Page 18 of Prudence
The excuse I gave Derek as to why I couldn’t be his girlfriend was eating me up inside. It only half the reason I’d refused him. The other half was, sadly, because of my aunt. I’d looked up to her my entire life. She was the one who always came to help when my parents had dug themselves into a financial hole and needed money to bail them out. If it weren’t for Aunt Nell, I’d spend all my time worrying about my family and zero time focusing on my own life.
She’d seemed so disturbed by the idea of Derek being my boyfriend, her expression almost haunted, and that was why I just couldn’t do it, no matter how much I wanted him. I couldn’t date the son of the man who’d put her through hell. I already felt guilty enough about being friends with him and his sister. Some days I thought that it might even be worse developing friendships with them, especially because of how close I’d gotten to Nuala. She was just such a bright, bubbly person, and I found it impossible not to want to spend time with her.
It turned out that she’d been dealing with a toxic friend group at school and had been on her own for months before her cousin, Charli, came to visit and kept her company for the summer. By the time school started back up, Nuala and I were inseparable. She ate lunch with me, Tara and Celine almost every day, leaving her old friend group behind and fully becoming the newest member of our little trio. It also turned out that Nuala and Tara were second cousins, so they knew one another from childhood.
That was the thing about living in a relatively small Irish town, a lot of people were distantly related in some way.
My friendship with Derek was much more of a struggle. Over the weeks, my feelings for him grew ever more intense. My attraction, too. He went out of his way to spend time with me, behaving like a perfect gentleman all the while. Well, aside from the times when he decided to flirt with me by telling me how pretty I was or how sexy he found me. He’d look at me all intense like he wanted to kiss me, and it took everything I had to resist.
We had a standing arrangement to swim laps together at his dad’s hotel every Sunday evening. Afterward, he’d drive us to get fish and chips, and we’d park by the beach, sitting in his car and watching the waves crash against the shore. Then on Monday, he’d have college, and I’d have school, so we wouldn’t see much of each other until the weekend.
Aunt Nell was aware of my friendship with both Derek and Nuala, and though she didn’t exactly approve, she also didn’t try to guilt me into dropping them.
“Just so long as you don’t get romantically involved with the boy,” she said. “Falling for someone, especially a Balfe, at your age only ever leads to trouble.”
So, I’d lied to my aunt, telling her there was nothing more than friendship between us even though every time I was around Derek I felt like I was dying inside little by little. I yearned for him to kiss me like he’d done in the closet at his house that night, the two of us trapped alone in the dark. Sometimes I felt a burning energy from him, like he wanted me just as badly, but he never made a move. I’d never experienced a more conflicted mixture of relief and disappointment than when Derek looked like he might smash his mouth to mine but did nothing.
As the weeks ticked by, turning to months, exam time came ever closer, and so my stress levels rose exponentially. When that happened, Derek was always there to take me for a swimor an evening drive or even an impromptu tennis match. He was adept at distracting me from my academic stress, and I felt myself falling deeper into a pit of despair because I was hopelessly in love with him, but I could never have him.
At long last, exam time arrived. I managed to get through the absolute hell of it and come out the other end relatively unscathed. I felt like it had gone well, and I just had to wait until my results came out at the end of summer so I could know for sure if I’d gotten into my chosen course. Aunt Nell paid for my entire family to spend a month at her villa in Spain, and though I enjoyed the break away from normality, I also missed Derek like crazy. But he was working at his dad’s hotel in the city for the summer, learning the ropes, so it wasn’t like he’d have much time for me anyway.
I arrived home two days before the exam results would be released, sun tanned and eager to see Derek. His texts hadn’t been very plentiful, and I feared he’d found a girlfriend and forgotten about me. On the day the results came out, Nuala, Tara, Celine and I all planned on going into the city to celebrate. All four of us were now over eighteen, so we could go to a bar or a club, something we hadn’t done before. To be honest, I was far too focused on getting my results and hadn’t really given much thought to the celebration afterwards.
Mam, Dad and Aunt Nell came with me to the school, where an administrator handed me an envelope. We stood huddled together in the school corridor as I eagerly tore it open before my eyes frantically scanned the contents.
In an instant, everything inside me deflated. I read and re-read the results, hoping the numbers and letters on the page would change, shift into something resembling what I’d been hoping for. My stomach pitched violently when they remained the same, the paper shaking in my hands. It was the oddestfeeling, but it felt like my heart was breaking. So much work and sacrifice, and all for nothing.
I couldn’t believe it.
By any standards, I’d gotten stellar results, but I was a measly ten points short of the predicted requirement for medicine. I felt like I was floating in a sea of disappointment. Self-recrimination reared its head. If only I’d studied that little bit harder, put in a fraction more effort.
All my plans were ruined, just like that.
My parents and aunt chattered around me, but I barely heard them. My ears caught fractions of sentences like, “could repeat next year” or “maybe study nursing instead,” but my brain wasn’t fully comprehending anything right then. By the time I started thinking relatively clearly, we were back at my house, and Mam had placed a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits in front of me as I sat at the kitchen table across from my aunt. Dad had retreated upstairs, as was his habit whenever something stressful was happening.
“I’ve been considering this as an eventuality, Milly,” Aunt Nell said. “The points system can be so fickle, you know? I even mentioned it to Edward.”
Edward was Aunt Milly’s second husband, and as far as I knew, they were still on good terms. Husbands number one and three were the ones who were dead to her. Edward was a surgeon at Great Ormond Street Hospital, where he performed lifesaving operations on children. Of all her marriages, it was a pity things hadn’t worked out with Edward, but both he and Nell were career people. Everything else came second, even spouses.
“And what did he have to say?” Mam asked as she came around the table holding a cup of tea.
“Well, he mentioned a preparatory course that Milly could complete in London before applying to study medicine in the UK.” Aunt Nell met my gaze. “There are many moreopportunities over there, not only for completing your training but also for when you graduate and start looking for a job. I’d be willing to pay for the preparatory course, as well as the eventual degree, and you could live in my penthouse, which is empty half of the year anyway. It’s an option to consider.”
Just like that, my out-of-body feeling of failure dissolved as a little hope filtered back in. “You’d do that for me?” I asked in disbelief.
“You’re my niece and goddaughter, Milly. Of course, I would. I’d do anything to help you achieve your dream.”
At this, Mam began to well up, and I wasn’t far behind her. Happy tears trickled down my cheeks as I stood and went to throw my arms around my aunt, hugging her tight. Sure, I could’ve stayed home and repeated my Leaving Cert in the vain hope I might achieve enough points next time around, or I could go to London and actually start studying to become a doctor for real.
“Thank you. You have no idea what this means to me,” I gushed as she returned my hug with a big squeeze.
***
Later on, I was in a much better mood as I got ready for my night of celebrations with my friends. I never normally went out and usually hated this sort of thing, but after the day I’d had, not to mention an entire year of studying, I felt an unusual urge to let loose. Forget my social anxieties and just enjoy my time with my friends for a night. Everyone was meeting at Tara’s house, which was closest to the train station, and then we’d take the train into the city.
I wore a tight, dark blue dress that was a little outside of my comfort zone, but I wanted to show off my holiday tan. I’d gone shopping with Nuala, and she’d convinced me it was “the one.” A while back, we’d developed this little joke that if we could justfind the perfect dress, we’d be able to seduce the boy of our dreams. She had no idea the boy of my dreams was her brother.
Sometimes I’d think of Derek and how he often looked at me and wonder if I even needed to look sexy to seduce him. Those looks, so heated and intense, made it seem like I could be wearing a bin liner paired with ratty, just woken up hair, and the liquid fire intensity in his eyes would remain.
