Her eyes widen as she gets to talk about one of her favourite things. She tips her head back like she always does to make her straight brown hair seem even longer than it really is.
‘I want to be like Pocahontas. Look, Daddy, it’s nearly to my waist.’
I feel my stomach twist. Even the creamy pint of Guinness and the bowl of steaming hot mussels can’t distract me from my favourite face.
‘Oh, guess what?’
‘What?’
‘Good guess!’
She rolls her eyes and giggles.
‘Just tell me, Daddy! You don’t need to always say guess what.’
‘OK, I’ve been dying to tell you this,’ I announce proudly. ‘I’ve downloaded an app to help me learn Spanish so I cankeep up with you when you go to your new school in the New Year.’
‘Cool!’
My heart crushes in my chest. I touch her face on the screen again, and the distance between us feels so real. The day she took her first steps comes to mind. The day I taught her to ride her first bike. So many firsts still lie ahead, yet I’m going to miss them all.
‘And maybe I can even still help you with your homework? We can Zoom to do it together. We’ll make it happen, I’ll make sure of it.’
I spot a plush, very expensive-looking Christmas tree twinkling behind her on the polished tiled white floor of her new home. I try to ignore her mother’s feet walking past in the background, but my blood boils at the sight of Clodagh, even if it’s just her feet in her whole new world. I do my best to shake it off. I’ve already said all I have to say about her decision to make her big move to Tenerife, especially leaving just before Christmas.
‘I can’t imagine you speaking Spanish, Daddy,’ Rebecca giggles.
‘Oh, really? Well, I can already speak Italian and a little bit of Irish, remember?’
‘I do remember. OK, maybe youcouldlearn it,’ she replies, tucking her hair behind her ears to show off tiny new stud earrings. ‘Rob’s already taught me hello, goodbye, dog and cat.’
‘That’s kind of him.’
Rob is ahead of the game as always. I’m so glad that Rebecca is totally unaware of the pain I’m feeling right now.
‘Me, Mummy and Rob are all learning ten words together every week so that when I go to school, I’ve got a head start,’ she explains.
Me, Mummy and Rob.
I force a smile but my heart cracks a little bit more with every attempt I make to be fine with this situation. He doesn’t miss a trick, good old Rob. Always at least ten steps, never mind ten words, ahead of anything I have to offer when it comes to my seven-year-old daughter.
I’m always the last to know about everything she does now that Rob is on the scene. Rich kid Rob, with his fancy house in the Canaries, who has whisked my only child away to a place where she doesn’t understand the language or why it’s sunny at Christmastime.
It will never last, Niall told me as soon as he heard of Clodagh’s whirlwind wedding and plans to pack up and go, all within months.Wait and see. Too much too soon is never a good thing, believe me.
It’s not that I wish my ex any unhappiness. I just wish she’d stayed in the same country so we can co-parent our child.
‘Where are you?’ Rebecca asks me. ‘Where’s Max? Is Helena with you?’
I bite my lip as my eyes sting again at the thought of the long stretch to Easter when I’ll see Rebecca again in real life.
‘No, darling,’ I sigh. ‘Helena is staying at her own place this Christmas so it’s just me and Max here.’
‘Can I see him?’
I flip the phone screen to show Max snoozing by the open fire.
‘We’re spending Christmas in a very pretty cottage in Donegal,’ I say quickly, hoping that seeing Max doesn’t make her homesick. ‘It’s in a place called Fanad where we used to take you when you were very little. Do you remember?’
