Always You (3 page)

‘Oh, Cahal,’ she said, clasping her hands together and crying with relief. ‘That’s wonderful.’

‘I’d get a decent starting salary. Enough for the two of us to live on. We could move in together.’

‘Oh.’ What would her father say to living in sin? And Aunt Vi?

‘Or,’ he added hastily, seeing her reaction, ‘we could get married. Whatever you want.’

‘Married?’ she said, her head filling immediately with images of her in a white dress and Cahal by her side in a penguin suit, both of them smiling, delirious with happiness.

‘Yes. And then we’d never have to be apart ever again.’

She threw her arms around him and pressed her face into his warm, damp neck. He smelled of cigarettes and last night’s curry. Her stomach churned with desire. ‘Oh let’s, Cahal. And then no one, and nothing, can ever come between us.’

Carnlough beach, at the foot of Glencloy and just twelve miles north of Ballyfergus, was bleak on this bright but bitter February day. Carved out of the landscape by a massive ice age glacier, the glen, framed on either side by gently rising hills, swept gracefully down to meet the beach like a vast, winter-faded green velvet skirt. On its northern hem, the buildings of Carnlough village, mostly hewn from local limestone, clustered like pearls. An icy wind blew down the valley from the west, chilling the four people walking on the shingle beach.

Sarah’s nose was red with the cold and spits of cruel rain speared her left cheek like painful darts. Sarah’s sister, Becky chatted away beside her and, up ahead, Sarah’s children – eleven-year-old Molly and nine-year-old Lewis – stumbled gracelessly along the coarse sand, hindered by ill-fitting wellies. Molly, blonde-haired and grey-eyed, was very like Sarah. Lewis, with short red hair standing up in spikes and brown freckles sprinkled liberally across his face like hundreds and thousands, was the spitting image of his Dad.

Not for the first time, she wondered idly what Lewis might have looked like had she married Cahal instead of Ian. He might’ve had dark curly hair instead of red, and blue-green eyes instead of pale, almost translucent, blue ones. And then, just as quickly as the thought came to mind, she pushed it crossly away, annoyed that she had allowed Cahal to occupy her thoughts even for a second. He had done the thing he promised never to do – he had left her. She would never forgive him. In the same way her father used to dampen down the coal fire every night with a layer of slack, she buried her curiosity under a layer of determination not to think of him again.

‘So,’ Becky was saying, ‘after watching me for ages at the bar, this guy comes over and starts chatting. He was a postgrad. Nice looking. A few years younger than me I’d say, but that didn’t seem to put him off.’

A sudden gust unwound Sarah’s navy and grey cashmere scarf and whipped it in her face. She secured it round her neck again. ‘What were you wearing?’

‘Oh, my grey dress.’

Sarah knew the one – slinky jersey with a v-neck as deep as the Grand Canyon and a skirt that stopped mid-thigh. Becky liked to wear it with black fishnets and killer heels. She had even been known to wear it to work, though with flat boots, thank God, not heels.

‘Anyway,’ Becky went on, ‘we had a few drinks. Well, more than a few drinks.’

Sarah glanced at Becky, taking in the bags under her eyes and her rather carelessly applied make-up. Was that last night’s make-up with a fresh layer slapped on top?

Becky grinned and dug her hands deeper into the pockets of her padded red duvet coat, which made her look big and plump compared to Sarah. But the figure underneath the coat was more curvaceous than fat and, while she was well-upholstered, it was in all the right places. ‘And he was so hot. You should’ve seen his pecs.’ She pursed both lips together and pulled a crude, lustful face in the manner of Dawn French.

‘It wasn’t his personality you were interested in then?’ said Sarah with a raised eyebrow.

Becky chuckled. ‘Well, let’s just say the rest of him wasn’t a disappointment.’

Sarah opened her mouth, but Becky didn’t wait for her to ask the question that was on the tip of her tongue. ‘He had a flat up near the university. We went there and I drove home this morning.’

Sarah stopped dead in her tracks. ‘Becky! You said you’d stop picking up strangers in bars and sleeping with them! He could’ve been an axe murderer for all you know.’

Becky wrinkled her nose and the crystal stud in her left nostril glinted like a dewdrop. ‘He wasn’t a stranger. Well, not really. I’d seen him in the uni café a few times and we spent all evening talking. I wouldn’t have gone home with him if I didn’t think he was sound.’

Sarah tutted and shook her head. She understood Becky’s desire to rebel against their strict upbringing – hadn’t she done it herself? – but this behaviour was positively reckless. Lowering her voice, Sarah said, ‘What if he had an STD or HIV?’

‘I’m not completely stupid, Sarah. We used a condom. Condoms, I should say,’ she added, and gave Sarah a saucy smile.

‘They’re not always safe,’ said Sarah sniffily, not that she knew much about the subject. Since the divorce from Ian eight years ago, she’d not had much need for contraception. She squinted into the wind. Eight years of celibacy. What a depressing thought.

‘Have you met anyone nice lately?’ said Becky, as if she could read Sarah’s thoughts.

Sarah gave her a weary look. ‘You know I haven’t.’

‘You’re never going to meet someone if you don’t get out on the dating scene,’ said Becky gently. ‘I’ll go out with you. We’ll hit Belfast together!’

Sarah bit her lip and kicked sand with the toe of her boot. ‘I know,’ she said quietly.

‘So what’s stopping you?’

Sarah shrugged and looked ahead. Lewis, oblivious to the cold and the sharp needles of rain, twirled his navy hat in his hand, his red head exposed to the elements. ‘The kids. Work. Running the home. Lack of time.’

Becky glanced at her sharply. ‘And the real reason is?’

Sarah took a deep breath and smiled wryly. Becky would not let her away so easily. But how could she possibly explain that the love she had known with Cahal had been so perfect, so all-encompassing that she knew she would never experience the like of it again? And even if it were possible to love another man like she had once loved him, she would not take the risk. His betrayal had hurt too much. ‘I’ve been so disappointed in love. I guess I’m scared to give it another chance.’

‘Oh, Sarah,’ said Becky. ‘It makes me so sad to hear you talk like that. But you and Ian have been divorced for a long time now. You must put all that behind you.’

Sarah looked away guiltily and failed to correct Becky’s assumption about Ian. ‘I’m really happy with my life. Honestly. A man isn’t the be-all and end-all. You mustn’t worry about me.’ She linked arms with Becky and said brightly, ‘So tell me, are you seeing this guy again?’

‘I doubt it. We didn’t swap numbers or anything.’

‘Didn’t you like him?’

‘I did like him but he … well, it was just a one-night stand.’ She ducked her head. ‘I don’t expect him to appear on my doorstep bearing a dozen red roses.’

How could he, when he didn’t even know where she lived? Sarah sighed, exasperated. She slipped her arm out of Becky’s and turned her back to the wind, so that she could see her sister’s face more clearly. She chose her next words carefully. ‘You jumped into bed with him too quickly.’

Becky guffawed. ‘Oh, Sarah, that is so old-fashioned. People sleep with each other on first dates all the time.’

‘Do they?’

‘Yes and anyway, I like sex. A lot of the time, that’s all I want. I don’t want them to marry me.’

‘But you would like to be in a long-term relationship. You told me you’d like to settle down one day and have a family. And if that’s what you want, you’re going about it the wrong way.’

Becky came to a halt, turned her back to the wind and whipped a packet of cigarettes and a lighter out of her pocket. She put a cigarette in her mouth and, after several attempts at lighting it, the white tip burned like a cinder.

‘I wish you wouldn’t,’ sighed Sarah. ‘Do you want to end up like Mum?’

‘Oh, come on, give me a break.’ Her hazel eyes, the same as Mum’s, flashed under thin, arched eyebrows. ‘Mum didn’t die from smoking. A blood vessel in her brain burst. And she never smoked a cigarette in her life. You have to stop worrying so much.’

‘I can’t help it.’

‘Come here,’ said Becky and she put one arm around Sarah’s shoulders and gave her a big, rough hug. ‘Better?’ she said, holding the cigarette at arm’s length, her breath sour with the smell.

Sarah smiled, feeling for a rare moment as if the heavy mantle of responsibility that she felt towards Becky had been lifted – as if she was the little sister and not the other way round. ‘Yeah.’

They started walking again. The edges of Sarah’s coat flapped like black wings, and the feeling of lightness evaporated, as if blown away on the breeze. She took a deep breath. ‘To get back to the subject in hand, the problem with sleeping with someone on the first date is that you completely destroy any sense of mystery. Men like a bit of intrigue. If you just give it all out on the first date, you spoil the romance, or rather, the prospect of romance.’

Though she had slept with Cahal on their first date, she did not feel any sense of hypocrisy in dishing out this advice to Becky. Her relationship with Cahal had been different from the start.

‘Did you enjoy the seisiún?’

She’d returned to her friends and had not seen him come up. He leaned against the bar and crossed his ankles. Her friends all stared while she blushed and groped for words.

‘I could see it in your eyes,’ he went on, staring at her as if she were the only person in the room. ‘The way you connected with the music. The way it connected with you.’

The music had touched her. ‘I thought it was beautiful.’

‘I’m Cahal by the way.’

‘Ca-hal,’ she said, trying out the unfamiliar name. ‘Sarah. How did you learn to play like that?’

He shrugged as if his talent was nothing. ‘I’ve tickets for a Chieftains concert next week. Will you come with me?’

She did not hesitate. ‘Yes.’

‘So says Miss Celibate.’ Becky grinned to take the sting out of her comment.

‘That’s not fair. I did have a sex life once,’ said Sarah.

‘And you will do again,’ said Becky confidently.

Sarah smiled doubtfully. ‘Seriously, you should think about what I said.’ She spied Lewis’ hat on the ground, picked it up and shook the sand off it. ‘What happened with that promotion at work? Weren’t you to hear this week?’

Becky sighed. ‘I didn’t get it.’

Sarah’s heart sank. It was the third promotion Becky had been knocked back for. She worked as an admin assistant at Queen’s University Belfast, a job she’d taken straight after leaving school with three good A levels. Sarah had tried to encourage her to go to uni but Becky, under the influence of a no-good boyfriend at the time, had refused.

‘They recruited externally,’ Becky went on. ‘You know, I’m really cross about it. I wouldn’t have minded, but you should see the nerd who got the job. He can barely switch on the computer. Has to ask me every little thing.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Sarah and glanced furtively at Becky. The nose piercing was a recent one and it still looked raw and sore. ‘Did you get any feedback on why you didn’t get it?’

Becky shook her head. ‘Just vague feedback about not being right for the job. My boss said I should’ve got it, but it was up to the interview panel, not her. And I didn’t know any of them.’

They walked on, arms linked. Up ahead, Molly veered left, onto the seaweed-strewn pebbles at the top of the beach, and Lewis trailed in her wake. ‘Have you thought that how you present yourself might have something to do with not getting the job?’

Becky sighed crossly. ‘I’m an admin assistant, not a model. Surely what I do is more important than what I look like?’

‘It ought to be. But the thing is,’ said Sarah tentatively, ‘first impressions are ever so important. Everyone who knows you thinks you’re lovely but to someone meeting you for the first time, well, they might not think so.’

‘Why not?’ snapped Becky, shaking off Sarah’s arm.

‘The piercings and the tattoos and the dyed hair. They give out a message, Becky. Quite an aggressive one. Why don’t you let your hair go back to being brown? It’s the most gorgeous chestnut colour.’

Becky lifted her chin and her eyes narrowed. ‘I’m not going to change the way I look just to fit into other people’s idea of what’s acceptable. And I wish you would stop trying to change me into a clone of you. Just because you have it all – the house, the kids, the high-flying career. And the figure and looks.’

Sarah gasped in surprise. ‘How can you possibly say that? I’m a single mother struggling to run a home and hold down a full-time job. I’d hardly call that having it all.’

Becky blushed. ‘Well, you did have it all until you got divorced.’ There was an awkward pause and she sighed. ‘I just wish you would stop telling me how I should dress and what I should do.’

Sarah looked away, chastened. ‘I don’t mean to boss you around. I just want things to work out for you. In and out of work.’

Becky sighed and patted Sarah’s arm. ‘I’m okay, Sarah, really. I’m happy the way I am. You don’t have to be so protective. You’ve been mothering me ever since Mum died.’

Sarah swallowed, the mere mention of their mother bringing a lump to her throat.

The rain had stopped. A shard of sunlight broke through a chink in the pale grey, skitting cloud – and just as quickly vanished again. In the blank canvas of the sky, Sarah saw the stark grey-whiteness of the hospital ward where her mother had died.

She perched on the edge of her mother’s bed, the metal bedframe digging into her thigh. Crisp white sheets crunched between her fingers. The low hum of equipment, like a beating heart, filled her ears. The room was hot and smelt of floor polish and the fragrant sweetpeas that Dad had picked from the garden two days ago and which now sat, wilting, on the bedside table. Fear, terrible fear, ballooned in her chest.

‘Sarah.’

She leaned over her mother’s body, already still, like a corpse. She held her ear close to her mother’s lips, her heart tight and cold in her breast, and waited.

‘Take care of Becky.’ Her mother’s breath was a caress, like a summer’s breeze. ‘You’re sister and mother to her now.’

The last words her mother had said to her.

Becky’s quiet voice cracked through the memories. ‘It wasn’t right of Mum to ask you to take care of me,’ she said, harbinger of a message that Sarah stubbornly refused to own. ‘You were little more than a child yourself.’ Becky paused. ‘You must know that.’

Sarah looked away, her heart heavy with old, well-worn guilt. There was logic and truth in what Becky said. But her mother had asked. And she had promised. She’d spent the rest of her life trying to fulfil that promise. Such a contract, so solemnly made, could not be broken, despite Becky’s plausible arguments to the contrary. She blinked to clear her vision. ‘But if I don’t look out for you, who will?’