‘I don’t think you like me much, Enya.’
The blunt statement made Enya sit up straight; it felt both goading and confrontational and yet was offered with a smile, almost in jest.
‘I don’t know you, Trish! Not really, not yet, and actually, Idolike you. I also think that when it comes to something like finance and marriage,’ she took a beat and considered what she wanted to say, ‘it’s something you work out, isn’t it? Who knows what cards you’re going to be dealt? When we were first married, Jonathan was an apprentice and I earned more than him. Then he qualified and earned more than me. We never made the other feel indebted, we just lived our life together. Then when he got sick, he earned nothing, but luckily for us he had always been prudent and we managed, more than managed.’
‘I’m not looking for a meal ticket for Iris.’
‘Then why mention it at all? I mean, supposing he and Iris had married, had kids, divorced, would you think it okay for him to stop supporting his kids if he met someone else?’
‘No, I’d rather they didn’t divorce in the first place.’ Trish tutted her laughter. ‘And that’s not what I was getting at, I’m just worried for my kid.’
Enya smiled and tilted her head,touché . . .
‘Iris might seem confident, worldly, but she isn’t. There were eating issues when she was at school, and I worry it wouldn’t take much to knock her off course again. We’ve worked so hard to make her better.’
‘I’m sorry.’ And she was, unable to imagine the horror of trying to manage that.
‘I guess it’s made me super-protective of her. You understand.’
‘I do. I really do.’ Enya calmed and felt herself warm to the woman, wishing Trish was an ogre. It would make the harbouring of thoughts of her husband that much easier and acting on them easier still. That, and with the knowledge of what Iris had already endured, she would never do anything to bring further upset to her door. ‘I think your child getting married is a big, big deal. And when they’re marrying someone they’ve only just met andbarely know, it’s super-scary, risky. Throw in something like an unexpected pregnancy and my goodness, is it any wonder we’re both a bit jumpy?’
‘You’re right,’ Trish nodded, ‘you’re right. I just feel like everything is slipping out of control. Everything’s changing.’ She looped her hair behind her ear.
‘Well, I know how that feels.’ Enya looked down the street to the sign that read ‘Greengate and Greengate, Solicitors’, knowing this too was coming to an end and her routine was once again changing, and all without the comforting presence of her best friend to smooth the transition. But she would be fine, she had to be.
‘I don’t want Iris to make the same mistakes I made; I just want her to be happy.’ Trish blinked.
Enya stared at the woman. Was Trish saying she wasn’t happy? She wanted the detail, but was in no position to ask, to probe, not when it would only be with the intention of satisfying her own curiosity. ‘I think it’s true that we learn from our mistakes.’
She hoped this was of comfort.
‘That’s what they say, isn’t it, whoevertheyare.’ Iris’s mother sat forward in the chair and rested her elbows on the table, her hands clasped. ‘I’m not happy. Haven’t been happy for a long while really, and I suppose having Iris around as my little buddy, it’s not only that I want to keep her safe, keep an eye on her, but I’ve relied on her too. The thought of her marrying anyone is hard for me, even though I want her to live her life, spread her wings, all of that stuff, but letting go isn’t easy, is it?’
‘None of this is easy.’ Enya felt kinship with the woman, and couldn’t have put it better herself,letting go isn’t easy...
‘I love my husband.’
Trish looked right at her. Enya felt her insides turn to liquid.
‘I love him and yet I’m notinlove with him, does that make any sense?’
Enya nodded and swallowed the boulder of guilt in her throat.
‘I can’t seem to get it right. He’s not happy, I’m not happy, and that makes me feel worthless. Makes me hide my sorrow in a Prosecco bottle.’
They’re not happy... they’re not in love...Enya did her best to control the leap of something in her gut that felt a lot like the fireworks of possibility. It was indeed like being seventeen again, jittery, exciting. This she knew, however, was not enough to act upon, not enough to complicate Aiden and Iris’s lives for something that could, in all likelihood, turn to dust. Her son and Dominic’s daughter were getting married, and she could only guess at their reaction to her and Dominic hooking up. This was enough to temper her response.
‘Mine’s rosé.’ She tried to show allyship, to let Trish know that you never knew what went on behind closed doors.
Trish gave a half-smile. ‘I’ve tried so hard to be all he needs me to be, but...’ She shook her head, as if it mattered not if Enya was present; either way, she wanted to say the words out loud. ‘He’s started to move out to the flat he’s taken. Things are all on hold for a bit until after the wedding, we didn’t want to spoil Iris’s big day and the build-up.’
‘I’m sorry, Trish.’ She meant it.
‘It’s not a surprise, not really. We’re very different people and we want very different things. It’s like the bridge we used to rest on, that place we’d meet, the point of compromise, it crumbled away a long time ago, and so we both sit on opposite sides of the river, staring across the void, trying to figure out how to get back to each other, do you know what I mean?’
‘Kind of,’ Enya answered softly, kindly. ‘Jonathan and I were always great friends. Things had certainly calmed between us, were more predictable, a little slower, but there was something comforting in that. But what you describe, it sounds lonely.’
‘It is.’ Trish sniffed. ‘That’s why I’ve clung to Iris, I guess. And I don’t want her to marry someone who might not love her in the way she does him. Someone who might look at her as if she’s a stranger, or worse, long to be with the mother of his child. I want more for her than that.’
