Can Anybody Help Me? (11 page)

PRIVATE MESSAGE

‘Eamonn! Over here! This way, please!'

The noise rose like a wave and slapped her in the face. Disoriented, Yvonne grabbed Gerry's hand and allowed him to pull her through the crowd.

‘Eamonn! This way, please! And one more!'

Unsteady on her high heels, she peered over her husband's shoulder and was momentarily blinded by a dozen camera flashes.

‘Is it like this all the time?'

‘Pretty much, yeah.' Gerry grinned. ‘Mad, isn't it? C'mon. Let's go inside.'

Taking one final glance towards Eamonn Teevan, who was giving the photographers a mock ‘ah shucks' grin, Yvonne wobbled up the red-carpeted steps and into the hotel. Tuxedoed waiters carried trays laden with champagne flutes and Gerry pressed one into her free hand as they manoeuvred their way through hoards of dicky-bowed men and their polished, over-excited partners who were using the mirrored walls to check their reflections and evaluate the competition at the same time.

Snatches of conversation drifted past her.

‘Amazing. He looked absolutely amazing …'

‘… think she was a model, but I'm not sure …'

‘You'd know he used to play, I believe he's in the gym every day …'

Gerry guided Yvonne through the foyer and into a vast function room, the air humming with kisses and frantic banter. A stage had been erected at the top of the room, with a banner assuring her that she was welcome to the National Television Awards. Greeting almost everyone he passed with a series of eyebrow raises and head nods, Gerry steered Yvonne towards a table. As he pecked her on the cheek his eyes remained open.

‘So, what do you think of it so far? Mad, isn't it?'

‘Insane.'

Yvonne tucked a strand of hair behind her ears and looked around, grateful that Gerry had chosen a spot by the wall. She had never been to a party like this one before. All of the women looked like the ‘after' pictures from a makeover show and she kept trying to say hello to people she recognised before realising she only knew their faces from TV. Her husband had worked in television in London, but the only party she'd attended there had consisted of a round of drinks in the local following a Chinese meal. This was Gerry's new life and, strange and all as it felt to her, she knew he wanted her to see it.

Suddenly nervous, she took a large slug of champagne and shuddered as the cold liquid trickled down her throat. She was just so bloody tired. And she hated her dress. Shopping with the baby had been no fun at all. Róisín had been irritated by the bright lights in the changing room and Yvonne had ended
up jiggling the pram with one arm while trying to slide on a dress with the other. Stifling a yawn, she rubbed a hand across her face, remembering just in time not to dislodge the makeup she'd managed to apply over Róisín's head while she slept in the sling in her arms. Gerry had had great plans to come home from work early and let her go to the hairdressers and get ready. But he had been delayed and she hadn't wanted to ask Hannah for a further favour, given that she was babysitting that night already. So, of course, she had managed, taking a bath with the baby and then rinsing her long red curly hair with the shower attachment while her daughter wriggled on a towel on the bathroom floor. She had managed. It would do.

‘Y'okay, hon?'

Giving a final head dip and a ‘good man yourself' to a sweating acquaintance in a too-tight pinstripe suit, her husband bent towards her.

‘Glad you came?'

Yvonne thought for a moment about telling the truth and then forced a smile onto her face. This was a big night for her husband, a huge night. Eamonn Teevan was in the running for ‘Newcomer of the Year' and there was a rumour going around he might scoop ‘Personality of the Year' as well. As executive producer of
Teevan Tonight
the award would be as important to Gerry as it would be to Teevan himself. So Yvonne had no intention of telling him how exhausted she felt. What sort of a wuss was she anyway? Half the women in the room probably had children; they weren't flopping around, drained and distracted, wishing they were anywhere other than here.

‘Absolutely!'

‘Here.' Reaching out to a passing waiter, he grabbed another
glass of champagne. ‘Get that into you. I just want to say hello …'

‘You go on.' Yvonne squeezed his hand. This was a work night for Gerry and it was important for him to network. They'd have plenty of time to chat later.

‘Thanks, love. Won't be long.'

Released, her husband bounded off, immediately firing off three ‘great to see you's, two ‘not a bother's and a ‘there ya are, now' to a tall figure Yvonne recognised as being the chief news reporter on Ireland 24.

Looking around, she realised how alone she was. Everyone in the room seemed to know everybody else and her husband wasn't the only one participating in three-, four- and five-way conversations. In the hope it would make her look less desperate for company, Yvonne rummaged in her bag for her phone. There were no new text messages. Great. No messages meant her mother-in-law was getting on just fine. No baby emergencies. Then again, Hannah was so confident of her baby minding skills that Yvonne reckoned she wouldn't ring with a problem unless the baby was actually in danger of being hospitalised.

In fact given the glint in her eye when she had ‘finally' taken sole charge of her only grandchild, Yvonne wondered if even a medical emergency would make Hannah swallow her pride and ask her to come home. The atmosphere had been strained from the moment they'd arrived in her mother-in-law's house earlier that evening and Hannah had done nothing to put herself and Gerry at their ease.

‘So. they've finally decided to trust me to look after you, have they, sweetheart? Oh, yes, they have, they'll probably be ringing
me every five minutes though, won't they? Ah, we won't pay any heed to them, pet. I'll have you all to myself this evening, we'll have a ball.'

The words, uttered in a high-pitched baby voice had been directed to the infant in the car seat, but Yvonne had been under no illusion about where they were really aimed. By her side, she had felt Gerry stiffen. Strange, it wasn't like him to get riled by his mother. He must be nervous about the night ahead, she had thought, and decided she would be magnanimous for both of them. She bent her own head down to her little girl and smiled as broadly as her mother-in-law.

‘You're going to have a great time with Granny, aren't you? Ooh, yes, you are. We won't be worried about you anyway!'

From across the room, she could see her brother-in-law stifle a grin. Hannah hated being called Granny. Well, feck her, as they said over here. She was getting her wish, a whole evening with the baby, and if Yvonne wanted to call her Granny, she could suck it up. She had to swallow a grin herself then. She didn't often stand up to Hannah. It felt good, even in this most subtle of ways.

And then Bill had made tea and the tension in the room had dropped to a manageable level. It was no wonder, Yvonne thought, that Gerry made a point of meeting his brother for a weekly pint. Bill wasn't the high achiever of the family. But there was something restful about him and she had a feeling that Hannah, despite her bossiness, depended as much on him as he seemed to do on her.

And her mother-in-law was right, she decided. Róisín would be fine.

She took another sip. Róisín would be fine and she was
fine and they would have a great evening. All she needed was someone to talk to. But the room just seemed so … impenetrable. In the distance, she could see Gerry at the centre of a crowd of people. He was laughing, his head thrown back, blonde hair glinting under the giant mirror ball. God, he was gorgeous. He hadn't changed at all since they'd met. He was still the most attractive man in the room, still the centre of all that was fun and lively and happy. Parties only started when Gerry got there.

Yvonne had never been that type of person. No one ever put her first on the list to be invited to a gathering, or considered cancelling a dinner party because she couldn't make it. Gerry was a star. He had grabbed her by the hand and drawn her into his life when they met and she had really enjoyed it, for a while. But with Róisín in the mix, it was all much more difficult. It was usually close to 2 a.m. before Gerry fell, exhausted, through the front door. If Yvonne were asleep, he'd tiptoe into the spare room trying not to wake her. If she were awake, she would be bitterly so, barely able to contain her frustration at another sleepless night spent coping alone. On the odd night he did get off early, she would hand him the baby as soon as he walked in the door, desperate for a break, a hot shower, a cup of tea finished before it went cold. She couldn't remember the last time they had both watched a DVD all the way to the end without her falling asleep, or him getting a call from work or flicking through his iPhone to make sure there wasn't some breaking news somewhere that couldn't wait till morning. And sex was just the box marked F she ticked on Róisín's medical forms.

Her fingers raked at her own phone. God, she must bore him.

She felt like such a fool, standing on her own in a too-tight dress that pinched at her midriff and left her breathless, as Dublin's elite sparkled around her. She had nothing to say to them and they hadn't even noticed she was there. Desperate to look like she had something to do she tapped the phone screen again and opened the Netmammy app.

She tapped the last. The question she had put up earlier was still near the top of the page and had generated lively discussion.

DRESS TO HIDE MUMMY TUMMY?

A few posts had quickly followed, some advising a trip into the city centre, and another recommending the Dundrum shopping centre in the suburbs. Yvonne had taken that advice and hadn't had time to return to the discussion since. But several
more posts had been added since she had last looked and a lively discussion had developed over whether black was in fact flattering and how soon after a C-section you could wear magic knickers.

Yvonne paused, her finger hovering over the reply button. Some of the women gave away an awful lot of information about themselves in their posts, where they lived, the names and ages of their children … She herself had never even mentioned Róisín's name online, preferring to refer to her as the
commonly used Dear Daughter, or DD. But she could keep it vague …

Draining her champagne she typed a quick response.

Pressing return, she felt a prickle of tears at the back of her eyes. Jesus. She needed to get a grip. Whining to a crowd of strangers on the other end of her phone. But who else was she going to tell? Gerry had been swallowed up by the crowd and she wasn't close enough to any of her friends in England to call them up and say hey, I feel really miserable right now. This invisible internet army was the closest thing she had to a gang of friends.