Kissing Maggie Silver (20 page)

Maggie looked at her new friend.
Jo was a lot more pregnant now but she still appeared to be quite calm about living on her own, and was preparing for her forthcoming baby in between writing papers about the work she and Ollie were doing in New Zealand.

“You didn’t need a safety net,” she said.

“Oh yes I did!” Jo laughed as she settled herself into the chair opposite. “When I first started travelling on my own I probably called my poor mother every single day. It cost her a fortune in reverse phone charges, and I had been brought up to travel the globe whereas you…”

“Have never been anywhere,” Maggie finished for her.

“I wasn’t going to say that,” Jo’s voice was gentle, and if Maggie had looked she would have seen real concern in her eyes.
“I was just going to say that as you are still trying to decide what you want to do maybe a long term teaching job in another country is not the best starting point, whereas I had my career all cut and dried by the time I was in my teens.”

“Lucky you!
”

“
Lucky me indeed. But not many people know what they want to do at such an early age. Did you always want to be a primary school teacher or is it something that just happened?”

Maggie was thoughtful as she replied.
“I guess it sort of crept up on me. I like children and I was always good with them because I’ve had a lot of practice with all my nieces and nephews, but apart from that…well I didn’t have any better ideas once I finished university, not realistic ones anyway. ”

Then she surprised herself by telling Jo about her real dreams for the future.
The ones she’d never shared with anyone since the day her parents had dismissed them as pie in the sky and told her she needed to get herself a proper job, one that came with a career structure and a pension.

“Eventually I’d like to write books for children, fact and fiction, and illustrate them, but
I’m unlikely to ever earn enough to keep myself by doing that, I’m just concentrating on my teaching career at the moment.”

“But you’re not letting that stop you surely?” Jo looked genuinely shocked.
“Please tell me that you are writing and painting in your spare time.”

Maggie flushed with embarrassment.
“Well…no. I mean, I did start…I do have a lot of stuff stored away…but somehow I’ve let life get in the way. You must think I’m a real failure,” she added miserably.

“Failure? No, of course I don’t.
But I do think you make yourself far too available to your family. Tell me, why do you still live with your parents?”

It wasn’t possible for Maggie’s cheeks to flush any pinker as she searched for a reply.
“Well I don’t really live with them even though it looks that way. I have my own space, my own bathroom and sitting room as well as a bedroom. It’s just that when Mum said it was silly for me to live in a bedsit when they had plenty of room at home, it seemed a bit churlish to refuse,” she finished lamely.

“I guess,” Jo nodded understandingly although she didn’t make any further comment.
Instead she changed the subject.

“Ollie arrives home on
Saturday!”

“How fantastic! I didn’t realize he was coming so soon.
You must be really excited. What time does he arrive? Would you like me to drive you to the airport to meet him?”

Maggie was so thrilled for her friend that she pushed her own unhappiness to the back of her mind.

Jo shook her head. “I couldn’t ask you to do that Maggie. It would take a big chunk out of the middle of your day. Besides, I was thinking of hiring a car.”

“But you don’t need to, not when I don’t have any other plans. I’d be happy to take you, honestly.”

“Well if you’re really sure then I must admit I’d be glad of the company. I’m beginning to feel a bit nervous about travelling too far on my own now that I’ve only a couple of weeks to go.”

“Is it really that soon?” Maggie looked at the very pregnant mound of Jo’s stomach with interest.

“I’m afraid so but I have no intention of having this baby until Ollie is well and truly home. I’ve learned to cope with being apart for months at a time, and with him being so absorbed in what he’s doing when he’s around that he barely speaks for days on end, but I have no intention of coping with childbirth without him!”

Maggie smiled at her.
“I think I would feel the same. I think you’re marvelous to have coped with living alone over here for as long as you have.”

* * *

The journey to the airport took longer than Maggie had anticipated owing to a minor accident blocking off two lanes of the highway. To make sure Jo didn’t miss Ollie, she stopped at the drop off point.

“You go on inside in case the flight has landed early.
I’ll park the car and come and find you.”

Jo didn’t need telling twice.
She almost fell out of the car in her eagerness to find her husband and barely gave Maggie a backward glance as she hurried into the airport. Suppressing a twinge of envy, Maggie found the entrance to the short stay car park and drove up a series of ramps until she found a parking space. Then, having secured her car and collected a parking token, she made her way through to the Arrivals Hall where she knew Jo would be waiting.

She arrived just as Ollie came through the double doors onto the airport concourse.
She knew it was him without being told because he was pushing a trolley laden with a huge rucksack as well as various pieces of bulky equipment packed in sturdy canvas bags which had then been secured with tape and bubble wrap. He also had the same out-of-doors look that Ruairi had, as well as the tan. He didn’t look anything like the man in the wedding photograph though. He was sporting a curly black beard and wearing the sort of sleeveless jacket she imagined explorers wore, one that was full of pockets and zips, and which bulged with unseen objects.

His face lit up when he saw Jo and without bothering to walk around the barrier towards her, he abandoned his trolley, leaned across the space between them and kissed her very slowly and very thoroughly, much to the amusement of everyone around
them.

Maggie’s fragile heart gave a funny little thud and then another when she saw the happiness on Jo’s face.
If that was what absence did for them, then maybe there was something to be said for it. Not that she would ever know of course because Ruairi had made it very clear he wasn’t about to take chances on that sort of love. For him work came first, last and always, and she didn’t have any say in the matter.

Forcing her lips into a smile
she waved when she saw Jo looking for her, and soon she had been introduced to Ollie and the three of them were making their way back to where she had parked the car.

“This is so kind of you,” Ollie said as he fitted his luggage into the trunk. “And so is everything else you’ve done for Jo.
She told me all about it when we talked on the webcam, and Ruairi has spoken about you too.”

“Is he…I mean how is his work going?” Maggie asked, hoping he hadn’t noticed her blush when he mentioned Ruairi’s name.

“Fine I think. We haven’t talked about it much. Both too busy I guess!” He smiled down at her, keeping his expression neutral. He had no intention of telling her that Ruairi appeared to be suffering from a severe bout of lovesickness because, according to Jo, it would apparently be more than his life was worth if he told Maggie anything at all; and after leaving his wife to fend for herself for almost two months he had every intention of doing exactly what she told him.

* * *

Much later, after she had delivered Ollie and Jo to their flat and tried very hard not to envy them their obvious happiness, Maggie drove home and sat for a long time in her car, thinking.

When she eventually let herself into the house there was nobody in. With a sigh of relief she hurried through to the part of the house that was hers and closed the door
firmly behind her. Now she would be able to put her plan into operation without having to answer her mother’s inevitable questions.

Kicking off her shoes, she changed into her oldest jeans and then climbed the narrow flight of stairs that led up to the attic.
As she pushed open the door she was assailed by the musty smell of things that had been stored for a very long time. She wrinkled her nose as she switched on the overhead light. All around her was the debris of family life; broken chairs, old curtains that would never be hung again, bags of clothes waiting to be taken to a charity shop, piles of dusty books, even school bags and old footballs and cricket bats despite the fact her brothers had all left home years ago. And there, behind it all, hidden deep in an old tea chest where she had put them several years before, were Maggie’s manuscripts and paintings.

Pulling them out
, she sank down on the floor and leafed through them. They were better than she had remembered. Not good enough of course, but still good.

Don’t waste your talent
one of her tutors had told her when she was at university and he had seen her work.
You’ve got what it takes Maggie. You’ve just got to believe in yourself.

“And yet I’ve done exactly the opposite,” she whispered, covering her face with her hands.
“I’ve wasted my talent. I’ve stopped believing in myself and listened to other people instead. Well it’s not going to happen anymore!”

She dusted herself off, gathered up the papers as well as a large box of paints and brushes and made her way downstairs, back to her small sitting room.
Once there she spread the paintings out on the table and stared at them for a very long time before carefully stacking them into two separate piles. Then she fired up her laptop computer, opened a new file, and typed in the words Children’s Book.

For a long time after that Maggie was busy.
Lost in her own world she forgot to eat supper. She didn’t hear her parents return home either and when hunger and thirst eventually drove her to the kitchen it was dark and quiet outside, and her mother and father were both sound asleep in bed.

Chapter Sixteen

Autumn arrived with an extra burst of sunshine that lifted everyone’s spirits as they settled back into their usual routine. Even Maggie’s gloom lifted because although the feeling of loss Ruairi had left behind didn’t go away, she soon found she was able to push it to the back of her mind for hours at a time while she worked on her children’s book.

With all her nieces and nephews back at school, no family occasion looming, and her mother preoccupied with her latest grandson, she was able to spend every spare moment either tapping away at her computer or working on a series of illustrations for the book she had in mind. She didn’t share her secret with anyone, not even Jo. Nor did she correct her family’s assumption that she was preparing lessons or correcting class homework when she shut herself in her room.

She still managed to visit June and the children though; and Jo as soon as she had her baby, a little boy who she named Henry, and who arrived on time and healthy.

“He
’s absolutely gorgeous,” she told her as she laid flowers, a card and a present on the hospital locker next to the bed.

“He is, isn’t he?” Jo grinned at her.
“And I managed to hold onto him until Ollie came home.”

Maggie looked down at the little boy who was fast asleep in his hospital cot. His head was covered in fluffy curls and he had screwed his tiny pink face into a ferocious frown. She leaned forward and lifted one of his hands.
It looked like a miniature starfish against her palm.

“Have you told Ruairi about him,” she asked before she could stop herself.

“Of course. Ollie emailed him straight away and told him to try to get back here to see him before he starts kindergarten!”

Maggie laughed, as she knew Jo meant her to, but deep inside the hurt that was always with her bloomed and grew at the sight of the tiny baby in the cot.
There was something about Henry that moved her in a way that her own nieces and nephews never had.

“Would you like to hold him?” Jo’s eyes were wide with compassion as she watched her.
“He’s due to wake for a feed shortly so it doesn’t matter if you disturb him.”

Maggie didn’t need a second invitation.
She bent down and lifted Henry to her shoulder, breathing in talc and baby lotion and an ineffable baby smell that went straight to her heart. She knew the connection she felt with Henry was because of Ruairi and she tried hard not to feel bitter because he had not been ready take a chance on the sort of love that had produced this tiny replica of Ollie.

Blinking away the tears that were pricking her eyelids, she pressed her lips to Henry’s downy head and her heart contracted as she felt him snuggle into the warm hollow of her neck.
Adjusting him more comfortably against her chest she turned back to Jo.

“How long before you take him back to New Zealand?”

“Didn’t I tell you? We’ve wangled a pass to stay here until at least the middle of next year because Ollie managed to complete enough research in the last couple of months he was there to keep him busy at the computer for quite a while.”