Never Too Late (7 page)

found herself with only half a job, working four mornings

a week, the way she still did. Her plans to travel around

the world had been shelved when she and Stephen got

married, which Olivia often thought was ironic: he way

now never off a plane and had enough air miles saved to

buy tickets to Mars, while she never got farther than her

daily triangular loop in the car to the school and the

supermarket via Sasha’s creche.

She couldn’t complain, she knew. After all, they had

darling little Sasha and it had taken her so long to get

pregnant that she thanked God for her daughter every day

of her life. After seven years where Olivia longed for a baby,

even if Stephen had been a bit unconcerned about her

inability to conceive, she’d felt gloriously lucky to become

pregnant. Sasha had been worth the wait, the little pet.

‘Hilarious, wasn’t it?’ Cedric said, barely able to contain

his laughter at his own anecdote.

Olivia blinked. She hadn’t been listening - ‘wool gathering’

was what Stephen called it when she tuned out like

that. Sometimes her mind wandered and she always felt so

guilty that she hadn’t been listening to what he said,

especially as she missed him so much when he was away.

‘I’m obviously not interesting enough for you, Olivia,’

he’d say in mock disapproval, pulling her to him and

settling her on his lap.

‘But you are,’ she’d protest, kissing him to prove her

point.

And they’d end making love, a frantic, almost silent

encounter with the door of their bedroom ajar as they

listened out for sounds of Sasha getting bored with her

toys and trundling down the corridor on her solid little legs

to see what they were doing. Stephen got very irritated by

having to keep quiet.

‘Olivia, didn’t you think that was funny?’ Sheilagh was

saying.

‘Hysterical,’ fibbed Olivia. She couldn’t wait for

Stephen to arrive home.

‘There’s hardly any need to take more booze to your

parents’ house and you know I don’t like too much

drinking in front of Sasha,’ Stephen complained the following

afternoon as he watched Olivia pack a couple of

bottles of wine into the giant hamper they were taking to

Ballymoreen.

‘We’ll have a couple of glasses of wine and I hate to turn

up with nothing,’ she protested.

They were in the kitchen, with Stephen lounging against

the counter, still in his grey suit, white shirt and crimson

tie. He’d arrived homo from the airport a couple of hours

previously, tired and definitely not on top form.

‘Bloody thing still isn’t sorted out,’ he’d said shortly

when Olivia inquired. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

However at the sight of his parents, he cheered up

miraculously.

‘It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t see you until New Year,’

he said affectionately as he hugged Sheilagh. ‘Has she been

looking after you both?’ he asked in a teasing voice, giving

Olivia’s hand a squeeze as he spoke.

‘Olivia was wonderful,’ cooed Sheilagh.

‘Not that we expect her to look after us,’ interrupted

Cedric. ‘She’s a busy woman, she doesn’t have the time to

fetch and carry for us boring old things. We’re quite

capable of looking after ourselves.’

Olivia stiffened, thinking of exactly how much fetching

and carrying she’d done since they’d arrived.

It had taken a considerable amount of effort on Olivia’s

part not to give Stephen chapter and verse on this when

Cedric and Sheilagh finally took themselves oft to their

room to pack - after yet another enormous meal, naturally.

Instead, she confined herself to saying that she didn’t

like it being asked if she’d looked after his parents.

‘I mean, what do you think I’d do with them, Stephen?’

she demanded hotly. ‘Leave them watching the TV and go shopping with Sasha? You know I’m always hospitable to your parents. I resent your even mentioning it.’

‘Have I ruffled your feathers, Mother Hen?’ he asked,

tickling her affectionately. ‘It was a joke, that’s all.’

‘It wasn’t funny,’ she replied.

‘Come on.’ He tickled even harder. ‘Don’t be such a

grump. It doesn’t suit you. Frowning ruins that lovely face

and I like to see my girl smiling.’

But Olivia, exhausted after her exertions, didn’t feel like

smiling any more than she liked being called ‘Mother

Hen’. She was fed up with that stupid name.

When Stephen was away it suited him to let her run

their home and cope with every crisis. When he returned,

he wanted her back as fluffy old Mother Hen so he could

be master of the house. For once, Olivia wasn’t in the

mood to be patronised.

Instead of hugging Stephen in return to defuse the

situation, she’d gone into the kitchen and started organising

things for their drive to her father’s house. Now there

was a coolness between them, a coolness which meant

Stephen was in a bad mood.

Trying to ignore the bad-tempered vibes emanating from

her husband, Olivia consulted her list to see if she’d

forgotten anything. Quiches. Stephen moved one long arm

and stuck the pepper grinder in a cupboard, flicking away a

couple of pinpricks of pepper from the worktop.

‘We better do a clean out soon,’ he said coldly, looking

into the cupboard and staring at the slightly untidy arrangement of tins and packets. ‘The kitchen really looks better

with nothing on view and these cupboards are a mess.’

Olivia rapidly shoved the little silver elephant she’d

been given by a pupil into the cutlery drawer. Stephen

believed the stark modern look of the room was spoiled by

knickknacks, although she loved little bits and pieces, even

if they were hell to dust.

She opened the fridge, wishing she’d kept quiet earlier.

Her and her big mouth. She should have said nothing.

Now Stephen was in one of his moods and the drive home

would be hell. She hated driving with him when he was

angry: he overtook other ears dangerously, accelerating like

a maniac and flashing his lights aggressively, and didn’t

seem bothered if Olivia and Sasha went green around the

gills with car sickness.

‘What sort of quiche did you make?’ he inquired idly,

still watching Olivia’s preparations through narrowed eyes.

‘One spinach and cheese, two smoked salmon and a

tomato, feta and olive one for Pops.’

Stephen grimaced. ‘I hate feta cheese.’

“I know, darling,’ Olivia said patiently as she arranged

Tupperware in the hamper, ‘but you don’t have to eat it. I

got a big thing of cashews for you,’ she added anxiously.

He adored them.

‘Mmm,’ was all he said to that.

Olivia, thinking of the drive ahead of them, tried again. “I almost couldn’t get my hands on parsnips yesterday but,’

she gave him a broad smile, ‘knowing how much you love

them, I managed it. Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas

without some pureed with a little ground black pepper,

the way you like them …’

‘Jesus, Olivia,’ he snapped. ‘I’ve just spent a few tough

days trying to sort out a huge crisis in the Frankfurt office

and I come home to find you moaning about my parents

and bloody parsnips! Can’t you think of anything more

interesting to say?’

Stung, she turned away rapidly, feeling her eyes brimming

with tears. She hadn’t said anything complaining

about his parents, although she could have. And as for the

parsnips … she was only trying to show him how much

she loved him, to make up for being cross earlier.

She could have told him about her hellish week in

school, about the horrible kids in 3A or about how Cedric

and Sheilagh had sabotaged her entire shopping plans by

landing unannounced at the apartment. But she didn’t.

She’d tried to be the perfect wife to the busy executive by

standing smiling at the door to greet him with freshly

washed pale gold hair flopping around her shoulders,

wearing the elegant silk shift dress he loved and that she

hated because it rode up her thighs when she walked.

What a pity he didn’t appreciate her efforts.

Stephen wanted the gleaming, polished home, the

kitchen full of home cooking and a squeaky clean wife and

daughter, but he didn’t want to know how they got that

way. The minutiae of their lives bored him.

She didn’t turn round when he marched out of the

kitchen but when he walked into the sitting room, she

could hear him speaking to his parents in a voice so

lighthearted it was as if their argument had never

happened.

‘Mummy, will I give Daddy his card later?’ asked Sasha,

appearing beside her suddenly with a sparkly card in one

fat little hand.

Sasha’s eyes, the same slanting silver-grey as Olivia’s,

were solemn. Olivia sank to the floor and hugged her

tightly, comfort flooding through her as she felt the small

solid body snuggle into hers. Her daughter had a better

idea how to handle Stephen than she did. Sasha instinctively

knew when he was in one of his moods and kept out

of his way. Like I did when I was small and Mum and Pops

were fighting when they were drunk, Olivia realised with

a shock.

Why was she so surprised by how perceptive Sasha was?

Small children could be aware of so much. Their finely

tuned antennae picked up every nuance of adult arguments.

At least Stephen was nothing like her parents, Olivia

consoled herself. He never ran through the house like her .

lather had on those few terrifying occasions in her childhood,

blind drunk and fuelled by some inner rage. She

shuddered to remember it and kissed Sasha’s soft shampoo- .

scented hair. Thank God Stephen was nothing like that.

The drive to Ballymoreen was hell. Stuck in a tailback of

Christmas Eve drivers all heading determinedly to family

gatherings via the motorway, Stephen got into an even

worse mood. Not even the comedy special on the radio

could improve his temper. Olivia sat silently beside him,

watching the rain stream down the side window as they

drove with agonising slowness towards Blessington.

She’d remained calm even during the ‘did you remember

to bring my …’ conversation. How Stephen, a man

who routinely packed for weeks away without forgetting a

single thing, could turn into a man incapable of packing his

own luggage when they went away for a family weekend,

Olivia had no idea.

By the time they reached Ballymoreen, Sasha was asleep

in the back of the car and Olivia was dreading the moment

when they arrived at her parents’ home. Stephen had

never really liked Leslie and Sybil; partly because he knew

how tough Olivia’s childhood had been, the only child of

an eccentric couple who viewed their hectic social existence

as their true calling in life; and partly because he

resented their wealthy Anglo-Irish background.

Both came from a long line of hunting, shooting and

fishing types who thought that jobs were for common

people, a view which was like a red rag to a bull for a man who’d won a scholarship to college and had been brought up in a home dedicated to the work ethic. It was immaterial

that her parents were stony broke, having had a long line of

similarly profligate ancestors who’d squandered the family

money. Their rambling, rundown home was four times the

size of Stephen’s family’s home in Navan, a bungalow

complete with anti-macassars, spotless lino, regimented

gladioli and not a wine rack in sight.

In turn, her parents didn’t like Stephen very much

because he clearly disapproved of their hedonistic lifestyle

and made it plain every time a de Were family party

deteriorated into the customary drunken piss-up.

As usual, Olivia would have to referee.

Stephen drove the BMW past the pretty stone church

and Olivia couldn’t help but brighten up at the sight of

Ballymoreen. Like a picture postcard version of an Irish

village, it would have been the perfect location for a movie

set in the forties - if only location directors had been able

to find it.

Tucked away in a corner of Kildare unhindered by major,

un-potholed roads, Ballymoreen was guaranteed privacy by

virtue of its inaccessibility.

Nothing seemed to have changed very much in the

village since Olivia had been a child, from the small post

office - now with a strip of bright green lifting the pale

facade - to the pretty stone monument to the Civil War in

the centre of the village, where tubs of plump evergreen

shrubs sat all around the chiselled grey stone in winter.

Village life revolved around the monument and the

wooden benches under it. People on their way from the

gossip central that was Phil’s Convenience Shop stopped at

the monument to talk to people who were strolling down

the village from the direction of the post office.

On summer evenings the local teenagers sat and chatted

around it, discussing that eternal question Ballymoreen

teenagers had been discussing for at least three decades: