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Authors: Roisin Meaney

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Pity Ruth hadn’t more of a spark about her though – nice was all very well, but when you had to watch what you said all the time, make sure you didn’t offend . . . She wondered
what Breffni would make of Ruth. Chalk and cheese, definitely. But maybe Breffni would be charmed by Ruth’s shyness.

Yeah, right.
Laura started to gather the photos together.

‘We’d better put these back before they get drink spilt on them. When did you say the album proofs would be ready?’

And Ruth, having no idea of the nightmare that lay ahead – how could she? – began to talk about her future.

Cecily O’Neill clipped the wafer-thin metal bookmark over the top of the page before closing her book. She turned her head and looked out the window. Not yet five
o’clock, and already the day was starting to give up its brightness.

She always dreaded the winter. Biting wind drying up her skin, chilling her right through to her bones, no matter what she wore. Long, long, dark nights spent alone in her wide double bed,
curling up to keep warm – electric blankets were so unhealthy – trying to shut out the sound of the interminable rain.

Having to pile on layer after layer of clothing – those horribly unfeminine thermal vests – hiding her neat shape. Cecily had always taken great care with her appearance, proud of
the fact that she looked years younger than her age. She was fairly sure that everyone at the book club assumed she was in her mid-fifties – not, of course, that she would dream of discussing
the subject with any of them.

It had never come up with Brian; he’d never asked, she’d never said. He almost certainly thought she was younger than thirty-three when they met; and she, having long since lost
patience with men but longing for the respectability of marriage, had never told him otherwise.

She hadn’t commented when she’d come across his passport one day and discovered him to be four years her junior. She’d simply made sure that her meticulous skincare routines,
and her careful diet, never varied: cleanse, tone and moisturise every morning and night, with a weekly facial and a full body massage every fortnight. Lots of chicken and fish and fresh
vegetables, very little red meat. A carefully controlled amount of milk and cheese for her bones, plenty of water.

No sweets or chocolate – dessert on special occasions only – and never more than one small gin and tonic before dinner. A daily walk, whatever the weather. And, of course, no direct
sunlight – the ruination of so many complexions. She thoroughly disapproved of Andrew’s tan when he and Ruth had come back from their honeymoon – not that she had mentioned it, of
course. And Ruth had obviously exposed her pale skin too – face covered in freckles, nose peeling most unattractively. She’d be sorry eventually, particularly as she was no Venus to
begin with. Presentable enough, certainly, but had probably never turned a head in her life – or looked a day younger than her age.

Cecily assumed that her own husband had probably discovered how old she was at some stage – a marriage of twenty-three years has few secrets – but if he had, he’d never spoken
of it. He was naturally quiet, not given to much in the way of small talk; and she, never one for idle chatter herself, was thankful for it.

So it still surprised her, whenever she thought of it, how quiet the house seemed after he’d fallen from a ladder five years ago and broken his neck. It wasn’t as if he’d ever
made much noise when he was alive.

She set her book down on the little table beside her, then got up and drew the heavy curtains together before switching on the standard lamps. The room was softened with golden light. Still half
an hour or so before Andrew and Ruth got in; then just enough time for a pre-dinner drink before her Basque-style chicken was ready. Cecily rearranged her cushion, sat back down and returned to her
book – Ann Tyler’s latest, and up to standard – with a satisfied smile.

Everything as it should be, as always.

‘Hello?’

‘Bref, it’s me. What’s happening?’

‘Hey Laur. Not much really. Poll’s just over a cold. We had a couple of broken nights – she was really choked up.’

‘Ah, the creature.’

‘Yeah . . . she’s fine again now though. What’s up with you?’

‘Just wondering about yourself and Cian coming to dinner here on Thursday, if you’re happy about leaving Poll.’

‘Happy and more than ready for a break – Granny Mary will hold the fort. What’s the occasion?’

‘You have to meet Ruth; they got back the other day.’

Pause. ‘Oh . . . right.’

Had Laura imagined that hesitation? She decided to ignore it for the moment. ‘I’ve told her all about you, so you need to come and show her you’re not that bad
really.’

‘Har de har – you should be on stage. How’s she getting on with the dragon lady?’

Laura smiled. ‘Hey, watch it – that’s my mother you’re talking about; she’s no lady.’

‘I’ll tell her you said that next time I see her. Anyway, she’s not that bad – “dragon lady” is actually a term of endearment. I just wouldn’t fancy
living with her.’

‘Hmm – and so say all of us. Ruth seems to be getting on fine with her so far. But then, she’s the kind who’d get on well with anyone – you know, nice. Friendly.
Easygoing.’

‘You make her sound like a sheepdog – or someone who crochets. Does she crochet?’

Laura laughed. ‘No, no crochet, as far as I know; no sign of any lace doyleys. And no knitting or embroidery either: not so far anyway. She
is
quiet though – I have to watch
what I say a bit. I think she doesn’t quite know what to make of me. But she’s nice really, and she’s dying to meet you. So ye’ll come on Thursday?’

Another tiny pause. ‘Yeah, as long as it suits Cian – he’s not home from work yet. I’ll check with him and give you a ring back. What time do you want us?’

‘Eight-ish, I suppose.’ Laura thought of Breffni’s appalling timekeeping. ‘That does not mean nine-ish, it means half eight. And make Cian drive, so you can have a
jar.’

‘Oh he’ll drive, don’t you worry. I drove us to a work do of his last week; someone was retiring after about seventy-nine years in the job.’

Laura laughed again. ‘Right, so that would make him, let’s see . . . about a hundred and five?’

‘Yeah, about that. We got a set dinner and a man with an accordion entertaining us after; I think he was the office caretaker or something. Everyone was waltzing – it was worse than
a wedding. I nearly fell asleep into the pork chops. We were the only two under fifty-five.’

‘Serves you right for taking up with a boring old taxman, or whatever he is.’

‘Accountant please – give him his correct title. And I assume “boring” refers to his job.’

‘You know it does; Cian is a pet . . . .’ Laura hesitated – maybe she should say something, after all. ‘Look Bref, you are OK about this, aren’t you?’

‘About what – meeting the love of my life again?’ Breffni sounded amused. ‘Sure didn’t we meet at your wedding, and weren’t we fine?’

Laura wondered again if she’d imagined Breffni’s earlier hesitation. ‘Yeah, of course you were . . . but that was different. This’ll be back in Limerick – I thought
it might – oh I don’t know, stir things up a bit, or something.’ She began to feel a bit foolish – she should never have brought it up.

Breffni didn’t seem bothered. ‘Laur, I appreciate your concern, really I do, but you needn’t worry – Andrew and myself are ancient history. Haven’t I Cian now? And
we were bound to meet sooner or later, with us both back in the same territory – I’m amazed that I haven’t bumped into him up to this, actually, when you think that I’ve
been home nearly two years now.’

‘Well, you’re not exactly living a few doors up from us any more . . . so you don’t hate the thought, really?’

‘No; I’ll rise to the occasion, don’t worry.’

‘Good . . . and Bref, you won’t mention to Ruth about you and Andrew, will you? She’s not very confident really – it might throw her a bit.’

The amusement was back in Breffni’s voice. ‘God, what do you think of me? I’m hardly going to introduce myself as the one who had a fling with her husband when he was young and
innocent . . . well, young anyway.’

‘I know, I know; I just thought you might say it as a joke, or something – you know what you’re like.’

‘No worries; my lips are sealed. Talk to you later.’

‘See you.’ As she hung up, Laura let out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding.

Laura O’Neill and Breffni Comerford grew up five numbers apart in a cul-de-sac just off the North Circular Road, where Breffni’s parents, and Laura’s mother,
Cecily, still lived. For six years, the girls walked to school with one mother and came home with the other. When they reached fifth class, the mothers stayed at home. As they were growing up, they
went through phases of Van Morrison and James Taylor and the Smiths. They agreed to differ on Janis Ian, whom Laura loved and Breffni tolerated. They both threw away the walnuts on the tops of
their Walnut Whips, and they lusted after Paul Newman (Laura) and Andy Garcia (Breffni). From fifteen to seventeen they wore only black – apart from their brown school uniforms – and
they listened to Leonard Cohen and Billie Holiday in each other’s incense-filled bedrooms, and read
Lolita
and
To Kill a Mockingbird
and
Wuthering Heights
and
Brideshead Revisited
till their paperback copies fell apart. They agreed that Colin Firth was the ultimate Mr D’Arcy, and that Madonna tried too hard; and they both had secret
tattoos from a holiday in Portugal – a tiny sun on Laura’s lower back and a star on Breffni’s left hip.

They had their ears pierced at sixteen, and they gave up chocolate at seventeen. Breffni lasted three weeks, Laura almost eleven months. They traded clothes and secrets and diets. They
straightened Laura’s auburn curls and permed Breffni’s silky black hair, to the horror of both mothers.

They tried and failed to smoke. They sneaked out to drink cider from flagon bottles with local lads down by the river on long summer evenings, and were each other’s alibis the few times
they stayed out all night. Once or twice they recycled boyfriends, but that wasn’t a great success. They cried on each other’s shoulders when their hearts were broken, and once they
held hands and promised God everlasting good behaviour as they waited to find out that Breffni wasn’t pregnant.

The year they left school, when Laura was almost nineteen and Breffni a few months younger, they went to San Francisco for the summer and stayed with Comerford cousins that Breffni had met once
at a family wedding over six years before. They got a bus around the hairpin bends of Lombard Street and took the ferry out to Alcatraz and rode a cable car up California Avenue. They wandered
around Fisherman’s Wharf and walked through the Castro district, trying not to stare at the jaw-droppingly beautiful men strolling about hand in hand. They signed up for ten Bikram yoga
classes for ten dollars, and staggered home, drenched with sweat, from their first and last class.

‘God above – that was like doing it in a sauna.’ Breffni flapped the end of her damp pink t-shirt. ‘I’m wrecked.’

‘I nearly slipped when we were doing that tree thing, my mat was so wet.’ Laura quickened her pace to a trot. ‘Bags first in the shower.’

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