‘Jesus, they keep inventing new things for everyone to worry about. So get someone you can trust. How about your mother?’
‘Oh no!’ Dylan quirked his mouth down ruefully. ‘That would be so not a good idea.’
Ashling nodded. True enough. The only time that young Mrs Kelly and not-so-young Mrs Kelly saw eye-to-eye was when they were nose-to-nose in an argument – usually over the best way to take care of Dylan and Dylan’s children.
‘And Clodagh’s mother is crippled with arthritis,’ Dylan said. ‘She wouldn’t be able to manage the kids.’
‘I can babysit if you want,’ Ashling offered.
‘On a weekend night? A wild young thing like yourself?’
After a hesitation, she said, ‘Yes… Yes,’ she said again, more firmly and with slight defiance, ‘why not?’
If she was genuinely unavailable, it would increase the chances of Marcus Valentine ringing.
‘That’s spectacular.’ Dylan perked up. ‘Thanks Ashling, you’re a pet. I’ll book a table for Saturday night. I’ll see if I can get one at L’Oeuf.’
But of course, Ashling thought, amused despite herself. Where else? L’Oeuf was the elder statesman of Dublin restaurants. It had the unique distinction of always being in fashion – despite not serving Asian fusion or Modern Irish. Perennially glamorous, the food would bring a tear to your eye. So would the prices.
‘Your mammy, she’s better now, isn’t she?’ Dylan tried to make up for forcing the issue in the first place.
‘Better’ was a relative concept and anyway, that wasn’t always the point, but to please him, Ashling nodded and said, ‘Yes, she’s better now.’
‘You’re a great girl, Ashling.’ Dylan bade her farewell.
I am, Ashling thought drily, Aren’t I?
23
Ten minutes away from Dylan and Ashling, Lisa and Jasper Ffrench, the celebrity chef, were dining at the Clarence. Jasper had specifically requested that he be taken there, just so he could scorn the food as not being a quarter as good as what he produced in his eponymous restaurant. He was good-looking, unpleasant, manifestly thought he was a genius and had nothing but jealousy for everyone else in his field. ‘Amateurs,’ he declared, waving his sixth glass of wine, ‘they’re nothing but amateurs and dilettantes. Marco Pierre White – amateur! Alasdair Little – amateur!’
Jesus Christ, you’re a pain. Lisa nodded and smiled. Good thing that difficult men were her speciality. ‘That’s why you’re the one we’ve chosen to be part of Colleens success, Jasper.’
Not exactly true. Jasper was the one who was chosen because Conrad Gallagher had already turned her down, pleading pressure of work.
As Jasper made great inroads into the second bottle of wine, Lisa dazzled him with talk of synergy. Without actually promising it, she implied that a column in Colleen could easily lead to his own programme on Channel 9, Randolph Media’s television station.
‘I’ll do it!’ Jasper decided. ‘Bike me over a contract in the morning.’
‘I actually have one here,’ Lisa said smoothly, striking while the iron was hot.
Jasper scribbled his signature, and only just in time, because there was a tricky moment when the waiter came to take her plate away. As usual, Lisa had moved her food around, but had eaten almost nothing.
‘Was there anything wrong with your dinner?’ the waiter asked.
‘No. It was delicious but –’ Lisa became aware of Jasper glaring across the table at her and quickly amended her verdict to a more neutral, ‘It was fine.’
‘If it was anything like as insultingly bad as mine I’m not surprised she couldn’t force it down,’ Jasper challenged. ‘Black-pudding blinis? That’s beyond a cliché. That’s a joke!’
‘I’m sorry to hear that, sir.’ The waiter flat-eyed Jasper and his cleared plate. He used to work for him, the mad bastard. ‘Would you care to order dessert?’
‘No, we would not care!’ Jasper said hotly – to Lisa’s chagrin, because this week she was on a pudding diet. The lighter end of the scale, of course: fresh fruit, sorbets, fruit mousses. It had been well over a decade since the dizzying punch of Death by Chocolate had passed her lips.
Oh well, no matter. She paid the bill, and they both got up to leave, one of them less steadily than the other. By the door they shook hands, then Jasper attempted a drunken lunge at Lisa, which she tactfully deflected. Just as well she’d already got the contract signed.
Jasper tottered balefully up the street and the moment Lisa was by herself, the bleakness rushed in again. Why? Why was everything so much harder here? She’d been OK in London. Even after Oliver had walked out, she’d kept going. Pressing on, fulfilling her vision, making things happen, always certain there would be a prize of sorts for her. But the prize went to someone else and she was in Ireland and her coping mechanisms didn’t seem to work so well here.
She hadn’t rung her mum yesterday, even though it was Sunday. She’d been too depressed. She had only got dressed to go to the foul corner-shop for a tub of ice-cream and five newspapers, and as soon as she returned to the house, she got back into her wrap and spent the day moping in a fug of cigarette smoke. Her only contact with humanity had been the local eight-year-olds kicking their football repeatedly up against her front door.
Before she flagged a taxi she popped into a newsagent’s to buy cigarettes and her heart lifted when she saw that the new Irish Tatler was out. Irish Tatler was one of Colleen’s competitors and deconstructing it would give her something to do for the rest of the evening. All at once home didn’t seem so repellent.
‘Hiya Leeesa.’ A gaggle of little girls playing on the road yelled at her when she got out of her cab. ‘Your dress is sexy.’
‘Thank you.’
‘What size are your shoes?’
‘Six.’
A huddled conference followed that. How big was a six? Too big for them, they reluctantly decided.
Letting herself in, she flung her bag on the floor, flicked on the kettle and checked her answering machine. No messages, which wasn’t really surprising because almost no one knew her number. It didn’t stop her feeling like a failure, though.
She kicked off her lovely shoes, flung her dress on a chair and was changing into drawstring pants and a shortie T-shirt when the doorbell rang. Probably one of the little girls to ask if they could have her handbag when she didn’t want it any more.
With a sigh she flung open the door, and there, standing on her step, bending his tall bulk to fit the doorway, was Jack.
‘Oh,’ she said, stupid with surprise.
It was the first time she’d seen him out of his suit. His long, collarless shirt was open to mid-chest. Not by design, but because the buttons were missing. His khakis looked as if they’d done service in two world wars, and had a flap torn across the right knee, exposing a smooth kneecap and a three-inch square area of hairy shin. His hair looked even messier than usual, as did his face – Jack was a man who needed to shave twice a day.
Leaning against the doorframe, he displayed a device in the palm of his hand, like a policeman flashing ID. ‘I have a timer for your boiler.’
It sounded vaguely suggestive.
‘Sorry it wasn’t sooner.’ Then he hesitated. ‘Is now a good time?’
‘Come in,’ Lisa invited. ‘Come in.’
She was taken aback because in London, no one ever just called around to her flat. She’d never made an arrangement to see anyone without first opening her Psion or Filofax and playing the I’m-busier-and-more-important-than-you game. It was an elaborate ritual, governed by strict rules. At least five different dates must be offered and rejected before an actual one can be agreed on.
‘Next Tuesday? Can’t, I’ll be in Milan.’
Which is the cue for the other party to respond, ‘And I can never do Wednesdays because that’s my reiki night.’
An acceptable reply to that is, ‘And Thursdays are out for me because my Alexander Technique tutor comes.’
r /> The ante is upped by the second party coming back with, ‘The weekend after that is out of the question. Cottage in the Lake District with friends.’
To which the smart money responds, ‘The whole of the following week is gone for me. LA, on business.’
Once a date has been finally fixed, it is still acceptable – indeed expected – for you to cancel on the day, pleading jet-lag, a client dinner or having to go to Geneva to make seventy people redundant.
Like Gucci sunglasses and Prada handbags, Time Poverty was a status symbol. The less time you had the more important you were. Jack obviously didn’t know.
He looked around in admiration. ‘You’ve been here – how many? – three, four days and already the place looks nicer. Look at that –’ He pointed to a glass bowl overloaded with white tulips. ‘And that.’ A vase of dried flowers had caught his attention.
Good job he couldn’t see the cups under her bed that were in the early stages of growing mould, Lisa thought. Her homes were always a triumph of style over hygiene. She must try and sort out a cleaner…
‘Can I get you a drink?’ she offered.
‘Any beer?’
‘Um, no, but I’ve some white wine.’
She experienced ridiculous pleasure when he accepted a glass.
‘I’ll just get my stuff from the car,’ he said, ducking out and returning shortly afterwards carrying a blue metallic container.
Oh God, he had a toolbox! She had to sit on her hands to keep herself from touching him, from ripping off the last few buttons on his shirt, exposing his broad chest, which was just the correct degree of hairiness, sweeping her hands up the smooth skin of his back…
‘D’you mind if I open the back door?’ He interrupted the clinch that was taking place in her head.
‘Um, no, go ahead.’ She watched him cross the room and shoot the bolt that hadn’t been touched since the last time he’d been here. A fragrant breeze crept into the kitchen, bringing the dense, evening-time scent of foliage and the whistles and cheeps of birds winding down after the day. Nice. If you liked that kind of thing.
‘Have you sat in your garden yet?’ Jack asked.
No. ‘Yes.’
‘It’s so peaceful out there, you’d hardly know you were in a city,’ he nodded through the doorway.
‘I know.’ Tell me about it!
‘Here goes.’ He eyed the boiler. ‘This looks like a straightforward enough job, but you never know.’
Then he rolled up his sleeves, revealing the sinews of his lovely wrists, and set to work. Lisa sat in the kitchen, hugging one knee, enjoying, too much, the presence of an attractive man in her home. No matter what, she decided, they were not going to talk about the advertising situation. There would be no downers, this was a tailor-made opportunity to flirt.
‘So tell me all about you,’ she ordered with confident coquetry, to his back.
‘What do you want to know?’ He was none too civil as he banged and bashed metal against metal. Then he swung around, and exclaimed in mild outrage, ‘Lisa, come on! That kind of question would wipe anyone’s mind blank.’
‘Well, tell me how you’ve ended up being Managing Director of a commercial television station, a radio station and several successful magazines at the age of thirty-two.’ OK, so she was talking it up a bit, but she was in the business of flattery.
‘It’s a job,’ Jack said shortly, as if he suspected she was taking the piss. ‘I was sacked from my previous job, I had a living to earn.’
Sacked? She didn’t like the sound of that. ‘Why were you sacked?’
‘I proposed a radical notion, which involved paying staff what they were worth and giving them a voice in management. In return they were going to make concessions on demarcation and overtime, but the board decided that I was too much of a leftie and out I went.’
‘A leftie?’ Lefties weren’t much fun, were they? They made you go on marches and they had awful cars. Trabants. Ladas. That’s if they had a car at all. But Jack had a Beemer.
‘In my younger, more idealistic days,’ he hit the pipe an almighty belt with a spanner, ‘I might have been called a socialist.’
‘But you’re not one now?’ Lisa said, in alarm.
‘No,’ he chuckled grimly. ‘Don’t sound so worried. I threw in the towel when I saw that most workers are happy doing the lotto or buying shares in privatized state bodies, and their economic well-being is something they’re happy to take care of themselves.’
‘Too right. All you have to do is work hard enough,’ Lisa soothed. That, after all, was what she had done. She was working-class – well, she would have been if her dad had actually worked – and it hadn’t been to her disadvantage.
Jack turned and gave her a complex smile. Wry and sad.
‘Give me a quick career history,’ Lisa asked.
Jack turned back to the boiler and reeled off with no obvious enthusiasm, ‘Left college with an MA in communications, did the obligatory Irish stint abroad – two years in a New York media group, four in San Francisco at a cable network – returned to Ireland just in time for the economic miracle, worked for a newspaper group, got the boot like I said. Then two years ago old Calvin Carter gives me the gig here.’
‘And how do you unwind?’ Lisa enjoyed the sight of Jack’s shirt stretched tight across his back muscles as he toiled. ‘Like,’ she gave a mischievous smile, which was unfortunately wasted on him, ‘do you play golf?’
‘That’s the last time I come to fix your boiler,’ he muttered.
‘I didn’t think you were a golf man, somehow,’ she giggled. ‘So what do you do?’
‘Lisa, don’t ask me these questions. I know –’ Over his shoulder he flashed a fleeting half-smile, ‘I fix boilers. I call around to random houses unannounced and insist on fixing people’s boilers. Sometimes when they’re not even broken.’ He fell silent to concentrate on methodically winding a screw, then said, ‘What else? I hang out with my girlfriend. I go sailing.’
‘In a yacht?’ Lisa asked eagerly, ignoring the mention of Mai.
‘No, not really. Not at all, actually. It’s a one-man craft, not much bigger than a surfboard. Ah, let’s see. I play Sim City half the night, does that count?’
‘What’s that – a computer game? ‘Course it counts. Anything else?’
‘I d’know. We go to the pub, or out to eat, and we talk a lot about going to the movies but – and I really don’t understand this – we never end up going.’
Lisa wasn’t pleased with the ‘we’ in that sentence. She presumed it referred to Jack and Mai and she didn’t know what they did instead of going to the movies, but she could take a guess.
‘I see some friends from my college days, I watch a fair bit of telly but hey, just doing my job!’
‘Oh yeah,’ Lisa scorned playfully. Then she realized something. ‘That’s what you enjoy most, isn’t it? Working on the television station?’
‘Ye–’ Then she watched Jack’s back tense up as he remembered who he was talking to. ‘Er, I enjoy the magazines too. You wouldn’t believe the amount of work Channel 9 generates for me…’
‘So you could have done without Colleen and all that extra work?’ Lisa teased.
Jack tactfully deflected her question. ‘Thing is, Channel 9 is currently very gratifying. After two years of real graft and struggle, finally the staff are well paid, corporate sponsors are pleased and consumers are getting intelligent programming. And we’re nearly on the point of attracting investment so we can commission even more quality programming.’
‘Top,’ Lisa said vaguely. She’d heard enough about Channel 9 for now. ‘What else do you do?’
‘Aahhhhh,’ Jack thought out loud. ‘I see my parents most weekends. Just pop in for an hour here and there. They’re not as young as they used to be so time with them seems that much more precious. You know what I mean?’
With desperate haste Lisa changed the subject. ‘Do you ever go to restaurant openings? Or first nights? That ki
nd of thing?’
‘Nope,’ Jack said shortly. ‘I hate them. I was born without the shmooze gene, although I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that.’
‘How so?’ Lisa dissembled.
‘Ah, come on, I’m a narky bollocks.’
‘You’ve never been to me,’ Lisa said, which wasn’t to say that she hadn’t noticed his tantrums.
‘I don’t mean to be,’ he said with vague wistfulness. ‘It just… sort of… happens, and I’m always sorry afterwards.’
‘So your bark is worse than your bite?’
He swung around. ‘Done!’ he said, putting down his spanner. Then he added softly, ‘Not always. Sometimes my bite is very bad.’
Before she could take him up on that provocative statement, he was clattering spanners and screwdrivers back into his toolbox. ‘It’s on a twenty-four-hour clock, should be no bother to set, hot water any time you like. See you tomorrow and sorry for arriving unannounced.’
‘No proble–’
Suddenly he was gone, the house seemed too empty, and Lisa was alone – very alone – with her thoughts.
Oliver had cared about clothes, about parties, about art and music and clubs and knowing the right people. Jack was a badly dressed closet-socialist who sailed on a surfboard and who had no social life to speak of. But he was also big and sexy and dangerous and smelt nice, and hey, you can’t have everything.
24
You’re a great girl, Ashling, you’re a great girl, Ashling. Dylan’s farewell to Ashling carouselled in her head, as she walked home from the Shelbourne. And only stopped when she popped into Café Moka for something to eat.
When she finally reached home, Boo was sitting outside.
‘Where’ve you been?’ Ashling asked. ‘I haven’t seen you in a couple of days.’
He threw his look heavenwards. ‘Women!’ he exclaimed, good-naturedly. ‘Always trying to keep tabs on you.’ His eyes were bright in his unshaven face. ‘I felt like a change of scene.’ He waved a grubby hand in a playfully louche gesture. ‘A beautiful shop doorway in Henry Street beckoned, so I laid my hat there for a couple of nights.’