knowing stare.
Becky, who was only eleven at the time, bless her, said quietly, ‘But isn’t it up to Sarah?’
‘No, it’s not,’ snapped Aunt Vi, her voice all high and shrill, like the way she sang in church. ‘His father’s been in prison, Sarah, for heaven’s sake.’ She clutched the neck of her blouse tight between shaking fingers.
‘So what?’ said Sarah, indignation giving way to anger. ‘That’s not Cahal’s fault! I knew you two were prejudiced, but I didn’t expect you to be out-and-out bigots.’
‘We’re not bigots,’ said her father calmly, setting the spoon on the table. ‘We respect other people’s views and beliefs.’
Sarah blushed because she knew this to be true. Her father played golf with Dr Flynn and he was a Catholic. And her aunt was never done sending meals and home baking over to old Mrs Riley who lived alone next door and insisted on flicking ‘holy’ water over Sarah every time she stepped through the front door with a plate of food.
Anger made her brave. ‘So what is it then? Because he’s working class?’ she said nastily.
Dad’s face hardened even more, the muscles in his jaw twitching. ‘I’m sure this Ca-, or whatever his name is –’
‘Ca-hal,’ interrupted Sarah, emphasising the two syllables slowly, taking offence at her father’s inability to pronounce the name.
Dad’s gaze flicked over her. ‘I’m sure he’s a decent boy but I didn’t raise you to mix with people like that.’
‘People like what?’
‘Stick to your own kind, Sarah,’ shouted Aunt Vi, who had never before raised her voice in Sarah’s presence. ‘That’s what your father’s saying. People who’ve been brought up the same way as you and believe in the same things. People with the same standards.’
‘You’re both just snobs, pure and simple,’ cried Sarah, slapping the table with both palms. And she jumped up and ran out of the room.
‘Can I have it?’ Molly’s dove grey eyes, the same colour as the bedspread, were wide, her expression expectant.
‘What?’
Molly pointed at the ring in Sarah’s hand.
‘Oh, no, love. I don’t think so,’ said Sarah gently, letting her hand fall onto her lap, her fingers closing around the ring.
‘Just to borrow?’
Sarah shook her head and her fingers tightened.
‘Please?’
‘It’s too big for you.’
‘I could wear it on a chain,’ she said, touching the pale delicate skin at the base of her throat.
How on earth would she explain its appearance round Molly’s neck to her father and Auntie Vi? They would recognise it immediately. Sarah put a hand on Molly’s arm. ‘Not this time, darling. You can have that silver bracelet though. I bought it for myself when I got my first job.’
Ignoring this comment, the child persisted. ‘But what’s the point of having it if you don’t wear it?’
Sarah’s hand slipped from Molly’s arm. ‘Because it’s a … a memory, Molly. Sometimes people like to keep things to remind them of happy times.’
‘But it’s not making you happy. It’s making you sad.’
Sarah forced a limp smile. ‘Sometimes happy memories make you a little sad.’
Molly screwed up her nose, folded her arms across her narrow chest and shook her head stubbornly. ‘I don’t get it.’
Sarah sighed. ‘It’s a little hard to explain,’ she began and floundered. How could she explain the bitter-sweetness of her memories? Or how the desire to remember, suppressed for so long, had been cracked open last night by the mere sight of Cahal Mulvenna. How could she admit to herself, never mind Molly, that seeing him again had brought with it not only pain but a stupid, fevered hope?
‘I think I might give it back to the person who gave it to me,’ she announced, realising as she said it that it was the right thing to do. The ring had never been hers, it had only ever been borrowed. It belonged to Cahal.
‘Who’s that?’
‘Come on, time for bed,’ she said sharply, dropping the ring and necklace into the box, and snapping the lid shut before shoving it back in the drawer, slamming it firmly shut.
‘And let’s see if we can find you some cough medicine, young lady,’ she smiled and taking a reluctant, wide-awake daughter by the hand, led her into the bathroom.
Cahal typed ‘Ballyfergus’ on the keyboard, hit the return button, and stared at the computer screen, unable to get Sarah in that red dress and high heels out of his mind. So she had married Ian Aitken. How could she? She’d had little to no time for Ian at university, even though the poor bugger was clearly in love with her. So what had changed? Or had she married him just to please her family? The thought repelled him.
She’d hurt him so deeply the pain had never really gone away and seeing her had only re-opened the old wound. She’d refused to go to Australia with him and she’d not responded to a single one of the dozens of letters he’d sent her from there, nor the phone call either. She’d effectively ended the relationship without the courtesy of an explanation, though he guessed what had happened after he’d left. Ian would’ve been waiting in the wings, all too ready to offer tea and sympathy.
But maybe she wasn’t what she’d pretended to be. What if he’d never known the real Sarah? Maybe his going to Australia was the opportunity she’d been waiting for? An opportunity to end a relationship she was too cowardly to finish face-to-face.
He brought his closed fist down quietly on the table. She was here, somewhere, in this very building, Laganside Tower, going about her business along with the twelve hundred other staff. And these questions were driving him mad.
He had not known she worked for VTS, and when he saw her at the Europa Hotel two days ago, shimmering like a star amongst the drab suits and dreary conversation, he’d not, at first, believed his eyes.
He had not imagined that her appearance would be so largely unchanged from when he’d last seen her, twenty years ago. There were fine wrinkles on her skin, yes, but she had the same pretty face framed by that blonde hair, cut into a shorter, neater style than the one she’d worn at uni. The same big, grey doe eyes and slim, boyish figure that had entranced him from the first moment he’d set eyes on her folding her knickers with intense focus in the uni laundry … he swallowed and shook his head to dispel that particular image.
He was a little ashamed of the way he’d flirted with Jody in front of Sarah – but he’d been angry when he heard the name Aitken and he took a mean sort of satisfaction in her response. She’d gone red and stomped off in a huff almost as if she cared. And the idea that his tiny act of revenge might have made
