But Paddy knew Mary Ann would love Taizi. She’d like the discipline of prayer and the ecumenical nature of the place. She wouldn’t be sharing a room with someone who bared her breasts and swore while she prayed. Paddy would miss her silent presence, her giggling, and the sound of her breath as she slept. She’d never felt the same about her brothers or Caroline. Mary Ann was exclusively hers. She thought of Kate and Vhari, two sisters, the older one compliant, the younger a defiant little spitfire who brought ruin on the others.

“How’s Caroline?”

Trisha tutted and sighed.

“Not gone back to him?”

She tutted again.

“Maybe she shouldn’t, Ma.”

“Well, she shouldn’t have got married, then.”

Paddy nibbled a coconut biscuit. “The story we’re working on: the police went to the door of a house and saw a girl covered in blood but they left and the man killed her. They thought it was her husband. John must have beat Caroline something awful-”

“She should not have married him, then,” said Trisha firmly.

“But, Mum, she did.”

“For better or worse.”

Paddy picked up a chip and took a bite. “What if he kills her, Ma? What if you send her back and he kills her?”

Trisha slapped Paddy on the thigh. “Don’t talk rubbish.”

“Seriously, what if he murders Caroline? How bad are you going to feel if he does that?”

Trisha turned to look her in the eye. “It’s a sacrament, Patricia, a vow in front of God. Ye can’t just change your mind and leave. You and your women’s lib.”

“Oh, God, Mother, don’t start all that-”

“Well.” Trisha put her cup down noisily in the saucer. “You’ve missed your chance with Sean over a job, a job, for heaven’s sake, and now he’ll be married soon and he’s got a good job and could have kept ye fine.”

Paddy was so surprised she dropped the half-eaten chip onto the floor. “What do you mean ‘be married soon’?”

“He proposed to Elaine, did he not tell ye? The minute he got that driving job he proposed and she’s accepted. Mimi Ogilvy’s taken up residence outside the chapel telling everyone. Did he not say?”

“No.” She tried to hide her disappointment. “He never said.”

Elaine was a squeaky mediocre pest but Paddy could hardly blame Sean. Since she broke off their engagement she’d slept with three men and knew Sean was waiting until he got married. He must have been as horny as hell. She knew how much that could warp her own judgment. Mary Ann was leaving and now Sean wasn’t hers anymore. For the first time ever she saw herself as alone.

“Who are you going to get now?”

“I’m only twenty-one, Mother, there are other men in the world.”

“Aye, we’ll see, anyway.”

They finished their tea but Paddy left the rest of the chips untouched.

At the door of the hotel she took the plastic bags from Trisha and felt she was leaving her forever. She followed her down into the street, running after her.

“Ma!”

Trisha turned and Paddy threw her arms around her, hugging her hard even though Trisha stood stiff in her arms. Tiredness and nausea overwhelmed her and she pressed her face into her mum’s shoulder, eyes flooding onto Trisha’s neck.

Reluctantly, Trisha lifted her arms around her daughter and whispered into her hair to hush. A bus rumbled past and the cold wind sweeping across the square skirled around them.

“I’m sorry, Mum. I’m sorry I’m not what ye want me to be.”

Trisha was crying too, fighting it but crying, sobs racking her chest as she stroked Paddy’s hair and patted her back. “Oh, now. Come on now, it’s not so bad as all that, surely?”

She hid her face in her mother’s soft neck. “I’m not you, Mum. I can’t be as good as you.”

Trisha stroked and patted her, holding her tight as if she had been hungry for contact for ten years.

Finally, Trisha broke off. “Eat that soup, it’ll do you good.” She smiled bravely and unzipped her handbag, rummaging for her change purse and her house keys, reassuring herself that she would be home soon.

Paddy wiped her nose on the back of her hand and sniffed. Trisha pulled the keys out, and Paddy saw the clear laminated plaque on her key ring and remembered the slogan. Trisha had bought it in a holy shop, an orange sunset behind a silhouette of a tiny boat and the inscription:

Lord help me,

The sea is so wide

And my boat is so small.

III

The renewed vigor of the newsroom had disappeared now that everyone had worked out when Random would be in and out of the room. The fact that he was generally stationed downstairs holding meetings about money meant that long hours could easily be spent carelessly doing nothing or scanning job vacancies in the News or other papers.

McVie sloped in through the door to the tea room and stood close to her, watching the kettle come to the boil.

“How are you?” he asked, uncharacteristically needy. He was too close, looming over her.

“I’m fine,” she said, scowling up at him, hoping he’d do it back.

“So, what did you…” He rolled his head to the side. “You know, think the other night?”

She realized that he wasn’t standing close to her so much as pinning her into the wall, penning her in. “He’s a nice chap.”

McVie raised his eyebrows and leaned across her, picking at a bit of dried jam on the fridge top. He seemed offended.

“I mean, he’s nice enough. I wouldn’t spend a lot of time with him. Not that you shouldn’t. He’s nice. Pleasant.”

“Hmm, pleasant… Yeah.”

McVie and Paddy had known each other for four years and had a bitchy, easy rapport, but now the conversation felt as clumsy as grade one Arabic. They cringed in unison, watching the kettle come to a boil. She had overfilled it. Scalding water bubbled out from under the lid, spilling down the sides and over the cord. They grinned together as the steaming water spilled down the door of the fridge.

“That’s not very safe, is it?”

“Naw.” Paddy grinned and moved her feet away. Her suede boots were ruined already but she didn’t want to make them any worse. “I don’t care if you’re a poof.”

McVie blinked hard at the word and rubbed his long gothic face with his hand. “I heard you shagged George Burns in his car.”

Paddy felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end in alarm. A week before she would have been frightened of him knowing-she’d never really trusted him sexually-but now he was the only safe man in the newsroom. Suddenly it seemed funny that McVie knew. She started to giggle into the wall. McVie watched her, disconcerted for a moment, and then snorted through his nose, shaking his shoulders, actually looking more miserable than before but laughing, she was quite sure he was laughing.

“What did your wife say when she found out about you?”

McVie rolled his head back at the mention of his wife and barked up at the ceiling. “Surprised.”

“Are you two having an affair?” It was Shug Grant, standing at the door, talking loud to draw the newsroom’s attention to them.

“Grant.” McVie spoke without a hint of aggression. “You’re about a half as interesting as ye think ye are. Fuck off and shut up.” He turned back to Paddy. “Tomorrow night we’re going for a drink with Paddy Meehan. Press Bar, seven o’clock. Okay?”

She nodded.

Scolded, Shug backed out of the room and McVie followed him, pointing a warning finger back at her. “Seven, right?”

“I’ll be there.”