The Aer Lingus Gold Circle Lounge at Heathrow was, Sarah thought, rather dowdy. They had tried to create a business feel, with little ‘secluded’ areas for small meetings, but it was completely ineffectual. Nothing like the British Airways lounges she had been in with Conor on his business trips to New York, Hong Kong and Singapore. There was just something special about BA; that touch of class, of glamour, that attention to detail. It wasn’t down to bias, because she was English – it was simply a fact.
Of course she didn’t mention that to him.
‘If you didn’t play hurling and it wasn’t in your school, why do you love it so much?’ she said.
Conor sipped his gin and tonic and contemplated his response. Sarah was drinking a Diet Coke. She was seven weeks pregnant with his baby and she was certain that the weekend would provide the ideal moment to tell him.
‘It’s difficult to explain,’ he said. ‘My uncle used to bring me to games. He and my father played for Blackrock, a club in Cork city. Really, though, there’s just something about hurling. It draws you in. The skill. The speed of the ball. It’s Cork, too, of course.’
He looked at her then with an expression of intensity, of passion. Not unlike the look that precedes sex, or that she had seen on men’s faces during sex. When everything is heightened; when their breathing turns to panting and every moment is engorged with the raw need, the hunger.
She could feel herself become aroused and her face flushed with embarrassment. She wondered where the idea had come from. It was probably the hormones – she’d read somewhere that an increased libido occurred during the first trimester. She was trying to adjust, but there was a lot going on. And now this game, her first time in Ireland with Conor, and meeting his parents – she didn’t know what to expect. She wasn’t used to being nervous and she knew it didn’t suit her.
When they checked in to The Marker Hotel in the Docklands area of Dublin, the understated style and quality of the lobby and their suite took her by surprise. The rooms were done in lime and grey, set off by a stunning French lilac carpet. The staff were just as she liked them in hotels: friendly, attentive and competent, but not fawning. The area was so modern and clean – it reminded her of St George’s Wharf.
The tall, narrow windows of their bedroom overlooked a plaza and a theatre, which was lit up that night in funky greens and reds. They ate tapas in the balmy Skybar on the roof and watched the sun drift low over the mountains. There was barely a breeze; it was one of those perfect late-summer nights.
Her heart pounded in her chest when they gazed out over the river and he put his arm around her and pointed out the lights of the conference centre and the new bridge. She thought: now, now, now. But she lost her nerve at the last moment. She almost wept in the lift going down to their suite when she realised that another opportunity to tell him had passed.
It took her an age to get to sleep amid the usual middle-of-the-night hotel sounds: a toilet flushing, a passing conversation in the hall, a muted TV from the floor above, traffic in the distance, and the dull intermittent buzz from Conor’s phone, on silent, receiving emails. She’d been surprised he hadn’t wanted sex, and was disappointed when he kissed her, said goodnight and turned away. He fell asleep in seconds. Sore and swollen breasts or not, her sister Natasha had suggested a good time to break the news might be after he’d ‘gotten his leg over’. It seemed to be happening less frequently these days, or perhaps she was imagining it.
She used the time to practise her lines.
‘How far are you gone?’
‘The doctor isn’t sure, perhaps four weeks.’ A lie, it was closer to eight.
‘But how did it happen when you’re on the pill?’
‘It must have been around the time I had that tummy bug and we went back to my house. Remember? After that play?’ Another lie.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I was in shock. I had to come to terms with it myself, first. I was waiting for the perfect time.’ Mostly true. Mostly.
Sarah had come off the pill in late April, when her prescription ran out. She hadn’t planned it. She was too busy to go to the doctor and the days just slipped by. It just sort of happened. Then it felt right. It wasn’t because he needed a push, or because she wanted out of her dead-end job in the gallery, or that her clock was ticking and a baby would complete her life. It just happened. Things just happen, sometimes. In any case, babies are a blessing. Nothing in the slightest to feel guilty about. He’ll be delighted to be a father. He may even propose.
Or else he’ll want to get rid of it, and her.
She looked up at the ceiling as he slept beside her. She turned on her side to spoon him. She put her hand on his bony hip, and on the rise and fall of his rib cage. The chill certainty that this would be their last night together passed through her with a jolt and she was reminded of the abortion clinic in Waterloo a few months after her mother died, when she’d had her crazy affair with Derek – that thorough shit who had been married to her aunt at the time. It doubled as an STD clinic, and reeked of people who had tumbled through their own wretched lives into a lesser, sordid existence. She remembered her determination as she had walked out its front door that day: never to fall so low again. Never.
She woke up groggy and heavy-hearted. In the shower, it seemed as if her bump had already begun to show. How could that be possible, when at eight weeks the foetus was only the size of a kidney bean? And how could a baby the size of a kidney bean have hands and feet with webbed fingers and toes? How could its eyelids not yet cover its eyes? How tiny are those eyes? How could its breathing tubes extend from its throat to the branches of its lungs? It didn’t make any sense. Lungs, on a kidney bean.
Natasha had been like a whale after just three months and the thought of being so fat and awkward dismayed Sarah. She turned her back to the bathroom door then, and, under the flow of the shower, she did let herself cry, hoping to feel better afterwards. It worked. Sort of.
Late in the morning they met with his parents in the hotel foyer. His mother, Maureen, appeared to be quite nervous, her coffee and scone untouched. She barely took a breath between long rambling stories about their summers in Kerry when Conor and his brother were young. She spoke so quickly that Sarah found it quite difficult to understand what she said – her accent was somewhat guttural. Not to mention the distraction of that frightfully gaudy floral dress.
She had a rather worn-down look, a severity around her thin lips that the claret lipstick could not mask. So unlike her own mother, who had been gentle and open, and who had pulled everyone into her soft, warm Italian bosom. Poor Mama, who had pined away after Father dumped her for that bitch nearly half his age, and died at forty-five from bowel cancer. She was only skin and bone at the end – she looked like a famine victim, an ancient travesty of herself.
Conor’s father, Alan, was more reserved, his speech measured with an educated tone. He also had a distinct glint in his eye. At one point, she was astonished to realise that he was flirting with her. She turned to Conor and saw him scowling at his father – she hadn’t imagined it. Remarkable.
Sarah sensed a strain between the men. They’d hardly glanced at each other, even when they said hello. Conor sat still and watchful during the conversation. She knew that look well, it meant he was on guard.
She noticed a tremor in Alan’s hand when he put down his cup. A hesitation in his walk, that rigid expression. It was Parkinson’s for sure; she knew it from her uncle, William. But why hadn’t Conor told her? Perhaps he had, but surely she would have remembered.
They were so alike. There was no doubt where Conor had gotten his good looks from, but there was a hollowness in the older man’s cheeks – the beard couldn’t mask it. A wateriness to the eyes.
And yet, he’d flirted with her!
She remembered to tone down her accent, smile a lot, listen keenly, look them in the eye, say little and keep her knees together. All in all, she judged it a success. But how Maureen clearly adored Conor. She had tried to mask her emotion in their parting kiss, but Sarah could see her fight back tears. Surely Maureen would be on her side when the news broke, happy to hear that Conor will be a father, that she, herself, will be a grandmother. Wasn’t that every mother’s dream?
‘It was awfully good to meet your parents, Conor. Your Mum was ever so nice,’ she said as they left the hotel to walk to Croke Park. She smiled at him and held his hand.
‘Yeah, sorry about Mam’s ramblings, she does go on,’ he said.
‘Not at all. You’re certainly the apple of her eye, anyway.’
‘Hmm. Sometimes.’
They stopped at traffic lights by the new bridge.
‘I thought I saw a shake in your father’s hand.’
‘Yes, did I tell you he has Parkinson’s?’ Conor said.
They crossed the road.
‘I don’t think so. Is it advanced?’
‘I think he’s had it for a while and said nothing. I noticed it first in June and then Mam told me. Apparently he didn’t want anyone to know, and he won’t talk about it.’
‘I see,’ she said, and she glanced at him.
‘He’s very proud,’ Conor said. ‘And he thinks he’s God’s gift to women, did you notice that?’
She was suddenly on alert; there was something too casual in the way Conor had spoken.
‘What?’ she said.
‘All that stuff about “The English Rose”? Spoofer. He was all over you like a rash,’ he said.
‘Don’t be silly, he was just being friendly.’
‘Yeah, right.’
They walked on in silence.
When they turned away from the river the atmosphere changed. A buzz of good humour permeated the streets. Groups of fans wound their way up the hill and luxuriated in the sunshine with their smiling, flushed pink and red faces. There were almost as many girls as boys.
Pockets of laughter drifted out of crowded-looking pubs. She was glad Conor didn’t want to go into one – there seemed to be a lot of drinking. She tried to see it all through his eyes, but she felt so out of place. Excluded, like a pagan at a church service.
The people they passed, especially the men, weren’t particularly handsome. That was one of the things she liked most about Conor – that he looked more Scandinavian than Irish. Of course, she daren’t tell him that. She had never been interested in a man who wasn’t at least six-foot tall and Conor was six-two in his socks, with his blue eyes and fair hair and lantern jaw.
Sarah had been surprised when he’d suggested that she travel to Dublin with him for the game. She knew how much it meant to him. He’d already gone home to attend one match with his mates that summer.
She had jumped at the opportunity. It was surely a sign.
‘There it is,’ Conor said, as they turned the corner of a tree-lined square and saw the towering mass of concrete and metal rise high above the rows of houses.
‘Wow,’ she said, knowing he wanted her to be impressed.
‘Yeah, that’s it,’ he said. He removed his Tom Ford sunglasses and smiled at her. He took her hand as they walked past the faded elegance of a Georgian terrace.
The next street was run-down and grim; council houses, many of them derelict. Conor had warned her that it wasn’t the most salubrious area but Dublin still seemed like a city of such wild contrasts. Nothing was predictable and she resented the unfamiliar feelings of being out of place and unsure.
She pulled her Ronny Kobo skirt down a little after she was wolf-whistled at by some beer-bellied men outside a pub. Conor had glared at them but she dragged him on. Then she felt silly – it was already virtually to her knees. The tank top was a bit tight but very little seemed to fit her properly these days, and it was the only red one she had. It wasn’t really her colour.
Conor had glanced at her when she changed in the room before checkout but he hadn’t said anything. He was dazzling, of course, in a red Ermenegildo Zegna cashmere crew knit with chinos. When she asked him if she looked okay he returned a perfunctory ‘fine’. She should have pressed him. She really needed to get some new clothes, bras especially.
On a blocked-off street near the stadium, Sarah noticed a blonde girl with blue ribbons in her hair, maybe seven or eight years old, skipping ahead of her parents and an older brother. She wore a light sleeveless blue top and a yellow flowing skirt to her calves. One of her plastic sandals was blue, the other yellow. She swung her little flag from side to side before her, and sang: ‘Up Clare, up Clare, up Clare, up Clare, up Clare!’
Sarah’s feet hurt – another new sensation. The Valentino pumps had seemed the best option, usually so comfortable. She wasn’t wearing bloody runners for the next seven months, that was for sure. She sighed.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, trying to make eye contact.
‘It’s nothing. Really, don’t worry, I shan’t ruin your day,’ she said, and changed the subject. ‘Is the atmosphere always so,’ she began, and carefully chose her next word, ‘pleasant?’
‘Always,’ he said, with pride. ‘Never any problems.’ He turned to her. ‘Now, it will be noisy. Some fellows might get carried away, after the drink, in the heat of the moment, and so on.’
‘What? Irishmen drinking? I’m shocked.’
‘Hey, you lot are not so bad at it either. In the Premier area it won’t be too crowded. But I’ll probably get a bit noisy too.’ He shrugged. ‘Just giving you the heads-up.’
‘Fine by me,’ she said, and reminded herself again why she was really there. She didn’t do sports, let alone Irish sports. She told herself to buck up.
Her one and only time at Twickenham with James and his friends had been an utter disaster. Despite being tipsy from the champagne in the tent, she had seethed all through the match. Him pleading amnesia that morning, when in fact he’d tried to force himself on her in Charles and Megan’s apartment in Richmond the night before. She’d had to jam her knees up into his chest before he got the message that no meant no. He was well aware too that she couldn’t shout at him with the others sleeping next door. He’d promptly fallen asleep while she’d fumed through half the night. If she’d had any gumption at all she’d have walked straight out and gotten a taxi home. It had heralded the end, really – a wasted two years. Live and learn.
But the testosterone of those huge men on the pitch butting into each other like goats; the appalling fans braying and swaying and spilling beer; the drunken renditions of ‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot’. She shuddered – surely this would be different?
She thought about the winter night her father had brought her to see Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. She must have been around thirteen. As they queued to enter through a turnstile, a large group of drunken northern football fans were herded past by policemen on horses. The hatred in their eyes, their shaved heads, their vicious chants. She had been so frightened in the grim, dark, hostile shadow of that West London monolith that she’d almost peed herself. Not that she let on, of course – not to Father. ‘Hmm. Now is this lip stiff or is it wobbly? Stiff or wobbly, Sarah?’ ‘Stiff, Father.’ ‘That’s my girl.’ If only he knew. Already she had learned how to please him.
The rigidity in his lined face last February when she’d told him that she was ‘seeing’ an Irishman. What a silly euphemism, too. For ‘seeing’, read: ‘head-over-heels in love with’, ‘fucking the brains out of’, ‘soon to get pregnant by’, ‘hoping to spend the rest of my life with’.
Of course, Father had been too English to openly disapprove, but the lack of warmth, or even interest, did hurt. She was certain that he’d come round to the idea of an Irish son-in-law as soon as he met Conor. If they ever did meet. Claudia had phoned that Sunday when they were all due to have lunch in Soho with the news that he was ‘under the weather’ and ‘couldn’t possibly travel across town in that heat’. Gold-digging bitch.
At the gate their tickets were scanned by a smiling woman in a navy pants suit, as though they were in an airport boarding a plane. She waved them through and pointed out the lifts. Sarah was surprised that there were lifts, and she berated herself. Why not? A well-dressed middle-aged couple shared the lift with them.
Conor nodded to the man, who wore a well-cut suit and tie and expensive-looking shoes. He had keen, intelligent eyes.
‘Limerick didn’t quite make it this year, Seamus,’ Conor said.
‘Next year, please God. We’ve some good players coming up. Ye’re Cork anyway by the looks of ye.’
‘Yes, Conor Dunlea. Pleased to meet you. This is my girlfriend, Sarah Taylor. Sarah’s from London but she’s an honorary Cork woman for the day.’
‘Seamus Curtain,’ the man replied. ‘And this is my wife, Finola.’
Sarah shook hands with the tall, elegant woman, who wore a fitted navy and cream two-piece suit, with pearl drop earrings to match. The huge sapphire around her neck looked real.
‘Sarah, if there’s a more stunning-looking woman in Croke Park today, I’d be shocked,’ she said, and smiled as the lift doors opened. ‘You’re a very lucky young man, Conor. I hope you appreciate that.’
‘I do indeed,’ he said, and Sarah felt herself blush. What a lovely thing to say.
They walked out into a carpeted reception area with windows along its full length, giving a view onto the vast stadium and the green area at its centre. A match was in progress, though not many paid attention to it. Faint cheers ebbed and flowed from outside as the white ball was struck up and down the pitch. The stadium was still quite empty. The other couple were immediately subsumed into one of the groups of people standing around. A young woman with a tray of drinks approached them.
‘Drinks? Madam? Sir?’
Conor took a bottle of Heineken and Sarah a sparkling water.
‘Not going to have a drink?’ he said.
‘It’s a bit early. Trying to be good,’ she said. ‘Maybe later.’
He nodded and they clinked bottle to glass. She looked around and was relieved to see some younger people in jeans.
‘Who were that couple?’ she said. ‘Do you know them?’
‘Oh, he’s Seamus Curtain,’ Conor said. ‘He’s … well, he’s rich. A billionaire, in fact.’
‘A billionaire?’ she said. But Conor was watching the hurling and did not react.
Her friends used to mock her. Because she’d always gone for the posh ones. The rich ones, who were mostly shits, some of whom had treated her like a common tart before dumping her. But Conor wouldn’t do that. Yes, he could be detached, sometimes. She had often waited for him in bars and restaurants, and wondered which Conor she would be spending the night with. If that was the price she’d pay, she told herself, it would be utterly worth it.
She had broached the subject of them living together, but he’d been elusive. Her plan had been to move in with him when her lease was up in December, even before she got pregnant. When they discussed it, he complained that his place was too small – whereas it was anything but. The location at St Katherine’s Docks was perfect for work, though she would love to quit when the maternity leave ended. When he got his partnership from the firm, they could buy a house in Kensington or Chelsea, with a nice garden for the little one.
An autumn wedding, perhaps, the following year. A russet and crimson theme with rustic invitations. The Oleg Cassini organza three-quarter-sleeved wedding dress would accentuate her height – she’d have her figure back by then. A marquee in Hampton Court, a civil ceremony in one of the rooms there. Her little niece Rebecca a flower girl, strewing petals; Natasha her maid of honour; a pink ribbon in baby Clara’s hair – Clara, called after her mother.
He was so hard to pin down, but the baby would change everything. Now, she just needed to tell him.
The match itself was a blur. The ball seemed to fizz up and down the pitch at random, and Sarah could not keep up with it. The players stood around a lot of the time in pairs, and when the ball came near them they engaged in some kind of frantic wrestling or they chased each other and swung their sticks dangerously.
Conor grew more agitated and distracted as the game progressed. He had been drinking steadily since they arrived. He hardly touched the overcooked food they were served and Sarah ate too much and felt dyspeptic, the beef repeating on her. The noise was horrendous. One fat man near them kept standing up and shouting something about a banner.
Conor tried to explain the rules to her at the beginning and how teams score, goals and points, and the different colour flags held by the men in white coats by the goal, but it was pointless. She couldn’t take it in.
His despair shocked her, when Cork seemed destined to lose. He screamed, almost hysterically, at the Cork players and the referee – it was so unlike him. His eyes rigid with a helpless panic, his hand over his mouth. The match appeared to be nearing its end.
Only then did it occur to her. What if they lost? If they lost, she couldn’t possibly tell him today. Could she? She was running out of time and they were flying home later. How stupid could one be?
He barely noticed when she excused herself to go to the toilet. Such a relief to get away from the tension, the noise, all the shouting. The Ladies was utilitarian, not that it mattered. And mercifully empty. Huge roars reverberated around the walls and she winced, clutching at a toilet roll holder in the cubicle. Her Facebook and Twitter feeds wouldn’t connect – it kept telling her there was ‘no network available’. She tried to text Natasha – ‘message failed’. She tried to phone her but it wouldn’t connect. She felt like smashing the useless bloody thing on the tiles at her feet.
‘You fool, you bloody fool,’ she whispered.
An attendant came in as she was drying her hands and Sarah stared at her as if she were a ghost. She looked at herself in the mirror, at the huge dark bags under her eyes. She had to rummage in her handbag for her compact. Another deafening roar. Women and girls surged into the cubicles behind her.
She was sure that her legs wouldn’t carry her back up the steps to her seat. But it had to be now – she couldn’t put it off any longer.
The flow of people down the steps buffeted her. She held her Marc Jacobs handbag in front of her for protection. People were so ignorant. She reached their area, which had almost emptied, and Conor was standing with his back to her. Sarah braced herself and took a breath. It had to be now.
She licked her lips, her mouth as dry as powder.