even more money for organizations that already had obscene amounts of it while simultaneously accruing a personal fortune.
Even if he’d had the stomach for that sort of work, Ferdia didn’t think he was smart enough.
His grades were okay, slightly above average. Jessie said if he made more of an effort, he’d do better. She was wrong. Even if he killed himself working, he’d never be up there with the alphas. Others in his year – a small, earnest group – planned to be social workers. Their dedication was admirable but he wanted to help on a bigger scale. However, last summer’s stint counting barrels of cooking oil in the Philippines had shown him the reality of working for a big charity. It had been ridiculously boring, and in no way gave him the good feeling he’d been expecting.
Would he be different if his dad hadn’t died? Less afraid of the future? Who knew? And what did it matter? All he could do was play the hand he’d been given.
FORTY
Jessie barely noticed the sun-drenched greenery of Westmeath as they whipped past in their people-carrier. Everyone in the car was subdued by the misery leaking from Johnny. Canice never missed a chance to tell him he wasn’t up to running the family business. Which wasn’t true. Johnny just hadn’t wanted to be a solicitor, doing wills and conveyancing, in a town so claustrophobic it made him feel as if bricks were being piled on his chest. As for Rose, she seemed incapable of love. Except when it came to clothes: she was a valued customer at Monique’s, Beltibbet’s fanciest boutique. And it really was fancy – Jessie had been staggered by the prices, while recognizing none of the labels. Most of their dresses featured robust internal corsetry. It was a whole other world.
What amazed Jessie was how much pride Canice took in Rose’s appearance. He was always given a chair outside the dressing room, and whenever Rose emerged, he made comments and suggestions, genuinely engaged. Jessie had no memory of her own mother ever buying new clothes and it was laughable to think of her dad even noticing. They’d run the general store in their small town in the wilds of Connemara. Because they lived right next door they were always on duty. The shop was open seven days a week but, even so, a knock on their window late at night or very early in the morning was commonplace, people looking to buy emergency matches or milk or a short length of rope. Dilly Parnell had lived in a flowery apron. Jessie supposed she didn’t have the need for anything else. Maybe she hadn’t had any interest. Both her parents had been humble, quiet people – old-fashioned but very loving.
They’d encouraged Jessie every step of the way and had been fit to burst with pride in her. It was nearly twelve years since her dad, Lionard, had passed – he’d had dementia and just faded away, like a picture left in the sun. His death had felt like a soft landing.
Not so when her mother died. Granny Dilly had come to live in the granny flat in Jessie and Johnny’s back garden, a gentle, undemanding presence, loved by the children. Nine years ago, when she’d died, Jessie was devastated. TJ was only six months old but Jessie decided that the only thing that could save her was another baby. Which was how Dilly – named after her granny – had come to be.
Jessie still cried for her parents, but mostly from simple gratitude for her good fortune. They’d been decent, kind people. Very different from Canice and Rose.
When Jessie and Johnny had gone to Beltibbet to inform them that they were getting married, polite conversation was made in what Rose called the ‘drawing room’. Jessie thought it had gone okay.
It was only as they were leaving that Rose gripped Jessie’s wrist, stopping her progress. ‘My son is nobody’s second choice,’ she’d said, in a low, pleasant voice.
Shocked, Jessie acted as if she hadn’t heard. In retrospect, that had been the best approach: if she and Rose had had words, they would never have got past it. But Rose’s hostility had caught her on the hop. Especially because Rory’s parents, Michael and Ellen, had been lovely. She began to wonder if Rose’s enmity was her fault. She had been married to Johnny’s best friend – perhaps Rose was only being protective of her first-born. But Cara had been welcomed into the Casey