Champagne Kisses (15 page)

Despite my compliments on her ‘Fabulous Cartier watch’ and her ‘Warm telephone manner’, she couldn’t be frostier to me. As everyone gathered up their coats to head home, I thought what a witch she was.

It couldn’t possibly have been Catherine Zeta-Jones that she reminded me of. It must have been her mother. With that, and just two steps from the safety of the front door, Maureen swung around to me.
Swooping
real close she whispered, ‘Have you not worked out who I am yet?’

Taken by surprise I stumbled backwards and asked, ‘Sorry?’

‘I said, have you not worked out who I am yet?’

Completely baffled I thought for a moment before mumbling, ‘Emmm, the boss of me?’

‘God, you’re even more stupid than Annette said.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You heard me. Does the name Annette Barron mean anything to you?’

Instantly my heart sank. Ground, open up and swallow me whole. Maureen was the ferocious-looking woman from the Four Seasons who had been with Annette the day she slapped me. How could I have forgotten?

Drawing a total blank on anything intelligent to say, I uttered ‘Oh’ before she lunged at me again.

‘You had no thoughts for Annette the night you tried to steal her husband, so I can’t imagine you have any consideration for her today. But let me tell you this. You failed. David must have been blind drunk to even consider a slapper like you.’

Not knowing what to do, I ran. I didn’t notice who had witnessed our altercation. I didn’t care.

Running in the direction of Grafton Street, I cursed Maureen, Annette and David all the way.

I then cursed myself for not standing my ground.

Why hadn’t I told her he seduced me?

Why was it this snog was coming back to haunt me? Had I not paid for my sins already?

After spending half the night running up Parker’s phone bill complaining to Anna about my new job, I felt better.

Parker had been working late with some location managers making decisions on rural castles and churches, and I couldn’t moan to Maddie because she was in a tearful place, and was only in text communication.

I had tried to get her to go for a walk and talk through her options, but she said she wasn’t up to it.

Like me, when Maddie had something weighing heavy on her mind she shut down. All she wanted to do was blank out the outside world. She wanted nothing to do with anyone, not even me, and I just had to accept her wishes and hope that she would snap out of her mini-depression soon.

With a simple text, ‘I’m here for you’, I abandoned annoying Maddie, and focused on annoying Anna. She would have to do. After my confrontation with Maureen I needed someone to talk to and I didn’t care who; this was bound to leak sooner or later, with or without Anna’s help.

My first call had been to Lisa, when I had wrongly shouted at her, asking, ‘Why didn’t you warn me?’ But she had had no idea Maureen was a close friend of Annette’s. After all, Lisa had just left for her Bramble Hill Retreat adventure the day of the Four Seasons
Fiasco.
Wounded and apologetic, she did her best to soften the situation, which made me feel terrible.

She suggested she could ask Daddy to move Maureen somewhere else, but I pointed out that if anyone was to move it should be me.

Somehow I kept failing to learn from my mistakes.

I needed to start being nicer to people.

Unlike Lisa, my journey to enlightenment was stalled. I was never getting to heaven.

But was there somewhere worse than hell?

Parker later suggested my wardrobe …

By Sunday I was really ready to rock ’n’ roll. Snubbing the chance to see Robert and his pals take part in their annual skinny-dipping swim at Dun Laoghaire’s Forty Foot rocks, myself, Parker and some gorgeous young French boy called David – who sounded just like the chef Jean-Christophe Novelli if you closed your eyes – were making our way to Lisa’s family home in Dalkey, which had the most amazing view of Dublin Bay, and Bono’s house. Well, the roof of Bono’s house.

Every year her folks threw legendary parties, with the cream of Dublin’s social scene in attendance. Rich builders were always seen as sexy in Ireland. And the Tiswells were no exception. They had been quite the building dynasty, well, at least until Patrick and Patricia failed to produce any sons and neither Lisa nor the Joy-less daughter had any interest in taking over the company.

Since Parker had only got acquainted with his new
friend
a few nights earlier after meeting on the internet site Gaydar, we didn’t really know what to expect. But he had a really fit body, which was exaggerated by his tight fitted black shirt and tight jeans, and he seemed game for a laugh, even though his English didn’t stretch much further than, ‘Pleased to meet’, and, ‘Repeat please?’

He was really just a stopgap though.

The handsome Jeff, or Hairy Hands as Parker called him, had enjoyed several mischievous evenings with Parker after he flew us to London, but had ended the relationship abruptly because Parker wanted to be more public about their romance than Jeff was comfortable with.

Needless to say, he was a tad hurt by the rejection. But with David, he wasn’t looking for anything serious, just a good time.

But none of us could fail to be in a mood to party with our regular taxi guy Johnnie Barret around, who sang to us the whole way up.

We had met him one night several years ago outside Sophie’s Choice and we fell in love with him. Fanatical about Dean Martin, his life was to worship him and spread the Dino love.

Anyone who had the good fortune – or misfortune, depending on your tolerance – to fall into his taxi would receive the full repertoire of songs. He was his own sycophant. And since I was ‘in the journalism game’, I was privileged to be given one of his CDs, ‘totally free’, of his classic covers.

Poor ole Dino must have been turning in his grave as we murdered renditions of ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ and ‘Memories Are Made of This’.

Giddy from the anticipation of having a play day Parker was in flying form and without consideration for anyone else’s eardrums wailed his way into ‘That’s Amore’, before demanding, ‘What the fuck is a tarantella supposed to be?’

As Johnnie navigated his way up the narrow bumpy roads of Dalkey, I tried desperately not to stab myself in the eye with an eyeliner pencil as I finished doing my make-up. While the very likeable David won himself major brownie points for being extremely cute on mime percussion.

What was even cuter was his face when he saw all the security guys in their black suits, wielding walkie-talkies as they requested to see our formal invites. He looked like he had died and gone to stud muffin heaven.

Of course we had forgotten ours, as we did most years, but Lisa texted us the secret code, which was to tell the main guy, Vladimir, ‘Kiss me quick I’m Irish’ – Mrs Tiswell’s idea of a hilarious joke.

Not a bad idea really, considering he was six foot four and ex-Russian army. He was built like a bull and could have been my McDreamy any day.

Unfortunately Vladimir didn’t take us up on our offer, and just ushered us through with a wink and a cheeky smile.

Beefy bodyguards aside, even as a seasoned visitor
I
couldn’t help but be impressed by the pomp and glamour of the occasion. I had counted over thirty security men on the road, all in monkey suits, and we hadn’t even got close to the massive marquee yet.

Thousands of large white lanterns lined the road of the manicured garden, which would look stunning later, and even though the weather forecast had promised hailstones and perhaps snow, the party people were out in force as they queued in their Mercedes to get the ladies and their heels as close to the front door as possible.

Once we were inside, leggy models in short green cocktail dresses and pretty boys in green dickie bows offered us a variety of novelty drinks on trays, which included everything from Green Frogs to Green Diamonds.

Although Parker thought it was very uncool to drink such nastiness he managed to grab a Green Fantasy off some poor innocent young Matt Damon look-alike; I think he scared the poor boy by whispering, ‘You can share my fantasy any time!’

Appropriately, I grabbed a glass titled Green with Envy, and our little French boy went all patriotic and picked himself up a Green Guinness. We made our way through to the main marquee where a fella who looked like the fat bloke from the Commitments was belting out a version of ‘A Nation Once Again’.

Positioning ourselves at a corner which was near the bar, loo and had a clear view of the stage, we settled in for an afternoon of
craic agus ceol
, aka fun and music.

After doing her welcoming rounds Lisa joined us, as did some of her cousins, whom I had met several times before, but even though they told me their names again they left my head the second they entered. Either way, they were a good bunch and were just as able to entertain as the next.

As the afternoon progressed into the evening, we had worked our way through the Green Monsters and Green Demons and had moved on to Absolut Hunks and Mad Cows. Neither were on the menu, but the very accommodating barman Jordan, who didn’t seem to mind us telling him that he looked so much better since he got the boob reduction, was keen to match a ‘Bitchin’ cocktail’ to our personalities.

Of course Parker was thrilled, but then he had told Jordan that he worked in the film business and that they were currently looking for fresh faces.

It was a cheesy line, but it worked more times than not.

There was a powerful smell of stew wafting from the other side of the marquee, but Parker told us all that ‘Eatin’ is cheatin’!’ and that a game of Truth or Dare would take our minds off the hunger.

The craic really kicked off when one of the girls who was clearing our table of glasses got caught up in our high jinks.

In the middle of Lisa’s story of how she was a girl who liked to swallow rather than spit out bodily fluids, Parker piped up, ‘Eh, sorry, as a matter of interest, do you spit or swallow?’

Although I was half cut I was mortified, but she didn’t seem fazed.

Not flinching for a second, she revealed in a deep Aussie accent, ‘Oh mate, I gargle!’ Everyone at the table fell about the place laughing.

By this stage the live rebel music had been replaced by a DJ and it was time to express ourselves.

Dancing around the table we swung our arms in the air and gyrated like strippers in a rap video. People began to stare, but their disapproving faces made us want to dance bigger and bolder as if we were auditioning for Louis Walsh.

Thankfully the Tiswell family had seen this all before, and even though Lisa’s mum came over to say hi just as I had knocked over somebody’s pint, she just gave one of her own half-sozzled waves and told us, ‘I’m dee-lighted you’re all having fun.’

We were having the perfect day, and everyone was in high spirits; that is, until Parker’s ex, Jeff, walked into the marquee.

I spotted him walking in our direction and had to warn Parker, who was now sitting on the bar singing to our new pal Jordan.

What a tragedy, to interrupt such a pitch-perfect rendition of ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head!’. Parker literally fell off the bar as I pointed Jeff out as he chatted to Lisa’s dad just a few feet away. Instantly he turned to David and said, ‘Take your top off.’

A little confused, he said, ‘Pardon?’

But Parker wasn’t taking no for an answer. ‘I said
take
your top off,’ he demanded. ‘You’re not bringing much else to the table, so the least you can do is take your top off and show us those muscles of yours.’

And then like something out of a Diet Coke break ad, he did, clearly chuffed to be back at the centre of Parker’s attention.

By now several women who had been looking on in disgust were drooling with lust. Just as I was thinking what cocktail they should order, Jeff approached the group and with a sheepish smile asked, ‘How have you been?’

Pretending not to notice, Parker fondled David’s pecs while telling him to ‘Flex them again’, to hoots of laughter.

Doing my best sober impression I told Jeff that things were great but if he was planning any more trips to London to count me out because the men there were shits. Paris or New York I could handle, but he’d have to dump Florence for a bigger bus.

As soon as the word ‘dump’ left my mouth, I could see Parker’s back physically tense up.

It was obvious to all that Parker was deliberately ignoring his presence, but Jeff put his hand on his shoulder and pinched him. He refused to turn around.

After making the decision to recognize Parker, he wasn’t going to give up easily, so he stood his ground and asked, ‘Are you going to ignore me all night?’

While the rest of us made loud gasping noises, Parker glanced down at Jeff’s hairy hand, which was
still
on his shoulder, before darting a bored look at me. I’d seen that pissed-off face before and it normally signalled trouble.

After a cold silence he hissed, ‘Do we know her?’ It was totally mortifying. He was acting like a spoilt child, and he continued his tantrum by pushing Jeff’s hand away.

Trying to stifle my nervous giggles I brushed past Parker and invited our naked chef to the bar, but Parker was having none of it.

‘He’s not going anywhere, Eva. If anyone is leaving it’s Jeff here, he’s very good at walking away. Aren’t you, Jeff?’

After several requests for a word in private, a wounded Parker finally conceded, and the forlorn duo walked off in the direction of the gardens.

They were gone about twenty minutes when we got the nod that the fireworks were about to start. As everyone was handed a hot whiskey and guided out on to the patio, the Tiswells’ legendary firework display blasted off into the sky. They always splashed out a ‘minimum of €200,000’, on fireworks, according to Lisa, just because they could. And that was loose change compared to the cost of the bar tab.

The most my folks would fork out for a special occasion would be a couple of bottles of Lidl cheapo wine to wash down some vulgar beef curry. They were never big on entertaining, bless, as Mother dearest was forever worried about stains.