Anybody Out There - Marian Keyes (47 page)

"...if there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now..."
Dad's forehead was furrowed. He was baffled. "Is it not all a bit...what's that word you say?"
"Feathery Strokery," Jacqui whispered loudly from the row behind us.
"That's right, Feathery Strokery." Then he realized it was Jacqui who'd spoken, and mortified, he
stared at the floor. He still wasn't over the Scrabble e-mail.
I   can't believe a drug addict owns a hotel," Mum said. "Even if it is a small one." She gazed
around the beautifully decorated room, at all the ribbons and flowers. "Would you look at the
way Narky Joey keeps staring over at Jacqui?"
Everyone snapped their heads around. Joey was at a table crammed with Real Men. (One of the
tables, there were actually three in all, each housing eight Real Men. Several second-tier Real
Men and possibly even some third tier.) Undeniably, he was staring at Jacqui, who was at the
"Single People and Gobshites" table.
"Mind you," Mum admitted reluctantly, "she's looking very well for an unmarried woman who's
nearly eight months pregnant."
Seated among our peculiar cousins, including the oddball priest who was visiting from Nigeria,
Jacqui positively glowed. Most pregnant women I knew got eczema and varicose veins; Jacqui
looked better than she ever had before.
"Cripes!" Mum yelped as something hit her in the chest. A yellow hat. Maggie's.
Claire's son, Luka, and JJ were playing Frisbee with it.
"Best thing for it," Mum said. "It's rotten. She looks more like the mother of the bride than I do.
And I am the mother of the bride." She twirled the hat back to Luka, then looked down at her
plate. "What the hell are these yokes? Oh, these must be the famed sugar-snap peas. Well, I
won't be touching them." She shoved them onto her side plate. "Look," she said. "Joey's still
staring at her."
"At her bazoomas." This from twelve-year-old Kate.
Mum looked at her sourly. "You're your mother's daughter and no mistake. Go back to the
children's table. Go on! Your poor auntie Margaret is over there trying to control the lot of you."
"I'm going to tell her what you said about her hat."

"Don't bother your barney. I'll tell her myself."
Kate sloped off.
"That put that little madam in her place," Mum said, with grim satisfaction.
"Where's Dad?" I asked.
"Powdering his nose."
"Again? What's up with him?"
"His stomach is sick. He's nervous about his speech."
"He's got food poisoning!" Helen declared. "Hasn't he?"
"No, he has not!"
"Yes, he has."
"No, he has not!"
"Yes, he has."
"Anna, there's some man, over there, who keeps sneaking looks at you," Claire said.
"The one who looks like he's out of the Red Hot Chili Peppers?" Mum said. "I've noticed him,
too."
"How do you know about the Red Hot Chili Peppers?" several voices asked.
"I don't know." Mum looked confused. In fact, she looked quite upset.
"Givvus a look," Helen said. "The one in black? With the long hair?" She drawled, "He looks
like a bad, bad man."
"Funny, that," I said. "Because he's a very good one."
H     ow's everyone here?" Gaz asked. "Any headaches? Sinus problems?"
"Go away," Mum said.

Rachel had warned Gaz not to acupuncture anyone and he had said he wouldn't unless it was an
emergency. But despite his best efforts to drum them up, no emergencies had happened.
"Go on, be off, yourself and your needles! Don't be badgering people. The dancing is about to
start."
"Okay, Mammy Walsh." Forlornly, Gaz wandered off, with his pouch of accoutrements, almost
tripping over a posse of little girls who had been liberated from the children's table.
Francesca collared me. "Auntie Anna, I'll dance with you because your husband died and you've
no one to dance with." She took my hand. "And Kate will dance with Jacqui because she's
having a baby and she doesn't have a boyfriend."
"Um, thank you."
"Hold on," Mum said. "I'm coming for a bop, too."
"Don't say `bop'!" Helen said, in anguish. "That's a terrible word, you sound like Tony Blair."
"Dad?" I asked. "Will you dance?"
Carefully he shook his head, his face as white as the tablecloth.
"Maybe we should get him a doctor," I said quietly. "Food poisoning can be dangerous."
"He's not poisoned, it's just nerves! Hit the floor."
We merged forces with Jacqui and Kate, all of us holding hands. Helen joined us, then Claire,
then Maggie and baby Holly, then Rachel. We were a girl circle, our party dresses swinging,
everyone happy and smiling and laughing and beautiful. Someone handed me baby Holly and we
twirled together, my sisters' hands helping to spin me. Swirling, whirling past their radiant faces,
I remembered something I hadn't known I'd forgotten: Aidan wasn't the only person I loved; I
loved other people, too. I loved my sisters, I loved my mother, I loved my dad, I loved my
nieces, I loved my nephews, I loved Jacqui. At that moment I loved everybody.
L    ater, the music abruptly changed from Kylie to Led Zeppelin and the Real Men thundered
onto the dance floor. There were an awful lot of them and suddenly great swaths of hair were
whipping around in a blur and air guitars were being played with verve. Eventually a circle
cleared around Shake; they were giving the master space to do his thing. Shake played and
played, sinking to his knees, leaning right back, his head almost on the floor, his face a picture of
ecstasy as he twiddled his fingers on his crotch.

"Doesn't it look like he's...at...himself?" Mum murmured.
"Hmm?"
"Playing with himself. You know."
"You're obsessed," Helen said. "You're worse than the rest of us put together."
98
N    eris Hemming here."
"Hello, it's Anna Walsh. I'm calling for my reading." I was curious. Curious but not hopeful.
Okay, maybe a bit hopeful.
Silence whistled on the line. Was she going to tell me to shag off again? More builders?
Then she spoke. "Anna, I'm getting...I'm picking up...yes, I've got a man here with me. A
young man. Someone who was taken before his time."
Well, top marks for not trying to fob me off with a dead grandparent, but when I'd originally
made the booking, I'd told the reservations person that my husband had died. Who was to say
that she hadn't passed that information to Neris?
"You loved him very much, didn't you, honey?"
Why else would I be trying to contact him? But my eyes welled up.
"Didn't you, honey?" she repeated, when I remained silent.
"Yes," I choked, ashamed of crying when I was being so crudely manipulated.
"He's telling me he loved you very much, too."
"Okay."
"He was your husband, right?"
"Yes." Damn. I shouldn't have told her.
"And he passed on after an...illness?"
"An accident."

"Yes, an accident, in which he became very ill, which caused him to pass on." Said firmly.
"How do I know it's really him?"
"Because he says so."
"Yes, but--"
"He's remembering a vacation you took by the ocean?"
I thought of our time in Mexico. But who hasn't had a vacation by the ocean with their husband?
Even if it's just in a trailer in Tramore.
"I'm getting a picture of a blue, blue sea, a blue sky, barely a cloud in it, a white beach. Trees.
Probably palm trees. Fresh fish, a little rum." She chuckled. "Sounds about right?"
"Yes." I mean, what was the point? Tequila, rum, they were both holiday drinks.
"And, oh! He's interrupting me. He has a message for you."
"Hit me."
"He says, don't mourn him any longer. He's gone to a better place. He didn't want to leave you,
but he had to, and now that he's where he is, he is happy there. And even though you can't see
him, he's always around you, he's always with you."
"Okay," I said dully.
"Have you any questions?"
I decided to test her. "Yes, actually. There was something he wanted to tell me. What was it?"
"Don't mourn him any longer, he is gone to a better place..."
"No, it was something he wanted to tell me before he died."
"That was what he wanted to tell you." Her voice was "don't fuck with me" steely.
"How could he have wanted to tell me, before he died, that he was gone to a better place?"
"He had a premonition."
"No, he didn't."
"Hey, if you don't like--"

"--you're not talking to him at all. You're just saying stuff that could apply to anyone."
She blurted out, "He used to make you breakfast." She sounded--what? Surprised?
I was surprised, too--because it was true! I'd once remarked that I loved porridge and Aidan had
asked, "Is porridge the same as oatmeal?" I'd said, "I think it is," and the following morning I
found him standing at our barely used stove, stirring something in a saucepan. "Porridge," he'd
said. "Or oatmeal, if you prefer. Because you can't eat at the lunches with those scary beauty
ladies in case they judge you. So have something now."
"I'm right, yeah? He made you breakfast every morning?"
"Yes." I was meek.
"He really loved you, honey."
He did. I remembered what I'd forgotten: he used to tell me sixty times a day how much he loved
me. He'd hide love notes in my handbags. He'd even tried to persuade me to go to self-defense
classes because, as he said, "I can't be with you every second of every day, and if anything
happened to you, I'd shoot myself."
"Didn't he, honey?" Neris prompted.
"What did he used to make me for breakfast?" If she could answer that, I'd believe in her.
Confidently she said, "Eggs."
"No."
Pause. "Granola?"
"No."
"Toasted muffin?"
"No, forget it. Here's an easier one. What was his name?"
After a silence she said, "I'm getting the letter L."
"Nope."
"R?"
"Nope."
"M?"

"Nope."
"B?"
"Nope."
"A?"
"Okay. Yes."
"Adam?"
"That's my sister's boyfriend's name."
"Yes, of course, it is! He's here with me and is telling me--"
"He's not dead. He's alive, in London, probably ironing something."
"Oh. Okay. Aaron?"
"Nope."
"Andrew?"
"No. You'll never get it."
"Tell me."
"No."
"It's driving me crazy!"
"Good." Then I hung up.
99
M       itch looked like a different person. Literally, like a different person. He actually appeared
taller and so sure of himself he was almost cocky. Even his face was a different color. Six, seven,
eight months ago, I hadn't known that he looked gray and rigid. It was only now that he'd lost
that terrible stiffness and had become animated and face-colored that I noticed.
He spotted me and broke into a massive smile. A real dazzler, the likes of which I'd never seen
him do before. "Anna. Hey, you look great!" His voice was louder than it used to be.

"Thank you."
"Yeah. You don't look so much like a stunned seal."
"Did I look like a stunned seal?" I hadn't known.
He laughed. "I wasn't too good either, right? Dead man walking."
I'd called him after my reading with Neris Hemming; there were a couple of questions I wanted
answers to. He'd professed himself delighted to hear from me and suggested we meet for dinner.
"Right this way." He led me into the restaurant.
"For two?" the desk girl asked.
Mitch smiled and said, "We'd prefer a booth."
"So does everybody."
"I guess they do," he acknowledged, with a laugh. "But see what you can do."
"I'll go see," the girl said grudgingly. "But you might have to wait."
"That's okay."
He smiled again. He was flirting with her. And it was working. I thought, I've never met this
person before.
I noticed something else. "You don't have your kit bag! This is the first time I've seen you
without it."
"Really?" He barely seemed to remember. "Oh yeah," he said slowly. "That's right. Back then, I
just about lived in the gym. Wow, that seems so long ago."
"And you've spoken more in the last five minutes than in all the months I knew you."
"I didn't talk?"
"No."
"But I love to talk."
The girl was back. "Gotcha a booth."
"For real? Thank you," Mitch said sincerely. "Thank you so much."

She colored. "My pleasure."
So the real Mitch was a charmer. Who knew? My speedy reassessment of him continued apace.
After we'd ordered I said, "I have to ask you a question."
"So ask it."
"When you spoke to Neris Hemming did you really believe she was channeling Trish?"
"Yeah." He hesitated. He seemed embarrassed. "You know..." He gave a short laugh. "Look. At
the time, I was out of my mind. Looking back, I can see I was actually crazy. I needed to
believe." He shrugged. "Maybe she channeled Trish, maybe she didn't. All I know is, it worked
for me at the time, probably stopped me from going totally over the edge."
"Do you remember you told me that she guessed your nicknames? Yours and Trish's for each
other. What were they?"
Another hesitation, another embarrassed little laugh. "Mitchie and Trixie."
Mitchie and Trixie? "I could have guessed that for free."
"Yeah. Well, like I said, it did what it needed to do at the time."
"How do you feel now about everything?"
He thought about it, staring into the distance. "Some days it's as bad as it ever was, sometimes it
feels like day one all over again. But other days I feel good. That it's true that her life wasn't
interrupted, but completed. And when I think that, I think I can have a life again someday,
without the guilt killing me."
"Do you still try to, you know, contact Trish?"
He shook his head. "I still talk to her and have pictures of her everywhere but I know she's gone,
and for whatever reason, I'm still here. Same goes for you. I don't know if you'll ever contact
Aidan, but the way I see it is, you're alive. You've got a life to live."
"Maybe. Anyway, I'm not going to any more psychics," I said. "That was just a phase."
"Glad to hear it. Hey, are you free Sunday afternoon? I've got a billion great places for us to go
to. How about the Immigrants in the Garment Industry Museum--that's got some niche appeal.
Or the Planetarium, they do simulated spacecraft rides. Or bingo, we could go to bingo."
Bingo. I liked the sound of that.
100

T    ake a look!" Jacqui hiked up her skirt and pulled down her knickers.
I averted my eyes.
"No, look, look!" she said. "You'll love it. I've had a Brazilian and something a little bit special.
Can you see?"
She angled herself so that I could see beneath her massive bump; she'd had a dinky diamante
rose appliqu�d to her naked pubic bone. "So we'll have something pretty to look at while I'm in
labor."
Every time she said the word labor I felt dizzy. Please, God, don't let it be too terrible. She was
due on April 23, less than two weeks away, and I was staying with her, in case it all kicked off in
the middle of the night.
"And let's face it, it's bound to," she said. "No one ever seems to go into labor at a nice
convenient time, like a quarter to eleven on a Saturday morning. It's always some godforsaken
hour in the dead of the night."
Her beloved LV wheelie bag stood by the door, packed with a Lulu Guinness wash bag, two Jo
Malone scented candles, an iPod, several Marimekko nightdresses, a camera, a lavender eye
mask, Ipo nail polish in case her mani-pedi got chipped "while I'm pushing," a teeth-whitening
treatment to fill the time because "I could be doing a lot of hanging around," three Versace baby
outfits, and her most recent scan.
The other scans were stuck up on the wall. And that reminded me of something...
B    efore the accident, I used to be a right hypochondriac. Not that I faked being sick, but when
it happened, I was very interested in it and tried to involve Aidan in the drama. If I had, say, a
toothache, I'd give him regular bulletins on my symptoms. "It's a different kind of pain now," I'd
say. "Remember when I said it was a kind of hummy ache--well, it's changed. More darty."
Aidan was used to me and my drama, and he'd say, "Darty, hey? That's new."
I'd even broken a bone about a year and a half ago; I'd been rummaging through cupboards
looking for something and I turned around too quickly, cracked my finger against a drawer, and
started bellyaching, "Ooh, Christ, oh God. Oh, my finger, that's awful."
"Sit down," Aidan said. "Show me. Which one?"