The Legacy of Lucy Harte: A poignant, life-affirming novel that will make you laugh and cry

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‘Okay, then,’ I tell him. ‘Let’s have one for the road.’

I dread to think how bad his story will end, but no matter how much I anticipate, the real story is a whole lot worse.

‘Mum drove into town after a morning’s drinking behind our backs,’ he tells me. ‘We found her stash in the hot press, under the kitchen sink, in her old handbags, everywhere there was evidence that she had been topping up all along. They hit a car in a head-on collision and she was killed instantly. Lucy lived for two days, but her injuries were too much for her to survive.’

‘Oh my God!’ My hands cover my mouth. ‘Not your mother too! No…’

‘The other driver escaped almost unmarked, which was lucky for him. He was as devastated as we were.’

‘And Henry? Was he okay?’

I am almost afraid to ask.

‘Henry is … well, Henry is alive,’ says Simon. ‘Well, as alive as he can be. He was in a coma for three weeks with a brain injury and he stayed in hospital for two months after the accident. He needed special care after that and has lived with our Aunt Josie in Glasgow ever since. I see him when I can but he remembers very little really. He doesn’t speak much. He exists, but he doesn’t really live any more. He is twenty-eight years old but has the mind of the little boy he was on that awful day.’

We sit together, numbed at the story that has unfolded and for once in my life I am truly lost for words. Simon seems to be too as we stare at the table, at each other, at the barman who is wiping down empty tables and at the piano, which is now idle and without a tune.

‘I think we should go,’ he tells me.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I think we both need some sleep.’

We have thrashed out enough, more than enough, for one night and our minds and bodies need to rest and digest all that we have told each other, though, to be honest, despite the rush of alcohol that fills my veins, I doubt there will be very much sleep for me tonight.

I say goodbye to Simon Harte and watch him from the back seat of my taxi as he walks towards the Lisburn Road to the B&B with the real chandeliers.

He looks so lost and lonely and his sister’s heart aches inside of me with longing to ease his pain. I only hope that meeting me can give him the closure he so desperately needs so that he can look forward to his new life with his wife and their baby.

Chapter 9 (#ulink_1825d934-fbd6-5615-881f-d038d8fe0986)

I count sheep. I count them in English and then in French and then As Gaelige and then backwards in each language, but still sleep won’t come. I see her every time I close my eyes. I see her freckled nose and her glasses and her long wavy, tatty hair that needed to be cut so badly that day. I hear her voice, or what I think it might sound like, and I feel… well, I feel her heart beat inside me and it makes me very sad.

‘God bless you, Lucy,’ I say out loud. ‘God bless you poor, poor Lucy Harte.’

I think of Henry and his wide-eyed innocence. A little boy at only twelve years old, now orphaned and trapped in a man’s body and fully depending on his ageing aunt. I think of Simon, sat that morning with his young girlfriend and worrying about how he might kiss her, when the police arrived at the door. I think of their father, now dead and buried too, and all the pain and regret he must have lived with for so many years. And I think of their desperately addicted mother, who probably thought she was doing the right thing that day by taking her daughter to have her hair cut, topped up in Dutch courage by the dreaded drink.

Life is cruel. Life is crap and cruel and I can’t sleep.

I get out of bed and take my insomnia to the living area, where I curl up on the sofa under my throw again and turn on the TV. Shopping channels. Yes, that should do it. I lie there and squint at the screen, the rush of gin pumping through my veins and my head begins to spin. I am going to be sick. No… I am not. Yes I am… no… should I get up? What time is it? I feel dizzy again… I’m so….

The TV has gone onto standby and I wake up to the sound of a car radio booming outside. I lift my head from the sofa. Ouch. Damn you Cucumber Coolers. Then I remember about the whiskey. My mouth is like sandpaper. No bloody wonder. Yuk.

I am raging to be awake as I was having the most glorious dream where Jeff came to my door, totally unannounced, but looking oh-so handsome apart from needing a haircut, and like someone had waved a magic wand, he told me that Saffron didn’t even exist and it had all been a big mistake. There was no affair. In fact, there was no one in this entire world called Saffron. No one in the entire universe called Saffron, in fact. Saffron who? He kept saying this. You must have been dreaming, babe! You’re my wife and I love you.

He wanted to take me back to the place we called home, the terraced house we bought in Stranmillis until we decided where to build our dream pad, and the place where we would bring our first baby home to in just a few months’ time because I was already pregnant and didn’t even know it. It would be a girl, he said, and we would call her Lucy Harte. Will Powers Sr was with him at the door and he was laughing at the idea of me thinking they had told me to take time out from work. Don’t be so silly, Maggie,