Jude was a prime example. A lot of our disagreements came from a vast difference in opinion on what I wore and how I looked.’
I close my eyes tightly in instant regret. I didn’t want this to be a time when Jude would creep into our conversation, and I’m sure that Aidan doesn’t need or want to hear my tales of woe about the man I married and couldn’t wait to escape from. It’s the first time I’ve mentioned him in Aidan’s company, and my face flushes with remorse.
‘I’m – I’m sorry to hear you lost your husband so young,’ says Aidan, just a little bit awkwardly. ‘I didn’t want to mention it until you did, but it must have been tough on you. And Ben, of course.’
‘It can be tough, yes,’ I mutter, fiddling now with the silk scarf. ‘I’m dealing with it as best I can on so many levels, but Jude and I had a very complex, complicated history that went on for a lot longer than it should have before he died.’
We sit in brief silence.
‘And Mabel’s death must be bringing a lot back?’ whispers Aidan. ‘I’m sorry. It’s tough.’
He tilts his head, acknowledging how I’ve opened up ever so slightly for the first time about my turbulent past.
‘It has, yes,’ I tell him, wanting to close the conversation as quickly as I unintentionally started it. ‘But it’s not straightforward. This is a very different type of grief with Mabel. It’s not at all the same thing.’
We don’t speak again for a few seconds, both tangled up in thoughts of how painful the subject of loss can be.
‘You know, when I look at your son I see a lot of my younger self staring back at me,’ Aidan says with gentle trepidation. ‘Losing a parent so young definitely shapes you for life. I know it did for me, anyhow, and I’m sure losing your life partner is just as difficult. I know you are going to miss having Mabel’s support to lean on.’
I busy myself by taking out a wonderfully soft cashmere camel coat with an over-the-top fur collar that brings me back to when Mabel first marched me down to meet Camille to ask for a job here.
‘She was a very determined woman,’ I say with a smile. ‘I’m so sorry, Aidan, but can we talk about Mabel instead of my ex? Grieving for Mabel is a very different process than what I feel for my husband’s passing, and I would much rather remember her with the love she deserves. I doubt she’d want my late husband stealing her thunder.’
My forehead is creased into a frown that Mabel used to call ‘the look of doom’, and I consciously change my expression.
‘Of course,’ says Aidan, changing tack immediately. ‘OK, let’s stay focused on the job at hand here and the legendary Mabel Murphy. So tell me about this coat. I don’t think I remember it?’
I breathe out a very obvious sigh of relief, and then we both erupt into a fit of nervous laughter.
And so I launch into the story of how Mabel was fed up looking at my long, pale face one day, and equally was fed up with me talking about the dire state of daytime TV in Ireland and my tendency to lie on the sofa, day in, day out while Ben was at school.
‘Did you move here to get a life together or to simply exist?’ she’d asked me crossly one afternoon in March. ‘You’re better than this, Roisin O’Connor! You’ve a whole life ahead of you that I only wish I had! Get up and get out! I’m taking you to Camille once and for all!’
Aidan is all ears, and is especially impressed at my facial expressions, my New York accent, and how I can mimic Mabel right down to the way she used her hands to illustrate her point.
‘She had threatened me with Camille ever since I let it slip that I used to sneak in here and drool at the rails of clothing in Truly Vintage, wishing I’d someday have the courage to follow my own passion and dreams for upcycled fashion, arts and crafts,’ I tell him. ‘Before I knew it, I was being led by the hand like a school girl right to the door. She was wearing this coat that day. I’ll never forget it.’
The meeting with Camille, who was about to go on holiday at the time, was as it turned out perfect timing as