‘Family dos,’ Raymond said, shaking his head. ‘It’s bad enough when it’s your own family; when it’s someone else’s …’
I looked around. I had no prior experience of such events, and the main thing that struck me was disparity; age range, social class, and the sartorial choices made by the guests.
‘You can choose your friends …’ Raymond said, toasting me with his pint glass.
‘But you can’t choose your family!’ I replied, delighted to be in a position to complete the well-known phrase. It was only a quick crossword clue, not a cryptic one, but still.
‘This is exactly like my dad’s fiftieth, Mum’s sixtieth, my sister’s wedding,’ Raymond said. ‘A shite DJ, overexcited kids high on sugar, people who haven’t seen each other for years catching up and pretending they like each other. Bet you anything there’ll be a buffet with vol-au-vents, and a fight in the car park at closing time.’
I was intrigued.
‘But surely it must be fun?’ I said. ‘Catching up with family? All those people, pleased to see you, interested in your life?’ He looked at me carefully.
‘D’you know what, Eleanor? It is. I’m just being a grumpy bastard – sorry.’ He finished his pint. ‘Same again?’ he said. I nodded, and then remembered.
‘No, no, it’s my turn,’ I said. ‘Will you have the same again?’
He smiled.
‘That’d be great. Thanks, Eleanor.’
I picked up my shopper and made my way to the bar. I caught Sammy’s eye en route – he was sitting in an armchair surrounded by friends and family members, as usual. I went over.
‘Eleanor, love!’ he said. ‘How are you? Great party, eh?’
I nodded.
‘I can’t believe my wee boy’s forty. It seems like yesterday he was off to school for his first day. You should see the photo – he’s got no front teeth, the wee scamp! And look at him now.’
He pointed across the room to where Keith was standing with his wife, their arms round one another’s waists, laughing at something an older man was saying.
‘That’s all you ever want for your kids: for them to be happy. I just wish my Jean was here to see it …’
I pondered this. Was that what people wanted for their children, for them to be happy? It certainly sounded plausible. I asked Sammy if I could purchase a drink for him, although he did, to my inexpert eye, already seem somewhat intoxicated.
‘You’re fine, hen,’ he said, ‘I’ve already got these waiting for me!’
The table was covered with short glasses of amber liquid. I said I’d see him again later and went to the bar.
There was quite a queue, but I was enjoying the atmosphere. Blessed relief – the DJ was taking a break, and I could see him over in the corner, swigging from a can and talking morosely into his mobile telephone. There was a background hum of noise, male and female voices, and a lot of laughter. The children seemed to have multiplied, and had gravitated towards one another in order to form a merry band of mischief makers. It was clear that the adults were all occupied with the party, so they could run and whoop and chase each other with unsupervised abandon. I smiled at them, envied them slightly.
All of the people in the room seemed to take so much for granted: that they would be invited to social events, that they would have friends and family to talk to, that they would fall in love, be loved in return, perhaps create a family of their own. How would I celebrate my own fortieth birthday, I wondered. I hoped I would have people in my life to mark the occasion with me when the time came. Perhaps the musician, the light of my new life? One thing was certain, however: I would not, under any circumstances, be celebrating in a golf club.
When I returned to our table, it was empty. I put Raymond’s pint down and sipped my Magners. I supposed he’d found someone more interesting to talk to. I sat and watched the dancing – the DJ was back behind the decks, and had selected a cacophonous racket from a silver box of records, something about a man after midnight. I allowed my mind to wander. I’ve found this to be a very effective way of passing the time; you take a situation or a person and start to imagine nice things that might happen. You can make anything happen, anything at all, inside a daydream.
I felt a hand on my shoulder and jumped.
‘Sorry,’ Raymond said. ‘I nipped to the gents, got talking to someone on the way back.’
I felt the heat where his hand had been; it was only a moment, but it left a warm imprint, almost as though it might be visible. A human hand was exactly the right weight, exactly the right temperature for touching another person, I realized. I’d shaken hands a fair bit over the years – more so recently – but I hadn’t been touched in a lifetime.
Of course, Declan and I had had regular sexual intercourse, whenever he wanted to, but he never really touched me. He made me touch him, told me how and when and where, and I did so. I had no choice in the matter, but I remembered feeling like another person at those times, like it wasn’t my hand, like it wasn’t my body. It was simply a case of waiting for it to be over. I was thirty years old, I realized, and I had never walked hand in hand with anyone. No one had ever rubbed my tired shoulders, or stroked my face. I imagined a man putting his arms around me and holding me close when I was sad or tired or upset; the warmth of it, the weight of it.
‘Eleanor?’ Raymond said.
‘Sorry, I was miles away,’ I said, sipping my Magners.
‘Seems to be going well,’ he said, gesturing around the room. I nodded.
‘I was chatting to Sammy’s other son, Gary, and his girlfriend,’ he said. ‘They’re a good laugh.’
I looked around again. What would it be like in future, going to events like this on the arm of the musician? He’d make sure I was comfortable, dance with me if I wanted to (unlikely), make friends with the other guests. And then, at the end of the evening, we’d slip away together, home, to nest like turtle doves.
‘We seem to be the only people here who aren’t part of a couple,’ I told him, having observed the other guests.
He screwed up his face. ‘Aye – listen, thanks for coming with me. It’s shite going to stuff like this on your own, isn’t it?’
‘Is it?’ I said, interested. ‘I don’t have a control situation to compare it with.’
He looked at me. ‘You’ve always been on your own, then?’ he said. ‘You mentioned that guy last week, the one that …’ I saw him reach for words, ‘the one that you were with when you were at uni?’
‘As you know, I was with Declan for a couple of years,’ I said. ‘And you also know how that turned out.’ More Magners. ‘You get used to being on your own,’ I said. ‘Actually, it really is much better than being punched in the face or raped.’
Raymond choked on his pint, and took a moment to recover himself. He spoke very gently.
‘You do realize, Eleanor, that those are not your only options, don’t you? Not all men are like Declan, you know.’
‘I do know!’ I said, brightly. ‘I’ve met one!’
In my mind’s eye, I saw the musician bringing me freesias, kissing the nape of my neck. Raymond looked uncomfortable, for some reason.
‘I’ll just nip to the bar,’ he said. ‘You still on the Magners?’ I felt strange, stirred up. ‘I’ll have a vodka with cola, please,’ I said, knowing from experience that vodka would be good for whatever ailed me. I watched Raymond shuffle off. If he would only stand up straight, and shave! He needed to buy some nice shirts and some proper shoes, and read a book or two instead of playing computer games. How could he ever hope to find a nice girl otherwise?
Keith came up to the table and thanked me for coming. I gave him his birthday present, which he seemed to find genuinely surprising. He looked at each item in turn with an expression that I found hard to read, but I quickly eliminated ‘boredom’ and ‘indifference’. I felt happy; it was a nice feeling, giving someone a gift, the kind of unique, thoughtful present that he wouldn’t have received from anyone else. He put the carrier bag on a nearby table.