love you, not where you came from, not what school you did or did not go to, not your family, and whatever is going on there. You are the person I fell in love with and respect, and want to marry. You don’t need to lie to me … to pretend.’
She couldn’t believe it. Matt still loved her, wanted her, wanted to marry her!
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes,’ he said firmly. ‘And are you sure you won’t object to taking on the son of a disgraced bankrupt, my snob of a mother, and God knows what other family scandals are coming down the track?’
‘I’m not marrying them … I’m marrying you,’ she said, running over and jumping on to his lap. Matt held her as she cried and cried and cried. Matt stroked her hair and told her that it didn’t matter, everything was going to be all right.
Tessa had made breakfast, and was downstairs listening to the radio, when she realized that it was almost ten o’clock and Florence hadn’t appeared. It was unlike her mother to be such a late riser, but she had seemed a bit tired the past few days. Putting on the kettle, Tessa made a fresh pot of tea and toasted a few slices of McCambridge’s brown bread, putting them on a tray to bring up to her. There’d been a slight shower overnight, but the weather forecast for the day was good, and maybe they could go for a bit of a drive or a walk if her mum felt up to it.
‘Morning, Mum,’ she called. The curtains were drawn, and her mother stayed asleep as she put down the tray and opened them, letting the sun flood into the bedroom with its rose-patterned wallpaper.
‘Here’s some tea and toast for you.’
Florence Sullivan looked so peaceful, her eyes shut, her white hair spread out against the pillow.
‘Mum,’ Tessa called again, trying to rouse her.
It was only when she sat on the bed and went to touch Florence’s hand that she realized that her mother had died.
She wasn’t breathing but wasn’t completely stone cold either.
‘Mum, Mum!’ Tessa called, trying to wake her, rouse her, bring her back to life, knowing in her heart that it was far too late, and that Florence Sullivan was gone … had passed away some time in the last few hours.
She sat holding her mother’s hand for an hour, just wanting to sit there quietly and peacefully with her as she said her own personal goodbye.
Then, gathering herself, she phoned their local GP. Doctor O’Connell agreed to come straight away.
She tidied the bedroom a bit, waiting for the doctor’s arrival.
‘She looks so peaceful,’ said the doctor when she saw Florence. Tessa waited downstairs while the doctor made her examination.
‘As we suspected, it was heart failure,’ Dr O’Connell said gently, coming into the kitchen. ‘Very peaceful, and just the way Florence would have wanted to go. No hospitals, no drama, asleep in her own bed. She’s a lucky lady.’
‘Yes,’ said Tessa, finally giving in to her tears.
‘What should I do now?’ she sobbed.
‘Well, you need to contact the rest of your family, and the funeral directors – they will help you with the arrangements – and then maybe there’s a friend or someone you could phone who would come over to give you a bit of support,’ she said kindly. ‘Someone who would stay here with you for a bit.’
‘Yes,’ Tessa nodded.
‘Will you be all right?’ asked the doctor.
‘Yes, of course. I’ll make a few phone calls.’ Tessa found herself gabbling. ‘I’ll start to organize things. My brother is
in California, and my sister is in Hong Kong. They’ll need to book flights home at once. They’d want to be here. Be here with Mum.’