Gypsy Wedding (4 page)

‘I don’t know. I’m not happy with the idea, not at all. If she doesn’t go, she’ll get over it.’

‘Okay, Uncle Johnnie. I just promised myself that I’d ask you. I just hate to see her miserable and it’d break my heart if I didn’t think I’d done everything in my power to make things perfect for her.’

He got up and left, leaving Johnnie with his barbecue.

Night was falling by the time the O’Rourkes had finished gorging themselves on the mounds of food they’d prepared. Kylie had long since been bathed and put to bed. The boys were playing with a swingball set, Johnnie and Mary-Rose were sitting by the still-glowing coals sipping cold beers and the two older girls were doing the washing up and tidying up the trailer at the end of the day.

Across the park were the sounds of kids playing, people laughing, music coming from someone’s trailer – the sounds of happy people enjoying a balmy summer evening.

‘Young Liam had a talk with me earlier,’ said Johnnie.

‘And?’

‘He says that our Vicky will be unhappy if we don’t let her go to college.’

Mary-Rose tutted. ‘She’ll get over it. There’s lots of worse things that can happen in life than not going to college.’

‘He says she mightn’t be able to make those dresses like she’d planned.’

‘What’s Liam doing worrying about the dresses?’ Mary-Rose was outraged. ‘That’s women’s business. How would he like it if I started on about carpentry?’

‘He wasn’t talking about the actual dresses themselves, just the making of them. He says Vicky’ll need special equipment.’

‘Then she’ll have to manage without.’

‘I know. But Liam’s right: she’s set her heart on doing it.’

‘Then she can
un
set it.’

‘That’s what I thought, Mammy, but now I don’t know. Liam said that they could get married this time next year so she could go to college, get the dresses made, she’d be happy, he’d be happy …’

‘But college?’

‘Our Vicky’s a good girl.’

Mary-Rose nodded in agreement.

‘She’s never given us a jot of trouble,’ continued Johnnie.

‘That she hasn’t.’

‘If it doesn’t work, she could leave.’

Mary-Rose nodded again. ‘So you’re thinking of changing your mind?’ Which was a rare occasion. And if Johnnie was thinking along different lines then Mary-Rose knew it was okay for her to do similar.

‘I’m not sure. What do you think?’

‘Well, it’s only till next year. It’s too late for her and Liam to be thinking of marrying this summer and I’ve never liked the idea of a winter wedding.’

‘So shall we tell her?’

‘She needs to know before she gets her results,’ said Mary-Rose, still a bit thunderstruck by her husband’s change of mind.

‘Call her out here, then.’

Mary-Rose heaved herself out of her chair and asked her eldest to come outside. ‘Your daddy wants a word.’

Shania and Vicky exchanged a glance. What was this about? Why did her dad want a talk? Dutifully Vicky went outside while Shania hung around the entrance to the trailer, agog with curiosity.

‘I’ve been thinking about college,’ said her dad.

Vicky nodded, and desperately tried to keep her hopes from soaring like a lark.

‘I don’t know nothing about the place, and I don’t understand why you want to go but I can see it’s important to you.’

Despite Vicky’s best efforts her expectations that this was a ‘good’ talk began to rise.

‘But I need you to promise me that if …’ her dad paused. ‘
If
,’ he repeated for effect, ‘I let you go, you promise me you’ll do nothing to disgrace me or your family or bring shame on our community.’

‘Daddy,’ said Vicky, almost crying with happiness. ‘I promise on my life. If I do anything,
anything
that anyone here would worry about I’d kill myself, so I would.’

‘But you won’t,’ said her mother. ‘You’re a good girl and you know how to behave.’

Vicky nodded so hard she felt her teeth clatter together. ‘Mammy, I’ll be such a credit to the family.’

Shania could bear it no longer. ‘College?’ she cried, jumping out of their trailer and ignoring the step. She leapt forward so that she was right in Vicky’s face. ‘
College
? But you should be getting married. What about me?’

‘Hush, you’ll wake Kylie,’ reprimanded her mother.

‘Blow Kylie. What about me?’ she repeated, her voice shrill with indignation. ‘I just know Mikey is going to ask me to marry him soon and I don’t want to hang around once he has.’ She turned to her mother for support. ‘Just because Vicky can’t get her act together I don’t see why I should suffer.’

‘You haven’t been asked yet and you’re only just fifteen,’ replied her mother, reasonably.

‘But I can be married at sixteen. And if Vicky doesn’t get going I’ll be seventeen before I’m wed.’

‘That’s not old,’ said Vicky.

‘Do you know something?’ Shania squared her shoulders at her older sister. ‘I don’t think you want to get married at all. If you did you’d just be getting on with it. You’re just playing at getting married.’

‘How dare you say that? Of course I want to wed Liam. Who wouldn’t?’

‘You, apparently. You seem to be looking for problems.’

‘I so am not.’

‘You so are – I mean,
college
? What the heck is that all about?’

‘It’s about …’ Vicky just couldn’t voice her dream. It was her innermost ambition, her innermost hope. The idea of being a professional dressmaker one day was just too big a deal to talk about. And it certainly wasn’t something to go into with her father present.

‘It’s about just getting my wedding perfect,’ she lied. She wasn’t going to let on about her true motivation. ‘I know the dressmaker will do her best but only I know
really
what I want for my bridesmaids and if it takes a bit longer to create …’

Shania shook her head. ‘It sounds like an excuse to me. You’re just finding reasons to not set a date.’

‘Vicky,’ roared Johnnie, ‘will get married in under three hundred and sixty-five days from now, and that’s an end to it.’

Silence fell. Vicky was contemplating the fact that she’d never take the A level she’d set her heart on and Shania was thinking that she had a whole year to wait at the very least, which, as far as she was concerned, was just totally unfair.

The next morning Vicky was awake at dawn, her stomach churning with nerves at the realisation that this was results day. She crept out of the bed she shared with her sister, praying that Shania wasn’t going to wake up. She had enough to worry about today without a re-run of the row they’d had the night before. They had both got ready for bed still spitting tacks, hissing harsh words at each other in low voices so as not to antagonise their father further – Shania making it plain that she thought her sister’s attitude was unbelievably selfish and Vicky shooting back that Shania was being completely unreasonable. She’d never gone to sleep without making up with her sister before and this morning she felt bad about it. She’d sort it out later. Vicky hardly ever fell out with her sister and she didn’t like the atmosphere between them, but she wasn’t going to back down on the subject of college. Liam supported her and now that her father had changed his mind she didn’t care that it didn’t suit Shania. Tough – she’d have to get over it. That was assuming that she got the grades, because if she didn’t …

No, she wasn’t going to think like that. Mrs Truman was sure she would pass her textiles GCSE with flying colours. A couple of the other subjects were a bit iffy but she didn’t care two hoots about science or history. Just as long as she got her English, maths and textiles then she could go on to college. Anything else would be a bonus.

She glanced down to check her sister was still sleeping, grabbed her dressing gown, towel and sponge bag and then slipped out of the tiny room they shared in the family trailer, shutting the door behind her silently. Equally quietly she let herself out and breathed in the fresh, chill morning air. It was going to be another glorious day. Above her the sky was milky blue and cloudless, there wasn’t a breath of wind and the grass under her bare feet glistened with dew. The birds in the trees around the park were singing almost loud enough to drown out the traffic noise and at the edge of the park, where the grass grew long and lush, rabbits were foraging. Fingers of mist were rising off the field and the low sun cast long shadows. It all looked so perfect, Vicky almost thought she was on a film set.

She stood for a moment enjoying the sheer peace and loveliness of the morning before she skipped across the grass to the shower block, leaving a trail of dark footprints in the silver dew. As she had got up so early, she had the block to herself and she luxuriated in the shower, taking her time, knowing that she wasn’t keeping anyone waiting. She washed her thick dark hair and then combed conditioner through it. If she was going to be meeting all her classmates she wanted to look as neat and tidy as possible. Her best friend Kelly knew where she lived, and so did some of her teachers, but the fact that she was from Irish traveller stock was a secret she kept from everyone else.

Of course, the kids at school weren’t stupid and they’d picked up on one or two of the kids from the trailer park, Shania being one of them, and had given them a hard time – name calling and bullying to the extent that those children had left the school completely, their parents telling the authorities that they were moving on. Since outsiders were less than welcome on the site no one ever checked up; as far as the local education authority was concerned, if the traveller children couldn’t read or write adequately it was their parents’ lookout.

So Vicky had known all her life that if she wanted to pass unnoticed she needed to tone down her Irish accent when she was away from the site and do nothing to draw attention to herself. The fact that she was naturally bright and a quick learner had also helped her to blend in, as did the uniform. Looking the same as the other kids, wearing the same clothes and doing absolutely nothing to stand out Vicky became almost invisible.

Quite how her schoolfriend Kelly had guessed about Vicky’s background she didn’t know, but when Kelly had stopped her on her way to lunch in the canteen one day and asked her outright if she was a gypsy, she and Vicky were close enough for Kelly to agree to keep the truth to herself.

‘I can’t believe it!’ Kelly had said in a shocked whisper. ‘You, a gyppo! I mean I know I asked if you were but I really didn’t expect the answer to be yes.’

‘Well, there you go and please don’t call me a gyppo, it’s really rude.’

‘I am sorry, I didn’t realise. Blimey, that explains a bit.’

‘Maybe it does but you mustn’t tell a soul. Please,’ Vicky pleaded, taking Kelly’s hand and looking into her eyes. ‘You know what some people are like and just because they have accepted me here don’t mean their attitude won’t change once they know where I live.’

‘Surely not?’

‘Well, I don’t want to find out that I’m right.’

‘No, I can see that. There’s one or two who just love to make other people’s lives miserable.’

‘Chloe for one.’

‘Exactly.’

Kelly had been true to her word and a couple of years on no one else had guessed. There had been a couple of dodgy moments when other kids noticed that although Vicky was one of the oldest in the class, as she had a September birthday, she seemed to have to obey much stricter rules than some of the youngest. One or two of the boys had also wondered why she was so uptight about going out with anyone but Kelly had always jumped to her friend’s defence and said that her father was really strict. Which was true, but the way Kelly told it made him sound just old-fashioned rather than the fact that Vicky’s whole lifestyle was so different to theirs, that her schoolmates would never understand.

Vicky rinsed the conditioner out of her hair, switched off the shower and dried herself carefully before winding her towel round her wet curls. When she left the shower block she could see signs of life springing up on the park. A couple of the trailer doors were open and hooked back, a dog had been let out and was rushing up and down the hedge trying to find the rabbits that had been there a few minutes before, and there were footprints other than Vicky’s in the grass.

When she got back to her trailer the family was awake. Kylie was in her high chair with a beaker of warm milk and Shania was cooking bacon for her father and brothers. The smell was delicious but Vicky was feeling so wound up with nerves that instead of making her feel hungry she just felt sick.

‘Cut the bread,’ said Shania.

No ‘good morning’, Vicky noticed, so clearly Shania was still in a mood with her. Not wishing to upset her sister further, Vicky put off drying her hair and expertly cut half a dozen slices off a new loaf. She slathered them in butter and passed them to her sister, who flipped the bacon from the pan onto the slices and made up three big sandwiches.

‘Breakfast,’ she called.

With the men being fed Vicky was free to sort herself out. She had hours before she was due in school but she had to think about what to wear; no more school uniform for her, which meant that the anonymity of black trousers and a white shirt wasn’t available.