Lifesaving for Beginners (51 page)

‘Eighteen?’

I shake my head.
‘I’ll save you the bother of counting up to forty, shall I?
I’ve never had a nervous breakdown, although I’m not ruling one out.’
This generates some titters around the room.
Nervous ones.

More hands.
Minnie takes her time.
She points and roars, ‘YOU.’

‘Is it true that you got the name Killian Kobain from the back of a Cornflakes box?’

‘No, it was Sugar Puffs.’
Some of them are writing that down.
I swear to God.

And on it goes.

Someone asks about the dedication.
I was wondering when that might come up.
Killian never dedicated his books to anyone.
‘You’ve dedicated the book to Beth.
Is that your daughter?’

I say, ‘No,’ and Minnie’s about to bark ‘YOU’ at someone else when I say, ‘Beth is my daughter’s mother.
I dedicated the book to her by way of thanks.’

‘YOU.’

A small, narrow woman with a pinched face says, ‘Your mother once likened the writing of crime novels to painting by numbers.
How do you respond to that?’

‘She’s changed her mind.
She says it’s more like join-the-dots now.’
I look at Mum who squirms in her seat but manages a small smile.
I feel a rush of affection.
This hasn’t been easy for her.
But she’s doing her best.

Minnie says, ‘One more question,’ and the room is a collection of hands and somehow Minnie manages to pick one.
‘YOU!’
she roars, even louder than before, as if she knows that her PR career is nearing its end and she wants to go out with a bang.

‘Are you going to write any more Declan Darker novels?’

I say, ‘Yes.
One more.’

‘Why just one?’

I don’t answer immediately and into this pause, someone shouts, ‘She’s going to kill him!’
As if Darker is a real live person and I, a killer who may very well bury people alive in shallow graves in Leitrim.
There are gasps around the room and, for the first time, I think I get it.
How much people like Declan Darker.
Love him, even.

I say, ‘No, not necessarily.
But he’s getting on, you know.
Maybe I could retire him.
Buy him a cabin in Montana.
He’d love that.
I could even marry him off.
Maybe he finally meets someone?
Falls in love?
Gets happy?
Why not?
That sometimes happens.
Doesn’t it?’

Someone shouts, ‘That’s outrageous.’

Minnie says, ‘That’s it.
No more questions,’ and the hands come down and an orderly queue forms in single file down the right-hand side of the bookshop, just as Minnie instructed.

III

The queue starts from the little table at the top of the bookshop, where I’m sitting, snakes to the door and spills onto the street.
After an hour my hand is as rigid as a claw and my face aches from smiling into people’s cameras.
I motion Milo over.
‘See how long the queue is now,’ I whisper.
The news isn’t good.
‘Another fifty or so,’ he says.

‘Or so?’

‘Seventy-three to be exact.’
He smiles at me and somehow I manage to sign more books, smile into more cameras and even hold a woman’s baby while she rummages in her bag for her copy of the book.

Beside me I feel Minnie tense.
I look up.
Her eyes are trained on the door.
She picks up her walkie-talkie and presses a button.
‘We’ve got a situation at six o’clock.
Over,’ she whispers into the radio.
She looks at me.
‘Stay there.’
Then she walks with a huge degree of purpose towards the door.
I stand up and that’s when I see him.
In the queue, at the door, the top of his head reaching for the architrave.
He nods when he sees me and the grey curls bounce, like an Irish dancer’s wig.
He’s wearing the skinny black jeans that I bought him on a mini-break in Donegal.
The white T-shirt  with the hole in the back where his goat got at it when his rigged-up clothesline collapsed.
No jacket.
In one hand, a copy of the book.
My stomach contracts.

The hired goons and Minnie bear down on him.
Thomas stays where he is, oblivious to the imminent danger.
I say, ‘Excuse me,’ to the man at the top of the queue who looks at his watch and shakes his head, tutting, like I’m a train that’s been delayed.

I move towards the crowd.
The goons are on either side of Thomas, waiting for the signal from Minnie.
She nods at them and they move closer to Thomas, sandwiching him between them.
I push through a particularly thick knot of people and burst through the other side.
‘Stop!’
I say, stumbling over someone’s handbag on the floor and falling against one of the goons, who feels as solid as a brick wall.
He puts his gigantic hands on my shoulders and places me back on my feet.
Minnie looks at me.
‘He claims he’s only here to get the book signed.
But I can have him removed from the building.
Just say the word.’
Then she looks at Thomas and smiles.
‘No offence, Thomas.
I’m just doing my job.’

Thomas smiles back.
‘I didn’t know you’d gone into the security business.’

‘Sideline,’ Minnie says.

Thomas looks at me as if he’s about to say something, and I’m dying to know what it is he’s about to say when Minnie declares, ‘Decision time, Kat.
In?
Or out?’

‘I .
.
.
ah .
.
.
in.’

‘You sure?’

I look at Thomas.
‘If you want to.
Stay, I mean.’
He nods, amused.

Minnie looks at the goons and says, ‘Stand down,’ in a disappointed, resigned sort of a way and they take a step back at the same time, like a pair of gigantic dancers, oddly graceful.

Minnie takes my arm and frogmarches me towards the table.
On the way, I pass Milo.
‘Can you count them again?’
I hiss at him.
He nods.

Back at the table, the man is still looking at his watch and shaking his head and tutting.
I’m signing his book when Milo comes back with a hefty ‘Fifty-seven.’
Thomas is at the end of the queue.
I square my shoulders and keep on signing.
Inside my head, there are questions.
Doubts.
Second guesses.
Worry.
But there are other things too.
There are possibilities.

I notice that my inscriptions are becoming more flamboyant.
Caution is in my hands and I am throwing it to the wind.

Before, my inscription was always the same: their name.
My name.
The end.
Now I was going all out.

Kat xxx

Love, Kat xxxx

Lots of love, Kat xxxxxx

All my love, Kat xxxxxxxxx

I can’t stop smiling.
Thomas is here and I’m like Brona now.
I’m calling it A Sign.

To Ger, best of luck with the driving test, will keep fingers crossed!
Loads of love, Kat xxxx

To Barney, so lovely to meet you.
Hope she says YES!!
Best of luck, Kat xxxxx

To Siobhan, you’ll never know if you don’t ask.
Ring him!!
Love Kat xxx

To dear Michael, your kind words mean the world to me.
Lots of love, Kat xxx

And the weird thing is, I mean it.
Every word.
I’m on a high.
I’m on a roll.

Faith arrives at the table.
‘You OK?
Can I get you anything?’
I look at her and I get the jolt.
I say, ‘Can you get me the book I signed for you?’
She hands it to me and I re-open it at the page where I signed it earlier.
The page where I wrote her name, then my name.
Now I write, in big, looping lettering,
Thank you for coming to find me.
Lots and lots of love, Kat xxxxx
I make her promise that she won’t read it in front of me.
She promises and I hand her the book and she opens it and reads the inscription right there in front of me.
She nods and says, ‘You’re welcome.’

The book I signed for Minnie is still on the table.
I open that and write, below the place where I wrote her name and my name,
Even if I had lots of friends, you’d still be my best one.
Kat xxxxx

Later, Minnie will read it and say, ‘Soppy cow.’

I look at Milo, who is keeping count.
He flashes ten fingers at me, closes his hands, then a further seven.
Seventeen people left.
I keep going.

Now there’s just one woman in front of Thomas.
One woman with an enormous rucksack on her back.
She struggles out of the bag, sets it on the floor and opens it.
Inside are books.
Stacks of them.
She removes them one by one.
Places them in two piles on the table.
Eighteen in total.
Nine in each pile.
The Declan Darker books.
Two sets.
She explains about her neighbour, who is in hospital having her varicose veins done.
Would I mind signing all of them?
One set for her and the other for her neighbour?
The veins are bad.
They’re the bulgy variety.
The operation hasn’t been as successful as she’d hoped.

You can’t argue with bulgy veins.
I say, ‘My pleasure,’ and I start signing.
Even the cramping of my hand is not enough to quell my outpourings of affection.

‘What’s your neighbour’s name?’

‘Dolores.’

To darling Dolores, so sorry to hear about your troubles.
Hope you are back on your feet very soon.
All my love, Kat xxxxxxxxxx

I write eight more variations of that, then I start on the other pile.
The woman’s name is Kerry.
I start to write.
‘No,’ she says.
‘It’s with a C.
And an ie.’

‘Cerrie?’

‘That’s me.
And could you sign this one for my boyfriend?’

To Des
.
.
.

‘With a Z.’

To Dez

‘This one’s for Florence.’

‘With an F.’
My little joke.

‘No, with a
P
h.’

‘Phlorence?’

‘That’s it.’

I sign and sign.
I’m nearly there.
Behind Kerry – Cerrie – Thomas is on the phone.
I hear his voice, soft and low.
Wispa bars.
My mouth waters.

‘Here’s the last one.
Can you make it out to Lola?’

‘Sure.’
Lola.
You can’t go wrong with Lola.

‘Eh, there’s an H at the end,’ says Cerrie.
I add the H – Lolah – and Cerrie smiles.
‘You’re much nicer than I thought you’d be.’

‘Er, thank you.’
It takes her ages to put the books back inside the rucksack.
I try to help but she says no.
They have to go back in chronological order.
I don’t say, ‘Have a safe trip back to the asylum, won’t you?’
I say, ‘No problem.
And thank you for coming.
And give my best to Dolores, won’t you?
And to Dez, Phlorence and Lolah, of course.’