JP

A tale of two worlds. That’s what the sergeant said. Harry McNamara and me, one of us born with a silver spoon, the other – well.

I can see the tabloids loving that headline.

It’s not that black and white. Everything was fine until Harry McNamara fucked things up.

By 2007, I’d made a great life for myself. I’d moved up the ranks to become a supervisor in the office equipment company. I still dreamt of getting into banking, but, for the moment, I was good where I was.

Charlie was about to graduate, and the hospital where she’d done most of her work experience was taking her on. It was a public hospital and she’d be working for the state but, as she kept pointing out, it was secure and came with a pension. I snorted when the words came out of her mouth.

‘You sound like a spinster civil servant already,’ I said. ‘They’ll have you doing twenty-four-hour shifts and you’ll be coming out with about fifty pence a week.’

‘At least I’ll be working,’ she retorted. ‘I’ve read what they’re saying. Did you not see that piece in the paper by that top economist fella? He says it’s all going to collapse, and then who’ll be laughing? Me, with my nice safe public-sector job.’

Man, did she call that right. And she loved nursing, so pay wasn’t really an issue for her. She loved the company of the other girls in the job and talking with the patients, young and old. Most of all, she loved being needed.

I was still a bit of a loner. I kept my head down and did my job well, but I didn’t really mix with my co-workers. I didn’t have close friends, just my sister. I was a bit worried Charlie was slipping away from me. Already, her hours studying and nursing meant she was missing most of the week. I was so used to her easy company, it was hard to be without it.

‘Fancy meeting up later and catching a film?’ I asked over breakfast one morning. It was June, the sun was shining and the weekend was upon us.

‘Oh, JP.’ She laughed, but there was an edge to it. She’d been off for a few days, not herself. I thought she’d fallen out with a friend, but it was more.

‘What?’

‘You want to spend Friday night at the pictures with your sister? For the love of God, will you not get a girlfriend? I mean, I adore you and everything, but we’re never going to expand our little family if you stay a monk.’

‘I’m not a bloody monk, you cheeky mare.’

She raised an eyebrow.

I wasn’t either. Plenty of girls fancied me, and the fact I didn’t bother turned out to be a secret weapon in attracting them. I’d had plenty of one-night stands and the odd second date. I didn’t go further. The girls my age were starting to have expectations. I couldn’t imagine a long-term relationship because then I’d have to conceive of marriage and, terrifyingly, children. With Seamie and Betty as role models, that wasn’t a road I planned to go down.

She frowned at me, stirring her cereal with the spoon, none of it making it to her mouth. There was definitely something on her mind.

‘What about that girl in Payroll? The new one who started last week. The brunette. Ask her out. You said she’s gorgeous.’

I blushed. The new girl was a looker.

‘I knew it. Just make a move, will you?’

‘Not this again. I’m only twenty-seven, Charlie, would you ever let up? Why are you so determined to marry me off ?’

‘You’re an old twenty-seven, JP. Are you going to ask that girl out or not?’

‘Maybe I will, maybe I won’t. What are you doing tonight that you’re so eager to get rid of me?’

‘That, big bro, is my business.’

‘So you can organize my life but I’m not allowed to know about yours?’

‘Pretty much. Look, JP, one of these days we’re going to go our separate ways. We can’t keep living together, or we’ll end up like one of those odd old pairs sharing a cottage down the country. Everybody will think we’re having an incestuous relationship. I might have to move into digs at the hospital too, and I don’t want to feel like I can’t leave here.’

I nearly choked on the toast I was chewing.

‘What the fuck?’

‘Seriously. Live your life. I’m living mine. Sometimes you just have to move on. You need to stop crowding me. We’re not kids any more – I don’t need you coddling me all the time.’

She stood up angrily, scraping her chair off the floor. Seeing the look of hurt and puzzlement on my face, she hesitated.

‘Sorry, JP. Don’t mind me. I’m … tired.’

I didn’t know then what the little episode had been about. Of course, it was nothing to do with me at all. She’d had a fight with a boyfriend. If I hadn’t been so thick, I’d have figured it out. Instead, I felt pretty hard done by. I’d never looked for thanks for taking Charlie on, but I knew I’d made sacrifices. It was my job. She was my baby sister. To have it thrown at me like that – it was unfair.

In work that day, I sought out the new girl, Sandra.

I knew – I just knew – that Sandra was different. It wasn’t just her looks. The girl was intelligent and carried herself in a way that told you she was worth something. I knew she was more than a one-night stand and it scared the life out of me. Other people are frightened of things like heights and spiders. I was frightened of falling in love.

‘Do you fancy coming to the cinema later?’

I practically spat it out. I was better when women were coming on to me, not the other way round.

Her face lit up with a huge smile and she nodded.

‘I would love to. I thought you’d never ask, John Paul.’

She gave me butterflies.

It was stocktake day and I didn’t finish until 8 p.m. Sandra went home and got changed and came back in to meet me. We went straight into the city centre to have dinner first in a Chinese restaurant on O’Connell Street. I enjoyed it, enjoyed being with her. She was undemanding, funny, easy to be around. And I couldn’t take my eyes off her. She was really gorgeous. Tall, long brown hair, big blue eyes. Like a model, and confident with it. She came in to meet me wearing a pair of jeans and a white silk blouse. She knew she’d look good in a black sack; she didn’t need to put it all out there.

When I ordered a Coke instead of joining her on the wine, she asked me why I wasn’t drinking.

‘I’m not a fan of the stuff,’ I said, feeling the familiar embarrassment. To be Irish was to drink. Charlie spent her life telling other revellers she wasn’t pregnant or on antibiotics. When I said no, people just backed off.

Sandra studied me for a moment, then asked the waiter to scrap her order and bring her a Coke too.

‘I only drink because I’m nervous, to be honest,’ she said. ‘I’m not a fan. It’s a bloody scourge. It’s nice to meet a man who doesn’t think booze is the answer to all life’s problems.’

We nearly missed the film, we enjoyed ourselves so much over the meal.

‘I’ve had my eye on you,’ she said, and blushed at her own directness.

‘Have you?’ I said. I was startled – I hadn’t noticed.

‘Oh, yeah. The whole strong, silent cowboy thing you have going on. I love it. The lads in the office spend their lives just talking shite. And they want you to talk shite back. There’s only so many times I can change football-team allegiance and pretend to give a fuck.’

‘I’ve absolutely no interest in football.’

‘Glad to hear it.’

‘Unless West Ham are playing.’

‘Bollocks. Is that not a bit unusual for an Irish bloke? West Ham? Not Liverpool or Man U?’

‘I grew up in East London.’

‘I thought I detected a twang! So that’s why I’m attracted to you. I’ve always had a thing for a wide boy.’ I groaned, and laughed.

Too perfect. She was just too bloody perfect.

We caught a late movie and settled into the dark and the action thriller.

I’d turned down the sound on my phone but hadn’t turned it off, so I felt it buzz in my pocket when the first message came through.

It was from Charlie. She’d typed ‘Haven’t heard from you all day, are you annoyed at me? Sorry for earlier’ and a sad face.

I put it back in my pocket.

A few minutes later it rang. I took it out again and saw her number flashing. I silenced the buzzing and was about to put it back in my pocket when a new message came in:

‘Any chance of a lift home?’

‘Is everything okay?’ Sandra whispered. ‘Do you need to be somewhere?’

‘My sister,’ I said. ‘Looking for a lift.’

‘I don’t mind if you want to go. Really.’

I hesitated.

I could have left. I should have left. Saved myself from falling properly for Sandra.

Normally, I would have. I was always at Charlie’s beck and call.

‘No,’ I said, decisively. ‘She’s a big girl. She’ll find her own way home.’

I didn’t want to leave Sandra. It was the first time I’d made a choice for me, and it felt good.

I didn’t push it. I dropped her home like an absolute gentleman. All I tried for at the top of her road was a chaste kiss on the cheek, but she turned her mouth to mine at the last minute and our lips met. She was a soft, gentle kisser. No urgency, just generous and warm. It made me want to make love to her, proper like, not just a quick shag. I had a future with that girl.

She didn’t want me to walk her to her house. She still lived with her mum and dad and didn’t want the folks dragging me in for the third degree. It was only a couple of hundred metres down a well-lit road anyway.

I was so close to asking Sandra to come home with me, but it felt like a step too far, too soon. I’d have to introduce her to Charlie, and that was practically a marriage proposal as far as my sister would have been concerned. Turned out, the wagon wasn’t even home.

I suppose the fact I was a little bit annoyed at Charlie for snapping at me that morning helped, but I think I would have ended up with Sandra anyway. Everything about that night had fate written all over it.