‘Sure, no problem,’ he says casually. ‘Let me just load my own bags here onto the boat first, then I’ll be across to help.’
I watch while he walks down to the harbour and drops his own meagre belongings onto the deck of the boat. ‘I didn’t know Conor
was coming with us today,’ I whisper quickly to Dermot as he tugs at the first of my many cases.
‘Didn’t I mention it?’ Dermot’s muffled voice replies from inside the people-carrier. ‘I bumped into him in the village and
said you and Niall were coming over early. Because you requested a bigger boat this time, I’ve had to hire another skipper
and his boat to take us over to the island today, so we didn’t need Conor. But he offered to come early as well, since he’s
been staying locally in a B and B now that his mother’s house is sold. So there didn’t seem much point in refusing.’
‘Right then,’ Conor arrives back by my side. ‘What’s first?’ he pulls his sweater over his head to reveal another tight white
t-shirt underneath.
‘It’s all going over, sorry,’ I apologise, trying to avert my eyes from his torso. ‘I don’t really travel light.’
Conor grins. ‘I wouldn’t expect you to. Ladies as finely turned out as yourself rarely do.’
I feel myself begin to blush. But I don’t think Conor notices, as he’s now swung himself into the boot next to Dermot. He
immediately grabs two of my heavier suitcases and, with his biceps bulging under the sleeves of his t-shirt, jumps with ease
from the boot of the car.
‘Back in a tick,’ he winks, as he sets off towards Niall still dragging his own cases along.
‘What the hell have you got in this, Darcy?’ I hear Dermot call from inside the carrier.
I forcefully tear my gaze away from Conor effortlessly handling my cases to see Dermot tugging at a large holdall. ‘Er, that
would be my accessories bag.’
‘Accessories? It weighs a bloody ton. Accessories for what – committing murder?’
‘No,’ I glare at Dermot. Conor wasn’t creating a fuss, so why was he? ‘Shoes, belts, bags, that kind of thing. And be careful
with that bag, it’s designer.’
Actually it’s a fake Louis Vuitton holdall, but is Dermot going to know the difference?
Dermot tries to stand up in the people-carrier, but the ceiling is too low and he bangs his head. Trying not to look too annoyed,
he climbs out. ‘I repeat: Darcy, you are going to a remote island to live for a year. The seals and rabbits don’t really care
whether your shoes and bag match your outfit.’
‘No, but I do. And I won’t let my standards slip just because I’m going to be living there.’ I point out to sea in the direction
of the island, and I’m surprised to see that in the space of a few minutes the cloud has begun to lift, and already I can
make out the westerly tip of the island as the sun’s warming rays slowly begin to peel away its grey wrapping.
‘You tell him, Darce!’ I hear a familiar voice call behind me. ‘There’ll be no green wellies and Barbour jackets for my girl!’
I spin round to see that a taxi has pulled up a few feet away, and just climbing out of it looking amazing in a shocking-pink
minidress is Roxi.
‘Rox!’ I call, running over and hugging her. ‘What on earth are you doing here?’
‘You didn’t think I was going to let you to go through this experience all alone?’
I stand back to question her. ‘The truth, Rox?’
‘I lost my job at the pub, along with the flat.’
‘Why, what happened?’
‘Let’s just say it involved a rather fit guy, a miscommunication about whether he was single and a little fight breaking out,
involving several packets of dry-roasted peanuts and a bottle of WKD. Terrible mess, but yours truly came off the victor,
naturally. However, sadly it’s now left me jobless and homeless.’
I shake my head. ‘Oh, Roxi, will you never learn? Well, maybe you’re my silver lining now that these clouds have cleared.’
Roxi’s eyelashes – which I happen to know are the Cheryl Cole ones from the Girls Aloud range – start to bat when she suddenly
spies Dermot. ‘Or maybe he’s
my
silver lining.’ She saunters towards him. ‘Well, hello,’ she says. ‘Who are you?’
‘Dermot,’ Dermot says gruffly, ‘and you are?’
‘Roxanne,’ Roxi holds out the back of her hand to Dermot.
Dermot just stares at it.
‘Well you don’t look much like a
Dermot
!’ she snaps, lowering her bright pink fingernails to her hips as I catch up with them. ‘You look more like a
Simon
with that attitude.’
Dermot looks even more confused now.
‘Roxi and I are big
X-Factor
fans,’ I explain. ‘I think she means you don’t look much like Dermot O’Leary and more like … ’ I try not to smirk as I say
it ‘ … Simon Cowell.’
‘Really,’ Dermot says, looking disdainfully at Roxi.
‘We’ve another lovely lady joining us on Tara, I see?’ Conor says, joining the group with Niall.
Roxi looks as if she might pass out on the spot when she sees Conor. She looks upwards, presses the palms of her hands together
and mouths the words
Thank you
.
‘I am Roxanne Whitney Reynolds,’ she says, holding out her hand to Conor. ‘But you can call me Roxi.’
Conor takes her hand and gallantly kisses the back of it. ‘Enchanted to meet you, Miss Roxanne Whitney Reynolds. And I shall
be
delighted
to call you Roxi.’
‘Oh,’ Roxi gasps, ‘I love an Irish accent on a man!’
Conor grins, ‘Then I’m sure we’ll get on just fine, Miss Roxi.’
‘And this is Niall, Rox, you remember me telling you all about him?’
Roxi manages to drag her eyes away from Conor for a moment to be introduced to Niall. ‘Hey, Niall,’ she says, smiling across
at him. ‘How are you?’
Niall visibly breathes a sigh of relief. ‘I’m grand, thank you very much, Roxi.’
‘So, she’s coming with us?’ Dermot asks, looking down at Roxi’s high heels, which I’m quite impressed are the exact same shade
of pink as her dress. ‘Like that?’
‘Yes, Dermot, I’m very pleased to announce that Roxi is going to be coming across to join us on Tara, she won’t be needing
an interview, she’s my best friend.’ I smile happily at Roxi. ‘And,’ I lean across to Dermot, lowering my voice, ‘If you think
I’m OTT with clothes, just wait until you see Roxi in action!’
So this is the house that I’m to call home for the next year.
When Dermot kept mentioning there were still a few minor things that needed tweaking over on the island, I did wonder whether
we were going to arrive to find that ‘tweak’ meant ‘build’, and that there would still be walls needing to be erected and
roofs waiting to be put on.
But what I’m standing in front of now appears, from the outside anyway, to be a perfect little whitewashed stone cottage.
It’s very plain, with two four-panelled windows on either side of a solid wooden front door. The roof is covered in very basic
grey slate tiles, and an aroma of fresh paint wafts towards me as I stand there staring at it.
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ Dermot asks, as he lumps another of my cases onto the rapidly growing pile behind me. ‘Go
on; go inside, it’s not locked. There’s no need when there’s only us here.’
Hesitantly I walk towards the little wooden door, turn the handle and gently push it open.
‘The door still needs a lick of paint,’ Dermot says, following me. ‘But we haven’t really had time for all the niceties –
only the basics.’
Inside, I find a small hallway with a flagstone floor, and off that an empty room with a large fireplace. I walk across the
hall and again, opposite there’s another bare room with another open hearth. Further down the hall there’s a kitchen – it’s
basic, but there’s an open fireplace, a range-type cooker, and, I’m pleased to see, a small fridge. By the looks of the fresh,
unpainted wood, Dermot has knocked me up a few cupboards too.
‘I thought you might use this as your living area,’ Dermot suggests. ‘The view of the bay is quite impressive from the window.’
I go over to the large window that runs nearly the full length of the room and glance through it. He’s right; from here I
can see the large sandy bay where Eamon and I scattered my aunt’s ashes on my first proper visit to the island.
‘And I thought you might like to use one of the rooms at the front as a sort of site office. You know, a headquarters for
people to come to when they need something.’
I haven’t even thought about that. I guess people will be coming to me for help and assistance to begin with, if they have
any problems. After all, this is my island; I’m supposed to be in charge.
‘That’s why I chose this house for you. We’ve pretty much managed to adapt most of the cottages to suit, even those that are
going to have several people sharing them. All the others are a bit smaller than this one, but I assumed you’d need plenty
of space. What I hadn’t reckoned on, though, was that it would need to store your vast quantities of luggage.’
I decide to let Dermot’s jibe pass just this once, since he’s made such a good job on my house.
Wait
, I think, looking around me again,
there is a bathroom, isn’t there?
I haven’t seen one yet. Oh, my God, I don’t have to bathe in some waterfall somewhere, and go to the loo in a hole in the
ground?
‘Your bathroom is just through there,’ Dermot says, as though reading my mind. He points to a small door off the hall. ‘Are
you all right, Darcy? You’re awfully quiet.’
‘Hmm? Oh, yes, I’m fine. It’s just a bit overwhelming, that’s all.’
‘What do you think, then – of what we’ve done? I did most of the work on this one myself,’ Dermot adds proudly, looking around
at the little cottage.
‘It’s great,’ and realising I sound a bit ungrateful, I add, ‘I mean, obviously you’ve all done really well, considering what
these cottages were like the last time I was here. They were virtually derelict then. I wasn’t expecting you to turn them
into palaces.’
Dermot eyes me for a moment. ‘Thanks. I think.’
‘So,’ I look around at the bare rooms. ‘When does the furniture arrive?’
‘I don’t know,’ Dermot shrugs. ‘You tell me.’
‘No, Dermot,
you
tell
me
. I left everything up to you, remember?’
‘No, Darcy. I was quite clear in one of my emails that I would take care of all the structural work on the properties, and
I expected you to take care of the furniture and soft furnishings.’
I stare blankly at Dermot as the cold reality of what he’s saying slowly begins to dawn on me.
‘Let me get this straight, Dermot. Are you telling me that we have twenty people about to arrive on this island to join us
in the next few days, and we haven’t even provided them with a bed to sleep in?’
‘Correction, Darcy, it seems that
you
haven’t provided them with a bed, or any other furniture, for that matter.’
I glare at Dermot. How dare he lay all the blame for this on me? I don’t remember any email about furniture. Although to be
fair, after a while I had been skimming through a lot of Dermot’s progress-report emails – they did make pretty boring reading.
There was only so much interest I could take in cement, guttering and roofing tiles. Maybe I had missed this one.
‘We’ve still got a few days,’ I try to think quickly. ‘We’ll just have to get some ordered.’
I’ll show Dermot I can deal with this little setback
.
‘And just how are you going to do that?’ A questioning expression crosses Dermot’s face at the same time as he folds his arms
across his chest.
‘Over the internet, of course.’ I’m already debating in my head which of my favourite furniture stores might do us the quickest
international delivery rates.
Dermot’s eyes crinkle with amusement before his mouth lets forth the most almighty snort of laughter.
‘What?’ I ask indignantly.
‘Darcy,’ Dermot says, still trying to control his mirth. ‘There’s no internet access here. We’re on an island in the middle
of the sea!’
I feel my cheeks flush. Damn it, of course I’ve forgotten. At home, the internet solved all my problems quickly and with
such ease. That’s one of the things I’m going to miss most while I’m here. The World Wide Web gave me instant access to any
information I wanted at super-fast speed. I used it to shop, to book holidays, to bank – how am I going to live without it
for a year?
‘Right then,’ I try to sound blasé and in control. ‘I’d forgotten that small fact. I assume it’s the same for mobile phones,
too?’
Dermot nods slowly, as if he’s addressing a small child.
‘So what
are
we going to do, then? We can’t have everyone else arriving to no furniture in their houses.’
And, more to the point, with no beds on the island where on earth are
we
all going to sleep tonight? There’s no way I’m sleeping on some dusty floor.
Dermot’s look of mirth is replaced with a furrowed brow. ‘It’s a problem all right, Darcy. But it’s the first of many you’re
going to face while you’re here. I just didn’t think it would be on quite such a large scale to begin with.’
There’s a banging on the door.
‘Anyone home?’
‘Come in, Roxi,’ I call, pleased to hear a friendly voice.
Roxi comes swaying through the door, still in her pink heels; how she’s managing to walk around the island in them I have
no idea. Conor tilts his head as he enters through the low door, followed by Niall, who doesn’t need to bend at all.
‘So, this is it?’ Roxi says, looking around her. ‘Hmm, we’ve got our work cut out if we’re to make it into chez Darce and
Rox, like the old place. I’ve watched all those home-improvement shows, I’ve seen the designers talk about minimalist, but
this is taking it to a whole new level.’
‘They are a bit on the sparse side, aren’t they?’ Conor
agrees. ‘We’ve just taken a quick tour of all the cottages; you’ve done a grand job by the way, Dermot … ’
Dermot acknowledges Conor but doesn’t return his smile.
‘ … but none of the houses seem to have any furniture in them.’
I bury my face in my hands. ‘
Oh, God
.’