Anyone for Me? Page 2

  “How are we getting on now?” The saccharine shop assistant had tentatively reappeared.

  “We’re getting along just fine,” I answered. “Just leaving.”

  “But you’ve only tried on one dress,” she said in confusion.

  “And you are still in possession of your good looks so be very grateful,” I answered whilst staring menacingly at her.

  It was the month of June and my wedding was still eleven months away. I couldn’t understand what all the panic was about. Preparation and organisation were not my strong points anyway and I especially hated anything that involved too much fuss. To date, the only other arrangements that had been made for the wedding were the booking of the chapel and the reception venue. But there was plenty of time to do the rest, surely? We had decided to have our meal and party in the Swiftstown Arms. It was our local hotel and probably wouldn’t have been everyone’s first choice but it satisfied me. The food was nice and I knew the manager well and it was handy to home which meant that after my big day was complete I could be carried over the threshold and into my own bed. We were hoping to go on a honeymoon but (you’ve guessed it) nothing had been put in place as of yet. Maybe we’d get a last-minute deal.

  Three exasperating hours, two more bridal shops, more hideous dresses and one measly cup of coffee later and we were no further forward, aside from the fact that I now hated everyone who was employed in the bridal fashion industry. They were all horrible, mean people who acted like your body was an extension of their own, which meant that they could poke and prod you at will. They were also rather suspicious and hostile towards you when you first entered their sacred domains.

  “Were you looking for anything in particular?”

  “Well, as I’m in a fecking wedding-dress shop I think it’s fairly obvious what I want, don’t you?”

  I had to be escorted out of that one by the ear after the assistant wouldn’t let me try on a particular dress as she thought it was beyond my price range. Cheeky cow. (Big mistake. Huge. The saleswomen in Pretty Woman weren’t the only snobby cows in town!)

  I looked sideways at Frankie who at this stage looked like she was sucking a pickled lemon.

  “Frankie.”

  “Yes, Ruby.”

  “Are you annoyed with me?”

  “Me annoyed with you? And why would I be annoyed with you, Ruby Ross?” she said in a low growl. “We’ve had a wonderfully exhausting day of insults, sarcasm, endless complaining and still no bloody dress. Honestly, if I had known it was going to be this tough, I would have suggested that you go to a dressmaker and get it made to your precise instructions in the first place.”

  That was a light-bulb moment for us both as we suddenly realised that Frankie had stumbled upon the answer to all our problems.

  “Brilliant!” I said in delight.

  “So what do you want?”

  “A dress that doesn’t make me look like a moron would be a good start. No frills, no ponce, no mad heavy nets that you would need legs like a heifer to carry, no ten thousand jaggy sequins that itch the crap out of you and no ten-foot-long train for every eejit to stand on whilst your boobs pop out the other end from the strain.”

  “A bin-liner.”

  “Pardon?”

  “I was just thinking out loud, Ruby. Why don’t we fashion you a dress out of a bin-bag?”

  “Ha ha.”

  “What exactly is there left?” Frankie threw her hands up in aggravation and annoyance.

  “A good dressmaker will take one look at me and know exactly what I need.”

  I thought I heard my best friend and future bridesmaid mutter something about eye-poking and sharp sticks but I could have been mistaken.

  “How’d you get on?” Luke asked when I eventually arrived home that evening empty-handed apart from a family bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken and a box of beer which I intended to scoff with urgent immediacy. (Comfort food, as I felt victimised.)

  I tapped the side of my nose and tried to look mysterious as I watched him transfer photographs he had taken that day from a memory card onto his computer, where he would spend the rest of the evening working on them.

  “You didn’t get anything, did you?”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “I met Frankie at the shop earlier and she told me that if I had any sense I’d get you a wedding planner as a present as nothing would be organised otherwise.”

  “Okay, so I didn’t get a dress but it’s no big deal. I’ll just get one made instead.”

  Luke gave me his one-eyebrow-raised look and then kissed me tenderly on the nose. I ruffled his dark hair and put my arms around his neck, looked into his face which I found highly attractive as he had a gorgeous smile and expressive blue eyes which were surrounded by faint lines (created by constantly laughing at me as opposed to with me).

  “I don’t care if you turn up in a bin-liner, honey,” he said. “I’ll marry you anyway.”

  “Hmmm . . . funny you should say that.”

  Chapter 2

  I went to work the following day as normal and was delighted by the sight of my untidy desk which made Frankie hyperventilate every time she looked at it – she had a clear case of obsessive-compulsive disorder that hadn’t been properly diagnosed yet. It was stacked with papers (I could no longer see my ‘in’ or ‘out’ trays), had pens and other stationery scattered indiscriminately over it as well as editions of the Yellow Pages dating back to the caveman era. I viewed it as my sanctuary (a place where I was safe from demonic shop assistants and even scarier friends). My habitual doodles were also dotted around the area.

  I had worked in Redmond College for nearly eleven years as a Placement Officer which required me to put our students into the industry in which they wished to pursue a career. I loved my job (mostly because I could continue to act like an eternal student myself and also because they invited me on all their beer-and-kebab-fuelled nights out which were much more appealing than anything the staff had to offer). I had recently been given my own office which totally exasperated Frankie as she thought the perk was completely wasted on me. In truth I would probably leave it looking in the same state as my home (which would be Kim and Aggie’s worst nightmare if Luke wasn’t a dab hand with a duster). It wasn’t that the house was dirty or that I didn’t have personal hygiene standards, it was just that I thought life was too short to try and constantly emulate Mrs Mop, so I employed the philosophy that I’d let it get really mucky and then do all the chores at once.

  “Good morning,” Frankie said as she appeared, looking her usual spruce self.

  “Please don’t mention the word ‘shopping’. This is a wedding-discussion free zone as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Would I?” Frankie said with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “I tell you what – I’ll make a deal with you.”

  I hated deals as they usually required me to agree with something I clearly disagreed with just to keep the other party happy.

  “Pick a wedding-dress designer who we’ll go and visit next week and then I promise I will act as if you’re still single and spinsterhood, faded jeans and Doc Martens are the order of the day.”

  “Designer?” I said, feeling distinctly unimpressed at the thought.

  “Dressmaker then,” Frankie said, sensing my disgruntlement.

  She looked so optimistic and hopeful that I didn’t have the heart to burst her bubble. I knew that even if I wasn’t prone to getting excited about such occasions, Frankie was, and the thought of wearing a bridesmaid’s dress filled her with joy. Also, my little goddaughter Carly was going to be my flower girl and I could hardly make her wear dungarees (or could I?).

  I reached across and lifted the most up-to-date Yellow Pages, opened it at the appropriate page and proceeded to do what I did every time I needed to pick a name and didn’t know where to start.

  “Please tell me you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do,” Frankie said from behind her hand as she cringed and made fac
es.

  “Frankie, do you want me to do this or not?”

  “Ruby, you are the only person in the world who would pick the future maker of their wedding gown by closing their eyes and stabbing a list of phone numbers with a finger!”

  I opened one eye, closed it again and pointed downwards.

  “‘Rose Malone. Dressmaker specialising in Bridal and Fine Evening Wear.’ There you go. Go away and leave me to my Doc Martens.”

  Frankie spluttered and came over for a closer look.

  “Ruby, she’s based in some back street in Belfast! I have a bad feeling about this.” She picked up one of my doodles and waved it at me in a desperate fashion. “You could design your own dress. Why don’t you give it a go and then we’ll have another look for a designer – dressmaker, I mean. I shouldn’t have rushed you into this.”

  “I draw people and pieces of scenery, Frankie. Donatella Versace needn’t start shaking in her designer boots yet. The Finger of Fate has spoken. Now get lost and go and annoy somebody else.”

  Frankie raised her eyes to heaven and sighed. She knew when she was beaten.

  “Ruby, you are the most irritating person in the world but I still love you.” With that she plopped a kiss on my forehead and walked out the door.

  I stared after her fondly and thought back to when we first met. We had started working in a local recruitment agency on the same day thirteen years ago and had regarded each other with distaste for the first six months or at least until we had got to know each other a bit better. (In other words when I stopped thinking she was a blonde airhead and she had ceased believing I was a psychopath. Me? As if?) At that stage Frankie was married to Tony – please let it be noted that I have a dartboard with the weasel’s much-punctured picture on it. Of course, things aren’t as bad as they used to be as he now sees his children a couple of times a week and thankfully bestows his attentions on another gullible female. He treated Frankie really badly and left her high and dry for an American stick-insect called Stella when Ben was five and Carly was two. Things were horrible for a long time. Frankie lost lots of weight and hardly ever smiled but gradually things improved, especially when she met Owen (I introduced them – move over, Cilla, there ain’t room for the two of us). Owen is the loveliest man on earth (apart from my Luke, of course . . . I am occasionally sentimental . . . just don’t tell anybody). He treats her well, is a wonderful father to all the children, including Angelica (his sometimes wayward teenage daughter) and Baby Jack (their joint effort) as well as Ben and Carly. You can just see when you look at the two of them that they love each other completely (it would make you barf really). I couldn’t think of anyone I would rather have accompanying me down the aisle but I also knew that she would have me looking like the proverbial blushing bride and dressed like a blancmange on the day. Somebody save me, please, I prayed.

  “Ruby,” Mr Reid, the college principal, had come into my office clutching a piece of paper and looking thoughtful, “I need to see you for your ten-year review at some stage this month. They’ve introduced a new policy which says that you have to go for a medical as well, so make an appointment as soon as you can.”

  I groaned. If there was anything I hated more than wedding-dress shopping (and there wasn’t much, I can assure you) it was going to the doctor’s. Nosy feckers that again loved to violate your person by shoving you around and asking intrusive questions, most of which I didn’t know the answer to. Questions about family history were a constant source of aggravation for me and were always answered with the tick-box: don’t know.

  You may be wondering why I couldn’t comment on my heritage or give information about my family’s proneness to various health complaints. It’s not because I wasn’t interested or that I never bothered finding out – it was a lot simpler actually. I didn’t know because I’m adopted.

  I knew I might find out some useful information one day, though, and once I’d eliminated breast and bowel cancer, heart disease, diabetes and epilepsy, I was then going to ask the questions that had been bugging me for years. Who the hell was responsible for my greasy skin, why was my arse so big and worst of all whose wonky genes held the key to the most annoying, unmanageable reddest hair in the country?

  I had always known that I was adopted. My daddy used to bounce me on his knee when I was little and tell me about how special I was and how long they had waited for me (personally I would have been looking for a refund once I hit puberty but that’s a whole other story).

  It used to crack me up when people commented that I looked like either of my parents but they soon shut their mouths when I enquired if they were being accompanied by a Labrador or were in need of a white stick. Honestly, I couldn’t have been more different if I had tried. I have short sticky-outy mad red hair (which as I’m sure you’ve guessed will be mentioned a lot), am of average height, have hazel eyes and I suppose am quite striking in a weird sort of way. Frankie thinks I’m very attractive (her words not mine) and always comments that people give hairdressers hundreds of pounds to have my colouring but I’m not sold on the idea. I try to adhere to the philosophy that you have to make the best of what you’re given but often feel I’ve been short-changed.

  I felt a slight lump forming in my throat which always happened when I thought of my parents, my father in particular. My precious daddy died a few weeks after my eighteenth birthday and I can say that that was the day my heart broke in two. I loved my father dearly, idolised him completely and viewed him as a great friend. As a tomboy through and through, I had grown up in my father’s shadow and loved watching football and boxing matches with him and talking about everything and anything and took his opinions very seriously (which wasn’t easy for someone as strong-willed and stubborn as me).

  He was only fifty-seven when my mother tried to get in our front door one evening and found that she couldn’t get it opened properly. He was slumped behind it with his mouth contorted to one side. They said that he’d had a massive stroke and that it was a clot in his brain that had killed him. My mother was completely devastated but being the positive person that she is, she threw herself into her work as a cook in the local school until she had a nervous breakdown and was told she needed a break. It just so happened that at that time my great-aunt died and left Mammy some property in Donegal. So the suggestion of a break became a reality and she now lived there quite happily and ran her own home country store which provided the locals with home-made jam, chutneys, freshly baked bread and meat pies.

  I hadn’t actually visited my mother for a while but it was on my list of ‘things to do’ within the next few weeks as I didn’t want to leave her out of the wedding arrangements (I’d gladly have handed them over if I had the choice and if Frankie had stopped calling me a wuss). I closed my eyes and let my mind drift to my mother’s little cottage by the sea and suddenly the idea started to appeal to me very much. A few days of peace, quiet and home cooking sounded like a good plan and with that I lifted the phone, dialled the number and prepared to be interrogated for the next twenty minutes as to how I was looking after myself.

  Chapter 3

  “Sweet Jesus, you’d think they’d get these roads fixed,” breathed Luke in annoyance as my beat-up Renault Clio slid into yet another pothole. Luke also possessed a set of wheels – commonly referred to as ‘the good car’ – so needless to say it was safely at home. When you come from the North of Ireland, the best way of knowing that you’ve crossed the border (aside from the signs written in Irish and the mad currency) is the way you no longer glide on tar but instead slip into moon-sized craters in the road. (Slight exaggeration but I do value the suspension in my car, such as it is.)

  Some counties are famous for their football teams or their great landmarks or shopping attractions. Donegal, however, is most renowned for its breathtaking scenic beauty and the god-awful state of its feckin roads which must keep Kwik Fit in work all year round.

  We were en route to spend the weekend with my mother and I was viewing the tri
p with both trepidation and excitement. I was always nervous about visiting Mammy, mostly because our time together was too short and I hated leaving her again, although having a mother on the other side of a land border can be useful sometimes. Poor Frankie would cheerfully put an entire body of water between her mother and herself, so fractious is their relationship, but for me the old saying must be true – that absence makes the heart grow fonder.

  Smugglers’ Bay was not a big place. It was hard to ascertain whether the title of ‘village’ could be applied to it or not. The main focal point of the area, apart from its beautiful scenery and sea inlets, was a little square which was bounded by a pub called the Smugglers’ Inn, the local post office, a little grocer’s shop and another establishment that sold fishing equipment and anything else that the proprietor could get his hands on, it would seem. Wellington boots were strung up at the door by a piece of string and buckets and spades were sold in net wrapping. Wall pictures, tools, luminous workmen’s jackets, fishing tackle and dinner sets had all been placed in the window and made a most peculiar display.

  “Let’s go and have a look in the shop that sells everything in the world,” I said. I had looked through the window several times on past visits but had never actually ventured inside and curiosity had got the better of me. “I’m sure I’ll be able to get Mammy a treat for her sitting room in there.”

  “Your mother has enough ornaments gathering dust,” Luke complained. “She’ll just be happy to see you.”