Mother of the Bride (29 page)

‘These old houses are great,' remarked Cathy, looking out at the
garden, where Emily was stomping around and picking daisies from the lawn. ‘They have plenty of space for kids, and to build an extension like we did. Most of them are being sold and done up, so there is a great mixture of neighbours.'

Amy looked around at her gran's small cramped kitchen with its tired beige tiles and green kitchen presses, which could certainly do with being done up!

‘Mum was in hospital!' Helen was upset when Amy phoned to tell her what happened. ‘Your dad and I'll be there in a few hours,' she fussed. ‘We'll check out of the hotel and be on the road to Dublin as soon as we can.'

‘Mum, Gran's fine,' Amy reassured. ‘Take your time, there's no rush back. She's broken her arm and a rib and she's had a few stitches, but honestly she's OK.'

Amy had a slightly bizarre phone conversation with Jess, where her best friend mentioned the wasted theatre tickets, but actually seemed more upset that she had taken off somewhere for the weekend without telling her. Maybe staying here in Willow Grove with her gran for a while wouldn't be a bad idea!

Her parents arrived mid-afternoon. Her dad looked tired from the long drive on the motorway.

Amy watched, bemused, as her mum fussed over her grandmother as if she was a child.

‘What were you doing walking all that way to the shops on your own? You know that I'll always bring you shopping or get anything you need.'

‘I just wanted to get one or two things,' replied Gran stubbornly.

‘Mum, there are enough people to help if you want something.'

‘I'm perfectly able to get shopping for myself,' said Sheila calmly. It had always been her habit never to depend on others.

‘Mum, why don't you come and stay with myself and Paddy for a bit. Till you're feeling better, at least?' cajoled Helen.

‘I'm feeling fine, Helen, just a bit stiff and sore from the broken rib and the bruising. But I'll mend,' Sheila said stubbornly. ‘I'm not going anywhere.'

Amy could understand her grandmother wanting to stay in the familiarity of her own home with all her clutter of things around her. So much was changing around the old woman that this was probably the only place she felt safe.

‘Gran, would you like me to stay here with you for a bit?' she found herself offering.

‘That would be grand, Amy love,' nodded Sheila.

‘Then I'll stay here for the moment,' Amy volunteered. ‘I need somewhere to live. Jess's is great, but I can't stay there for ever. I've been trying to find somewhere, and being here with Gran is fine.'

‘Are you sure?' asked Paddy, concerned.

‘Yeah, it suits everyone.'

‘Amy, it would be great if you were here at night to keep an eye on things,' said Helen, unable to hide the relief in her voice. ‘But what will happen during the day when you are out at work?'

‘Doesn't Sylvie already come in three days? Maybe you could ask her if she could manage five mornings for the moment? Also, Gran's neighbours are great.'

‘There's no harm asking,' agreed her mother, ‘and at weekends Brendan and David and Tim and all the family chip in.'

‘Well, if that's settled, then,' said Sheila, ‘I'm going to put my feet up and have a nap in the front room.'

Paddy O'Connor checked in with the pretty young receptionist at the Oaklands Medical Centre. It had been over two years since he had graced the place, and he shifted nervously in his seat in the large waiting area, seeking refuge in a copy of the daily newspaper. He was mostly surrounded by women: some with babies, some with elderly parents, and Bernice Patterson, a neighbour from down the road who was on crutches. An old geezer in the corner coughed his lungs out and was given a wide berth by everyone. A forty-a-day man, by the sound of it, and as evidenced by the brown nicotine-stained fingers that trembled as he pretended to read a magazine. Paddy hated coming to the surgery, dealing with doctors and nurses and medical people, but lately he had been feeling unwell. He believed that health was wealth. He ensured that his car was serviced regularly and passed the NCT test, so it was the least he could do to make sure that his own engine wasn't developing some kind of problem.

To be honest, for the last few weeks Paddy hadn't been feeling right. He'd felt awful down at his sister's sixtieth party in Cork and was tired and out of sorts. He found that even doing simple things was making him breathless. He hadn't mentioned a word to Helen,
who had enough on her plate: dealing with Sheila – who seemed to suddenly have developed some form of mild dementia – and getting over the disappointment and upset of Amy's wedding. No, he would go calmly and quietly to Tom Galligan and find out what was what!

He scanned the sports results and the business page, unable to concentrate. In the distance a baby roared, the sound filling the silence. Poor wee thing, being vaccinated and subjected to a needle! He was a grown man, and yet he hated needles!

‘Mr O'Connor!' The receptionist called his name. ‘Doctor Galligan will see you now in room three.'

Paddy got up, abandoning the paper, and tried to compose himself as he walked along the cream-painted corridor.

‘Come in, Paddy, and sit down,' Tom Galligan said warmly, pointing to a leather chair opposite his desk.

His office was bright and neat, with a slim computer and screen sitting on the modern desk with its silver legs and wooden top.

‘How are you?' said the doctor.

‘I don't know. I've been a bit off sorts lately,' Paddy said.

‘In what way?'

‘Well, I'm finding it harder to lift things . . . even to go up the stairs to the office sometimes.'

‘Any shortness of breath?'

‘A bit, I suppose, but it's probably just my age. My office is up on the second floor, and even though I'd consider myself fit, recently the stairs take it out of me. Then at the weekend I thought that I'd do a bit of work in the garden, digging, clearing the back up near the shed – and I had to stop.'

‘Any pain?'

‘I suppose a bit. I just didn't feel right.'

‘Hmm,' said Doctor Galligan. He stood up and asked Paddy to remove his jacket and shirt. Then he took his blood pressure
and pulse before getting Paddy to lie on the white couch while he examined him and listened to his chest.

‘Paddy, when someone like you, who rarely darkens my door, tells me he's not feeling right a little alarm bell rings,' said Tom Galligan. The doctor examined him literally from head to toe. Paddy was embarrassed when he hooked him up to the surgery's ECG machine and stuck pads to his chest so that he could examine his heart.

‘Hopefully, it's nothing, but I'd prefer to have you checked out properly. I think that we should do a few blood tests here today, and then Elaine, my receptionist, will set up a few more tests for you in the morning. Also, I want to get Elaine to book you in for a more detailed test of your heart – an echocardiogram – which is an ultra-sound of your heart, down in the Blackrock Clinic tomorrow, if she can get an appointment.'

‘Tom, do you think there might be something wrong?' Paddy asked, suddenly alarmed.

‘I think we need to do a few more tests to see what's going on!' the doctor explained calmly. Paddy tried to mask his dismay as he thanked him and paid his bill before driving back into town.

Two days later Paddy got an appointment for the cardiology department in Blackrock Clinic. Luckily he had good medical cover and could get all the tests done on the same day. He filled in a detailed form which asked a load of questions about his health and his family history. His father, Seamus, had died of a stroke at seventy-two years of age. A fit, strong man, he had stepped out of bed one morning and collapsed, unable to speak or move, Paddy's mother finding him when she returned from ten o'clock Mass. There had been hospitals and doctors and scans, but his father had not recovered, and he had died about eight days later.

The first test was the echocardiogram: an ultrasound of his heart. The young male technician explained it to Paddy as he made him lie
down on his side on the narrow bed. He firmly pressed the scanner down hard on to his chest and sides: the ECHO would help show up any weakness or abnormality in his heart. It was strange listening to the gushing and thumping sounds of his own heart.

Everything seemed fine, and Paddy felt he was a fraud, wasting medical people's valuable time.

Afterwards he was asked to do an exercise stress test on the treadmill. He wasn't much of a one for the gym, preferring eighteen holes of golf or a good walk in the fresh air, but he had been on a treadmill a few times before and felt confident enough as the machine started. The pace was slow and steady and it increased very slightly, but after only a few minutes Paddy felt he was struggling; the nurse stopped the machine. A few more blood tests and he was finished. He chased back into town for a meeting with a new client who was converting a warehouse to a manufacturing unit.

Doctor Galligan's secretary phoned him two days later, and Paddy returned to the surgery for his test results.

‘The results of your tests are back and there are a few things that are causing some concern,' the doctor explained. ‘Paddy, your cholesterol is high and the results of your stress test, the ECG and ECHO, and some of your blood-tests, are flagging up that something is going on. I'm referring you to a cardiologist, Paddy, as the ECHO shows there are some definite changes to your heart and there may be some blockage of two arteries.' Paddy sat in the chair feeling as if he had been punched. He had never really been sick in his life and now he had to go and see a specialist. Paddy listened as the GP tried to explain it all to him and gave him a letter for Doctor Clancy, the cardiologist he was to see.

Doctor Brendan Clancy, the cardiologist, saw him five days later. He was a small, dapper man and he studied the results of Paddy's tests carefully and read the letter from his GP.

‘Paddy, I'm afraid that the result of the echo and your other tests indicate that there is a problem with the arteries, and we need to investigate further. I've scheduled you for an angiogram on Monday morning, here in the clinic.'

‘An angiogram!' Paddy couldn't believe it, and listened as Doctor Clancy explained how they would inject dye into the top of his leg and it would show up the arteries in his heart so that they would get a much clearer picture of what was going on. It sounded awful, and Paddy was scared, petrified. He didn't know what to think.

‘Once we see the angiogram we can decide what treatment you may need,' said Doctor Clancy.

‘Treatment?'

‘Well, if you need a stent or even a bypass.'

Sitting out in the car afterwards Paddy felt suddenly afraid. He was as healthy as a horse, had been all his life, and yet now there were doctors and tests and this bloody angiogram thing. He hated doctors, no matter how nice they seemed to be! What the hell was he going to do?

On Saturday night he persuaded Helen to go for a drink in Fitzgerald's. God knows, he could do with a drink after the strain of the past few days. He set her up with a vodka and orange and himself with a pint of beer. The pub was fairly busy and the barman, Ambrose, came over to say hello to them. Paddy wanted somewhere safe and quiet to tell Helen about his appointment on Monday. He knew her mind would be racing once he told her about seeing a cardiologist, and she would have lots of questions. Likely she would be furious with him.

Helen rambled on about Amy. ‘I'm still so worried about her, Paddy. She's trying to put on a brave face but you can see she's heartbroken.'

Paddy took a long sip of his pint.

‘Then of course there's Sheila. We need to know what's facing us!'

Paddy took another sip of his pint.

‘Nursing homes and hospitals and doctors and carers, that's what the Hennessys and the O'Connors are facing!'

‘Talking about doctors,' he began slowly, ‘I was with Tom Galligan the other day and he sent me for a few tests.'

‘I thought you had your health check done a while ago?' Helen put down her drink immediately.

‘I haven't been feeling that well recently. Anyway, my cholesterol is raised and a few of the tests came back as abnormal so Tom sent me for an ultrasound and organized for me to see a heart consultant. A nice chap in Blackrock Clinic called Brendan Clancy.'

‘Paddy, I don't believe it. You went and saw a consultant in hospital without telling me!' Helen whispered. ‘Why?'

‘You've had so much on your plate with Amy and Sheila that I didn't want to worry you,' he explained. ‘It's bad enough one of us worrying about it, without the two of us going up the walls!'

‘Paddy O'Connor, if we weren't in a public place . . . I'd kill you,' Helen blurted out. ‘I bet that's why you brought me down here to tell me!'

‘Too right,' he laughed, taking her hand.

‘So what did this doctor say?'

‘He said that I need to have an angiogram done of my heart.'

‘When?'

‘On Monday.'

‘This Monday?'

‘Yes, I have to be in Blackrock Clinic by nine in the morning, and I'm not allowed to drive.'

Helen was furious with him for not telling her that he was going to the doctor, and, worse still, that he had been sent to the Blackrock Clinic.

‘You could have keeled over, Paddy, and how do you think that I would have felt – or the kids?' she demanded, all emotional.

He held her hand.

‘Paddy, we're in this together. No more secrets, promise me!'

Paddy leaned over and kissed her, stroking her cheek with his finger. ‘No more secrets,' he promised, relieved that everything was out in the open.

As Paddy lay waiting to be brought down for his angiogram, Helen sat beside his bed. Helen sighed; Paddy was being his usual protective self, trying not to worry her. He was such a good man, and without thinking she reached over and hugged him.