‘Do you think Farrow and Ball are bitter about the paint-mixing machines?’ I ask idly as I watch the hardware man strap a tin into his mega mix so we can copy Dead Salmon for our bathroom for a fraction of the cost. It’s the perfect amount of pink, very muted, so I suppose Dead Salmon is a fair name for it. John finally picked it out, along with Omelette Surprise for the sitting room and Scent of Brown Paper for our bedroom. He also suggested a pale blue called On Porpoise for the kitchen, and I honestly couldn’t tell if he was making up the name or not.
After months of renovations, we slept our first night in Kellys’ cottage last night, our king-size bed the only piece of furniture in the whole place and the window left slightly open to the warm July night air and the sound of sheep squawking in the next field. We thought a sheet would be enough to keep us warm, but I woke up freezing in the middle of the night and John could only find bath towels, so he draped them on top of the sheet, and I just about climbed inside his skin. Denise Kelly says she sometimes feels like her toddler wants to climb back up inside her and I kind of get it.
The walls are freshly plastered, waiting for our Farrow and Ball knock-offs to be applied. We’re not even paying for the paint – the Kellys might be selling the house down the line – but I couldn’t in good conscience go back to them with a receipt for extortionate paint. The couch is coming next week, and I found an almost new fridge for a hundred quid on DoneDeal. Majella is flat out getting baby bits on DoneDeal and storing most of them at Mammy’s. Pablo’s superstitions are still not ready for a vibrating bouncer or a bottle steriliser.
John takes the paint tin from the man and swings it into the trolley with the others. ‘What’s next? Bathroom bits? His and hers towels?’ He nudges me with his hip and I go pink immediately and feel a familiar spit of something in my throat. It’s not shame exactly, or embarrassment. It’s whatever the closest emotion to ‘He’s got me’ is. I am more excited about us moving in together than I ever thought I could be. Even his joke proposals are starting to get me misty-eyed, and we’ve only been back together for six months. I suppose when you’ve known someone for ten years you’ve already ironed out the kinks. I nearly said yes when he interrupted me carefully applying my Dead Sea mud face mask in the bathroom in Sadhbh and Don’s the other evening. Between the greyish mask and the leave-in Paloma Porter conditioner in my hair, I looked like Beetlejuice, but John still got down on one knee with a flourish and told me I was ravishing.
The Dead Sea mud mask is now packed up in a box along with all my stuff from my bedroom in Sadhbh’s. Giving her and Don space couldn’t have come at a better time. Since getting back from the Maldives, they’ve definitely been at each other more than I’ve ever seen before, and Sadhbh told me they’re still not seeing eye to eye over the baby thing. She says she’s sad to see me go from the house but can tell I’m excited about the move.
‘Do you think I’m a big sap being this happy about moving in with my boyfriend?’ I asked her as I reefed the sheets off her guest bed.
‘Eh, no! And don’t you deserve happiness?’ She was sitting with her back against the wall because I refused to let her help after allowing me – and John half the time – to stay in her house.
‘I know, but me and John have been so on and off over the years. I know that can be a dose.’
‘Ah, who cares what anyone thinks? And haven’t you been through enough at this stage to deserve a happy ending?’
‘God, I hope so.’
After the miscarriage I was worried I’d never look forward to anything ever again. I had been ruminating and worrying that I’d always have the disappointed and heartbroken feeling, but the prospect of moving into a new place with John gave me hope.
‘We might have time to look at backsplash tiles in the morning if you’re meeting Hannah late?’ John’s voice breaks into my daydream in the middle of the screws-and-nails aisle.
I groan. ‘Don’t remind me.’
Hannah is taking the lead on the event walk-through for the Paloma Porter Style Awards, so I’m meeting her at the hotel at eleven. The Silversprings is just off the M50, so it makes more sense to go from BGB rather than going to Dublin and doubling back on myself. Mandy was disgusted that we didn’t get a more central venue, but when Aubrey backed me up that it actually made sense to use a hotel more accessible from all around the country, Mandy reluctantly agreed that it could go ahead. She even said the ballroom wasn’t as sad as she was expecting from the pictures.
‘Are you still afraid of Hannah?’
‘I’m not afraid of her! I just think she could rein in the confidence a tiny bit. And stop sending emails like they’re texts. Seven emails, one after the other, she sent on Friday. Like a stream of consciousness.’
John’s eyes widen and he points at me in recognition. ‘Seán Óg is the same. He called me a “boomer” the other day, and when I asked him what he meant I had to tell him I was born in 1989, not 1959. He was still pure horrified.’
Seán Óg is Titch Maguire’s nephew and John’s first hire for the gym. He’s only twenty-two but has terrifyingly defined muscles and is developing his own range of protein powders for his TikTok following. Meanwhile, I’ve become self-conscious of what I wear around Hannah. Last week she was able to somehow sniff out that my new posh sleek black runners were actually made by Ecco and insisted on taking multiple photos and a video to make a TikTok about seeing ‘Ecs’ as they’re supposed to be worn. Apparently, Eccos are the latest footwear Gen Z are appropriating as ‘cool’, but I suspect Hannah was not taking photos of my feet because she thinks I’m cool. I wasn’t wearing the runners ironically. I just couldn’t believe the arch support on a shoe that looks like something Amy Huberman might wear with a little pair of jeans and an effortless blouse.
‘Is Hannah any use with the awards, at least?’ John is straining up to look at hooks on a high shelf. I can’t relax unless I know my tea-towel hooks are in place.
‘She is, in fairness. She has great ideas for social media too. She’s currently going viral on her TikTok with a nostalgia series about the ugly houses of the Celtic Tiger. So many chrome breakfast-bar stools. Of course, she’s nearly too young to even remember the Celtic Tiger.’
John grimaces. ‘That’s not depressing at all.’
I give him a shove. ‘Give over. You’re having the time of your life in B&Q, old man.’
‘Still, though, maybe I’ll get Sharon to give me a mullet so I can stay down with the kids.’ He does a little twirl and gets in the way of a proper old man and immediately goes puce.
‘Speaking of Sharon, I need to ring her. What time is it? Ah feck, I’ll do it tomorrow.’
Sharon’s salon is nominated for four hairdressing awards, and it wasn’t even anything to do with me. She got hundreds of nominations in through the website and I couldn’t be prouder. I want to give her first choice of her table on Wednesday night.
****
John and I get chips on the way back to BGB, and I wash two of our new plates and glasses while he unloads the rest of our DIY bits. We were very keen to move in as soon as possible so said we’d do a lot of the finishing touches ourselves. We have a power shower and the bed, and the gas cooker is already installed so we’re flying. Having the cooker and the original Aga feels extremely decadent and is worth sacrificing a full-size dishwasher for. The one we’re getting is as dinky, but it’s just for the two of us anyway. The only hitch so far has been John’s indecisiveness about things like paint colours and flooring options. His past few months’ experience kitting out the gym has given him an inflated sense of interior-decorating knowledge. Honestly, you think you know someone until they’re staring at Dead Salmon and Barely a Rose for two hours. It’s a good thing I love him because otherwise not a jury in the land would convict me if I did a homicide over the ‘Which grey tiles?’ debacle.
We try to eat the chips sitting on the ground in the sitting room with a candle, but after two minutes I admit to him that what I thought seemed romantic is actually cold and uncomfortable, so we sit side by side on the bed instead.
‘Are you finishing that battered sausage?’ He pokes it with a chip.
‘Yes, I am, actually. The end is the best part. I told you to get two.’
‘Alright, alright. I was only asking.’ He swipes two of my chips instead.
‘What time are you in at in the morning?’
‘I’ve an induction session with Mad Tom at eight. He insisted on taking off his top when he was booking in, and I actually think he has the potential to be a beast.’
‘That’s all we need, a superstrength Mad Tom.’
‘How did your mother get on yesterday?’
Mammy was seeing Cara and Síomha for Matt and Denis’s birthday lunch. I’m surprised they didn’t invite John now that they’re practically besties on Instagram. I had to get really cross with him after they all followed each other so they could talk about hurling and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Sometimes I envy how low-maintenance men can be about things. Me and the sisters are basically mortal enemies, and John, Denis and Matt are simply oblivious. They’re probably planning a mini-break to Berlin.
I’m still extremely put out that Cara and Síomha didn’t show up for the Peigs gig back in April, but I’m trying to be mindful about Mammy’s accusation that I wasn’t being overly friendly to them either. She ended up going to Dr Trevor’s birthday party in the end, when he just flat out invited her himself. She was nearly breaking out in hives with the nerves, and I had to hold back from texting the evil stepsisters to rip into them about stressing her out. In the end, she had a good time, and the girls were distracted with other people. The twins’ birthday lunch will be just the six of them, though. I don’t know why they’re so obsessed with these constant celebratory meals. I’m surprised they don’t all have ulcers from the stress and gout from the truffle fries. It seems to be a real thing for their family, though, whereas when I was growing up we went out for dinner about once a year, and it was to a Chinese restaurant called Joe Wong’s, which was above the place Daddy got his tyres. Joe always gave us extra prawn crackers.
When I called in to Mammy last night, she had her arms around Dr Trevor in the kitchen and they sprang apart when I came in the back door. I didn’t know where to look, so I pretended I was looking for something, anything, in the Important Drawer and didn’t ask her about the lunch.
‘She really loves him. It’s the only explanation for putting up with those two.’
‘Do you not think you’ll have to make friends with them?’
I glare at him, furious and feeling attacked. ‘They’re the ones who don’t want to make friends with me. They mortified me not showing up to The Peigs. Those tickets were like gold dust! And I told you what I heard them saying about Mammy and BGB. They think they’re it. And you should be on my side.’
John holds up his hands. ‘Okay, I’m sorry, I really wasn’t taking sides. I just think it might make it easier on your mother?’
‘Well, I tried to with the Peigs tickets and they didn’t show. And I’m not going to just sit back and let them make Mammy feel like shite for the next however many years or months. I’m not letting them away with being little bitches.’
‘Is there another mud fight on the way then? Maybe some manure? Throw them in the slurry pit?’
‘I mean, it is a legitimate way to murder someone. And I feel like I’d have a decent defence in court too. That’s if they don’t murder us first.’
‘Are you finished?’ John nods at my abandoned plate and the uneaten nub of battered sausage.
‘Yes. I suppose so.’
He smiles and pops it into his mouth before lifting both plates and heading for the kitchen. When he comes back, I’m lying across the bed, bracing myself to go into my WhatsApps. Fifty-seven new messages in Majella’s Babe Shower. She changed the ‘baby’ to ‘babe’ herself after I made her an admin in the group. She insisted on both being in the group and being an admin because, despite all my protestations, she says she doesn’t think it’s fair for me to do all the work on my own, and I know without her saying it that she’s worried about me and all the baby stuff. I really am doing grand, though. Mostly grand. It pops into my mind a few times a day, but I try not to dwell. I don’t bring it up with anyone, really, apart from John. It makes people uncomfortable, I think. Even John and I have stopped mentioning it much because it tends to make me sad.
I sigh and go into the WhatsApp group just as John returns to the bed and lies across me, belly down, winding me a bit but providing a delicious sensory calm. This must be what Sadhbh is on about with her weighted blanket. She’s been on at me to get one, but I can’t fathom either having to carry it out of a shop or paying to have it delivered.
‘What’s up?’ He shifts himself slightly so he’s not completely squashing me.
‘The baby-shower WhatsApp. Fifty-seven. Oh no, wait, sixty new messages. Majella’s aunt Shirley hasn’t seen a single Magic Mike film so the girls are trying to fill her in. Her other aunt Carmel seems to be a big fan.’
John is silent for a minute, making space for the roaring sheep. ‘Are you okay with all that stuff? The baby shower?’
My bottom lip wobbles a little bit. ‘Ah, yeah.’ My voice comes out weird. ‘It’s for Majella. I don’t mind doing it.’
He rolls off me completely and scoots around so we’re lying face up side by side. He takes my free hand in his and laces our fingers together. I rest the phone on my chest. ‘You’d tell me if you were struggling with it, wouldn’t you?’ He squeezes my hand and I squeeze back.
‘Yes.’ We’re quiet again and then a thought pops into my mind. ‘John?’
‘Yeah?’
‘And you’ll tell me if you’re struggling with it?’
He’s quiet for one, two, three seconds. ‘Okay, yes, I will.’