Wellesley Wives (New England Trilogy) (47 page)

“Yeah,” Emily said as she glanced at her watch and downed the last of her wine. “And I’m the Harbor Master.”

Chapter 36 

Karaoke Night

The entire pub had joined in with the singer, and Popsy had to shout at Sandra to be heard. “Another five pints, two double gin and tonics, and one white wine,” she yelled over a classic Black Eyed Peas song.

    Mrs. Miller had warned them it would be a “brisk night,” but nothing had prepared them for the boisterous crowd that now filled the place. Monday and Tuesday had been so calm with just them, “the lads,” and a few passersby, but tonight there must have been about eighty or ninety people in a room that comfortably accommodated fifty.

Nearly everybody had a song prepared, and Popsy had met a lot of Mrs. Miller’s neighbors. They were a very friendly bunch, but boy could they drink. There seemed to be no limit to the amount of pints Sandra was serving up, and the wine flowed like water. Mrs. Miller banned half-pints on Wednesday nights because the place was just too busy, but nobody seemed to have a problem with that.

“Can you believe this noise?” Popsy shouted, still smiling.

“At least it stopped Betty from doing her Celine Dion numbers,” Sandra yelled back.

There was no way Betty could have heard the insult with the noise, but Popsy did and she laughed. Betty had been the first to arrive. She was one of Mrs. Miller’s good friends and completely tone deaf, but that didn’t stop her from trying and strangling, “My Heart Will Go On.”

Popsy cleared the tables of glasses as fast as Sandra could refill them. Mrs. Miller had suggested this arrangement when they’d come down earlier, and they agreed happily. They were enjoying the work because they felt it really got them into the community, much more so than if they were just the American tourists sitting on the sidelines. Sandra had teased Mrs. Miller about any chance of getting paid, and the landlady had surprised them by saying she would.

Athlone, in Westmeath County, was one of the larger towns near Banagher, and it had a college full of party-loving students, so hoards of them had turned up around eight and in the space of ten minutes, the place was full. Mrs. Miller’s karaoke night had garnered a reputation in the locality, and Sandra had been told by some of the students that even the local police force gave it a wide berth. It was good for the town and the local community.

Wednesday was, of course, the beginning of the weekend to any self-respecting student, and the Irish loved to sing. But what started as a student thing had quickly snowballed. Within a matter of weeks, the whole town was turning up for the fun. Then the party had taken on a momentum of its own and now, several years later, the Wednesday Karaoke Night was ingrained into the web of Banagher life. The college in Athlone had even included a reference to it in its college prospectus. When they’d found their lodging, Sandra and Popsy hadn’t had any idea what an amazing little discovery they’d made.

It was pretty clear from the start that many of the students had a regular act. The audience would either applaud or jeer, depending on the standard, but for the most part they were a forgiving, supportive bunch.

It was four young guys who’d gotten up on the tiny home-built stage to take on the Black Eyed Peas song, but the hit was so well-loved that everybody joined in. Then a group of four girls got up and tried their version of Katy Perry’s “California Girls.” Again, the pub exploded into song. But there were the few who’d drunk a little too much and their choice of song could have been better. Or indeed—no song.

A couple of girls tried to sing the B-52s’ “Love Shack,” and after that when they annihilated Bob Marley’s, “No Woman No Cry,” they were eventually told to sit down. Popsy settled them with another glass of white wine and a complimentary bowl of nuts, so they didn’t take it too hard. She noticed Shane heading out the door around then, too. It wasn’t much of a surprise. She didn’t see him being the karaoke type.

The door closed behind him, but it swung right open again and to her delight and great surprise, in walked Jeff and Simon, their friends from The Shelbourne Hotel. Popsy tried to catch Sandra’s eye, but it was impossible. She was focused on settling pints of Guinness, so Popsy weaved in and out between the overcrowded tables and got to them herself. She threw her arms around Simon who was closest to her, and then reached over to give Jeff a kiss.

“Guys, it’s so good to see you,” she shouted. “What brings you to dear old Banagher?”

“You do!” Jeff laughed as he took in the madness around them.

Then Simon said, “I phoned Sandra this morning to see how you ladies were getting on. I was wondering if you made it home all right because of the volcano. She told me you got waylaid, but this is wild.” He looked around the pub with amusement.

“Isn’t it? And look at us, we’re working.” She laughed. “Still, it’s so good of you guys to visit. You’re lucky you got her on the phone. The reception is very erratic around here. Oh no, do you have somewhere to stay tonight? I’m afraid this place is full.”

“We booked into the hotel in town before we left Dublin. We’ve already checked in. It’s fine. But hey, how in the world did you find this and . . .” Jeff asked, as he looked at Popsy from head to toe, taking in the cloth in her hand and the small white apron over her black wraparound dress, “how did you end up working?”

“I know, crazy right? But I have to tell you guys, we’re having a blast.” She turned and pointed to Sandra. “Look who’s pulling the pints.”

By now Sandra had spotted them and was waving frantically, so the boys made their way through the heaving room of people. Popsy was so happy to see their drinking buddies from the weekend before. She’d been quite frosty with Simon when they’d last met because he’d crashed out in Sandra’s bed while they were at The Four Seasons. But that was all in the past now, and she was just ecstatic to see a familiar face. Sandra introduced them to Mrs. Miller, who was happy to meet them. Soon, Jeff and Simon were squished in with a table of technology students, and it didn’t take long for them to get into the swing of things.

Early in the evening, before things got too manic, Sandra had said she could almost tell what somebody was going to sound like just by looking at them. Popsy tested the theory, and despite a few exceptions, it really seemed like Sandra had a point. The big, boisterous guys sang the big, loud songs, the pretty little girls sang the cutesy numbers, and the old women went for the ballads.

It seemed the evening had peaked. Everybody who needed to sing had sung, and now a few groups were getting up for their second attempt. Jeff got up on stage. He was thin and stood at about five-foot-five. As usual, he was dressed with impeccable taste. Tonight he wore dark denim jeans and a white GANT shirt. Jeff smiled at Simon who gave an ever-so-slight-nod. He must have known what was coming, but Popsy was anxious for him. She’d seen the crowd boo down a bad act. If Jeff’s performance was weak, they would be merciless. But she needn’t have worried.

Since Simon was the one who’d partied with Sandra, Popsy assumed he was the more extroverted of the two, but it turned out she was wrong. As Jeff moved into Elvis Presley’s “Fools Rush In,” she realized his voice was unbelievably powerful considering the size of his ribcage. Popsy stopped clearing the table and watched him. He was singing in perfect tune with the volume and strength of a professional baritone twice his size. The audience was quick to realize how good he was because a bit of a hush fell over the pub. Even Mrs. Miller, who never stopped moving, took a break.

As soon as she figured out what he was singing, a girl in the front row tried to sing along, but she was shushed by her friends. This was something special. Jeff actually sounded like The King, even though there was no physical similarity, and he didn’t try to pout like Elvis. He stretched his hand out to the women in the front row. One of them took it. Jeff looked to Sandra behind the counter and then turned and very deliberately looked at Simon. They locked into each other’s stare.

The pub erupted into applause as Jeff wrapped up the song. People were on their feet and stamping the floor. Popsy had never experienced such an electric atmosphere. At last, she was beginning to understand what the world meant about the Irish being party people. It was like some kind of group therapy, with a lot of alcohol to get the thing in motion.

Jeff was being slapped on the back by fellow revelers as he made his way back to his chair. Then the karaoke machine started up again.

The girl next to Popsy slapped her forehead. She must have recognized the tune before even the lyrics had begun. “Here we go again.” She groaned.

Popsy had started back to work, but she turned to see who had mounted the little stage. Mrs. Miller was singing. Her eyes were closed and she was wrapped up in her ballad about her heart being low. Popsy had never witnessed anything like it. The song was a new one to her, but it sounded fundamentally Irish, even though the words were in English. It had a sad but haunting quality to it—like it was from the Ireland of the famine days. Of course, Mrs. Miller’s strong Kerry accent could have had a lot to do with that, but the sorrow in the song was so overwhelming that it touched Popsy. She stopped working again and when a girl got up to go to the restroom, for the first time that night, Popsy sat down. She wanted to watch Mrs. Miller sing.

The words about surviving alone pierced her heart. Mrs. Miller was singing the song of Popsy’s life. The pain she felt—that which she was so incapable of explaining to her friends or family—was exactly what Mrs. Miller was singing about. Popsy felt the tears began to flow down her face as all the ladies in the pub joined in again, singing about their hearts being low.

It was so true, Popsy thought. Men just didn’t understand how deeply women could love and how much it hurt when a love like hers and Peter’s ended. That’s when she realized with a start that it was another anniversary. Peter had been gone fifteen weeks today. The time was going by so fast, and she’d almost missed her Wednesday anniversary.

Mrs. Miller was finishing up and she got a sizable round of applause. From what the girl had said earlier, Popsy assumed they’d heard her sing the song before, but for Popsy, it was a first—a revealing, touching, wonderful song that so completely encapsulated her life right now. Of course, the younger girls wouldn’t get it. They hadn’t been hurt by life yet. Their time will come soon enough, Popsy thought wearily.

She had to get out of the pub. There was no air in the room. It was too hot, too crowded, too everything. She ran out the door and went into the restroom to splash her face. It was the same bathroom she and Sandra took their shower in every morning. On Monday night she’d been too drunk to notice there was no bathtub, and on Tuesday after her long walk and her afternoon in the garden, she was okay without one. But now she really needed her therapeutic bath. She had to get into the water and submerge her head in scalding water to get away from the world—a world without Peter. She needed her bath, but where could she go?

“The river,” she said to her reflection. “It’ll be freezing, which will be just as good as scorching.”

Sandra had also been blown away by Mrs. Miller’s performance. She thought it was every bit as good as Jeff’s, who could so win
America’s Got Talent
. Sandra wondered if they had
Ireland’s Got Talent.
The landlady’s song was incredibly touching, but it was also downright sad. If it was supposed to move you, it sure had succeeded because Sandra went right up to that Karaoke machine to see if they had the song she was thinking of, and when she saw it did, she hit the buttons and grabbed the mic before she could talk herself out of it.

Even as the music intro started up, some of the girls clapped enthusiastically.

“Mrs. Miller, that song you just sang—that was epic. Really awesome. But you know, while we all suffer from broken hearts, I have to say, there are many ways of dealing with them.” She kicked into Beyonce’s “All the Single Ladies” and just as they did with Mrs. Miller, the girls in the pub joined in. Sandra changed the words a little to suit her life. It made her feel great.

Even Mrs. Miller, who’d taken over behind the bar, smiled.

Afterward, Sandra headed back to the bar to resume her pint-pulling duties and revelers applauded her, tapped her on the back, and told her what a great job she’d done, but there was one voice she hadn’t expected to hear.

“Now that was impressive,” someone said in a warm German accent.

Sandra swung around. “Sven! How in the world did you end up here?”

He smiled. “I heard about your singing on the local news.”

“Huh?”

He shook his head and laughed. “Joke.” He looked a little lost.

Then Sandra realized he was nervous. Sven, Mr. Gorgeous Hunky Single Doctor, was nervous. It made him even more attractive. “Seriously?” she asked.

“Your friend, Popsy. She called me this afternoon and told me you’d found my business card but you were too shy to call me, so she did it for you. Now, here I am.” He held out his hands as if offering himself up to her.

Sandra looked around the pub to see where Popsy was. “I’ll kill her,” she said, but she didn’t mean it. She was actually thrilled to see Sven again, even in this crazy atmosphere of young students who were now singing George Michael’s “Faith.”

Her old gym buddy looked even more attractive. While most of the students were dressed in jeans and hoodies or T-shirts, Sven was in a pair of cream chinos, a white shirt, and a navy jacket. He oozed class and maturity, and he was easily the most attractive man in the place. She squeezed his hand.

“I’m really glad you came.” Then she looked around the pub again. “Where is Popsy?” Simon and Jeff were watching her and Sven with great interest. Popsy had obviously managed to fill them in on her surprise. They smiled, but when she mouthed the word “Popsy,” and raised her shoulders as if to say “where is she?” they shrugged.

Popsy wasn’t thinking straight. She walked through the garden and down to the water’s edge. She wasn’t afraid of the cold. She didn’t care. She just needed to be under the water where there was no sound and no reminders of Peter. It had worked in her home in Wellesley and in that hotel in Dublin. It would wipe away the pain here, too. She took off her shoes and stood next to them on the grass verge. It was a clean bank, straight into deep water. But even from where she stood, she could see the current moving the water along. It didn’t matter if she climbed out a little farther down the river, she just had to submerge. She jumped.