Again, Rachel, page 5
I wondered about calling Quin. Dublin to Taos, New Mexico, would have involved at least three flights if he’d been going under his own steam. But as the client had flown both him and the architect on a private jet, he might have arrived already.
‘Rach?’
‘Quin.’ I felt a rush of warmth at the sound of his voice. ‘How are you? You got there okay?’
‘God, yeah.’ He groaned. ‘Private jets are just so great. But also so terrible. Whenever I travel on one, it takes me months to readjust to normal class.’
Quin designed bespoke audio-visual systems for the homes of very rich people. He was regarded as having a magic touch, which periodically bumped him up against great wealth.
‘It’s amazing here,’ he said. ‘We’re outside of town, in the desert. I’ve put some shots on Insta, if you want to take a look.’
I clicked on his grid and found images of a high desert plain. In the distance, a sudden eruption of jagged granite exploded from the flat nothingness, looking like a cathedral made of raw stone.
‘Oh, Quin, it’s beautiful. So, listen, can you talk for a minute?’
‘Sure.’ His voice was instantly alert. ‘Let me just go into another …’ There came the rustles of movement and the sound of a door closing. Then, ‘Okay, I’m here. What’s up?’
‘I got a call today. From a friend of my ex-husband’s.’
Quin’s sharp inhale was audible.
‘His … Luke, I mean, his mother has died. The funeral’s on Friday morning. I don’t know whether to go or not.’
‘Right.’ A pause. ‘Rach …’ Another pause.
Quin knew everything about me and Luke.
Well, nearly everything.
One of the great things about having met on a weekend where our very presence was an admission that we were struggling with life, was that, right from the start, Quin and I were admirably straight with each other. In our early days I’d felt okay to say to him, ‘I could never love another man the way I loved Luke.’
‘Ow!’ Quin had been visibly pained. ‘Radical honesty can go and fuck itself.’
But we’d been able to laugh about it.
For a moment the connection to New Mexico went loud and crackly. When I could hear Quin again, he was asking, ‘What’s your “inner voice” telling you?’
‘Nothing at the moment. But, like, would you mind if I went?’
‘If I did, that’s my stuff. Right?’
‘Haha.’
‘Sleep on it. See how you feel tomorrow. But’, he growled, ‘you’d better not fall for him again.’
‘I won’t.’
5
I turned out the light and hoped for sleep. But behind my eyelids, my eyes were wide open. I was cast back in time, to over twenty years ago, when Brigit and I were living in Manhattan.
There had been a gang of Irish lads we used to see around. All of them about six feet tall, with mad-long hair, tight, tight jeans and an abundance of neck and wrist accoutrements, they’d looked like they belonged in a hard-living rock band from the early seventies.
They drank Jack Daniel’s, which they called JD, were no strangers to leather waistcoats or a denim jacket worn over a bare chest and were always accessorized by skinny blonde girls in groupie chic.
Dying of embarrassment that they were Irish, terrified we’d be lumped in with them by the cool New York types whose approval we craved, Brigit and I had, oozing irony, named them the Real Men.
But when, inevitably, we got talking to them, they were actually lovely. It was a relief to talk to men who were funny and halfway normal.
Those were the days when Brigit and I were scouring New York City for boyfriends. I was hoping for someone chiselled, hot, well paid and worthy of respect. In fact, so great at generating respect that simply by being his girlfriend, I would also engender some.
What it came down to was, I was waiting for a saviour. But my saviour had been unaccountably delayed. So while I was killing time, I’d ended up having a passionate but messy sort of a thing with one of the Real Men – Luke Costello.
The mess was entirely my fault. With his long hair, as glossy as a blackbird’s wing, and his hard, fit body, Luke was an utter ride. I was happy to spend time – lots of it – in his bed but not to be seen with him in public (seriously, I was awful). He finally ran out of patience with me at the same time as I crashed, burned and ended up in rehab in Ireland.
Almost a year and a half later, when a new, clean-and-sober me returned to New York to make amends to Luke, it quickly became clear that the connection we’d once had was still there.
And we were so happy, all about Doing Things Right This Time. Even though we had full-time jobs we both started evening classes – neither of us had been to third-level but now we were keen to ‘better ourselves’.
Then shit got really real when I instigated the ‘kids conversation’.
‘Luke, do you want to have babies? Children?’
He paused. ‘Not right now.’
‘How strongly do you feel about it?’
Another pause. ‘I see my brothers and, like, they’re wrecked the whole time. And they live in Ireland, close to family, who help out. We’re here and we don’t have anyone to pick up the slack. What do you think?’
‘Same. I think I want them but it’s safer to get a career sorted, steady income, maybe even a mortgage and all that, first.’
‘Cool!’
So we were agreed that there was to be no rushing, no crazy impromptu decisions, nothing like the way I used to live. I had become one of those women with a five-year plan. Worse, I was proud of it.
The only worry was that my GP had said that we – and she mostly meant me – might be already on the decline, fertility-wise.
‘So,’ I remember saying to Luke, ‘in case we need a contingency plan, we’re getting checked out next Tuesday.’
‘Oh yeah? How does that go down?’
‘I have a scan to count my eggs and your sperm would get tested, to see if it’s … healthy?’ Was that the word? ‘Enough of it? Good at swimming?’
‘But how would it be tested?’ He seemed a little anxious. ‘Where would they get it?’
‘At the clinic. You’d, aaaah, do it there.’
‘You mean, I’d have to …’ He went pale. ‘Oh God, Rachel. I’d have to … do it, right there?’
‘In a cubicle, I guess. Not, like, in the waiting area.’
I wasn’t wild about the idea either. Luke in a small, bare room with a load of pre-used porn made me feel squeamish, jealous and oddly turned on.
He put his face in his hands and groaned. ‘Rachel …’ Then, ‘This is important to you?’
‘If everything is okay, we can park that issue while we get the rest of our lives in place.’ I added, ‘It will give us peace of mind.’
‘You sound like a dodgy insurance salesperson.’ He exhaled, long and loud. ‘Okay. On one condition. That you never use the word “sperm” again.’
‘Done. Do you think I like being this person?’
The afternoon of our appointment, as we arrived at the building in midtown, I was surprisingly nervous. All medical stuff was anxious-making, even if it was just a precautionary check. What if I was infertile? Or Luke was?
But we’d cope. It would be a shock, but we’d weather it. My faith in us was strong.
As we waited for the elevator to the doctor’s suite, Luke cut his eyes to me. ‘Peace of mind, you say?’
‘Peace of mind,’ I intoned. ‘For you and your family.’
After ringing the clinic’s bell, the door buzzed and we pushed it open – and the receptionist half rose behind her desk. Her glance flickered from Luke, to me, then back to Luke, his long hair, his leather jacket, his woven wristbands, the silver chain around his neck. For a moment I think she was considering calling security.
Who could blame her – the waiting room bristled with neatly pregnant women in bland Michael Kors dresses and Ferragamo flats, their accompanying menfolk in thousand-dollar suits.
Luke saw the receptionist’s concern. ‘It’s okay.’ His voice was gentle. ‘We have an appointment. And,’ he added, ‘insurance.’
I watched him smile at her; she stared, gave an abrupt half-giggle, then slowly flushed a deep red.
Clipboards and pens appeared for us to input our information. After a lengthy wait, we were ushered into the presence of Dr Solomon, a tiny woman with lots of curly hair.
‘You don’t plan to get pregnant just yet?’ She speed-read our forms.
‘Not right now.’ I sat up straight. ‘But if there were any issues, that might change things.’
She flicked back to my form. ‘You’re, hmmm … almost thirty-one? And Luke …?’
‘Same,’ he said.
‘We’re late starters.’ Defensively I wanted to blurt out our convoluted story and to reassure her that Luke and I were very together. We just moved in with each other. In twenty months he’ll be a Certified Public Accountant – I know, you wouldn’t think it to look at him, but a steady heart beats inside that sexy exterior. I’m doing a degree in Addiction Counselling, plus both of us are working full time. Once we’re qualified, our student loans must be repaid, then we want to buy a place to live. All of that needs to be tidied away before we can even think about having a baby.
‘It’s okay,’ Dr Solomon said. ‘Thirty-one is not old, not these days. If everything is in order, you’ve got plenty of time. So!’ She clapped her hands and a nurse entered the room. ‘Rachel, while you have your scan, Tomaka will take Luke for his semen extraction.’
Luke shot me an anguished WTF look.
‘You’ll be alone,’ Dr Solomon added. But there was a wry turn to her tone that made me wonder if she’d alarmed poor Luke on purpose.
As he stood, Dr Solomon gave him a good, long look. ‘I’m not saying you’ll have motility issues. However, in that eventuality, you should know that tight jeans are frequently a contra-indication.’
And on that note, Tomaka took him away.
Fifteen or twenty minutes later, we were reunited in reception. Luke – clearly mortified – kept his eyes downcast. In the elevator that returned us to ground level, he remained silent. Only once we were out of the building and onto the teeming streets of midtown did it feel okay to speak.
‘Luke? Was it … bad?’ I asked. ‘Magazines with the pages stuck together?’
‘What?’ He seemed startled. ‘No, babe.’ He slung his arm around my neck and pulled me closer, out of the path of the crowds. ‘No.’ Our foreheads touching, his dark eyes held mine. ‘There was no need for any of that. I just thought about you.’
6
As soon as I woke up, I heard in my head, You need to go to the funeral.
Well! I thought. You took your time!
Yeah. Lol.
So there we were. Whether I liked it or not, I was going to the funeral.
Then I went to work.
‘Giles had a bad night,’ Hector said at the morning meeting. ‘Overwhelmed with guilt. Crying non-stop.’
Ted looked at me. ‘You want a session with him? Murdo, you’re available to cover group?’
Murdo nodded.
‘And sorry for the short notice,’ I said. ‘But, Murdo, can you cover tomorrow morning too? I’ve a funeral to go to. Ex-mother-in-law.’
‘The ex?’ Murdo exclaimed.
‘You sure this is a good idea?’ Ted said. ‘Will the ex be there?’
I almost laughed. ‘Ted. It’s his mother. Anyway, I’ll be back in time for afternoon group.’
‘Grand. And your new client arrives tomorrow morning,’ he said. ‘Priya will email the file.’
I went to find Giles and, in the corridor, passed Dennis who was huddled with Roxy, deep in chat. God only knew what Dennis wanted with her, but certainly not advice on recovery, from the wheeler-dealery energy he was giving off. More like he was trying to sell her a septic tank (‘one careful owner’) or doing his best to buy a roller disco at a knockdown price …
He spotted me and an expression of theatrical fear crossed his face. ‘Jez, there’s Rachel,’ he declared. ‘I’m quaking in me boots!’
(Said boots were cut-off wellingtons, which the bottoms of his exhausted trousers were tucked into. Dennis, though a townie, was the kind of can-do operator who’d happily jump in to help with some emergency lambing, if he thought it would drum up a couple of votes in the local elections.)
‘Morning, Dennis, Roxy.’ I tried to sound lofty.
Being mean didn’t come naturally, but it was important that they were terrified of me.
‘Quaking,’ Dennis repeated, in a fake undertone.
You should be, I thought, almost sadly. I’m accumulating so much information on you and your shenanigans and soon I’m going to rain terror down on your head.
In the dining room Giles, flanked by Chalkie, was buttering toast and crying.
‘Wudja stop, ya big thick,’ Chalkie was saying, not unkindly. ‘Making a show of yourself.’
‘Let him cry.’ Trassa was all sympathy. ‘After the terrible, terrible things he’s done, the lives he’s ruined, who wouldn’t cry?’ As Giles scanned the length of the table, she asked, ‘What are you looking for, pet?’
‘Marmalade,’ Giles squeaked.
‘Harlie!’ Trassa yelled. ‘Pass the marmalade along to poor Giles.’
‘Giles,’ I said. He looked up, his face drenched. ‘I’ll see you in Consulting Room Three at ten o’clock.’
Mutely, he nodded.
‘You not doing group this morning?’ Chalkie was aggrieved. ‘Who’s covering?’
‘Murdo.’
‘Okay.’ Several expressions moved across his face, eventually landing on disappointment. Murdo, my heavily inked, much-pierced young deputy, was tough and that didn’t suit Chalkie because he was still trying to avoid who he really was.
Six minutes later, Giles, leaking tears, slid into the armchair opposite me. (The seats were much more comfortable in these small one-to-one rooms.)
A successful, entitled man, he’d spent his life accumulating and discarding wives and children. Everything had come easy to him. In recent years, though, his rarefied life of tennis and sailing had slid off the rails as his fondness for good times crossed the line into raging addiction.
But his second and third wives had been in competition to enable him for as long as possible. As soon as one tentatively voiced the opinion that starting each day with four lines of coke wasn’t perhaps ideal, he’d upped and left for the other. This ex-wife ping-pong had carried on for over a year, Giles bouncing back and forth.
His colleagues also protected him because he was ‘high functioning’ – which translates as ‘still able to charm potential clients’. (For as long as anyone keeps making money, everyone seems happy to pretend they’re fine.)
Only after having a paranoia attack on a press trip was he finally cut loose by his board – which was the catalyst that propelled him in here. I’d never yet seen an addict seek help if they weren’t in danger of losing – or had already lost – someone or something important to them.
Over the past four weeks, I’d unleashed a bombardment of truth on Giles. His friends, wives, ex-wives and adult children had all showed up to reveal the truth about him.
It had broken him wide open and now he sat weeping, a box of tissues on his lap.
‘Why are you crying?’ I asked softly.
‘All of it,’ he said thickly. ‘Leaving Danielle.’ His first wife. ‘She was devastated … and I didn’t care, because I thought I loved Ingrid.’ His third wife. (Yes, he’d somehow managed to slot in an extra wife between his first wife and the woman he’d left her for. Giles was full of plot twists.) ‘And my children. They were just babies and I neglected them …’
This was a tricky time for anyone in rehab and Giles needed to be guided gently. If he became too overwhelmed with grief or regret, there was a chance he’d leave, to run back to his old painkiller.
The Cloisters regime was tough. Yes, the patients were pushed way out of their comfort zones, but always with exquisite care. They were monitored with a gimlet eye so that we knew when to hold back, when to press hard, when to abruptly change strategy and show them some love.
‘You’ve come a long, long way in the last twenty-nine days,’ I said. ‘You’re becoming a whole new person. It’s painful, all this clarity, but it’ll be worth it. Over time, you can try to make things right with the people you hurt.’
‘They’ll never forgive me.’
Who knew if they would or they wouldn’t and if they didn’t, that was their right. But … ‘No matter what,’ I said, ‘you can live through this and anything else life throws at you, without relapsing.’
I walked him back to group and, on a whim, crooked a finger to extract Harlie, just to check she was okay after Simon’s departure.
She swished into the consulting room, everything on point – brows, lashes, skin and hair. In the outside world, she managed a CosMedical clinic (called Rich Girl Face – I loved the name), where she had access to all kinds of tweakments.
‘So,’ I said. ‘Simon?’
‘What about him?’ She was cagey.
‘You and he were … close?’
‘You mean I fancied him?’ Her glare was combative. Then, ‘Maybe I did. For thirty seconds. Big mistake.’
‘Don’t beat yourself up about it,’ I said. ‘Happens all the time in here. When your drug of choice is taken away, you’ll look for other ways to make yourself feel good.’
‘Yeah, but,’ she said, ‘I heard about him and Prissie. They’re all trash, aren’t they? Liars and cheaters, the whole shower of them.’
‘Who exactly are you talking about?’
Immediately her mouth bunched up, as if it had been pulled tight with a string. She didn’t want to let the name escape. In our first session, two and a half weeks ago, she’d growled, ‘That fucker is dead to me.’
‘Who?’ I repeated.
‘Nnnnnn,’ she hummed, from behind her sealed lips, her eyes bright and popping. I swear to God, despite her fury, she was hilarious.
