Page 38 of Coming Home to Inishbeg Cove

‘And you think mine hasn’t been?’ I blazed.

Suddenly I became aware of Lucy looking at us. Her small face was studying our expressions worriedly and I felt instantly contrite. I couldn’t do this in front of her.

‘Sit down for cup-a-tea, Mama,’ Lucy ordered.

I took a seat across the table from Joe and let her pour me an imaginary cup from her teapot.

‘She’s got so big,’ Joe said as we watched her play. ‘Her speech – everything – she’s grown up so much since I saw her.’

‘She has,’ I agreed. ‘Three months is a long time when you’re three.’

‘I owe you an apology. I’ve treated you very badly, Penny. I know words can’t make up for what I’ve done, but I need to try and explain. I’ve been in a bad place and, to be honest, I think I have been for a long time.’

Finally, I was getting an explanation. That was all I had wanted to hear for the last few months, but now that he was here in front of me, it all felt a bit … strange. I was confused. Before he had arrived, I had been slowly starting to accept that my marriage was over, and I was emerging from the awful grief that came with that realisation. I had been starting to see the light, to feel more positive, but now everything had been thrown back up in the air and I didn’t know how I was supposed to feel. I was angry, for sure, but mainly I felt hurt that it had taken Joe this long to decide that Lucy and I were what he wanted.

‘I haven’t been able to paint properly for months now,’ he continued, ‘and I stupidly believed that family life was stifling my painting, but when you and Lucy left, I was worse than ever. I realised that my creativity has been blocked for a long time. Since you’ve been gone, I haven’t been able to eat, sleep or paint, and that’s because I need you both. It was never you – it’s always been me.’

I was stunned. Never had Joe opened up to me like this before. He was admitting that he had the problem. How many times had I questioned myself, wondering if I was the reason for his difficult moods and ill temper? At times I had felt like I was going crazy, analysing everything I had said or done to make sense of his behaviour.

‘I thought you had fallen out of love with me,’ I admitted.

He shook his head. ‘Oh Penny, it was never you – it was me. I’ve always loved you. I’ve been so consumed by my painting for my whole life, but art is meaningless without you.’

His ice-blue eyes locked on mine and I found I had to look away. Just an hour ago, I had been kissing another man. What had I been thinking? It now seemed as if a different person had melted into Tadgh’s embrace, a different woman had felt her skin tingle, all her tiny hairs standing to attention, as Tadgh traced delicate kisses along the nape of her neck. No matter how frayed the ties of our marriage were, I was still Joe’s wife.

‘It hasn’t felt like that for a while,’ I said.

‘When you left,’ he continued, ‘I thought I needed the space to figure my head out. I needed to see where the blockage was and to fix it. But after a few days alone, I realised that I was the problem.’

‘But why didn’t you come down here then?’

‘When you were gone, I spiralled into an even darker place. I was drinking, trying to paint, then sabotaging whatever I did manage to paint, in a drunken stupor. It was like I had been possessed by demons.’

‘But never mind about me – how could you stay away from Lucy for all that time?’

He shook his head. ‘When I look back, I don’t even recognise that man. I think I’ve had some kind of breakdown. I’ve been in a black place, Penny, but I’m slowly seeing the light.’

‘We can’t just take up where we left off, Joe. Everything has changed now.’

He nodded. ‘I know that, but if you can forgive me, I will prove how much I adore you and Lucy. I will spend every day making it up to you both for the rest of my life.’

All I had wanted for so long was to hear him say these words, but now that he was standing before me saying them, I felt flat. Even if I managed to forgive him and we were able to move forward from here, I knew our marriage would be irreparably damaged. Like a vase that has been broken then glued back together, no matter how well it is repaired, you would still be able to see the cracks if you looked closely enough.