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“Ma, we’re barely engaged,” Daisy responded, scolding her. “We haven’t had time to let it sink in yet,” her daughter explained.
“Are Ryan and Belle behaving?” her mom asked me.
“To be honest, that’s highly unlikely knowing my nephew, but we’ve barely seen them. We had some drama with Paddy and they both disappeared leaving us to deal with him.”
“What kind of drama?” her father asked.
“Just drank too much and caused a scene in the ski boot rental shop because they only had red and white boots. He was wearing a green jacket and refused to let the colors clash, or some bullshit like that,” I explained.
“Ah, well he’s right on that. I’d have refused to wear them as well. Red and green should never be seen—”
“Except on an Irish Queen,” I finished, mimicking Paddy’s accent when I said it.
“Well, that’s how the saying goes anyway,” Dermot insisted, but chuckled.
“Superstition or something?” I asked.
“Who knows, it’s just something we heard growing up,” Daisy’s dad elaborated, but he looked embarrassed when he said it, like he didn’t understand the saying himself.
“Ah, well, anyway, he never got to go skiing because he was so fecking sozzled. Felix took him upstairs to bed,” Daisy explained.
“I thought he was married to Bernie,” Dermot joked, like he’d implied Felix had snagged Paddy because he was drunk.
“Best not let Felix hear you joking like that,” I remarked.
“Oh, look I’m quaking in my boots at that threat,” Dermot replied, playfully. “Hasn’t anyone told you, us Irishmen are fearless?”
I chuckled and Daisy broke into the conversation to ask her mom how Poppy was doing at the pub. Once Roslin reassured her everything was in hand at home, we concluded the call, explaining we’d had to run to spend our last day on the slopes before flying back to Dublin.
By the time hit the center of the resort and reached the chairlift, everyone was waiting for us. It was the first time, apart from dinner, when everyone was in a fit enough condition to ski.
Bernie was stone-cold sober, and Paddy had tried hard to follow her example. By his groveling behavior, it was clear he knew I was offended by his behavior the day after our engagement. Since then, he had tried not to drink in such a binge drinking way that he could barely function. When I say he tried, that didn’t mean he had always been successful today.
However, I was in no doubt he would make up for that in the privacy of his hotel suite after we’d left for the day. But on the occasions when we’d headed for the slopes or out to dinner at least, he’d somehow managed to moderate his intake.
Like most things in life, Ryan demonstrated what an amazing snowboarder he was, and although I loved snowboarding myself, I’d chosen to ski that week due to Daisy’s preference to learn how to ski when given the choice. Once I’d seen how much trouble Belle had at keeping her balance on her board, I figured my girl had made the right choice.
“Right, Ryan, I’ll race you down to the bottom,” Paddy challenged. The look that passed between the rest of us said we thought this to be a very bad idea.
“You’re on,” Ryan snapped before I could signal for him to ignore the contest Paddy had suggested.
Belle looked worried and leaned in close to Ryan. “This isn’t a good idea.”
“Blue run,” I interjected, quickly before my nephew suggested a more difficult run. Ryan glanced toward me like he was going to protest, but the scowl I was sure that was on my face made him instantly back down from any thought he had in his head.
“Sure, let’s keep it simple for the old man,” Ryan replied, poking the bear.
“Are you saying I couldn’t do a harder one?” he asked.
“He’s not saying that. I’m saying we want to get as much skiing in as we can, and if you go to the top of the mountain, the ladies will all be freezing their asses off here by the time you finish the run,” I interjected to squash Paddy’s competitive streak.
My bandmate considered this and nodded. “I can understand that,” he said, suddenly reasonable.
Again, I figured this was out of character for him and that he felt he needed to walk on eggshells in case I lost my cool with him. Daisy smiled lovingly toward me, like I was her hero for saying this and I winked.
“If they’re doing a blue run, can’t we all go up instead of waiting for them?” Belle asked.
“Good idea,” Bernie muttered. “It beats the embarrassment of Paddy wagging his cock with a teenage boy to see whose is the biggest.” Paddy shook his head at his wife but gave her an affectionate smile.
