A Time for Friends (27 page)

‘If you start arguing I’m switching back to RTÉ,’ Hilary declared.

‘Mam, because it’s my birthday sleepover I don’t suppose we could go to Wes?’ Sophie asked hopefully. ‘After all I’m fifteen now.’

‘You suppose right. You’re too young,’ Hilary said firmly, not in the humour for having an argument about being allowed or not allowed to go to a popular disco. It was such a
nuisance The Grove, a disco in their neck of the woods, had closed a couple of years back. It was an institution and going there with a gang of friends had been a rite of passage for local
teenagers for several decades.

She and Colette and their friends had felt so grown-up the first time they’d gone to the famous disco. They had been in Seventh Heaven to finally walk past the bouncers through the
hallowed doors. Thereafter the weekly night out had been the highlight of their teen years. They had bopped their hearts out to The Rolling Stones, The Doors, The Eagles, Thin Lizzy, Bruce
Springsteen; the music had been class, she remembered with a smile. She would have had no problem with her daughters going to The Grove, but Wesley FC in Donnybrook was a different kettle of fish
and not comfortingly near like the disco in Raheny had been. And she hated driving over to the Southside when it was her night on collection duty.

‘Mam, it’s not fair! Millie’s allowed to go.’ Sophie’s remonstration interrupted her reverie. ‘Some of the girls—’

‘Millie’s seventeen. I’m not going to argue about it, Sophie.’

‘But—’

‘
No
!’ She glanced in her rear-view mirror and saw her youngest daughter sitting with a mutinous expression on her face and felt like slapping her. Sophie knew the rules.
Knew she wasn’t going to be allowed to go to Wesley until she was sixteen, and until then would have to make do with her youth club and sports club discos.

‘You’re not missing much, it’s not
that
great,’ Millie assured her. But Sophie was not to be mollified.

‘I didn’t ask you, did I?’ she said rudely.

‘Be like that then,’ Millie snapped.

‘You’re just so rude.’

‘And you’re—’

‘Girls! Be
quiet
!’

Whitney Houston’s melodic tones filled the air as Hilary’s daughters obeyed her dictate. ‘Take that puss off you in Gran’s,’ Hilary warned as Sophie stomped up Mrs
Hammond’s garden path ten minutes later.

‘Take a chill pill, Mam!’ Sophie scowled.

‘Less of your cheek, miss,’ Hilary snapped.

Had she been as moody and stroppy when she was a teen? she wondered when she’d dropped the girls home an hour later before going to do her supermarket shop. She’d been hoping Sophie
would get out of her huff and offer to come shopping with her and queue at the meat counter while Hilary shopped around the narrow aisles of the old-fashioned supermarket. And then unload the
trolley for her at the checkout. But neither of her daughters had offered and she felt grouchy and tired, with the beginnings of a headache. She circled the large car park hoping to get a spot near
the door. Luck wasn’t on her side and she had to park at the far end and got drenched before she made it to the shelter of the shop.

By the time she put her key in the front door, fifty minutes later, Hilary was starving and weary to her bones. She was going to put away the shopping, order their Chinese takeaway and pour
herself a big glass of red and that was it for today. The housework could wait until tomorrow.

The house felt warm and welcoming and she tried to overlook the two school bags dumped on the hall floor beside the hallstand. Millie’s leaking shoes were left in the middle of the floor
where she had stepped out of them. God Almighty, was it too much to expect them to put their stuff away when they came in from school? Laden with bags, she shoved open the kitchen door and felt a
rush of anger at the sight that greeted her. ‘Ah for God’s sake, you pair, look at the state of the place! The least you could have done was filled the dishwasher,’ Hilary ranted,
seeing the breakfast dishes still on the kitchen counter.

‘It needs to be emptied,’ Sophie muttered from where she lay sprawled on the sofa in the family room.

‘Well why didn’t you empty it? Do I have to do every bloody thing in this house? Sophie, you empty it and put those dirty dishes in it and, Millie, you get over here and help me
unpack the shopping.’

‘Why can’t she do it – most of this stuff is for her sleep-over,’ Millie grumbled, unpacking mini Twixes and Crunchies. ‘I have to study.’

‘You could have studied while I was doing the shopping instead of lolling on the sofa watching rubbish on TV.’

‘I was tired, Mam!’

‘And I’m not?’

‘Oh give it a rest.’

‘Don’t talk to me like that.’

‘Well you’re just
so
cranky,’ Millie retorted furiously.

‘Maybe if I got a bit more cooperation in this house I wouldn’t be so cranky. Perhaps if my daughters got up off their backsides and gave me a hand now and again instead of behaving
like two lazy lumps, I wouldn’t be so cranky. Did you ever think of that?’ Hilary raged, giving vent to her frustration.

‘Why don’t you just go and get someone to replace Magda?’ her eldest daughter said exasperatedly. ‘It can’t be that
hard
to get a cleaner.’

‘Listen, madam, it’s far from cleaners you were reared. And let me tell you when I was your age, myself and your aunt used to spend
every
Saturday cleaning Granny and
Granddad’s house from top to bottom. Hoovering, polishing, cleaning windows and floors, scrubbing the bathroom, shining the brasses. You pair don’t know you’re alive. Tomorrow
morning this house is getting cleaned thoroughly so be prepared to get up early and roll up your sleeves.’ She banged the press door having flung all the goodies for Sophie’s party into
the Tupperware containers.

‘This is all
your
fault.’ Millie turned on Sophie. ‘What do you need a sleepover for? You’re not ten any more.’

‘Oh just shut up you.’ Sophie slammed the dishwasher door closed and stomped upstairs.

‘Sophie, have you tidied your bedroom, and is that bathroom of yours clean?’ Hilary yelled.

‘It’s fine, I’ll do it tomorrow.’

‘You certainly will do it tomorrow if your friends are coming over,’ Hilary assured her.

‘They won’t mind. Their bedrooms are just as untidy.’

‘Well
I
mind. I have some
standards.
I don’t want them going home saying our house is a tip,’ Hilary shouted up the stairs and was sure she heard a muttered,
‘Oh piss off.’

Hilary’s lips thinned and she was ready to run up the stairs and have it out with Sophie for her lack of respect. No one in her family respected her, she fumed, spraying Jif into the sink
and scrubbing the tea stains around the plughole. They made it look so easy on those silly TV ads, for household cleaning agents, that assumed women were morons. She scrubbed aggressively, venting
her annoyance on her dirty sink, and deciding that first thing on Monday morning she was getting a new cleaner.

How nice for Niall to be out playing at a session on Friday night, leaving her to sort everything for the weekend as usual. He needed to cop on to himself a bit more and muck in. She was damned
if she was doing his or the girls’ washing this weekend, she decided, throwing tea towels and dishcloths into the washing machine. And he could press his own trousers while he was at it. That
was a bit passive-aggressive, she thought crossly. She should just have it out with him. Hilary hated rows, and it
would
turn into a row because Niall would get defensive and irritable,
knowing she was right, and there’d be an atmosphere, and sometimes it just wasn’t worth it, she thought glumly, fed up with everything and everyone. Did Colette realize just how lucky
she was with her housekeeper, and her Town Cars to whisk her wherever she needed to go? And her long weekends in Nantucket? Some people had all the luck. She tied a knot in the ponging bin bag and
hauled it out to the black bin, another chore Niall should have done, Hilary fumed resentfully.

When she finally ordered their takeaway, all the shopping had been put away, the hall had been cleared and the living room was relatively tidy. She was starving. She made up the shredded crispy
duck pancakes while a sullen Millie dished out the lemon chicken, egg fried rice and chow mein.

Millie took her plate and marched out into the hall to take her meal upstairs. Hilary took a deep breath, ready to remonstrate with her. Meals were not allowed to be eaten in bedrooms. But she
stopped. Her daughter looked pale and tired, she had her period, and there had been enough shouting and arguing. It was Friday night. They were all tired. Enough was enough. She took her own plate
to the sofa, and Sophie followed her and sat in the armchair. They ate their meal in silence, lost in their own thoughts.

Colette lay sprawled on her queen-sized bed, the sun slanting through her apartment windows, reflecting on the Murano glass vase that held an arrangement of peony roses.
Normally the sight would give her pleasure but she was too troubled to notice the beauty and simplicity of the arrangement. She studied a photo of herself and a smiling, brown-eyed, straight-nosed,
square-jawed, broad-shouldered young man with his arms around her. It was the happiest time of her life. She had been in love, in lust, completely confident in her allure for Rod. And then, out of
the blue, he’d told her he was ending it. He wanted to ‘concentrate on his studies’. Bitterness rose in her at the memory. Concentrate on that little fat bogger was more like it.
Had he married his red-headed nurse?

Tears slid down Colette’s cheek. Rod had confirmed what she had always known, that men could not be trusted. No man was capable of being faithful. She couldn’t be sure, but she
suspected Des had the odd dalliance or two. He hadn’t given her any reason to think so, but she had her suspicions. Extra-long hours at the office. Working out more than usual. A keener
attention to his appearance.

She wouldn’t ever let on to Hilary though. Some things you had to keep to yourself. No doubt Hilary trusted Niall one hundred per cent. She was a fool. Who was to say he didn’t dally
with some of the women who enjoyed his music sessions? Colette had seen how they’d responded to his easy charm. She’d caught him giving her the once-over a few times. If she put her
mind to it she could seduce Niall Hammond, Colette thought dismissively, wiping her eyes. It wasn’t seducing men that was the problem, it was keeping them that was difficult.

Hilary was right though. If she had any sense she would stay well away from her ex-boyfriend. To go down that road again was more than she could bear.

‘Well that was tasty, son. Very tasty indeed – you’re a dab hand at the cooking,’ Nancy praised, wiping the last bit of sauce from her plate with a
piece of Vienna roll. Although she had enjoyed the chicken dish, her stomach was unsettled at the thought of what was to come.

‘It’s so simple to prepare and it’s all cooked in the one dish,’ Jonathan explained, scoffing a crispy potato quarter. ‘Just line a dish coated with olive oil with
sliced onions and mushrooms and a few lemon slices. Put the seasoned chicken breasts on top. Mix a couple of quartered spuds, some trimmed green beans, garlic, seasoning, and a drizzle of oil. Cook
for fifty minutes and Bob’s your uncle. Actually it was Hilary who gave me the recipe. It’s one of her “life-saver” dinners as she calls them.’

‘I wish I’d known that recipe when I was working,’ Nancy chuckled, remembering how she would race home at lunchtime and cook a meat, potatoes and veg dinner before hurrying
back to work. ‘I’m very fond of Hilary, she’s a lovely girl.’

‘I know,’ Jonathan agreed affectionately. ‘She’s the best in the world and I’m lucky to have her as a friend.’

‘And she’s lucky to have you too,’ Nancy declared, placing a large helping of apple crumble, drenched in steaming creamy custard, in front of him.

‘Ooooh yum! You spoil me rotten.’ Jonathan tucked in with gusto, delighted that she had made his favourite childhood dessert. ‘So tell me all the news, scandal and
gossip,’ he grinned when she sat back down opposite him.

‘Ah it’s quite enough around here these days. Poor Nellie Murphy passed away last week and she was lying on a trolley in A&E for two days before they got a bed for her.
It’s a disgrace,’ Nancy grumbled. ‘All them chancers up in the Dáil never have to wait in A&E departments. Into the Mater Private and the Blackrock Clinic with them.
There might be a boom but it’s not making any difference to the likes of us.’

‘Ah yes, the golden circle. The privileged few will always be looked after. Will it ever change?’ Jonathan spooned honey-sweetened apple into his mouth.

‘And we’ve plenty of chancers here too, I can tell you. You know that fella Donnie Quill over on Hawthorn Street? He works for the Health Board. Well Maura Flynn who lives beside him
– she’s in the knitting group and she’s a nurse – she saw himself and another fella, brazen as you like, unloading a hospital bed from his trailer and storing it in his
garage. And they cost
thousands
! And he’s getting petrol from somewhere too because Maura sees him filling the two cars with it. You know the wife, Antonia, a real snooty one that
wouldn’t pass the time of day with you if you met her on the street, a right little consequence. Well Maura has the measure of her. “Did your car run out of petrol
again
?” Maura says, ever so airy-fairy when Donnie was filling it with petrol, and Antonia was raging!’ Nancy chuckled, and Jonathan laughed, enjoying his catch-up with the
various goings on in Rosslara. ‘Terrible, isn’t it, to be robbing the Health Board like that?’

‘Robbing
us
like that! It’s our hard-earned taxes that pay for it.’ Jonathan began clearing away the dishes. ‘But don’t forget, what goes around comes
around.’

‘And seemingly he was fiddling the gas company for years. Could have blown up the street interfering with the meter. Ah the world is gone to the divil.’ Nancy wiped the table.
‘The news is full of terrible things. How can people do the things they do to each other?’