Marian Keyes - Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married (38 page)

"Here's the chicken korma," he said, as he saw the waiter coming.

"Korma, korma, korma, korma, kor-ma, chameleon! You come and go, you come and go," Daniel sort-of-sang, moving the dish close to me and then moving it away again, moving it closer, moving it away. "Course you will. Your turn."

I pointed to the bowl of aloo gobi on the next people's table and sang absently, "Aloo, is it me you're looking for? But when?"

"Let me see," he said carefully. "I'll have to think about this one, Lucy. Oh yes, I know!"

My heart leaped. Daniel knew when I'd get over Gus?

"Tikka chance, tikka chance, tikka, tikka, tikka chance, tikka chance on me," he sang. "That was a good one, wasn't it?" He beamed. "Chicken tikka," he explained kindly to my puzzled face. "You know, tikka chance on me--Abba sang it."

"But what about me and Gus?" I asked faintly. "Oh fuck it! I can see it's pointless trying to have a serious conversation with you. What's this?"

"Vegetable curry."

"Okay. You can't curry love, you just have to wait. Your turn."

It took him a moment or two before he thought of one.

"It's my paratha, and I'll cry if I want to, cry if I want to, cry if I want to," he tone-deafed at me.

I stopped a passing waiter and asked him to bring me a bowl of dhal tarka, then I turned to Daniel.

"Got myself a crying, walking, sleeping, talking, living dhal!" I sang.

"Stand by your naan," he replied.

We spent the rest of the evening in convulsions. I know we had fun be- cause the people at the next table complained about us. I couldn't remember the last time I'd had such a laugh. Well, it had probably been one night with Gus.

And when I got home Karen wasn't waiting up for me.

That was one of the great advantages of her having no respect for me. It meant that I could fly in the face of her orders, actively disobey her and it would never even occur to her that I might do so.

61 The next morning when I arrived at work, Megan said, "That slime merchant Daniel just rang, he said he'll call back later."

"What's he ever done to you?" I asked in surprise.

"Nothing." It was her turn to sound surprised.

"So why are you calling him names?" There was a defensive edge to my voice.

"But that's what you always call him," she protested. 458 / marian keyes

"Oh." I was shaken. "I suppose I do."

Technically she was right, yes, of course, I was nasty to Daniel all the time but it wasn't as if I really meant it.

"It's what we both call him, Lucy," she reminded me. She sounded con- cerned and well she might. When Megan had first met Daniel and she said that she didn't like him and couldn't see what all the fuss was about, I had been thrilled. I held her aloft as an example of intelligent womanhood to anyone who would listen. "She says that Daniel wouldn't stand a chance in Australia," I gleefully told everyone, including Daniel. "She says he's too slimy and she likes her men to be rougher and tougher than him."

And now Megan was concerned that I had changed the rules. It was no longer open season on Daniel.

I hadn't changed any rules, I thought uncomfortably, but it sounded funny to hear Megan call Daniel a slime merchant. Horrible, actually. I felt as if I was being disloyal to him, especially after he'd been so nice and paid for my dinner.

But then Meredia lumbered in, followed by Jed. And I forgot about Daniel because Jed was so funny. He hung up his coat, stared around at the office, rubbed his eyes and said, "Oh no, so I didn't dream it, it wasn't a nightmare! It's horrible, HORRIBLE!"

He did that most mornings. We were so proud of him.

The day proceeded.

I barely had my computer switched on (which meant that it was about ten to eleven) when my mother phoned and said that she was on her way up to town; it would be nice to meet me.

I couldn't have agreed less, but she was insistent.

"I've something to tell you," she said mysteriously.

"I can't wait," I said patiently. Her "somethings" were usually about the next-door neighbors stealing our trash lucy sullivan is getting married / 459

can lid, or the birds continually pecking the tops of the bottles of milk even though she had repeatedly told the milkman to close the gate after him, or something equally earthshattering.

It was odd that she was coming up to town. She didn't ever, even though she was only twenty miles from central London.

Twenty miles and fifty years.

I didn't really feel up to meeting her but I felt that I should because I hadn't seen her since the start of the summer. Not that that had been my fault--I'd been out to the house lots of times--well, once or twice any- way--but only Dad had been there.

I agreed to meet her for lunch, although not in so many words. I didn't think she was au fait with the concept of "lunch." She was more of a "cup of tea and ham sandwich" kind of woman.

"Meet me in the pub across the road from my office at one o'clock," I said.

But she was appalled at the suggestion that she sit in the pub on her own and wait for me.

"What would people think?" she asked in alarm.

"Okay." I sighed. "I'll get there first and you won't have to wait on your own."

"But no," she said, sounding panicked. "Sure, that's just as bad, a single woman in a public house..."

"What's wrong with that?" I scoffed and began to tell her that I was al- ways going into pubs on my own, but stopped myself in time, before she started wailing, "Oh, what kind of girl have I reared?"

"Someplace where we can have a cup of tea," she suggested, again.

"All right then, there's a caf� near..."

"Nothing too fancy," she interrupted anxiously, terri 460 / marian keyes

fied that she might be caught in a "which one of these five forks should I use" scenario. But she needn't have worried, I wasn't too comfortable in those kinds of places either.

"It's not too fancy," I said. "It's nice, relax."

"And what kind of things do they have there?"

"Normal food," I reassured her. "Sandwiches, cheesecake, that kind of thing."

"Black Forest g�teau?" she asked hopefully. She knew about Black Forest g�teau.

"Probably," I said. "Or something very similar, anyway."

"And do I ask for my tea at the counter or do I...?"

"You sit down, Mum, and the girl takes your order."

"And can I just march on in there and sit wherever I like, or should I...?"

"Wait until they seat you," I advised.

When I arrived she was already sitting at the table, looking like a hick up from the sticks for a day, all awkward, as if she felt she had no right to be there. She was wearing a nervous "I'm just fine" smile and had her handbag clenched tightly against all the muggers. "They won't get the better of me," her grim little hands seemed to say.

She looked slightly different--slimmer and younger than usual. For once Peter had been right--she had done something funny to her hair. But it suited her, I grudgingly admitted.

And there was something strange about her clothes, they were...they were...what was it? They were nice.

And, to top it all, she was wearing red lipstick. She never wore lipstick, except to weddings. And sometimes to funerals, if she hadn't liked the person who died.

I sat down opposite her, smiled awkwardly and wondered what it was she wanted to tell me.

That was what she wanted to tell me. (Although it was probably over- stating the case to say that she wanted to tell me, it was more accurate to say it was what she had to tell me.)

The shock was nauseating, literally. I was surprised that she waited until after I had ordered a sandwich to break the news to me, because she de- plored waste.

"I don't believe you," I croaked, searching her face for a sign that it wasn't true. But all I saw was that she was wearing eyeliner and she had it on crooked.

"I'm sorry," she said humbly.

My world felt as if it was falling apart, and that confused me. I had thought I was an independent twenty-six-year-old woman who had left home and established her own life, one who had no interest in whatever sexual shenanigans her parents might get up to. But right at that moment I felt afraid and angry, like an abandoned four-year-old.

"But why?" I asked. "Why are you leaving him? How could you?"

"Because, Lucy, it's been a marriage in name only for years and years. Lucy, surely you know that?" she asked, urging me to agree with her.

"No, I didn't know that," I said. "This is all news to me."

461 462 / marian keyes

"Lucy, you must have known," she insisted.

She was overdoing the calling me "Lucy" bit. She kept trying to touch my arm in a pleading sort of way.

"I didn't know," I insisted back. She wasn't going to get me to agree with her, no matter what.

What's going on? I wondered in horror--other people's parents split up, but mine didn't. Especially because mine were Catholics.

A stable home life was the only reason I had put up with Catholic parents and their nonsense for so long. It had been an unspoken deal. My part in- volved, among other things, going to Mass every Sunday, not wearing patent shoes on a date and abstaining from candy for forty days every spring. In return for which, my parents were supposed to stay together even though they might have hated each other's guts.

"Poor Lucy." She sighed. "You could never face up to anything unpleas- ant, could you? You always ran off or stuck your nose in a book when the going got rough."

"Just fuck off," I said angrily. "Stop picking on me, you're the one in the wrong here."

"Sorry," she said gently. "I shouldn't have said that."

Now that really shocked me, it was one thing for her to tell me that she was leaving my father, but this was another thing entirely. Not only had she not shouted at me for using bad language, but she'd apologized to me.

I stared at her, sick with dread. Things must be very serious.

"Lucy," she said, even more gently. "Your father and I haven't loved each other for years. I'm sorry this has come as such a shock."

I couldn't speak. I was witnessing the destruction of my home, and me with it. My sense of self was amorphous enough as it was. I was afraid I would completely vanish lucy sullivan is getting married / 463

into thin air if one of my main defining features disintegrated.

"But why now?" I appealed to her, after we had sat in silence for a few moments. "If you haven't loved each other for years, which I don't believe anyway, why have you picked now to leave him?"

And suddenly I knew why--the hairdo, the makeup, the new clothes--they all made sense.

"Oh Christ," I said. "I don't believe it--you've met someone else, haven't you? You've got a...a...boyfriend!" I had teased my brother with such a possibility, never dreaming it could be true.

She wouldn't meet my eyes, and I knew I was right.

"Lucy," she implored. "I've been so lonely."

"Lonely?" I asked in disbelief. "How could you be lonely when you've got Dad?"

"Lucy, please understand," she begged. "Living with your father was like living with a child."

"Don't!" I said. "Don't try and make out that it was his fault. You've done this, it's your fault."

She stared unhappily at her hands and didn't say anything to defend herself.

"So who is he?" I spat, the taste of bile in my mouth. "Who is this...this...boyfriend of yours?"

"Please, Lucy," she murmured. Her gentleness unsettled me, I was much more comfortable when she was scathing and sharp-tongued.

"Tell me," I demanded.

She just stared mutely, tears in her eyes. Why wouldn't she tell me?

"It's someone I know, isn't it?" I said in alarm.

"Yes, Lucy. I'm sorry, Lucy, I never meant for it to happen..." 464 / marian keyes

"Just tell me who it is," I said, my breaths coming short and quick.

"It's..."

"Yes?"

"It's..."

"WHOOOO?" I almost screamed.

"It's Ken Kearns," she blurted out.

"Who?" I thought, dizzily. "Who's Ken Kearns?"

"Ken Kearns. You know, Mr. Kearns from the dry cleaners."

"Oh, Mr. Kearns," I said, vaguely remembering a bald old codger with a brown cardigan and plastic shoes and false teeth that seemed to have a life of their own.

The relief! Ludicrous as it seemed, I had been gripped with fear that her boyfriend was Daniel. What with the way he'd been boring on recently about his mysterious new woman, and the way Mum had flirted with him when he came to visit, and the way that Daniel had said that Mum was pretty...

Okay, so I was glad it wasn't Daniel, but, honestly, Mr. Kearns from the dry cleaners--she couldn't have picked anyone more awful if she had tried.

"Tell me if I've got this right," I said, in a daze. "Mr. Kearns, with the false teeth that are too big for him, is your new boyfriend."

"He's getting new ones," she said tearfully.

"You're disgusting," I said, shaking my head. "You are truly disgusting."

She didn't shout at me or berate me like she would normally have done when I said something disrespectful to her. Instead she acted all martyrish and humble.

"Lucy, look at me, please," she said, tears jostling at the corners of her eyes. "Ken makes me feel like a teen lucy sullivan is getting married / 465

ager, can't you see--I'm a woman, a woman with needs..."

"I don't want to hear about your disgusting needs, thanks very much," I said, shutting out the appalling mental image of my mother and Mr. Kearns rolling around amongst the coat hangers.

And still she made no move to defend herself, but I knew her. Sooner or later she'd run out of cheeks to turn.

"Lucy, I'm fifty-three years old, this could be my last chance of happiness. Surely you can't deny me that?"

"You and your happiness! Well, what about Dad? What about his happi- ness?"

"I've tried to make him happy," she said sadly. "But nothing works."

"Rubbish," I sputtered. "You've always tried to make his life a misery! Why the hell didn't you just leave years ago?"

"But..." she said feebly.

"Where are you going to live?" I interrupted, feeling sick.

"With Ken," she whispered.

"And where's that?"

"It's the yellow house across from the school." She tried, but failed, to keep the hint of pride out of her voice. Ken, the Dry-Cleaning King, obvi- ously had accumulated a fair bit of money.

"And what about your wedding vows?" I asked. I knew that would really hit her where it hurt. "What about the promises you made, in a church, that you'd stay with him for better, for worse?"

"Please, Lucy," she said in a little voice. "I can't tell you how I've wrestled with my conscience, I've prayed and prayed for guidance..."

"You're such a hypocrite," I exclaimed--not that it 466 / marian keyes

mattered to me on any moral ground, but I knew it would upset her, and that was my highest priority. "You've rammed the teachings of the Catholic Church down my throat all my life and stood in judgment over unmarried mothers and people who've had abortions, and now you're no better yourself! You're an adulterer, you've broken your precious seventh com- mandment."

"Sixth," she said, her usual self making a guest reappearance.

Hah! I knew I'd break her.

"What?" I asked in disgust.

"I've broken the sixth commandment, seventh is stealing, didn't they teach you anything in catechism classes?"

"You see, you see!" I crowed in bitter triumph. "There you go again, standing in judgment, setting yourself up as a moral watchdog. Well, let he who is without sin cast the log out of his own eye!"

She hung her head and twisted her hands. Back to being a martyr.

"And what has Father Colm to say about all of this?" I demanded. "I bet he's not so friendly with you now, now that you've become a...a...a home wrecker.... Well?" I asked again, when she didn't answer.

"They've told me not to do the flowers for the altar anymore," she finally admitted. A single tear ran down her cheek, leaving a little white line as it washed through her inexpertly applied foundation.

"Quite right," I snorted.

"And the committee wouldn't take the apple tart that I'd made for the sale of work," she said, more tears streaking down her face. She looked like a deckchair.

"Quite right too," I said hotly.

"I suppose they thought it might be catching," she said lucy sullivan is getting married / 467

with a little smile. I stared coldly at her and, after a few seconds, her smile vanished.

"And you picked a great time to tell me," I said nastily. "How am I sup- posed to go back and do an afternoon's work after hearing this?"

That was unfair of me because Ivor was out and I wouldn't have done anything anyway, but it wasn't the point.

"Lucy, I'm sorry," she said quietly. "But I wanted to tell you right away. And I couldn't have you finding out from someone else."

"Okay," I said briskly, picking up my bag. "You've told me. Thanks a lot and goodbye."

I put no money on the table. She could pay for my sandwich as she was the reason that I hadn't been able to eat it.

"Wait, please," she urged. "Don't go yet, Lucy. Please just give me a chance to say my piece, that's all I ask of you."

"Go on then," I said. "This should be good for a laugh."

She took a deep breath and started.

"Lucy, I know you've always loved your dad more than you've loved me..."

She paused, in case I needed to contradict her. I stayed silent.

"...but it was very hard for me," she continued. "I had to be the strong one, I had to be the disciplinarian, because he wouldn't. And I know you thought that he was a great laugh, and that I was mean and miserable, but one of us had to be a parent to you."

"How dare you," I demanded. "Dad was twice, ten times, the parent you ever were."

"But he was so irresponsible..." she started to protest. 468 / marian keyes

"Don't talk to me about irresponsible," I interrupted. "What about your responsibilities? Who's going to take care of Dad?"

Although I already knew the answer to that one.

"Why should anyone need to take care of Dad?" she asked. "He's only fifty-four and there's nothing wrong with him."

"You know he needs to be taken care of," I said. "You know he can't look after himself."

"And why's that, Lucy?" she asked. "Lots of men live alone, men much older than Dad, and they're well able to take care of themselves."

"But Dad's not like other men, and you know it," I said. "Don't think you can get off the hook that way."

"And why isn't your dad like other men?" she asked.

"You know why," I said angrily.

"No, I don't," she said. "Tell me why."

"I'm not having this discussion with you any longer," I said. "You know Dad needs looking after and that's that."

"You can't face it, can you, Lucy?" she said, looking at me with this in- furiating saintlike, doe-eyed expression, all faux compassion and social- workeresque concern.

"Can't face what?" I asked. "There's nothing I can't face, you're talking even more nonsense than you usually do."

"He's an alcoholic," she said gently. "That's what you can't face."

"Who's an alcoholic?" I asked, disgusted by her manipulations. "Dad is not an alcoholic. I see what you're up to, you think you can call Dad names and say terrible things about him just so people will feel sorry for you and say that it's okay for you to leave him. Well, you can't fool me."

"Lucy, he's been an alcoholic for years and years, prob lucy sullivan is getting married / 469

ably before we even got married, but I didn't know the signs then," she said.

"Rubbish," I snorted. "He's not an alcoholic, you must take me for a complete fool. Alcoholics are those men in the street with dirty coats and big beards, who talk to themselves."

"Lucy, alcoholics come in all shapes and sizes, those men in the street are men just like your dad, except they were a bit more unlucky."

"They couldn't have got more unlucky than being married to you," I threw at her.

"Lucy, do you deny that your father drinks a lot?"

"He drinks a bit," I admitted. "And why wouldn't he? You've made him miserable all these years. You know, my earliest memory is of you shouting at him."

"I'm sorry, Lucy," she said, tears spilling down her face. "But it was so hard, we never had any money, and he wouldn't get a job, and he'd take the money that I had put aside to buy food for you and your brothers and he'd drink it. And I'd have to go down to the local shop and give them some made-up story about not getting to the bank on time and would they give me a bit of credit. And they knew damn well, and I had some pride, Lucy, you know. It didn't come easy to me to do that, I was brought up to expect more from life than that."

She was crying hard now, but it meant nothing to me.

"And I loved him, so I did," she sobbed. "I was twenty-two and I thought he was gorgeous. He kept telling me that he'd give it up and I kept hoping that things would get better. I believed him every single time, and every single time he let me down."

On and on she went, a catalogue of accusations. How he was drunk the morning of their wedding; how, when she went into labor with Chris, she had to make her own