I don’t feel I can tell him I really don’t want the tea any more. He’s going to so much effort. There’s a wall of interested faces looking at me as I turn and try to work out where to sit. Seats are shuffled and I’ll have to share a table with someone. Then I spot a lifeline.
‘Could I use the internet?’ I point to the computer at a table in the corner.
‘Help yourself. It’s a euro for half an hour. It’s all gobbledygook to me but work away, work away,’ he says, dropping tea bags into a stainless steel pot.
‘Thanks.’ I put my head down and slide in behind the computer, which is now acting like a screen between me and the rest of the café. I skulk down as low as I can in thechair. I don’t even know what I am going to do on it. It’s not like I’m going to update my Facebook status with ‘Having a crackin’ time in Galway. Rain, rain, rain’. I’m avoiding Facebook and emails, I remind myself. I don’t want anyone to know where I am.
I look up the weather forecast back home. Sunny with some cloud. Then I Google some jobs pages but don’t know where to put as a location. My fingers hover over the keys. I can’t help myself. I type in my password and find my fingers instinctively leading me to Brian’s Facebook page, just to see how he’s doing.
I look over the top of the computer. The interrogation committee are still waiting. I take a deep breath and click on Brian’s profile.
Everything seems as it always did. He still likes Status Quo and The Coffee House. He’s still in Cardiff. He still works at Western Radio FM. Then I spot it. My eyeballs start to burn with humiliation and anger. I feel faint, lightheaded. The words swirl on the page in front of me.
‘In a relationship with …’
Hot angry tears feel like acid rain as they slide down my face. I feel like writing on his wall, ‘I’m so glad you’re happy! You’ve ruined my life!’ But I won’t. I’m too ashamed. He has it all and I have nothing, absolutely nothing. Not for the first time in my life my mooring has been cut and the rope is flapping around and I’m drifting directionless.
I read it and reread it.
‘In a relationship with … Adrian Polsey!’ it says.
Our best man!a voice shouts in my head as I bite the corner of my sleeve. I think we can safely say Brian has moved on.
Chapter Eleven
‘Here’s your tea, sorry for the wait.’
I jump like I’ve been caught red-handed. The café owner is standing beside me, tea in hand. I quickly minimise Brian’s page, promising not look at Facebook again, ever. I brush away the wetness from my boiling cheeks with the palm of my hand and sniff, hoping he thinks it’s a cold, and try not to look directly at him.
‘Good on that, are you?’ He uses the hand holding the tea to gesture at the computer. ‘I haven’t a clue about the world wide web. It’s all passed me by.’ He shakes his head. ‘Now then, a scone to go with your tea?’ He puts his free hand on his waist and his belly, covered in a big white wrap-around apron, sticks out even more.
I shake my head. He’s being kind but I can’t trust myself to speak without my voice cracking and making a total fool of myself … again. It wasn’t long ago I was standing on the steps of the Garda station in nothing but a cut-down wedding dress. Blubbing now would really give the waiting audience something to talk about. In fact I feel like a guest waiting in the wings to go onThe Jeremy Kyle Show.
‘That’s two euro then, for the tea,’ he says, putting my tea on the corner of the table and turning towards the till. I stand up, rummage in the pocket of my waterproof jacket and take out my last note. I could try and draw some cash from our joint bank account but that would be a sure-fire way of Brian tracking me down.
I follow the café owner to the till, carrying my hot takeout tea. All eyes follow me and I find it hard to swallow or breathe. I stand at the counter and focus on a plastic plantthat appears to be for sale for 20 cents, while the man looks for change for a fifty.
‘Won’t be a mo’,’ he says cheerily and goes off into the back room. Oh no, not again! How hard can it be to get a tea and leave? I focus hard on the photos on the walls. They’re of the café owner with a woman, neither of them smiling. My eyes are stinging but looking up at the pictures stops more tears from falling. Finally the café owner reappears, just like Mr Benn. I take my change without looking at it and pour it into my pocket, only my blurred vision makes my aim a bit off and some of the coins fall to the floor. I bob down quickly, chasing them as they spin round. As I’m peeling the last one off the floor a shadow falls over me and someone hands me a coin.
‘Here,’ says a young woman’s voice.
I look up. It’s the barmaid from the pub.
‘Thanks.’ I take the coin, straighten up and dust myself down. The barmaid is staring boldly at me with an interested smile. Grace peers round the open door. There’s a shaft of sunlight pushing though the watery path left by the rain on the pavement outside. I put my head down and attempt to side-step her, hoping she doesn’t want to make small talk.
‘Grandad, I’ve been looking everywhere for you,’ she says, and I breathe a sigh of relief. I’ve been let off the small talk.
‘So you’re the joy-rider they’re all talking about?’ she says as boldly as she’s looking at me.
The café goes silent.
Slowly I turn to look at her. The joy-rider! Wasn’t it bad enough the camper van company representative had referred to me as ‘the jilted bride’ when he’d turned up to reclaim the van shortly before I was taken to the Garda station. The Garda said I’d stolen the camper van, but I thought it was still rented to me. I didn’t know Brian had called the company to tell them of ‘a change of plan’.Typical Brian, always organised. So now I’m the jilted bride and a joy-rider. I just want to be left alone.
‘I’m not a joy-rider. It was a misunderstanding,’ I say quietly.
There’s a murmur around the café.
‘She says she’s not a joy-rider, it was a misunderstanding!’ Evelyn shouts into John Joe’s whistling hearing aid.
