there. Really, I’m fine.’
He wasn’t sure. But there was too much to worry about so he let it go.
NOW
* * *
NINETY-EIGHT
Johnny launched into a fit of energetic coughing – a bit of bread down the wrong way. But the chat around the long dinner table carried on. Lovely. He could die here, literally die, on his forty-ninth birthday, and would any of them even notice?
Jessie was his best hope but Jessie was off in the kitchen readying the next elaborate course: he could only hope he survived to eat it.
A sip of water didn’t help, tears were streaming down his face, and finally Ed asked, ‘You okay there?’
Manfully, Johnny waved away his concern. ‘Bread. Down the wrong way.’
‘Thought for a minute you were choking,’ Ferdia said.
‘That’d be a shame,’ Johnny croaked. ‘To die on my birthday.’
‘You wouldn’t have died,’ Ferdia said. ‘One of us would have tried the Heimlich manoeuvre.’
‘You know what happened recently?’ Ed asked. ‘Mr Heimlich? The man who invented the Heimlich manoeuvre? Finally, at the age of eighty-seven, he got to do it on someone.’
‘And it worked?’ This was from Liam, right down at the end of the table. ‘It’d be a bit mortifying if he did it and then the person died.’
Liam really did bring the snark to any situation.
‘Like Mr Segway,’ Ferdia said. ‘Said they were totally safe, then died on one.’
‘In fairness,’ Ed said, ‘his only claim was that you’d never fall over on one.’
‘So what happened?’ Johnny, despite his resentment, was interested.
‘He accidentally drove one off a cliff.’
‘Oh, God.’ Nell dissolved into giggles. ‘Started believing his own publicity?’
‘Got high on his own supply,’ Ferdia said.
‘You’d know about that.’ Liam threw his nephew a dark look.
Ferdia glared back.
So the feud between those two was on again? What was it this time?
He’d ask Jessie, she’d know. Here she came, carrying a trayful of sorbets.
‘Palate cleansers!’ she declared. ‘Lemon and vodka.’ She resumed her spot at the head of the table.
‘What about us?’ Bridey piped up. ‘We can’t possibly have vodka, we’re far too young.’
‘On it,’ Jessie said.
Course she was, Johnny thought. Fair play to her. Never dropped the ball.
‘Just lemon for you guys.’
Bridey issued stern instructions to the younger kids that if their sorbets tasted ‘in any way funny’ they must desist from eating them with immediate effect.
Jessie resumed her spot at the head of the table. ‘Everyone okay?’
Cheerful noises of assent rose, but when the hubbub quietened down, Cara said, ‘I’m bored out of my skull.’
Good-humoured chortles ensued and someone murmured, ‘You’re gas.’
‘I’m not joking. I am bored to tears.’
Jesus Christ, was she serious?
‘I mean, sorbets?’ Cara asked. ‘How many more courses do we have to sit through?’
Okay, Cara had one or two issues. To put it mildly. But she was a sweetheart, one of the nicest people he’d ever met.
Johnny’s gaze went nervously to Ed – it was his job to keep his wife under control. If that wasn’t a very sexist thought and, yes, he admitted it was. Ed looked stupefied with confusion.
In an attempt to pull things back to normal, Johnny adopted a light-hearted tone. ‘Ah, come on now, Cara. After all the work Jessie has done …’
‘But the caterers did it.’
‘What caterers?’ someone asked.
‘She always has these things catered.’
Jessie would never use caterers. Cooking was her thing.
Up and down the table, the mood was one of scandalized commotion. Why was Cara – normally the loveliest person – saying such stuff?
‘How much have you had to drink?’ Ed asked Cara.
‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Because I had that bang –’
‘– on the head!’ Ed finished her sentence and his relief was audible. ‘She got a bang on the head earlier. A sign fell off a shop and hit her.’
‘That’s not what happened.’
‘We thought she was okay.’
‘You wanted me to be okay,’ Cara said. ‘I knew I wasn’t.’
‘You should go to A and E!’ Jessie was struggling to recalibrate to her default nurturing and bossy personality. ‘I insist you go this very moment. Why are you even here?’
‘Because Ed needs Johnny to loan him the money,’ Cara said.
Right on cue, Jessie asked, ‘What money?’
‘From the other bank account,’ Cara said. Then, ‘Oh, God. I wasn’t meant to say that.’
‘What bank account?’ Jessie asked. ‘What loan?’
‘Cara, the hospital, right now.’ Ed stood up.
‘Johnny …?’ Jessie asked.
However, he still had something in his arsenal. ‘Jessie? What caterers?’
Ferdia glared at Johnny. ‘You’re really doing this to her?’
‘I’m entitled to know.’
Ferdia’s tone had many layers. ‘You? You’re entitled to nothing.’
In Johnny’s stomach, eels of dread slithered. Ferdia knows.