for a minute and I can hear people calling Amanda in the background.
‘Laura, you’ll be okay. Stay where you are. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
‘Okay.’ I cry again.
‘Laura, I have to finish off what I’m doing. There’s a crowd here from England. I’ll just take them to the restaurant and leave. I’ll be with you in a jiffy. Don’t do anything. Do you hear me, Laura?’
I mumble a yes and hang up the phone.
I need to find somewhere for Shay to sleep. I don’t want to leave him in the car seat all night. I look around the room but I can’t see anything that would do the job. I go to the bathroom where Amanda has a display of wicker baskets with towels and slippers and tissues and things. The one holding the towels looks like it might work. The basket is quite rough and I’ll have to cover it with something soft. Shay is used to sleeping in soft blankets, blue and yellow stars floating on the mobile above his head. I wonder if he’ll notice the noise here in the city. Panic rises inside me as I unload the towels from the basket. What am I doing here? Why did I take Shay from the comfort of his home to sleep like the baby Jesus in a strange house in the middle of the city? Again I cry. Again I look at the white clock above the door. Where is she? Where is Amanda? I can’t stand this. She must have had to stay for the meal. Just as the thought enters my head, confirmation beeps on my phone.
Sorry Sis, going to be a little while longer, hope you’re okay.
I send her a thumbs-up emoji. Then I take the basket into the main room where Shay is sleeping in the car seat.
‘Mammy’s going to make you your very own manger, Shay,’ I say, tears falling down my face. Doubt is flooding my mind. Did I react too hastily? Should I have told Conor what I knew? No. Then he would have just come up with some elaborate story. Yes, I should have given him a chance to explain. Oh, I’m not sure what to think. It would all be so much easier if I hadn’t just had a baby. I’ve heard so much about Conor’s past in the last few days I’m completely confused. I always believed Conor was a good man. That he loved me, loved Shay. And now I find out that he lied about leaving the house in the middle of the night. He could have been meeting Vicky Murphy. There are nights she wouldn’t have finished up at the bar until two or three in the morning. But even with all this circumstantial evidence that I’m concocting in my head – which is all it is – something is telling me I might be wrong.
The phone rings just as I’m padding the towel baskets with a soft throw from the back of Amanda’s sofa. My heart jumps. It’s him. It has to be Conor. He must be going ballistic. I reach over and lift the phone. A picture of Conor holding Shay the day he was born flashes on the screen. It was taken at the hospital not long after Shay arrived into this world. It was Conor’s first time to hold his son. Conor’s face says it all. I have never been happier.
I’ll have to answer. The longer I leave it, the harder it will be. Not to mention the fact that Maggie will have the army out searching for her grandson. They’re probably worrying that we’ve been in an accident.
My finger shakes as I drag it across the face of the phone.
‘Hello.’ My voice is a tiny whisper.
‘Laura, where are you?’
‘I’m at Amanda’s.’
‘Amanda’s? What are you doing there, is she okay?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is Shay okay? It’s very late to be travelling with him.’
I can tell from Conor’s voice he hasn’t a clue why I’m here and he doesn’t sound too happy that I am.
‘Laura, you should have told me you were going to Dublin. I’ve been worried sick and when you didn’t answer your phone…’ Conor pauses. ‘Laura, why are you in Dublin?’
The sound of Conor’s voice seems to minimise my fear to a pile of nonsense. I must stay strong.
‘Conor, I came to Dublin to get away from your lies.’
‘What lies? What are you talking about, Laura?’
‘All those nights you told me the alarm was going off, it wasn’t,