Last Chance Saloon - Marian Keyes [170]
Stunned, he watched her heft up the bags and boxes and carry them to her car. As she came back for a second load his eyes widened in shock. ‘Hey. Leave my bludeh coffee table alone!’
‘Whose coffee table?’
‘Mine.’
‘Who paid for it?’
He didn’t answer.
‘I did. So, Thomas,’ she said triumphantly, ‘it’s my bludeh coffee table.’
64
‘Yippee!’ Fintan snatched off his Marilyn Monroe wig and twirled it like a lasso above his head. ‘I still can’t believe she did it. Can you believe it, Katherine?’
Katherine thought of Tara, who’d been crying solidly for the past forty-eight hours and murmured, ‘Mmmmm, I can, actually.’
‘Tell me what you’ve found out. Was he devastated?’
‘Quite upset, I believe.’
‘Oooohhhh.’ Fintan clenched his fists. ‘To have been a fly on the wall. Isn’t it a shame she didn’t video it? How is she?’
‘Broken-hearted, to be honest.’
‘Roy Orbison?’
‘No.’ Katherine smiled mysteriously. Roy Orbison was currently languishing in a shoe-box, beneath four photo-albums on the top of her wardrobe. It was one of the first things she’d done when Tara had arrived with her stuff, because there was no way she could cope with another two months of ‘It’s ooooooohhhhhh-ver!’
‘Is she going on about having to become a lesbian because she’ll never meet another man?’
‘Yes, just like old times.’
‘Evening classes?’
‘Talk of mosaic-making, learning Portuguese and banjo-playing so far. I’ll give you fair warning, she’s talking of roping you in.’
‘Holy God – banjo-playing! Isn’t it a stroke of luck that I’ve to go in for my next bout of chemo tomorrow and I’ll be too sick to even look at a banjo?’
‘There’s lucky.’
‘Listen, you don’t think she’ll get back with Thomas, do you?’
‘Well, he’s already rung to ask if they could still be friends.’
‘I see. He wanted a shag. And what happened?’
‘She said – actually it was great, Fintan. She said, “Still? How can we still be friends when we were never friends in the first place?” ’
‘Oh, lovely. She’ll get over this yet. But what we mustn’t do under any circumstances is suggest that she gets back on the horse. Look at what happened after Alasdair.’
‘Quite. What’s that box in the corner?’
‘My abdominizer. Don’t worry, it’s going back. So how are things with you?’
‘Very well.’ Katherine smiled like a Cheshire cat. ‘Very well, indeed.’
‘Still averaging three hours of sleep a night?’
‘If that.’
‘And look at you! Positively thriving. When can I meet him?’
‘When would you like?’
‘Best to wait till the chemo is out of the way. I don’t want to puke all over your new fella on our first encounter. It’d be very poor.’ The phone rang and Fintan asked, ‘Will you answer it? You’re nearer. Who could it be? Oh, the mad social whirl, my dear!’
‘Hello,’ Katherine said. ‘Oh, hello, Mrs O’Grady. Really? Are you sure? No, I knew nothing about it. No, really I didn’t. I swear to God I didn’t. I understand, ye – I underst – of course, I understa – But wait a minute. Maybe you’d better find out if it’s true before you start threatening to kill people.’
Katherine handed the phone to Fintan. ‘It’s your mother. Do you know anything about Milo selling his farm and moving to London for good?’
Tara climbed out of bed and the first thing she did was tick the calendar that Katherine had given her. Ten. The tenth night in a row that she’d managed to stay away from Thomas. Ten never-ending, sleep-free nights, her circadian rhythms shot to hell by displacement, the large quantities of alcohol she was ingesting to anaesthetize the pain and fear of her yawningly empty future.
Her initial bravado when she’d marched out on Thomas had dissolved before she’d even arrived at Katherine’s. She’d almost turned the car around and driven back. But she knew that because of the extensive way she’d humiliated him, she’d burnt her bridges good and proper. Everyone told her that she’d get over him, but she knew her life was finished. She thought back to those heady, carefree days during her late twenties when she still had time. Of course, when Alasdair had dumped her, she’d