‘Would you take us swimming in the Forty Foot?’ said Killian. ‘Mum won’t because she goes with her friends and says it’s her time and Dad says he doesn’t have time. And we’re both so hot.’
‘I almost died last night with the heat,’ groaned Isabelle.
‘Ididdie,’ added Killian.
‘If we’re really good and don’t drown?’ said Isabelle.
‘Or cause you any worry at all,’ said Killian.
‘Yes,’ said Rosie, as the twins both let out a whoop that could have been heard across the bay and as far as Howth. ‘But not today. Friday? Can you wait?’
The twins nodded as Isabelle squeezed Rosie’s hand. ‘We love you, Rosie.’
‘Yes, we love you,’ agreed Killian. ‘We are the luckiest children in Ireland to have you for an aunt.’
‘Yes, Mummy says we are lucky to have you because you only have Lucinda and you’re a much better aunt to us than she is to you.’ And Isabelle smiled a dimpled smile at her and Rosie felt suddenly better about the chaotic weekend ahead of her and her obvious-to-everyone awful navy suit.
6
PATRICK
‘Did I tell you about Kate, Niamh’s friend?’ said Seán, brightly. They had turned off the motorway and were now weaving their way through the outskirts of Dublin. ‘She’s gorgeous. Great personality. Nice-looking. Not that I have noticed, of course. But purely for information’s sake. And she’s single.’
‘You setting me up?’
‘Might be. It was Niamh who suggested it. Says Kate deserves someone nice.’ He looked at Patrick. ‘God knows why she suggested you.’
Patrick smiled back at him.
‘Weren’t you seeing someone?’ asked Seán. ‘Who was the latest one?’
‘Ashley. She dumped me.’
Seán shook his head. ‘Why on earth did she do that?’
‘Something about not being emotionally available…’
Seán laughed. ‘Yikes.’
Patrick smiled. ‘So I said that I’m sorry for being emotionally crap, but there’s not much I can do because of my dysfunctional childhood and leaving it all behind is harder than it looks. And coming to Boston is not far enough to run away from my past…’ He had meant it to sound amusing and to make Seán laugh again, but Seán was giving him a double take.
‘Did you really say that?’
‘No, of course not.’ Sometimes Seán was still so innocent. ‘I said that I was going to finish with her, but she got there first and I wasn’t that into her anyway.’
Thankfully Seán laughed properly. ‘I think I might have used that particular line over the years.’ He glanced over at his older brother. ‘So, what about Kerry-Anne Daly? When are you two finally going to get it together?’
Patrick thought of what she’d asked him the night before. He didn’t really want to think about it, knowing his answer but not wanting to hurt her.
He did sometimes wonder if he could love Kerry-Anne. It wasn’t impossible. She was beautiful, clever and interesting and, best of all, he liked her. They’d be a good team, which they already were. And he wanted children and a family. He wanted to prove to himself that he could be a better father than his own ever was. Yes, there’d been girlfriends over the years, but they never worked out. He was too stubborn, they’d often say, married to his job, always working. And then his last night in Boston, and her proposal. Not marriage, no. But something else. He’d told her he’d think about it.
Kerry-Anne was only a couple years older than him, but she was a million years ahead socially and emotionally. Kerry-Anne had been hanging out with grown-ups all her life, had gone to an expensive girls’ Catholic school in Boston and then to Harvard. She knew her way round a wine cellar and could talk to anyone – from congressmen and women and benefactors to her team at the Kerry-Anne Daly Foundation. She had a fecking foundation, for God’s sake.
When she first came to the Boston Business School searching for young people that the Kerry-Anne Daly Foundation could invest in – especially anyone on a full scholarship like he was – she seemed already a grown-up aged twenty-four and he was two years younger and felt like a kid. She never wavered when entering a room full of people, never looked anything but immaculately dressed. She had boyfriends and partners, men from her social class, men with big, bright teeth and year-round tans, who wore their collars up, who disappeared into their city jobs during the week, reappearing for weekends of sailing. Kerry-Anne would bring them to Fitzgerald’s – introducing them and their double-barrelled names, always with a something-something the third. There was even a something-something the fifth once. Kerry-Anne had taken him sailing out on Nantasket, along with her gang of friends who all seemed to have a yacht or the right shoes to wear or know how to make small talk.
Patrick’s mind wandered, thinking of that summer, when he was back in Ireland for his placement from the Boston Business School, and Kerry-Anne Daly had called him.
‘Where are you?’ That refined Boston accent, that confidence, that knowledge that you belong in the world.
