Chapter 15

Jo set the table while Gram and Nana went about serving up the dinner. Ian managed to carry over a water pitcher and then the butter dish. While Jo laid down the place settings, she kept stealing glances at him.

Jo liked this side of him. She wished she could have known him before his injury. She’d bet he was a lot of fun to hang around with. After the night at the pub and then this morning, she felt encouraged. She liked the way she felt when she was with him.

As they all sat down together, she noticed her plate was heaping with tender slices of chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, a sage-and-onion stuffing, a carrot-and-parsnip mash, turnip, and broccoli. If she finished all this, she wouldn’t have to eat for a week.

Scruff circled around Ian’s chair and finally came to rest on the floor next to Ian’s leg, his head raised, his gaze fixed on Ian.

“Ian do not feed the dog from the table,” Nana said.

“No, Nana, I won’t,” Ian said, but he whispered to the dog, “I’ll save you some chicken.”

“Where did the two of you head off to this morning?” Nana asked as she sat down to join them.

“We went for a drive to Wexford town,” Jo said.

“That must have been nice,” Bridie said absentmindedly as she poured liberal amounts of gravy over her own plate of food.

“It was,” Jo said truthfully.

Ian shrugged, not taking his eyes off of his plate. He scooped up a forkful of mashed potatoes. “Johanna’s starting to get the hang of driving a manual.”

He didn’t say anything about stopping to see his ‘relative,’ and Jo decided she wouldn’t say anything either. It was kind of nice to keep between them, she thought, almost like a private joke.

Bridie recounted to Ian their visit to Mary’s homeplace, and the spread laid out at her brother’s and his wife’s home.

“The food! You know how Nora is, Ian,” Bridie said. “If you go away from Nora’s table hungry it’s your own fault.”

“How are Tom and Nora?” Ian asked.

“They’re well. Tom’s walking great since he had his hip replaced,” Bridie informed him. “They asked after you. You should really visit them once you’re driving again.”

“I will. I like visiting relatives,” Ian said. He glanced sideways at Jo and winked.

Jo pressed her lips together to suppress a grin.

“What kind of trouble have you and Mary been getting into?” Ian asked his grandmother. This question resulted in a round of giggles and laughter between the two elderly women. He grinned. “That much?”

“We’ve been having a ball,” Gram said, wiping a tear from her eye. She and Nana started laughing again.

Jo said, “I don’t know who the bad influence is here.”

Ian regarded their grandmothers and pronounced, “It looks to be pretty even.”

Once the dinner plates were cleared, Nana and Gram served up dessert.

Jo leaned back in her chair and folded her arms across her abdomen. She blew out a breath, and her bangs lifted off her face. “I don’t know if I can. I’m pretty stuffed.” She’d been hungrier than she thought.

But a plate was put in front of her with a mini mince pie on it.

“Try one of those,” Gram said with a nod toward the floral dessert plate. “Bridie and I made those last night.”

Bridie stood at the counter, using an electric whisk to whip up a bowl of cream. “You can’t have Christmas without mince pies.”

“How many for you, Ian?” Gram asked.

“Two is good,” he said.

As Nana doled out a generous dollop of cream on top of their mince pies, Jo asked, “What kind of plans do you have for the rest of the day?”

“We’re going into the city to see a pantomime.”

“By yourselves?” Ian asked.

Nana shook her head. “No, we’re going with the retirement group. The bus pulls away from the church at six sharp.”

“What about you two?” Gram asked. “Any plans for the afternoon?”

Both Gram and Nana stopped what they were doing and looked expectantly at Jo and Ian. Jo felt like it was a test she must pass.

“We’ll figure something out,” Ian said smoothly. “I’ll take Johanna to see something.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Jo regarded him. He sat so close to her that his arm practically brushed against hers. She studied that arm as unobtrusively as possible, the ropey veins running the length of it. She would have liked to reach out and trace a finger along those veins, imagining how hard they would feel beneath her fingertips.

Deciding she couldn’t go down that road, no matter how much she wanted to, she reminded herself that he used to be a professional rugby player. He was a celebrity in his own right, and celebrities didn’t usually choose girls who sold clothes at the mall.

Jo tried to focus her attention on her mince pie, which was yummy. Gram had always made mince pies at Christmas, for as long as Jo could remember. Nana was right; it wasn’t Christmas without them.

But she found herself wondering what type of girl Ian had dated in the past. Most likely a looker, she concluded. The image of a leggy blonde with her arm looped through Ian’s came to mind, and Jo tried not to let it depress her.

After dinner, Jo offered to do the cleanup.

“Do you mind?” Nana asked. “It’s just that there’s a repeat episode of one of the Mrs. Brown’s Boys Christmas specials on RTE this afternoon, and I thought Mary might enjoy it.”

“We can watch that before we go to the pantomime,” Gram chirped.

“That’s what I thought too.”

“I don’t mind at all,” Jo said honestly. Besides, Nana and Gram had gone to the trouble of making a beautiful dinner; they’d certainly earned the right to put their feet up.

As they headed out of the kitchen, Nana said to Ian, “You’ll help Jo, won’t you, Ian?”

By her tone and pointed look, she made it clear that it was more of a command than a question.

Ian simply nodded his head and grabbed his crutches. Once standing, he hobbled over to the sink.

“Maybe I could bring the plates over and you could load them,” Jo suggested.

“Sure, that’s fine,” he said. “Just save a bit of the chicken for the dog.”

Jo nodded, putting aside some chicken scraps on a separate plate. She brought over the rest of the plates, scraped them off into the bin, and handed them to Ian, who loaded them into the dishwasher. They worked in tandem, wordlessly, focusing on their task. As Ian poured dishwasher soap into the compartment and turned it on, Jo wiped down the table and the countertops.

Ian put some chicken into the dog’s dish and Scruff gobbled it up, his tail wagging.

When they were finished, they glanced around the empty kitchen. From the front of the house came the sound of laughter and a television soundtrack. Both Ian and Jo smiled.

Ian glanced at his watch. “It’s still early, will we do something? Take a drive?”

Jo was nodding before he finished his sentence. “Yeah, sure.”

***

Jo felt her driving was coming along; she only ground the gears twice. Ian must be getting used to it, she thought; he’d refrained from commenting and only raised an eyebrow once.

They ended up heading back to Wexford town, to the ruins of Selskar Abbey, which dated back to the twelfth century. For a Sunday afternoon, it wasn’t that crowded. Finally, there was a little bit of sun, and the green grass glittered beneath it. Ian trailed along on his crutches as they made their way around the impressive grounds.

Jo admired the red sandstone walls on the eastern side. She marveled at all of it. Everything was so old.

“I’ll have to come back one day soon with my sketchbook,” she said.

“You seem passionate about sketching,” Ian said.

Jo nodded, shielding her eyes from the bright sunshine. She’d never thought to bring her sunglasses with her.

“I am, I love it.”

“Did you ever think about making a career out of it?”

“A starving artist? No thanks.”

Ian stopped and leaned on his crutches. “Who said you had to be starving?”

Jo shrugged.

“There must be something you could do with an art degree to support yourself.”

“I don’t know.”

“Have you ever thought of looking into it?” he asked, walking on.

“No, I guess I’ve boxed myself into thinking that there wouldn’t be a lot of career opportunities,” Jo admitted, biting her lip.

“Do you need to sketch or draw every day?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s almost like breathing. I find it relaxes me.”

“Do what you love, Johanna. Life’s too short to be stuck in a job you’re miserable at.”

“Did you feel the same way about rugby?” Jo asked, hoping he wouldn’t find her question intrusive.

“I did. I’ve been playing for as long as I can remember. I used to eat, breathe, and sleep rugby. Playing for the Irish Rovers had been a lifelong dream.”

They walked on in silence. After a bit, Jo said, “What will you do going forward?”

A bitter laugh escaped Ian. “That’s just it. I don’t know.”

“You couldn’t work in some capacity with your team?” she ventured.

Ian shook his head before Jo even had the whole sentence out of her mouth.

“If I can’t play rugby, I don’t want to be on the sidelines watching everyone else play.”

“Jeez, that kind of thinking is self-limiting, isn’t it?”

“Maybe it is, but it’s how I feel,” he said.

Jo had nothing to add so kept quiet.

Ian changed the subject. “Will we go for some tea?”

“That would be lovely.”

They made their way to the tea shop, and there was no more talk about careers in art or playing rugby. They kept it general, and the time flew.