'Is that what the young call it this generation?' she asked with one sceptical eyebrow raised.
Tim says that Mairead speaks better body than Queen's English, using the various parts of her anatomy to express the impressions and feelings she does well not to express verbally.
'Hope she's good enough for him! Are you willing to resign in her favour?'
That was another of her favourite arguments: over-mothering the young. That all kids would turn out better if deprived of doting mamas at an early age. As Mairead had been an abandoned child, I would have thought she'd feel quite the opposite.
'I don't think it's come to that, but he is seriously taken with the girl and she is a very nice child.'
'Have they, do you think?'
'I don't know and I haven't thought.'
'Now, now, mother dear, don't get huffy with me.'
'For God's sake, Mairead, what they do is their own business.'
'I'll remind you of that one day, pet.' I caught hold of my temper because sometimes Mairead says outrageous things and I never know if she means them or is merely having me on.
'I'm sure you wouldn't forget to, Mairead.' I felt that now was the time to shut her up with the gifties I'd procured in the States. Last year I'd brought her back a body-shirt and she'd complained bitterly that I'd only brought her the one because it was the most useful garment she'd ever worn.
This year I brought six, bought in various parts of the country, wherever the sales were tempting. She was unreservedly overjoyed with my selections. Then she made me show her the things I'd bought myself and, although I tried to be casual about the ski jacket and mask, and the sweater, she is very perceptive. I avoided the issue by cooking dinner, chattering on about places and people, all the while aware that she suspected I was leaving something of great moment out.
Then I wondered why I was withholding the story from her - I wouldn't have to draw diagrams to Mairead - but she'd certainly hoot over the manslaughter charge and my part in fouling up the D.A.'s case. I could hear her chortling with glee when she learned that my 'reputation' in Denver, at least, was unassailable. It was obvious that my brief affair with Dan meant more to me, much more to me, than to parade it for amusement before my friend, even though she was my best friend.
She didn't press me, knowing that eventually I'd come out with it in my own good time. She told me her own news: surprisingly good sales at Easter, a good contract with a 'reliable' firm in the States wanting to be supplied with handknits, though shipping costs were triple what they'd been three years ago. I still had that feeling of disorientation you get when you realise that life has continued in its usual merry pace despite your absence.
She didn't, however, spend the final night at my house but, after dinner, packed her things with such alacrity that I suspected she had a boyfriend again. She insisted house and Baggins had been no trouble, she'd do it again, so long as I continued to provide her with body shirts.
I don't get as de-synchronised travelling east as I do going west. I had no trouble getting to sleep that night.
The next morning I struck off in my usual routine, rising at eight to let my eager Baggins out for his morning tour of duty and inspection. I had one cup of coffee waiting for the mail, another reading the Alumnae Bulletin, the sole piece of morning mail. I dutifully went upstairs to write thank-you notes for hospitality but here the routine dribbled away.
As I stared out the mountain window, I had to admit to myself that routine was not going to suffice me. Distance had not ended my attachment to Dan-the-Man. Had our romantic interlude ended after that snowstorm, I think I could have talked myself out of the infatuation. But I'd had to go to his rescue and when you put yourself on the line for someone, like the Chinese adage, you become irretrievably involved. I hadn't saved Dan's life as had been claimed but I had saved him from the ignominy of standing trial and a possible twenty year sentence for manslaughter. Okay, to split a semantic hair, I suppose I had saved him the better part of his active life. He'd have been 60-ish when he got out - if they'd been able to make that asinine charge stick. I found myself wishing the bondage were more than Chinesely proverbial but I had also done my living best to keep it nebulous. I pondered now on the folly of sending him that sweater. But the deed was done and couldn't be undone, excepting postal inefficiencies. I was glad I had done it, and told myself to expect nothing in return for the gesture. Such ruminations were not making bread and butter come in, nor writing those thank-yous.
My mother, bless her heart, had a thing about discipline: you disciplined your mind and your body, and I always flung back at her, your heart. That wasn't precisely true, or fair. And I only learned what she meant during Ray's illness. Particularly about disciplining the heart - in my case, not to break while I watched him waste away and die.
So I set about exercising discipline. I tried not to see resemblances to Dan in strangers who just happened to have silvery hair and bushy moustaches, were the same height and general build. I succeeded in that endeavour in the next few weeks. What I couldn't succeed in bending to my will was my memory of smell, curiously enough. It seemed to me that in the April crispness of County Wicklow I could scent the Denver air, crisp with snow and cold and pine, mingled with those indefinably evocative scents of ironed cotton, maleness and aftershave lotion. I was also physically ill with wanting to feel his hands on me, his lips on mine, the prickle of his moustache against my nose and lips, the water smoothness of his flesh against mine. I bloody woke up a couple of nights whimpering in my sleep for that reassurance. And wished him the same sort of frustration, damning his luck that, as a man, he had more chance of easing his condition than I.
Some of my frustration also stemmed from the realisation that Tim had found himself a female companion. Not usurping my place in his affections. God forbid, but Tim maturing enough to stretch past our rewarding relationship to attach himself to a nubile female. I have never been a possessive or clinging female. I wouldn't start now, if I had to tie mental and literal hands behind my back and gag my mouth. I wanted for Tim what Ray and I had enjoyed before he got sick. My respect, admiration and deep love for Raymond Lovell had sustained me through the adjustment after his death and my loneliness while Tim was growing up. But I saw more loneliness ahead of me as Tim graduated from the position of 'man in my life.' Trish was helping to write on that particular wall in my emotional life and I'd better start planning ahead.
I don't like solitary living. I had had to discipline myself to accept Tim's departure to University but I could look forward to his summer return. I would have less of his time this year, and, God willing, still less of it from now on. Which was as it should be, but what did I do with the emptiness his going left? I thought of Beth, with Sam and Linda producing a grandchild to fill her lonely hours. I never had been especially maternaclass="underline" Tim and I were more friends, than son and mother. That flexibility would be a help but… there ain't no all night TV in Ireland. Discipline included occupation, and while I didn't wear a hair shirt, I knitted hairy Arrans. I finished a size 42 sweater, which usually takes a good fortnight, in less than nine days.
Mairead had also made herself scarce in my company: at first I thought she'd had enough of the lodge. Then I began to worry if I'd said something that had irritated her. She took umbrage at the most unlikely things. I finally realised that she must be in the throes of a new love affair and I'd better discipline myself out of such subjective whimsies.