Page 35 of Our Song

It should have been me.

It should have been me who flirted with him after our gig. It should have been me he kissed that night. It should have been me who walked out of that venue holding his hand. It should have been me. It should all have been me.

But it wasn’t me.

It was Jess.

Before our gig I’d been so convinced there was something between me and him.

I’d been convinced he was going to kiss me that night we went for dinner, before Ruairí interrupted us.

But because I wasn’t a hundred per cent sure, because he had never actually declared his love for me, I hadn’t done anything about it.

Jess couldn’t possibly have been totally sure either.

But she still risked it. She asked him to that family party.

She asked him back to her flat after the gig.

And it worked.

I dragged myself into college reluctantly the day after the gig, my stomach churning at the prospect of seeing Tadhg and Jess together, but there was no sign of either of them.

A few people came up to me and told me how great the gig had been, but I couldn’t think about the band right now.

I didn’t see Fiachra either, though I did get a text from him that day.

You okay Laura? Hope I didn’t do anything to upset you last night. xx

I told him he hadn’t and wished him a happy Christmas.

Over the weekend a part of me wished I’d sent Fiachra a very different reply to his text.

A part of me wished I’d suggested finishing what we’d started.

A part of me wished I’d spent the entire weekend in Fiachra’s room in his shared house off Dorset Street, fucking him until he made me forget all about Tadhg.

But I’d probably have started crying about Tadhg while Fiachra was going down on me or something.

I wasn’t in the right state to be with anyone else.

I didn’t hear from Tadhg over the weekend, and I obviously wasn’t going to contact him first. I tormented myself with thoughts of what he might be doing. In all of these miserable imaginings, he hadn’t left Jess’s flat. He hadn’t left Jess’s bed.

Katie was amazing throughout all this. She let me rage and she let me cry all over her.

She told me Tadhg was an idiot, that he couldn’t do better than me, that Jess was probably really high-maintenance and he’d get sick of her in no time, and I knew none of this was true but I let her say it anyway.

On Monday afternoon, the day before Christmas Eve, I finally got a text from Tadhg.

Hey Lol, hope the rest of Thursday night was fun. We should do some music stuff over the holidays – let me know if you’re free. Have a great Christmas!

I almost didn’t reply, but then I thought that would look worse, so I just sent ‘Sounds good, happy Christmas!’. Then I read his message again. And again. Over the next few days I spent more effort analysing that text message than I’d spent analysing any of my prescribed college texts all term.

‘You don’t even know if he’s going out with Jess!’ said Katie. She really did have the patience of a saint during all this. ‘He just shifted her! You were with Fiachra and you’re not going out with him.’

The day after St Stephen’s Day, I was lying on my bed thinking about that stupid text yet again when my phone rang.

I felt sick when I saw his name. For a split second I thought about not answering.

As long as I didn’t talk to him, there was still that uncertainty, that tiny possibility it might not be true.

But I knew it was true.

I sat up and answered the phone.

‘Hey, Lol!’ Did his voice sound nervous or was that my fevered imagination? ‘Um, it’s me.’

‘Hey!’ I said. ‘How was Christmas?’

‘Ah, you know, the usual. Lots of visiting relations, then eating loads of Roses and watching shit telly. Pretty good.’

‘Same,’ I said. ‘I basically stayed in my pyjamas all day yesterday.’ I didn’t tell him I’d spent most of the day torturing myself with thoughts about him. ‘Please tell me you’re not secretly one of those awful hearty people who goes for a walk at, like, nine a.m. on Stephen’s Day.’

‘Ha! No, I’m not.’ There was a pause. And that pause made my stomach drop. ‘But I did go to Wicklow yesterday. So there were some walks.’

‘Oh, right,’ I said.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I went to Jess’s folks’ house.’

I squeezed my eyes shut tightly and prayed that I could keep my voice steady.

‘Oh, right!’ I said again. ‘I bet they have a nice house.’

‘They do,’ said Tadhg. ‘It’s a big Georgian thing.’

‘Wow,’ I said. ‘Fancy.’

‘And actually,’ he said, ‘me and Jess.’ He paused. ‘We’re together. Like, going out together. Since the night of the gig.’

Don’t say ‘oh, right’ yet again, Laura. I took a deep breath.

‘That’s brilliant!’ I said. ‘She’s so great.’

‘She really is,’ he said, and something in the tone of his voice made tears come to my eyes. ‘So what’s the story with you and … was it Ferdia?’

I breathed out softly and tried to sound like someone who wasn’t crying. ‘Fiachra? He’s that guy I went out with in first and second year. There’s always been, you know, a spark between us.’

‘He’s not the one you wrote ‘Midnight Feast’ about, then?’ said Tadhg.

‘God, no! Very much not,’ I added. ‘That was Dan.’

‘Ah yes,’ said Tadhg. ‘Anyway … speaking of our songs, do you fancy playing some this weekend?’

‘I do,’ I said, though I wasn’t sure this was the truth. ‘But Jo’s still in Galway and Brian’s in Meath with his whole family. So we can’t get into the garage. Unless Jess gave you some housebreaking tools for Christmas …’

Look at me, saying her name as if it didn’t cause me physical pain.

‘I meant just me and you,’ said Tadhg. ‘You could call over to my place. But you know, if you want to wait for the others, that’s grand …’

I fell back on my bed and stared at the ceiling.

I felt like Tadhg was trying to make a statement here, showing me that he and I were still friends and bandmates, even though he had a gorgeous new girlfriend who was probably going to take up all his free time from now on.

And I felt I should make a statement too, and that statement was that I was totally cool with this.

So I said, ‘No, let’s do it.’

The next afternoon I found myself walking up the drive of a nice 1930s semi-detached house in Clontarf, guitar case clutched in my hand.

My mother had given me a lift, largely because she was worried about me, seeing as I had spent pretty much the entire Christmas holidays on the phone to the stalwart Katie or holed up in my room, crying quietly and writing heartbroken, angry songs on my guitar.

She even refrained from reminding me I should be spending more of my final college year studying than messing around with a band.

Most of the songs were terrible, but that morning I had found myself strumming a chord sequence that had something special, nice and poppy but with a bittersweet edge.

The more I played it the better it sounded, and I created a melody for it that worked perfectly.

Then I wrote some intentionally bland lyrics for the chorus, trite and romantic words about wanting someone to be your summer girl, so silly and meaningless that it wouldn’t hurt me hearing Tadhg sing them while knowing he was thinking about Jess.

As soon as I rang Tadhg’s doorbell I wished I hadn’t said yes to this. How could I be normal with him when my heart hurt so much? But it was too late to back out now because the door was opening and there he was.

‘Hey!’ he said. ‘Thanks a million for coming over.’

‘Hey yourself,’ I said, and let him hug me.

I followed him into the kitchen, where a good-looking middle-aged woman with dark wavy hair was emptying the dishwasher.

She looked up and smiled when we came in. ‘Hello! You must be Jess.’

I think I physically flinched. Tadhg said, ‘No, Mam, this is Laura from the band. Jess is calling over tomorrow.’

‘Of course!’ said Tadhg’s mother. ‘Sorry, Laura, I got the days mixed up. You know what it’s like at Christmas. Lovely to meet you at last. I’m Marian.’

‘Lovely to meet you too,’ I said.

‘Tim’s told me what a brilliant musician you are,’ she said, as Tadhg put the kettle on.

‘I don’t know about that,’ I said.

‘Don’t listen to her,’ said Tadhg. ‘She is brilliant.’

It felt very strange seeing Tadhg’s room for the first time.

It was pretty much what I’d expected his former teenage bedroom to look like – indie film posters on the walls, some photos of friends, postcards and cuttings, packed bookshelves, piles of music magazines, a stereo and shelves of tapes, CDs and records. And a Casio keyboard and two amps.

‘What’s it like living back here again after being an independent gentleman in Cork for three years?’ I said, sitting in a battered wicker chair.

‘Not exactly ideal,’ said Tadhg, sitting down on the single bed. ‘But you know, my folks are grand. It could be worse. And if I can get some teaching work next year I’ll try to move out.’

And of course, I thought, Jess has her flat in Fitzwilliam Square.

But I couldn’t think about that now. And I really didn’t want to hear him talk about her.

So before Tadhg could potentially start telling me how wonderful she was and what a great time he’d had in her house, I said, ‘I wrote a bit of a song this morning.’

And for the first time, I played Tadhg what we’d end up calling ‘our song’.

I played the chords, and then I played the melody on the keyboard, and as usual he told me to just sing it and I refused. I handed him the lyrics, which I’d scrawled on a piece of paper.

He reached over to his desk and grabbed his minidisc player. ‘Let’s record it.’