Roisin had images of her mammy getting airborne if her little legs were to pump any faster. She’d be like a red balloon floating away in that rain jacket of hers, she thought. Noah, wrapped up in his new coat, was holding the plastic bag eagerly awaiting the moment he could use the title his nana had bestowed on him of official pooper scooper. So far so good, all they’d been privy to were numerous incidents of lamppost leg cocking on the walk here. At last Pooh slowed to check out something unidentifiable and Roisin and Noah caught up to Maureen.
Maureen pointed at the yacht club and shouted over the wind. ‘The Christmas dinner was last Saturday. I wore the red Vietnamese dress. You know the one Moira borrowed the night the three of you went to Quinn’s for dinner in the matching dresses I had made especially for you in Hoi An. Everybody said it looked very well on me. I had a grand time. There was dancing and everything.’
How could she forget? It was the night she’d met Shay and who would have thought that the Chinese style silk dresses would have such an impact but Aisling’s Quinn had barely been able to keep his hands to himself. Mind he struggled to at the best of times. As Moira was to Tom’s superbly sculpted glutes, so was Quinn to Aisling’s womanly rear. Tom had been rather taken with Moira in Mammy’s red number even if it had hung off her in the places it would have had a stranglehold on Mammy. As for Shay, she didn’t know what he’d thought about her enforced choice of evening wear but she did know there’d been a connection between them. Would she see him while she was here, or wouldn’t she? Did she leave it to fate or did she call him?
‘You’ve a daft look on your face.’ Maureen peered at her daughter from under the hood of her raincoat.
‘I haven’t.’
‘You have. Roisin, I’ve raised three daughters and I know that look. You’ve a man on your mind so you have.’
Roisin glanced guiltily at her son but he too was engaged in examining whatever the unspeakable thing Pooh was so interested in was and out of earshot. He’d adjusted to his new living arrangement but a new man on the scene was a different thing entirely, it was far too early to introduce anyone else into his life. Come to that she was getting so far ahead of herself where Shay was concerned it was ridiculous. Mammy read her mind.
‘Is it yer man, Shay? You know, the grandson of the auld fella Noah was after tormenting the last time you were over.’
Noah had enjoyed a rambunctious game of knock on the door and run away with Reggie, Shay’s estranged grandfather who’d been staying in Room 1 at O’Maras. The story had a happy ending, not for Noah—he’d had to apologise, but for Shay and his granddad who’d met for the first time. It was a new beginning before the end, because Reggie was terminally ill, but at least they’d had the chance to connect and get to know one another. She wondered how they were getting on, how Reggie was. He’d been a cantankerous old sod, made bitter by life but she’d seen past that and had liked him. She’d liked his grandson more but that was beside the point.
Roisin didn’t say anything but Mammy looked jubilant as she prodded her in the chest. ‘A-ha. It is. Moira was after telling me you were panting after him at Quinn’s. I wasn’t sure if it was just Moira making something out of nothing what with you and Colin only just having parted ways. But,’ she jabbed at her again, ‘I can tell by the way you look shifty. You had that same look on your face when you told me you’d found a job in the entertainment industry.’
‘I had, though.’ Roisin had lost count of how many times she’d protested this particular point.
‘Roisin, wearing next to nothing and prancing your way around the city’s nightspots while handing out free alcopops is not working in the entertainment industry.’
‘Mammy, you make it sound seedy and it wasn’t a bit like that. It was all about being entertaining as we promoted the product and the product happened to be sold in nightclubs.’ Actually, it was quite a lot like that but it was a long time ago now and sure look at her these days—a mammy and a secretary in an accountancy firm. You couldn’t get more respectable than that.
‘Hmm, you did far too much promoting of your product in my opinion.’
They were getting off track, and what were Noah and Pooh so fascinated by? She moved closer, deciding it looked like some sort of dead mollusc. She winced as Pooh licked it and made a note not to let him near her. It was time for a subject change.
‘So, you had dinner with the boatie brigade, that’s nice.’
Maureen had taken sailing lessons last summer and loved to tell people she was a member of the Howth Sailing Club. Though, Roisin thought, looking at the wistful look on her face as she gazed out at the churning water, to be fair Mammy had been very brave. She’d tackled life head on after their daddy died what with moving out of O’Mara’s, joining any club that would have her, trying new things and going on an Asian adventure. It was her way of finding her way without her husband at her side. The need to tell her how she felt swelled up in her like the surging waters on either side of them.
‘Mammy, I’m very proud of you. I know I haven’t told you that before, but I am.’
Maureen looked startled. ‘Where
