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

‘We were thinking of six to eight weeks, initially,’ says young Will Powers from the head of the table. ‘If this isn’t long enough, just let us know. We all need time out, Maggie. Hell, I know I do from time to time. I don’t want to see any of our staff burn out, least of all someone as valuable to the team as you are.’

My God, the Man of Steel does have a heart after all and a pretty big one at that.

‘I… I don’t know what to say.’

‘Do you agree it might help?’ asks Sylvia who sits opposite me. I always thought she was a bit of a self-absorbed snob and now I swear I can see her eyes fill with tears in empathy.

‘Yes,’ I mumble back to her and nod, wiping my nose. ‘Yes, I do. I didn’t think that things were so bad, but now that I’m here… well, yes, I do think it will help.’

‘That’s good,’ says Will Sr. ‘I want to see you get back in the hot seat here at Powers Enterprises as quickly as possible and if there is anything else we can do to help, just give me a call.’

I look at the business card he presses into my hand and flip it over to find his personal number written in his own handwriting. I am overwhelmed with a flurry of emotions, like a slow-motion movie is unfolding as I watch on in disbelief.

‘Thank you, Mr Powers,’ I whisper, still staring at the card. ‘Thank you. All of you.’

He walks me to the door but instead of stopping there, Will Powers Sr walks me through the open-plan office, past my colleagues, who don’t even lift their heads (no one ever does when he is around) and down into the foyer. Thankfully Bridget isn’t at the front desk. We walk outside and the rain has stopped and Davey the porter must be on a cigarette break, so I have a clear path to the car, but Mr Powers stops just before we reach it.

‘Sometimes, Maggie, life moves too fast and we can’t keep up no matter how hard we try. Before you know it, you’re facing retirement and kicking yourself, wondering how on earth you’ve missed out on the simple things in life. Take some time and breathe . Do at least one nice thing every day, something for yourself. Build yourself back up again and then I want you right back here where you belong. Do you hear?’

I nod back at him and smile. Carlsberg don’t do bosses …

‘You’re a very special and very kind man, Mr Powers,’ I tell him. ‘I will never forget you for this. Thank you.’

‘I’ll see you back here really soon,’ he tells me and for a second, I think he is going to give me a fatherly hug, but he stops and pats me on the shoulder and then walks off towards the tower block where I have spent most of my life for the past five years.

I sit in the car for a few moments and breathe right to the pit of my stomach, trying to digest what has just happened on today of all days. I feel a weight lifting off my shoulders, a pressure gone already and I take my time before I drive off and don’t stop until I reach the off license.

I need a drink.

It’s almost ten at night and I am watching my wedding DVD all on my own and I keep rewinding it to the part where Jeff reads out the poem he wrote especially for me and there’s a big close-up on me and my eyes are stinging red from crying at his overwhelming love.

Now they are stinging red from overwhelming love for Sauvignon Blanc. Isn’t it amazing what a difference a year or two makes?

‘You lift me up when I’m feeling down. You light up my world when you smile. You are my one and only, the one I love and the one who I want to grow old with.’

Vomit…

I can see that it’s straight from Google, or else a Ronan Keating song, now that I have snapped out of my starry-eyed romantic honeymoon phase. I am now in a ‘bitch of darkness phase’ after my afternoon of sleeping and drinking and sleeping and drinking and ignoring more phone calls. (It’s Flo this time. She will be grand, as they say here in Ireland. Grand. )

I switch off the DVD, put on some eighties’ classics and sway to the beat of Rick Astley, then look out the window onto the city below me and I raise my glass to my freedom and my future. I have got to be positive. I am merry and positive and I am on a ‘career break’ – that’s what they call it these days. I have it all at my feet and the world awaits, starting with this city I call home.

Plus it’s still my heart anniversary, isn’t it? On this day, seventeen years ago I was at death’s door and then a miraculous gift of life from a little girl in Scotland and her totally amazing family gave me the chance to grow into adulthood. So what if I don’t have a husband any more. So what if I almost lost my job by acting the eejit lately. I still have life! I don’t know how much longer I have it, but for now I do and it’s for living!

‘I still have life!’ I shout out through my open window and a couple below me shout back at me to fuck off. I smile at them and wave. I am drunk again. And I am loving it! I love everything right now!

Mostly, I love Belfast. I love the buzz, the people-watching, the culture, the accents, the shopping, the night-life and the sense of community that still exists, even though it’s very much a big city to a country girl like me with its universities, cosmopolitan quarters and bloody dark history.

I think of all the men I have loved and lost since I moved here in my university days and I start to laugh and laugh and laugh at the memories.

There was Bob, the engineering graduate (or Bob the Builder, as we all called him), who moved to Australia when I was in the thick of my studies and who never returned. There was Martin, an accountant from Dublin, who said he loved me but that with my temporary tattoos and purple hair at the time, he could never see me being the ‘wife’ type; there was Andrew who worked in sales but who turned out to have a criminal record the length of my said long legs and more, and then there was Jeff, the teacher who, as already mentioned, left me for Saffron the Stewardess quicker than the shine wore off his wedding ring.

My love life has been, let’s just say, colourfully complicated.

‘I love being colourfully complicated!’ I shout out loud and continue dancing with myself.

‘Fuck off’, shouts Mr Smart Ass from below again. This time I give him the fingers, then laugh my way to the sofa, totally absorbed in Wham!, who are now playing on the music channel. This is fun. No work tomorrow, a white-wine buzz and Wham! What more would a girl want? Who needs a husband and a job anyway? I’m drunk and I’m on top of the world! I’ve got this! I’ve finally got this!

I see my mail on the coffee table. How exciting! I’ve got mail! Real snail mail. I lift it up and try to sort it while still dancing, but my vision is blurred and I have to set down my wine glass to focus.

A letter from my mobile-phone company, a credit-card bill… I fling them on the floor.

A list of offers from the local supermarket? A voucher with a pound-off washing powder. How exciting?! And it’s on the floor it goes too!

But then a handwritten letter catches my eye and it stops me in my tracks.

I study it, knowing almost immediately that this is of some sort of huge importance but the words are moving, dancing before my eyes. I squint to focus. No good. I close one eye. The writing is neat, all in capital letters and in blue biro. It reminds me of the letters I used to get from a pen pal I once had who lived in Brighton and who drew lines on her envelopes with a pencil and ruler and then rubbed them out when she had written the address in perfect symmetry. Weirdo.

I try to read the postmark on the letter and eventually it comes clear. It says the letter was posted in town of Tain, near Inverness in Scotland.