‘Roisin Quealey but I used to be Roisin O’Mara.’ She explained her connection to the guesthouse and he invited her to sit down.
She did so and he placed a hand on the book. ‘It’s our story you know. Mine and Clio’s. Only the ending is different. The story in this book has a happier ending than ours did. I’d like to make mine and Clio’s ending different too.’
Roisin forgot all about everything as she sat transfixed by the story he told her.
Chapter 23
‘It’s lovely being ladies who lunch,’ Mammy said, her arms linked firmly through Moira and Roisin’s. All three of their faces were only visible in the gaps between the hats and scarves they’d donned as they stamped their feet against the cold, waiting for the lights to change so as to cross over to Baggot Street. An impromptu lunch had been Mammy’s bright idea and they’d opted to walk to Quinn’s bistro, aware of the amount of overeating they would be doing from hereon in until the New Year. Aisling, who’d had a successful morning shopping, had checked to make sure Quinn saved them a table.
She’d said to Roisin it would be a chance to get to know Cindy a little better. ‘I’ve to be back at O’Mara’s for three to meet the American group off the bus, they’re back from their tour of the south and I want to make sure all their Christmas Day dinner reservations are confirmed,’ she’d said shrugging into her coat before they left.
Baggot Street’s foot traffic was busy, Roisin noticed, as the lights changed at last and they made their way across the road, merging in with the Christmas shoppers. Aisling and Cindy, their heads bent as they talked and tottered in impractical shoes, were slightly ahead of them. Cindy, not used to the cold, looked like a well-endowed Russian Cossack with her faux fur hat, Roisin thought, smirking as a middle-aged man who should know better had an incident with a lamppost. Served him right for being so fixated on the blonde apparition mincing down Baggot.
‘It was good of your brother to offer to take Noah to the cinema,’ Maureen said. ‘It will be nice for the two men of the family to get to know one another better.’
‘It was,’ Roisin agreed. Patrick had surprised her with how much attention he’d given Noah and she’d been pleased when he suggested he and Noah go and see the Disney Christmas flick showing at the IMAX. Noah had been jumping up and down at the prospect of a boys’ outing. ‘I hope Pat doesn’t let him have the extra-large popcorn. If I know Noah, he’ll plump for it but he’ll make himself sick, stuffing all that down on top of the rasher sandwich Mrs Flaherty made him.’ Mind you, she wasn’t in a position to talk the way she’d snaffled hers down and now here she was off for a slap-up lunch! Thank goodness for yoga pants.
‘They’ll be grand. Don’t worry so, Roisin,’ Maureen said. ‘So, are you going to tell us how your evening went with your man? I hope you changed the sheets in your room.’
‘Mammy, nothing happened!’
‘I should hope not on a first date!’ Maureen was indignant. ‘You girls’ minds dwell in the gutter so they do. What I meant was your room smelt like a brewery when I poked my head around the door and as it’s a full house tonight, I’d hope you’d have at least put clean linen on the bed. I’m looking forward to us all being together under one roof again. And it’s been far too long since the O’Mara family attended Midnight Mass together.’
‘So, there was no riding,’ Moira lamented, looking disappointed.
‘No.’
‘Moira O’Mara!’
‘Did you kiss?’ Moira ignored her mammy.
‘Moira, mind your own business.’ Roisin peered around their mammy and eyeballed her sister.
‘Ah, Rosi, that’s not fair, especially after all the hard work I did sorting you and your fringe out,’ Moira moaned.
‘Will you be seeing him again do you think?’ Maureen asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Rosi said. Her head was beginning to hurt again.
‘Jaysus, it’s harder getting information out of you than a cold war spy,’ Moira muttered.
‘She always did play her cards close to her chest,’ Maureen added, nearly tripping as Moira pulled them to a stop in order to admire the vibrant new Revlon display in the window of Boots.
‘That’s your woman who looks like a man one, isn’t it? I danced to that at the yacht club dinner.’
‘Shania Twain, Man I feel Like a Woman. Read the slogan, Mammy!’ Moira rolled her eyes. ‘I like that shade of purple.’
‘It’s lavender,’ Maureen said.
‘It’s not lavender, that sounds old ladyish,’ Moira bounced back.
‘She looks well on it, your Shania one, doesn’t she?’ Maureen said wistfully.
‘She does,’ Roisin agreed, though she was unsure why they were all stood staring at her poster. It was tempting fate in her opinion because she wouldn’t put it past Mammy to break into a line dancing routine. She kept a firm grip of her arm just in case.
‘Do you think she uses the magic skin plumpy thing-a-me-bobs that are all the go at the moment?’ Maureen asked.
‘Serum do you mean, Mammy?’ Roisin said.
Maureen nodded, ‘Yes, semen.’
‘SERUM! And yes, for sure.’ Moira nodded knowledgably as though she was privy to Shania’s night time beauty routine.
‘Do you think I could do with a bit of plumping?’
Both sisters peered at their mammy’s face.
‘Your face has plenty of plump, so it does,’ Moira said.
Roisin recalled her exchange with Aisling where her sister had told her their mammy had been acting a little strangely since the yacht club dinner. ‘Why do you need plumping all of a sudden?’ Her eyes narrowed as she studied her mammy’s face.
‘A woman of certain years is bound to wonder from time to
