With All My Love (16 page)

She heard Katie give a little whimper and jumped out of bed, hastily wiping the tears from her cheeks as she hurried into her grandchild’s bedroom.

‘What is it, chicken? I’m here, Valerie’s here.’ She leaned down and kissed the little girl.

‘I’s having a bad dream. Can I come into your bed?’ came the plaintive plea.

‘Of course you can, darling.’ She leaned down and lifted her up. She loved the way Katie snuggled into her neck, with one small thumb tucked into her mouth.

‘Can I have a biscuit, Valwee?’ she asked sleepily.

‘Does Mammy give you biscuits at night?’ Valerie smiled as she carried her into her bedroom.

‘Sometimes,’ Katie yawned.

‘Just this once then.’ Valerie laid her gently on the bed and pulled the sheet up over her. She loved the way Katie called her Valwee. She had never wanted to be called ‘Gran’ or ‘Nan’ or the like. She was too young, she’d told Briony firmly.

She went out to the kitchen, shook a few biscuits onto a plate and poured a small amount of milk into two tumblers. Her hand hovered over some cupcakes but she decided against them. It was late; she didn’t want her granddaughter to get a tummy ache.

‘Are we having a midnight feast, Valwee?’ Katie’s eyes widened with pleasure and she sat up when she saw her grandmother bringing the goodies in on a small tray. She adored midnight feasts.

‘We are, love, but then you’ve got to lie down before Mammy comes home because we don’t want her to be cross,’ Valerie warned.

‘OK,’ her granddaughter agreed, and reached for her milk and biscuits.

Valerie watched her enjoy her snack and felt an ache of sadness as she took a drink of her own milk. It was inconceivable that Briony would prevent her from seeing Katie again. It just
couldn’t
happen.

But it could
, a little voice in her head said.
You stopped Tessa from seeing Briony. You got your own back there. Now it’s your turn to suffer.

Valerie stared at Katie as she licked her fingers, drained her tumbler of milk and handed it to her before settling down against the pillows, a smile curving her rosebud mouth. ‘That was brill, Valwee, thank you. Will you sing me a song? Mommy always sings me Sugar an’ Spice an’ all things nice.’

A flashback of Tessa singing that little song to Briony made Valerie catch her breath. Imagine that her daughter had remembered it and now sang it to her own daughter. Valerie wondered whether Briony could possibly remember Tessa singing it to her. She fervently hoped not.

‘I don’t really know that one,’ Valerie said faintly. ‘I’ll sing you “Christopher Robin”.’

‘Oh, yes, please. I
love
that one!’ Katie stuck her thumb in her mouth and her eyelashes fluttered down onto her cheeks. She was practically asleep.

Valerie sang, trying to keep the quiver out of her voice as the impact of what she had done all those years ago shook her to her core. Don’t think about it, sing the lullaby, she told herself fiercely as the evocative words floated over Katie’s drowsy head. She trailed off, aware that her grandchild was now fast asleep.

Tessa Egan had once sung lullabies to a much-loved grandchild. Had once comforted a distressed little girl and brought her to her bed. Had once had midnight feasts, and played in playgrounds, and painted and told stories, and sang songs. Tessa had done all those things with Briony, and Briony had loved her with all her little heart. Sometimes Valerie had felt that Briony had loved Tessa more than she had loved her.

And she had put an end to it. Had separated grandmother from grandchild. Only now when she was facing the same prospect did Valerie begin to realize the enormity and consequence of her act. If she felt Tessa had been spiteful, Jeff’s mother could say the same about her, she thought dully. She felt sick. People who believed in karma would say she was getting what she deserved. Something Lizzie was fond of quoting came to mind.

There is a destiny that makes us brothers;

None goes his way alone;

All that we send into the lives of others

Comes back into our own.

She had caused Tessa unimaginable grief. Only now was she beginning to understand just how much. Because she had caused such grief to Tessa, was she now going to be the grieved one? The one to suffer even more heartache?

But Tessa had
ruined
her life, Valerie thought angrily. She
deserved
what she got.

But Briony didn’t deserve what had been done to her
, that voice that would give her no peace whispered. Was this what was meant in the Bible when it said, ‘As ye sow, so shall ye reap’?

Oh my God! Please, please, don’t let me lose Briony and Katie, please, God. Don’t do this to me,
Valerie begged silently, distraught as she went back to her bedroom.

Her gaze rested on another faded photo, one of her and Jeff, and she picked it up and studied it, then felt a savage dart of anguish.

‘Jeff, please, if you’re watching over us, help us,’ she whispered.

His eyes, so happy and relaxed, stared back at her from the photo. He had his arms around her and she was looking up at him adoringly as he gazed towards the camera. The picture was taken the day of the Royal Wedding. The day Lady Diana Spencer and Prince Charles had married. The day Briony was conceived. It had been one of the happiest days of her life, and a day when it seemed all her dreams had come true.

It was Tessa who had shattered her dreams. Tessa and her interfering ways. She gazed at the photo with bleak sadness, remembering the pure optimism and joy she felt when life had been the best it had ever been for her and no dark clouds loomed on her horizon.

It was the last time in her life when she was truly carefree, and her thoughts drifted back to that sunny July day in 1981, when millions of people around the world watched a magical wedding and every young girl, including herself, dreamed of being a fairytale bride.

C
HAPTER
S
EVENTEEN

‘Right, we have the goodies, bacon and sausages for but ties, vino for later, and plenty of chocolate and crisps,’ Lizzie declared, surveying their stash on the coffee table in their small shabby sitting room. A chintz sofa that had seen better days and a matching armchair took up most of the space. A standard lamp with a pink bockety shade that matched the pink roses in the wallpaper stood in the corner beside it. Opposite them, a narrow fireplace with chipped green tiles. A wooden china cabinet with a cracked pane of glass sat in one chimney alcove, another coffee table holding their stereo unit and TV sat in the other. A wooden sash window with white lace nets looked out over an overgrown back garden. The elderly lady who owned the house and lived downstairs allowed them to use it. It was south-facing and perfect for sunbathing.

They had the upstairs flat in a large red-brick bay-windowed semi in Daneswell Road, close to Glasnevin Village. Shabby and old-fashioned as the flat was, they loved it. The rooms were big and airy and they had plenty of space compared to some of the matchboxes a couple of their friends lived in. They were having the time of their lives, free from parental restraint, with Valerie’s car, money in their pockets, new people to meet and places to see. They were in their element. The icing on the cake for Valerie was that she could now see Jeff in the evenings whenever she wanted, and occasionally spend blissfully happy intimate moments cocooned in a bubble of love. In the space of a couple of months her life had changed radically in a way that she had only dared to dream about.

Valerie had got her transfer to Dublin Corporation, and Lizzie was working in the P&T. When the letter of confirmation came from the Corporation telling her that her transfer had been accepted, and to present herself at their personnel department in Aungier Street, she had been dizzy with excitement.

Telling her mother that she was moving up to Dublin had been difficult. Valerie felt as though she was abandoning Carmel. ‘You’ll be able to come and stay with me and we can go shopping in Grafton Street, and have our lunch in fancy restaurants and go to the pictures and the theatre,’ Valerie had said comfortingly when she’d seen the stricken expression on Carmel’s face.

‘You don’t want your mother hanging out of you up in Dublin. Go on and live your life and have fun up there, Valerie,’ Carmel had said firmly.

‘No, Mam, I’d really like to do things with you. You could come up once a month, couldn’t you? You could take the bus up and I’ll meet you at Bus Aras, and we could have dinner and go to a show or to the pictures and you could stay the night.’

‘You haven’t even got a place to live yet.’ Carmel had laughed at her daughter’s enthusiasm, secretly delighted that she was so insistent about spending time with her.

‘We’re going flat-hunting at the weekend. Lizzie can’t wait because she’s living in a bedsit. You should see it, Mam, it’s tiny and she just has a little two-ring cooker and a fridge right beside her bed! And all her clothes are in black bags because the wardrobe is just a cupboard, and she has to share a bathroom. She can’t wait to move.’

‘I’m going to buy you some nice sheets and pillowcases, and some towels, and you can take some of those mugs and that matching jug and sugar bowl set that your aunt Alice gave me last Christmas,’ Carmel had offered.

‘Thanks, Mam, you’re the best.’ Valerie had hugged her, before getting a map of the city and putting it on the kitchen table, where they pored over it, looking for Aungier Street.

‘What are you two looking for? Where’s my dinner?’ Terence came in from work and stood staring at them, disgruntled that the table wasn’t set and his dinner wasn’t ready for him.

‘It’s a casserole. I’ll dish it out now,’ Carmel retorted.

Valerie started folding the map.

‘What are you looking for that’s so important?’ He’d slumped down on a chair.

Valerie had glanced at her mother and taken a deep breath. She had imagined this moment many times, and now that it was finally here all the eloquent speeches she’d composed about gaining her freedom and no longer being under his dominion, and particularly about her lack of respect for him because of his absolute lack of respect for her, and his total failure as a parent, evaporated. ‘I’m moving up to Dublin. I transferred to the Corporation,’ she said coldly.

‘You could have moved up to Dublin and gone to college and made something of your life.’ He scowled at her.

‘Oh, I will make something of my life, don’t you worry.’ She recovered some of her brio. ‘Lizzie and I are going to study for an Arts degree at UCD at night, when we have the money saved for it.’

‘Another hot thing, that Lizzie one. I’ll believe it when I see it,’ he’d said derisively and stuck his head in the newspaper he’d pulled out of his jacket pocket. That was the last time he referred to her moving away from home. When she actually moved to Dublin two weeks later, having found a flat that suited her and Lizzie perfectly the previous weekend, Terence had gone to do his Meals on Wheels stint long before she finally climbed into the Mini, the little car bursting at the seams with bulging black bags of clothes and boxes of books, tapes and personal belongings, which Jeff had helped her to pack. He was travelling back to Dublin with her to help her move in. But the fizz of excitement went flat when she saw Carmel standing in the doorway waving at her as she started the engine. She’d waved back but the lump in her throat nearly choked her, and her eyes were blurry with tears as she drove out of Rockland’s. What had Carmel to look forward to? A tedious existence living with a husband she didn’t want to be with. At least Valerie had her life ahead of her.

‘You’ll be able to come back to visit; it’s only an hour away,’ Jeff had said comfortingly, remembering his own mixed emotions when he had left home to go to college.

‘I know, I just hate leaving Mam. I won’t ever be going back to live there and she knows it,’ Valerie sniffed.

‘Um,’ he murmured, and she figured he didn’t know what else to say and that her tears were making him feel uncomfortable.

‘Sorry.’ She swallowed.

‘It could be worse, you could be emigrating or something,’ he had said awkwardly.

‘Yeah,’ she’d agreed. It was true she was only an hour away. As they drove along the N11, playing Queen on her tape deck, her anticipation kicked back in. When she pulled up outside their new flat and saw Lizzie waving excitedly out of the top window, she waved back, grinning broadly. This was going to be fun, she knew it was. She had left childhood back in Rockland’s, now she was going to spread her wings and fly high.

She had taken like a duck to water to living in the city and had settled into her new job relatively quickly, much more confident in her abilities than when she had first started working. She and Lizzie had decided to make a day of it when the date of the Royal Wedding had been announced and had taken leave. They were bunkering in with plenty of supplies to enjoy the royal pageant, and the smell of sizzling rashers and sausages was making her mouth water.

Valerie sighed happily as she turned on the TV and saw the crowds of well-wishers outside Buckingham Palace waiting for Lady Diana to emerge from her state carriage.

‘I’m dying to see the dress.’ Lizzie arrived in from the small kitchen with a mug of tea and a plate of crispy fried white pudding. ‘Starters,’ she grinned before hurrying back to the pan.

Valerie munched on the tasty fare. She and Lizzie had been out drinking with Jeff and some of his classmates in the Bolton Horse the night before, and she was feeling a bit under the weather. A fry-up was just the antidote she needed.

‘Hurry,’ she called. ‘The guests are arriving at St Paul’s.’

‘Coming,’ yelled Lizzie, hurrying in a minute later with a plate piled high with bacon and sausage butties slathered with tomato ketchup.

emong

‘Imagine wearing white to a wedding! Is that not considered a fashion
fax pas
?’ Valerie commented noticing how many of the guests were wearing white. ‘Oh look there’s the First Lady,’ she added as a reed-thin Nancy Reagan made a gracious entrance.