It Was Only Ever You (36 page)

Sheila looked up at Patrick and, for a moment, she saw her brother’s face as it might be now. An earnest young man, endlessly hopeful, but, in this moment, full of concerned tenderness.

Sheila’s face crumpled and seventeen years’ hard-held tears came pouring out of her. The black butterflies were stilled and in their place was an almost overwhelming feeling of love.

A
VA
’
S
RECOVERY
from her late miscarriage was long and hard won. However, it was not as long and hard as it would have been without her mother’s unstinting support. For three weeks Ava stayed in bed. The doctors had said there was nothing physically wrong with her and that she was more than ready to get up, but only her mother understood her seeming lack of motivation. The baby was gone, her husband was gone, she had nothing to live for. Nessa knew from her own experience that the devastating effects of losing a baby were rarely given the attention they deserved. The focus was always on trying again for a new baby. Ava did not want to go back into her marriage. Not yet, at least. Nessa remained silent. In truth, she had lost any of her opinions on the subject, good or bad. She had lost her fervour about controlling Ava’s future. Instead she remained focused on getting her through each day, keeping her calm and as at ease as possible. With daily care Nessa pulled Ava out of the despair and depression she would have certainly fallen into had she been left alone.

Tom was distressed and panicking at his daughter’s tardiness in getting herself ‘back to normal’. He was still angry with himself for the way he believed he had let her down. Nessa defended her daughter’s unwillingness to rush her recovery, ministered to her every day, bringing her up food and ensuring that she ate, just a little. During the brief times she was out of the room herself she left her distracting magazines and books which, for the first couple of weeks Ava did not look at, but then gradually came around to.

As three weeks stretched to four, Nessa called Myrtle, warning her not to make any mention of Patrick or Rose, unless she was prompted. Myrtle brought make-up and rollers and candy with her and said, ‘You look a fright!’ when she walked into the room, and pretended that everything was normal. She stayed overnight, as they had done when they were children. By the following day, Ava was ready to get up and go downstairs.

Myrtle stayed that second night, and they put on ‘Rock Around the Clock’ and danced around the living room.

Ava was pretending to be happy, but she was grateful to find she now had enough strength to pretend.

The baby was gone and nobody could bring it back.

She would always be sad about that, but she knew, too, that life would go on. Ava was glad to find the will to live again, even though she thought it had been lost to her.

‘Will you ever come out dancing with me again?’ Myrtle asked. ‘I’m still looking for a husband, even if you’re not. Of course, we don’t have to go to the Emerald...’

It was a clumsy prompt for Ava to talk about Patrick’s betrayal with Rose. She wasn’t ready, and felt she might never want to talk about it at all. It felt like an old wound she did not want to pick over. Her handsome husband had been making love to a beautiful girl who had the kind of film-star beauty she could never hope to aspire to. Now, it transpired, he had been engaged to Rose when he married Ava. Patrick had, she was certain now, simply used her to get along in America. Her mother had been right. It had never been true love. Vanity had tricked her into believing she was the kind of girl he could fall in love with, but she wasn’t. She was plain old Ava, as she had always been. For a period of time she had thought she was, if not beautiful, then at least attractive. Dermot had certainly thought so. She had been thinking about him a lot these past few weeks. Wondering how her life would have been if she had never fallen in love with Patrick and had stayed with him. They would be married now, and living comfortably near her parents, no doubt. She might even be pregnant.

The problem was, of course, she didn’t love Dermot. She had thought she loved him and she might have been happy, but then Patrick had come along, swept her away and shown her what true love was all about. Dermot paled in comparison with the passion she felt for Patrick. Not, indeed, that Dermot would come near her ever again after the sluttish, cruel way she had behaved towards him. Just thinking about it made her shudder. If Myrtle had her way she would spend the rest of her life raking over the dramas of the past, relishing every ghastly moment.

Myrtle gave her a look that said, ‘Trust me. You’ve had long enough.’

‘I don’t know if I ever want to go dancing again,’ Ava said. ‘Honestly? I don’t know what I want any more.’

Myrtle grabbed her hand and squeezed it. ‘Don’t worry, Ava, you’ll get another one.’

Ava did not know whether she meant baby or husband and she didn’t want to ask. Myrtle had meant both, but she didn’t want to push it either. Ava wasn’t ready. So, she leant across the sofa, switched on the TV and the two of them escaped into an episode of
Father Knows Best
.

Nessa, who had left the kitchen door open, listened in to the two friends. Above the canned audience laughter, as clear as if it were the only voice in the room, Nessa heard Ava laugh. A little tear ran down her cheek. She could tell, from the tone of her voice, that her precious daughter was, finally, on the mend.

*

The following week Myrtle was volunteering at Quinn’s Ballroom Dancing School in Yonkers. Once a month there were ‘men only’ evenings where the more atrocious of her students could step on the toes of hardy volunteers of the opposite sex. The humiliation for a man-who-couldn’t-dance was that the volunteers were generally women on the edge of spinsterhood, resigned to seeking out the fresh blood of a bachelor who had neither the courage nor the ability to hit the dance halls yet. This was Myrtle’s first time. She already felt desperate enough without seeing somebody she knew.

‘Dermot Dolan,’ she shouted brightly across the room. ‘What are you doing here?’

Dermot put on his best criminal lawyer smile but Myrtle could tell he was not one bit happy to see her either.

‘I am learning to dance, Myrtle. Well, trying anyway!’

After that awful time in the confessional, Dermot had decided that the ill-mannered priest was right, after all. It was time for him to get back out there and find himself a wife. Knowing that his two left feet were holding him back from entering the only place where a man might meet a woman these days, the cursed dance hall, he signed up for lessons. Dermot was embarrassed to see Myrtle but she was equally embarrassed to see him.

Breaking the ice with happy exuberance was, Myrtle decided, the best way to approach it for both of them.

‘I’ll take this one,’ she shouted across to Mary Quinn, marching over to him. Then she draped her hands over his shoulders for the opening waltz and added, ‘Unless you’re already taken?’

Dermot shook his head and laughed. He had always liked Myrtle.

The music started and they shuffled around a bit, he assiduously letting her lead so he could avoid her feet.

‘God, you really have not got the hang of this yet, have you?’

‘No,’ he said. Then he laughed, and she laughed and, for a moment, Dermot thought how nice her hair smelt and wondered...

‘How is Ava?’

It just came out of his mouth. He had not been going to say anything. Ava was the reason his heart had taken an unpleasant dip when he saw Myrtle, and yet he was compelled to ask.

‘Ah.’ Myrtle was surprised to find herself feeling a little disappointed. After all, a man was a man, and just recently she had come to wonder how important it was if he could dance or not. Dermot was nice. Certainly, Ava would have been better off if she had stayed with him instead of letting herself get carried away with a handsome cad. It had given Myrtle pause about her own preferences.

‘So, you’ve not heard?’

‘No,’ Dermot said. Oh, why had he been so stupid and asked that question? Now she was going to tell him about Ava and her wonderful life. He didn’t want to hear it.

Myrtle paused. She could tell Dermot the whole nasty story. About Rose trying to steal Patrick and showing the whole marriage to have been a sham. He could tell him about Ava’s ‘women’s problem’ that men were so squeamish about: how she had collapsed in the church, spilling blood everywhere, losing the baby, then had lain in bed, depressed and miserable for nearly a month, even when the doctors said, officially, there was nothing wrong with her.

If she told him all that, he might be glad to be away from the whole sorry mess. He might be happy to settle for a nice, cheerful, pretty, sensible girl who would teach him to dance. But then again, Dermot’s brother Niall was still single...

‘She broke up with Patrick. The marriage is over. Didn’t work out.’

‘Really?’ Dermot’s heart soared. What about the baby? Had she had it? He didn’t care. It didn’t matter. Maybe there was hope. Why that fool Patrick had left her did not occur to him. How any man could leave such a wonderful woman was beyond him. Surely, this meant there was a chance, again, for him? Perhaps – but it was too much to hope for – some residual feelings for Dermot may have contributed to the marriage not working. He could barely contain himself with excitement, but kept his voice light and steady as he asked, ‘Is she still in the city?’ He looked up and took his eyes from his feet.

‘Ouch!’

‘Sorry.’

‘No. She’s been back home with Tom and Nessa for nearly six weeks now.’

That wasn’t long off two months. Was it too early to call on her? Was two months a respectful amount of time after a break-up? Would she still be interested? Despite his reservations, Dermot knew that he had to go and see her. It would be embarrassing, potentially humiliating for him, but he had to find out if he was still in with a chance.

In the meantime, Myrtle had made her own mind up about something else.

Volunteering at Mrs Quinn’s was not for her. Not even in pursuit of a suitable husband like Dermot. Niall was way better-looking than his brother. And he didn’t step on toes!

*

‘Ah, Dermot.’

Tom’s heart sank when he saw the smartly dressed man standing on his front doorstep, his nervous smile almost entirely concealed by a huge bouquet of pink roses.

His daughter had just seen off one disastrous romance and now here was another one, seemingly determined to turn their family tragedy into the plot of a Jane Austen novel. Tom wished everyone would all go the hell away and leave his family alone. He just wanted things to be back the way they were before, when it was the three of them. Before his daughter had met Dermot Dolan or Patrick Murphy. He knew it was stupid, and untenable, but things were so much simpler and happier when he was the only man in Ava’s life. Was that such a terrible thing for a father to want for his daughter? To be able to protect her for ever? To have her wit and good humour all to himself?

He stepped aside, saying, ‘You had better come in.’

‘Thank you, Tom.’

He smiled, nervously.

Stupid fool. If Dermot had been enough of a man to hold on to his daughter in the first place, instead of letting her chase off after that gutty-boy, none of this would have happened. The only saving grace in this scenario was that Nessa was out shopping, so would not get to do the ‘Mrs Bennet’ act which had got them into all this mess in the first place.

‘Ava?’ he called out to the kitchen. ‘You’ve got a visitor.’ He nodded at Dermot’s flowers and said, ‘I assume they’re for Ava?’

‘Ah now, they’re not really your colour.’

Tom smiled, despite himself.

Ava got a terrible shock when she saw Dermot standing in the hall. She had thought it was Myrtle and had not even bothered taking off her apron. He looked so smart in his blazer and slacks. More handsome, less rounded than she remembered him. His eyes were sparkling in that slightly amused way he had. Although they had always sparkled when he looked at her. ‘I’d get these in water quickly, if I were you,’ he said, handing over the flowers. ‘Your father thought they were for him.’

As she took the roses from him, he turned to her father again and said, ‘Sorry, Tom, next time, I’ll bring you a cigar.’

He really was a wit! Ava felt like laughing out loud, but she didn’t want to give him the wrong idea. Was it possible he was still in love with her? After all she had put him through? She dipped her face in the flowers and in the moment of sniffing their divine, sweet scent she felt – there was only one word for it – happy! Such an ordinary feeling, once, but of late, it had become extraordinary.

‘OK, very funny.’ Tom was a lot more amused than he was letting on as he pottered out into the kitchen. He had forgotten how much he liked Dermot. He just hoped there wasn’t more trouble ahead.

‘You look well,’ Dermot said.

Ava smiled, self-consciously. She looked a mess but again, she knew he could not see it. She had not even dressed properly. She was wearing no make-up and an old dressing gown over slacks and a light sweater. She could not think of anything to say that would not raise his hopes. Everything she wanted to say, a joke about his shiny buttons, a quip on how he was ‘wearing his hair’ (even though it was thinning), or even a comment on how well he was looking himself, might slide them back into the comfortable familiarity of how they had once been. How were you supposed to be with a man you had cruelly dumped? A man who had the right to gloat over your misfortune, and yet, in his kind face, she could see so clearly that was not the case. Dermot, sensing her awkwardness, stepped in.

‘I was just passing...’

Ava held up the roses and smiled at him.

Dermot’s heart ached, just looking at her.

She looked so beautiful to him. He didn’t care if she was wearing a dressing gown and her hair looked as if she hadn’t brushed it for a few days. She looked like a queen to him. His queen.

‘Ah yes. The flowers. I found them on the sidewalk on my way in... They must’ve fallen out of a florist van.’

Ava laughed.