Page 16 of One More Day
‘Ah, you’re killing me.’
‘The garden has the daintiest little pink stone pathway up to the red front door, covered in snow for now, of course, and there’s even a thatched roof. There is no sound, except for the hoot of an owl and the gentle rush of the distant seascape which you can see from the front door.’
I feel a tear trickle down my face.
‘Wow!’
‘Everything is going exactly according to plan,’ I lie. ‘Now, get back to work, sunshine. I came here for peace and quiet, not to hear about the Rainey account, no offence.’
‘Says the lady who brought her laptop?’
‘I did. What can I say? I might need to check in for my own sanity before you all shut off for the holidays.’
‘Oh, before I go, Maeve and Yvonne have been quizzing me as to where you’ve gone. And I ran into your other friend,Sophie, at the bank of all places and she was saying she’d pop round to see you. They’re not being nosey, just concerned. What should I tell them?’
‘Tell them I’ve run away with Bradley Cooper.’
‘Again? Didn’t you say that last year when you pulled the curtains and pretended you didn’t get their texts over Christmas?’
‘Possibly. Ah, I don’t know what to tell them, Carlos. They know me by now. Just tell them I’m off home and I’ll text them when I can.’
‘OK, OK, just double-checking the script,’ he says. ‘We all love you, you know that?’
‘I know you do,’ I whisper, feeling tears sting my eyes.
‘And I wish I could teleport to that Donegal hideaway and give you a big Carlos snuggle. But you’re going to have a wonderful time. I can feel it in my bones.’
The only thing I can feel in my bones right now is the bitter cold, but I can’t tell him that.
He makes another joke then hangs up, leaving the sound of the squeaking wipers and George’s impatient panting my only company.
I put my head in my hands on the steering wheel, before letting out a stifled scream, wishing that all I had told him was indeed true. My car is facing in the direction south to Dublin, the snow is getting thicker on the ground, yet I’ve no idea really where I’m going. I can’t bear the thought of my own usual surroundings at Christmas back in my nice townhouse, with my cosy lifestyle and my empty heart.
I reach my hand down with my head still touching the steering wheel and blindly turn the ignition to start the car to make my way home to the grey, miserable, sleety city rain, but then I sit up quickly when the car chugs and spits a little, just as it did when I was leaving the cottage earlier.
‘Please, no.’
Then it cuts out with a splutter, just as it did at the cottage earlier too.
I try again and it does the same. First a chug, then a spit, then a splutter, then out. My palms sweat even though I’m beginning to shiver with the cold from outside. I can see my own breath. I say a prayer. A real prayer and not a made-up one, which confirms I’m truly beginning to panic inside.
‘Third time lucky?’ I say to George, who lets out a groan in an unconvincing vote of confidence. ‘Don’t panic, it’s fine.’
And so I turn the key again, but this time there isn’t so much as a whimper or a cough never mind a splutter from the engine.
This time there’s nothing. I try again, and again, and again. But nothing.
Just silence. Then a scrape that sounds painful.
Ouch.
‘Is this some sick joke?’ I whisper, gripping the steering wheel. A blanket of snow clouds over the windscreen now that the wipers have screeched to a halt after a false start. I stamp my feet, both in bad temper and to try to warm them up. ‘Give me a break, karma, please, I’m begging you. I get it. I don’t belong here. I don’t deserve the comfort of the cottage.I shouldn’t have come near Donegal at Christmas, but please just let me get home, wherever the hell that is these days.’
I try once more but the car just squeals as if it’s angry at me too.
‘Eugh.’
I pull my coat from the backseat and climb outside into the flurry of snow that is no longer picturesque but is now instead a proper pain in the ass. A thick puff of smoke greets me when I lift the car’s bonnet, stinging my eyes for good measure, and the engine is roasting hot even though I’d only been driving a few minutes before Carlos called me.
