Laura
Laura smiles after her comment that Aidan thinks her decision to go to university is part of a midlife crisis. She smiles because it’s easier to make it look as if she can totally understand why he would find her return to education amusing, instead of having to admit out loud that she really wishes he could fully understand how important it is to her.
It’s just not a notion or a whim. It’s something she feels incredibly passionate about. It feels like she’s finally found the thing in life she was always meant to invest her time and energy in. Yes, she has enjoyed her various jobs over the years. She has loved being a mother to Robyn and has found it incredibly rewarding. But this? Examining the cultures of other women and exploring the female place in the world feeds her soul. Being here, in the university, getting her student ID card, walking into a lecture theatre for a welcome meeting – it all feels incredibly thrilling. Knowing there are people around her whofeel the same fire for this subject is so exciting. She wants to sit and talk to them all. She longs to debate and discuss. She wants to learn. Yes, Laura O’Kane wants to learn in a way she just wasn’t ready for back when she was sixteen or seventeen. She wants to savour it – drink in all that fabulous knowledge just waiting for her. She hasn’t felt this fired up about anything in years.
Now that she is all signed up and given her ID, her timetable and a reading list, she feels like she just wants to get started. Damn them for having registration on a Friday and leaving her to wait a full weekend before she can actually walk into a classroom and enjoy an actual lecture.
She can’t wait to fill Aidan in on how it has gone. It being a Friday, Laura wonders if maybe they could even go out for a bite to eat later, maybe even have a drink or two. It’s a celebration after all, isn’t it? And it has been forever since they went out together, just the two of them. Before she leaves the campus she drops her husband a text suggesting she make a booking. It’s still early enough that she would have more than enough time to drive home, get a nap to catch up on her lack of sleep from last night, and grab a shower, or better still a long, luxurious soak in the bath. She could even put on a nice dress and take the time to do her hair and make-up and really make an effort. Robyn can be bribed with money to order a pizza and permission to maybe invite one of her friends over. Or better still, her beloved daughter can go and stay at one of her friends’ houses and Laura and Aidan can come home to an empty house.
It’s been a long time since they had time that was guaranteed to be free from interruptions. Life has been so busy and so complicated, and they’ve both been so tired…
No, she thinks, she will not focus on how things have beenbut instead on how they might be going forward. The past is over and done with.
She just has to wait until Aidan replies so she knows whether or not he’s all in for her romantic plans. She’s sure he will be. Aidan O’Kane has never been a man to turn down the chance at a nice meal and a nicer bottle of wine. Thinking it’s as much of a sure thing as it can possibly be, Laura heads for home ready to indulge in some first-class pampering.
Her mood doesn’t dull when she gets home and finds that this morning’s breakfast dishes are still on the kitchen island and not in the dishwasher where they should be. She doesn’t even tense up when she finds the blinds and curtains still drawn in the living room – ‘like a wake house’ as her mother would say. It only takes her a few seconds to open them, then a few more to right the cushions on the sofa and lift the wine glass Aidan left on the side table last night. It’s not a big deal, she tells herself, even though the phrase ‘weaponised incompetence’ is starting to swirl around her head. But does she really want to make a fuss about a wine glass and in doing so probably ruin what could be a lovely evening? No. She does not. She offers up to the holy souls, which is exactly what Kitty would tell her to do. Even though Kitty O’Hagan was not a big believer in God, she definitely had a soft spot for the souls of the dearly departed. So much so she decided to become one, Laura thinks wryly, knowing her mother would approve of her dark sense of humour.
Laura has learned the importance of picking your battles and this is not one that requires her immediate attention. She has a bigger desire to celebrate this momentous step she has taken towards her dreams and she really wants to share that moment with Aidan. They deserve to treat themselves. Shehovers around the kitchen, tidying away the bits and pieces her husband and daughter seem blind to. There is still no response, so she busies herself with more cleaning – changing the bedsheets on their bed and putting on a wash. She picks up the socks Aidan has left discarded on their bedroom floor and throws them in the laundry hamper, before dusting the room, running the hoover across the floor and spritzing the air with one of her favourite room sprays from Rituals. They’re a bit past the stage of lighting candles and setting the scene for a romantic night for two but a clean, fresh room helps her relax a little.
Aidan has still not replied.
He has not messaged to ask how she got on at registration, or called to see how her nerves were holding up. He is probably completely floored with work. She understands that – although Fridays at the conveyancing firm where he works tend to be more relaxed and often end in an early-doors rush to the pub for ‘just the one’.
Pushing any niggling doubts aside, Laura decides she will proceed as if their plans are going ahead, and she takes the chance to choose a nice dress to wear and lay out her outfit on top of their bed before luxuriating under the pulsing streams of a hot shower for a good twenty minutes, exfoliating every inch of her skin before slathering on her richest body butter so that she feels and smells magnificent. It has now passed five and there is still no word from her husband, or her daughter for that matter, and she’s starting to think that even if he were to message back now, the chance of getting a reservation somewhere for dinner tonight is going to be slim to none. The dress lying on top of their bed now seems to be giving her a look that screams of shrugged shoulders and ‘I don’t think this is happening, babes’, and she’s starting to agree. Looking at the delicate, lacy underwearshe had laid out too, she starts to think that it would just be very uncomfortable anyway and she’d much prefer the feeling of M&S’s finest cotton bra and full brief knickers over a scratchy lace thong. She does not enjoy thongs. Fails to see the appeal of feeling like you have a permanent wedgy. Long live the VPL.
8
I HATE YOU, TOMORROW
Becca
Patience is not and never has been my strong suit. If I have heard my darling mother tell me it was a virtue once in my life, I have heard her say it approximately a million times. And usually followed by ‘a watched kettle never boils’ and a reminder that ‘what is for me will not pass me’. I know she means well when she says this, but it really, really doesn’t help me cope with my in-built dislike for waiting for things.
It doesn’t matter if the things are good, or bad. I do not like waiting all the same. If I know something is going to happen, I’d very much just like to get on with it. I will have no peace until I do.
And I have no patience or peace right now. Why did I tell Conal I would be too tired to see him tonight? I mean, I am exhausted and would love a quick nap, but I also know my chance of drifting off into a peaceful sleep is pretty much non-existent.
Every time I close my eyes, even to blink, I hear ‘we need totalk’ echoing again. I thought if I tried to distract myself with walking Daniel and cleaning my house until it sparkled, I’d feel better and, assisted by physical exhaustion, be more than able to have a good night’s sleep.
But no, instead I just ached from head to toe, and still couldn’t relax.
I tried to follow up on the admin from the Fab Forties Club meeting, adding member details to the database, but as the numbers weren’t exactly interstellar, it didn’t take all that long.
A couple of ideas have come in from the girls about what to try next. An art class which may or may not involve some form of nudity is one option. I’m not sure. I don’t think I have the mental energy at the moment to try not to laugh like a schoolgirl at someone trying to maintain a serious expression while their genitals are on show. I also have a completely irrational fear that Roy Cropper from the coffee shop will be the model, because sometimes the universe has a very perverse sense of humour.
The other suggestion was an informal choir – one where the actual ability to sing isn’t a prerequisite. Niamh sent that idea, having heard about it from one of the music teachers at school. It seems very wholesome and dare I say cheesy for Niamh, but to my surprise she had an uncharacteristic level of enthusiasm for it. I always suspected she was a closet fan of the hit TV seriesGlee. There’s a frustrated Rachel Berry in her, of that I have no doubt.
I popped her an email telling her to set it up and then promptly fell back into my ennui – where I continue to languish – exhausted but too tired to sleep. All night I have battled with myself, once again, wondering if it would come across as too needy or neurotic to call Conal and ask him to tell me what it is he wants to talk about. I’m reluctant. In my experience, aka with Simon, men do not like their women needy and neurotic. WhileI know, of course, that Conal is not like Simon – not even one little bit – it has come to my attention that I still carry the wounds from my divorce. Who’d have thought it?
So I vow to stick to my very firm resolution not to send a very emotionally needy message asking him what it is he wanted to talk about before segueing into a slightly unhinged plea for him not to dump me and to just give us one last try.
But as I thump my pillow repeatedly to try to take out some of my frustration on it, and to also try to make it a little more comfortable to sleep on, I am regretting that decision. So I sit up, grab my phone from my bedside table and do the only sensible thing to do in these circumstances – I have a complete emotional breakdown in the group chat with Niamh and Laura.
Niamh
Are you still freaking out about that?
Becks
