It’s dark inside the bar and it takes my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the new lighting, a stark contrast to the bright, blustery evening outside in the harbour town of Howth.
The feel of the cold, cobbled floor beneath my shoes takes me back in time, as do the smell of beer and the noise of the TV in the background. I remember how we giggled as I manoeuvred across it in my heels from the night before, wearing Tom’s Guns N’ Roses sweatshirt and his jeans that just about stayed up round my waist.
Memories. This place is just bursting with memories of us. It’s where we spent the most wonderful beginnings that December and it’s where we tore each other apart with the most painful goodbye when he left for London just some months later.
I glance at the barman, convinced he’s the same one as before, as are some of the customers who sit along the bar on stools, sipping frothy Guinness after work or taking time out from life fishing on the sea. It’s a welcoming place, that’s for sure, and I’m reminded of how I fell in love with it almost as much as I fell in love with Tom.
‘Ah, you made it! Charlie, come and join us! The party’s over here!’
The familiarity of Tom’s voice makes me jump and I follow the sound to the same booth where we once sat huddled up by the fire on that cold December day, the day we made plans to run away together and live on love and music.
But, the party?
The fire in the hearth is out today, just a mass of grey and white ashes, and Tom isn’t alone as I’d expected, which throws me. I thought it was going to be just the two of us. I must look like a rabbit caught in headlights as I stand clutching my handbag with about twenty pairs of eyes staring at me. Tom waves me over and I approach his table, the same one we sat at before.
‘So this is your Dublin girl! Wow, I can see why she broke your heart, Tommy boy!’ says one of his friends in a very strong and distinctive New York accent. I recognize him as the bass player in Blind Generation. If Sophie could only see me now … she’d probably murder me actually. As would my entire family, not to mention my husband.
I get dizzy looking around me, totally flummoxed at the gathering of people who I assume to be band and crew members, all merry and loud. It’s hard to even find Tom amongst them. So much for our dinner and drinks … so much for our coffee and catch-up and moonlit walks on the pier.
I think I’m going to cry. I feel like such a fool.
Another two men, who I recognize as fellow band members, shuffle round to make room for me and I sit down quietly, unable to find my voice, which is lost in surprise that Tom has such vivacious company. I honestly thought I was meeting him alone, which makes me feel stupid and presumptuous, and maybe even regretful and silly that I made the trip this far. But I’m not doing this for him, I remind myself. I’m doing it for me and I’ll just have to take from it as much as I can get.
I can feel his eyes on me now, smiling brightly. I manage to catch his eye and I smile briefly back. It is good to see him up close again even if this big reunion is absolutely nothing like I’d imagined it to be.
‘Charlie Taylor, I can’t believe you actually came all the way here! What a lovely surprise!’
A surprise? So he didn’t think I’d turn up even though I thought it was what he’d planned? Or I’d planned? I’m confused now. I’m confusing myself to try and think of how I got this so wrong.
I can tell from the slur in his voice and the glassy look in his eyes that he’s also very drunk. How wonderful.
‘Charlie, meet Bosco, Lou and Steve,’ he says a little too loudly, extending his arm dramatically as he points out each of the men around the table. By now they are more interested in their drinks and whatever conversation I just interrupted than they are in me, but they politely shake my hand and then get on with their own company. ‘The rest of them can introduce themselves,’ Tom adds. ‘I’m too tired and pissed to even remember their names.’
He laughs, which means the others laugh too, and another group in the corner nod and wave my direction. I do the same back. They look as keen to see me as I am to see them. I feel like I’ve gatecrashed a wedding and everyone is too far gone to even be bothered I’m here at all.
I fidget, feeling my palms sweat as I grip my phone. I put it into my bag to stop holding it so tightly.
‘It’s good … it’s good to see you,’ I say to Tom, fixing my hair now. I have to say something and even if I’m working on a cringe factor that’s off the scale, I’m here now and I need to make the most of it.
‘You still do that to your hair when you’re nervous,’ he says, his eyes twinkling as they stare into mine. He really is drunk. ‘You know, I used to think that was the cutest thing in the whole wide world. Man, you still are the most beautiful creature, Charlie Taylor, aren’t you?’
Oh God help me. I can’t deny it, but there’s something about his voice. He may be drunk and amongst a heap of friends who don’t give a shit that I’m here, but his voice could tame lions.
He hiccups then and excuses himself. I manage to laugh and roll my eyes as the moment, however beautiful, is gone.
I sit back in my seat, wondering why on earth I thought for even a second it was going to be just the two of us here today where we would reminisce and talk about where it all went wrong in our love story. I’d imagined us sitting on the bench where we had that last most wonderful day together, looking out at the sea, where he’d tell me how I inspired so much of his music, and how he never really let my love go all this time.
Is that what I’d hoped for? I’m not even sure it was, but I definitely didn’t anticipate that I’d land in the midst of an afternoon party where the drinks, and God knows what else is going at this ‘party’, are plentiful.
I’m just about to ask Tom how he is, or attempt to indulge in other such small talk, when we’re joined by a girl who goes by the name of Eva and who seems to be in a bit of momentary despair. It’s the girl from outside, the foreign girl who was on the phone when I was coming in here, the one who looked straight through me when I tried to greet her.
‘She is, like, totally lost,’ she says, throwing her phone down onto the table. ‘I give up on her. She just has simply no sense of direction, Tom, so you’re going to have to send someone to go get her. The girl is clueless around that city. She’s too hungover to concentrate and she says she spent the whole day crying because you won’t answer your phone. Again!’
Tom grasps his hair in his hands and pushes it back so that his handsome face stretches, then he starts laughing. I assume they are talking about his fiancée, Ana.
‘What the hell is her problem? I told you to tell her to get a taxi and come out here to Howth,’ he says, his voice pinched and unnerving now. ‘I don’t know how much simpler it can be. We’re chilling, here, man! She’s really pushing me on this trip and you’re not helping either, Eva. Give me a break, please!’
I stare at the table, totally lost and out of my depth in these unfamiliar surroundings. Eva, who I take it is one of Ana’s supermodel buddies, is still to acknowledge I exist but I’m happy to sit here like I’m invisible. I also feel small, frumpy and ordinary next to her and no matter how many times I sit up straight and fix my posture, I know I’m totally way out of my comfort zone.
‘So, tell me Charlie, Charlie, Charlie,’ says Tom, singing my name, evidently having forgotten that his future wife is stuck in a hotel room in Dublin and can’t probably spell the word Howth, never mind pronounce it to a taxi driver. ‘You wanted to see me. How’s life with you? I can’t believe you went and got married and didn’t even give me one last chance.’
You wanted to see me. I suppose that is the truth, but the way he says it makes me sound like some desperate fan wanting a ‘meet and greet’ at a time when he really could be doing better things.
He says all of this totally out loud but the band aren’t one bit bothered by his big revelation that I should have given him ‘one last chance’. If he’d said all this to me privately, I might have taken him seriously but to do so in company just seems jokey, like he is paying lip service.
Eva snorts in response.
‘Ah, you must be another one of Tom’s girls who got away,’ she says, throwing her eyes up to the heavens and flicking back her long dark hair, all while texting on her phone. ‘Aren’t you the lucky one! Ask Ana. He can’t even be bothered to help her find her way from the hotel in the city. Poor girl only got two hours’ sleep and he should have waited on her, but no.’
The tension between Eva and Tom, who I’m unlucky enough to be sitting in between, is mounting fast but, when I look in Tom’s direction, he doesn’t seem to really give a shit. Could this have been me? Could I have been Ana, left behind in a hotel room in a strange city while he parties with his friends?
‘Can you get my friend a drink?’ he asks Eva, firmly and to the point, as if that’s what she’s here for. ‘I’d like to buy Charlie Taylor a drink. Hey, by the way, how’s your brother? I do think about him sometimes, you know. God, he really didn’t get it easy, did he? Is he OK?’
His words and questions mirror those he asked me that night outside Pip’s Bar when he enquired about Matthew. I feel a little bit angry now when I see how different his life is and how indifferent to Matthew’s he is with his casual question, but this isn’t the time or the place to show it. Matthew certainly wasn’t OK back then three years ago when he first enquired of him. He was crippled with depression, living back at home in our family home with Mam and Dad, his dreams of becoming a star like Tom crushed into oblivion. He wasn’t OK then and now he is in a wheelchair trying to learn to walk again while he sings cover songs in tourist bars. I’m not sure there’s a straightforward answer to whether or not he is OK.
But once again, just like the night in Pip’s Bar, I won’t let my brother down.
‘Matthew is still as strong and resilient as ever,’ I say. ‘He’s made a new life for himself over on the west coast and he’s very happy. He’s determined to walk again and we all believe he will.’
I don’t honestly think Tom listened to even one word I just said.
I want to ask him for some time on our own, just so we can talk about … I feel tears sting my eyes again now that Matthew is in my head. I think of Jack and how strong a force we are as a family as we’ve worked so hard to get Matthew all the medical help we can find for him.
Actually, what on earth do I want to talk to Tom about? Another penny drops when I realize I know absolutely nothing about this man and he knows even less about me.
Would we talk about his family? I’ve never met any of them.
His music? I think I already can see how that’s all been going.
His love life? Again, that’s all pretty much right in my face when I see how he doesn’t really seem too bothered that he has a fiancée.
I don’t have anything to talk to him about. I don’t know him at all.
He’s been partying for days, he has a fiancée who is trying to keep up with him and evidently can’t, and it looks like I’m just one of many women from his past who came and left while he followed his dream and left a trail of broken hearts in his wake.
Then, just when I’m coming to my senses and realizing that he really couldn’t care less if I’m here or not, he reels me in with a statement that makes me very much the focus of everyone’s attention.
‘Guys, this girl could have been one of the most famous songwriters of our time,’ he announces, finally remembering I’m beside him. Even Eva perks up her ears to listen and takes her eyes away from her phone. ‘She sang her songs for me one day back in the Déjà Vu days and I fell for her hook, line and sinker. Will you sing for us, Charlie? I’ll get my guitar. Go on, sing us one of your songs.’
My heart starts to race.
‘Let me get the girl a drink and give her time to relax,’ says Eva. ‘What do you want, Charlie? I’ll shout the bar.’
But there’s no way I’m singing here tonight. I can’t even think straight, never mind remember words to songs I haven’t sung in so long.
‘What can I get you?’ Eva asks again but I don’t know if I want to have a drink or not. I have the car outside and I’d planned to go home after a chat with Tom on how we feel about each other, and to decide if it’s really over.
The ‘old me’ would have loved this scene, a chance to kick back and get sloshed with a rock band in a cosy pub, but that’s not me any more.
Have I turned into some sort of prude who can’t just go with the flow? So many voices race through my head. I can still have some fun, though, can’t I? I’m allowed to have fun. Jack isn’t home for a couple more days and if I weren’t here tonight, I’d only be sitting at home alone watching the hours tick by in Ardara, torturing myself. Maybe I could stay somewhere local and see how it goes? I did pack an overnight bag just in case. Maybe I owe it to myself to relax a little and turn off the voices in my head. Maybe I’m not giving Tom and his lifestyle a chance. Am I being too judgemental?
I’ve had a stressful few months. I’m not doing anything wrong by having a drink with an old friend, am I?
‘I’ll have a gin and tonic, please,’ I tell Eva. I’m sure one drink won’t blur my senses that much, will it?