![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/shanahan1-banner.jpg\")
<\/p>\nBy\u00a0Deirdre Shanahan.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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The mirror says he\u2019ll do. More than do. He\u2019s made an effort though whether it\u2019s in the right way he can\u2019t tell. Too formal or not? On stage, years fell away and he knew he looked pretty good for his age. In real life he\u2019s revealed. He\u2019ll show he still cares. She\u2019ll see him as he really is. As he can be. It\u2019s not too late.<\/p>\n
He runs through the tangle of streets north of Oxford Circus but has to walk west for the church with the steeple. The place she mentioned. He\u2019s early but doesn\u2019t care. Once in his life he should be early. Which door? Smoky grey glass hides something, maybe people. Part of a hotel and at the main entrance a gathering of suited men and women in heels. He tries a door but it is locked, though a smaller one falls open at his pressure and he tips in.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, I am.\u201d<\/p>\n
The manager approaches. \u201cA table for one?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. Two please.\u201d<\/p>\n
The manager leads him to a table by the window and lays down a menu. Night in here, late October afternoon out there. With the blinds down he feels ill-dressed. Too casual. Too smart. And threads on the trouser seam are loose. A nimble blonde darts between tables, her skirt too short when she stretches to lay out the cutlery. A student or actress when she\u2019s off-duty? But someone should tell her. He opens the menu. Low muzak. He thinks of a pub in Manchester, where eighties tunes thudded out and someone started a fight. Loud, craggy blokes thrashed each other to the sounds of shredding guitars.<\/p>\n
The waitress smiles. \u201cReady to order?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot quite. I\u2019m waiting for someone.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSure. Take your time.\u201d<\/p>\n
He hates to disappoint and wishes he could say more, for her to linger. A clatter of footsteps. Two older women and a man with a toddler. The man shoots to the back, heading perhaps for the toilets.<\/p>\n
The door opens and an older woman enters. But behind her. Her. In blue and lavender under a black leather jacket. Short boots. Dark suede.<\/p>\n
\u201cHello.\u201d He rises.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo you found the place.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course.\u201d He pecks her on the cheek. \u201cWhy not? I live in Islington now.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo longer the wilds of Somerset.\u201d She smiles. Her face softens. She sits before he does, settling herself. In charge. But her hair is shorter. A blunt cut with a fringe. And a different tone. She has done something he can\u2019t work out. \u201cYou look the same as always,\u201d she says. \u201cPretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIs that good or bad?\u201d He tempts a smile. Her necklace of green beads shimmers. Her mother\u2019s. Is it lent or has it been given?<\/p>\n
\u201cI was surprised to hear from you.\u201d She stands the menu in front of her.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut you don\u2019t mind?\u201d He won\u2019t let this happen in future: looking her up online, ringing an old pal for her mother\u2019s number to get hers as he had changed phones.<\/p>\n
\u201cCourse not. You don\u2019t interrupt my life. I get on with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought, as I\u2019d moved here, I should let you know. In case, well, you need anything.\u201d In his head he hears a startled, mocking laugh, but she smiles. \u201cWill we eat?\u201d Is it lunch or brunch or even heading to tea-time? He doesn\u2019t know her taste, never has. When she was a kid he\u2019d made burgers with lentils.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want much.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not hungry?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll eat later.\u201d She scans the menu.<\/p>\n
\u201cHave something.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll right, then. A croissant.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the waitress returns he orders for her and a brioche roll with egg for himself. His gut is queasy but eating might help.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I have to give you this.\u201d He pulls out the notes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want it.\u201d She presses his hand closed before he can give her anything.<\/p>\n
\u201cI owe you. And it\u2019s not even with interest.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t need it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her words stab. She earns more in a week than he does in a month but it gives him a kind of pleasure to think she is independent. He will make it up, though. He will.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou look well,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThanks. I feel well.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe you\u2019ve been away or are you always working?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI did go away. For a week in the summer. To Cornwall.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAh, yes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPortleven. Isn\u2019t that near where you lived with that woman?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWho? Oh. I think so. It was long ago.\u201d He pulls the napkin close. A stark white bandage.<\/p>\n
The woman who played the dulcimer. Her warm brown eyes beguiling.<\/p>\n
\u201cHere we are.\u201d The waitress hovers with two plates, an aroma of eggs and a sweetness.<\/p>\n
He used to tell her about his guitars. Tested out tunes and delighted her when he changed the words: \u201cmy fairest girl\u201d became \u201cmy lovely daughter.\u201d A foolish thing, even then.<\/p>\n
She eats little but there\u2019s a greater chance of a meal later. They\u2019ll find a cozy bar or a vibrant one with music. Drink together like old buddies. Maybe cocktails if she prefers. He\u2019ll show her the parts of London he\u2019s discovered. If she doesn\u2019t know them already, which is more than likely. They\u2019ll go on and stroll. Find a neat little restaurant. Italian or French.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat was her name? Ramona? Lamorna?\u201d She fiddles with tabs of salt.<\/p>\n
\u201cMona.\u201d He watches her face, her slim nose and violet eyes.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes. But you never married. Her or any of them. You only wanted mum as your wife.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYour mother\u2019s doing fine without me. Teaching. And you are.\u201d He twitches the napkin up on his lap. \u201cI tried to be there.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile gadding about the country.\u201d She smiles.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy work. I have to.\u201d He shifts, hot under her gaze. The seats are too small, too hard. He should have sat where they are upholstered. He thought of the morning he and Mona woke to her little peering eyes at the bedroom door. He was more shocked than she might\u2019ve been and dragged a sheet across himself to rise and slam the door shut. He\u2019d dressed in a hurry, wracked by the fear that she\u2019d report back to her mother and the fissure would widen. But in the weeks that followed he detected only continual silence. Until the weekend visits fizzled out. His fault, he knew. He was never in the right place.<\/p>\n
He stabs the lettuce. Brioche. What did it mean? The sweetness is too much, anyway. But she should eat. She\u2019s fuller in the face than last time but with a frail beauty as if she needs protection. And he wonders how it happened, in front of his eyes. The last year or rather fourteen months he\u2019d been tied down to tours. Weeks flooded past. He hadn\u2019t meant not to call but there was always a pressing demand. A clash of dates. Accommodation not fixed. The logistics of leaving one town for another. He\u2019d missed her last birthday and, he suspected, also the one before. But it wasn\u2019t his fault he had to work on her graduation day. The twenty quid he\u2019d borrowed still bit. But he\u2019d repay her. Make things straight. Show her. Give her a good time.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s okay now. But she had to take on three different jobs.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThree?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wasn\u2019t likely to tell you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know she was put out.\u201d He doesn\u2019t tell her that Mona ended up leaving him after a year, taking his tunes and sheet music, for a man who ran a string of holiday flats. Someone else came after her, and a couple of others over the next decade, one or two resembling her mother, but whether it was because of that or not he couldn\u2019t settle. \u201cSorry.\u201d The word lands between them like a stone. He weakens, sliding into another being as he tries to be as he was: the young father, joking, entertaining his daughter. \u201cI can make it up.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, right.\u201d She sniffs. \u201cOh, eggs.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNothing. The smell. I\u2019m pregnant.\u201d She smooths her hand over her stomach. She doesn\u2019t look pregnant. And she is young. But she is, he realizes, the age her mother had been.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh. When are you due?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEarly next year. I wonder where you\u2019ll be then.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLondon, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou haven\u2019t gigs booked?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot yet. But you? What part of London are you in?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDavan and I are in West Hampstead.\u201d She takes a delicate bite and a dusting of sugar falls from the croissant.<\/p>\n
\u201cDoes he work with you?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s in finance. A different company. But we met at a work thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI wish\u2014\u201d He blinks. \u201cI hope\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease. Don\u2019t get teary.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her life has gone on without him. She is older. Different. But he will be. And he will be more present for this child. He tussles around the notion. Sun leaks through the blinds, throwing shadows like knives across the floor. Too hot. He has to remove his jacket. The restaurant is filling. People sit nearby.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019ll you do afterwards?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGo back to work. There\u2019s a cr\u00e8che. But much\u2019ll depend on Davan\u2019s work.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHas your mother met him?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe likes him very much.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you\u2019re happy? Of course you are.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s lovely. Thoughtful. Caring.\u201d<\/p>\n
Qualities her mother would say he lacked in himself. Brass rails burnish in the sun. A bright afternoon out there and he wonders if he\u2019ll see the two of them again, the three as one. As at her First Communion. The spring before the break-up. Like a bride back then and now the age of being one.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll be better in future,\u201d he says and she stifles a laugh. \u201cWhat\u2019s wrong? What d\u2019you think?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDoesn\u2019t matter what I think. You\u2019ll do as you want. You won\u2019t phone for months or make it easy to get in touch.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt won\u2019t be like before. I\u2019m not touring so much. I\u2019ll be based more in one place. We\u2019ll be able to meet.\u201d He\u2019d inch closer. He would. Sneak up like a fieldmouse. \u201cI want to make it up.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOkay. Thanks.\u201d<\/p>\n
He couldn\u2019t tell for what. His words? Himself for being there? Her quickness of mind slid and confused him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year I\u2019ll be around. You\u2019ll see. We\u2019ll meet again soon?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy not. But you haven\u2019t my work number.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cRight.\u201d He scrabbles in his pocket for a piece of paper, tumbling out sweet wrappers, a ball of fluff, a button. He flattens the back of the receipt from a drycleaner and searches for a pen.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to lose that.\u201d She checks through her bag and hands him a business card. \u201cOnly I have to go away.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWell,\u201d he says, \u201csoon as you\u2019re back.\u201d He\u2019ll show her. Take her somewhere she likes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019ll be a while. I\u2019m going to Lagos.\u201d She pushes back from the table as though it has grown between them.<\/p>\n
\u201cNigeria?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re opening a new office.\u201d She rises and his eyes blur. \u201cWe\u2019ve had a nice time, but I\u2019m due elsewhere.\u201d He wants to cling to her. \u201cI\u2019ll call you.\u201d She stretches out her arm and he thinks it is to shake hands. Businesspeople striking a deal. But she hugs him and he wraps his arms around her. Her. His missing part. He is heavy and ragged with time. So much happening while not happening within the scope of his embrace.<\/p>\n
She strides across the marble floor to the door and a wind blows through him. He is slowed. Emptied. The food was too much. Or he has eaten too little. He is hungry and full at the same time and sits and kicks at something under the table. Bends to see what, bends to retrieve the shiny blue case of a lipstick.<\/p>\n
He runs to the door and is out, passing down the street between the crowd, to see her walk arm-in-arm with a man who is tall and wears a striking dark tailored coat with a back vent.<\/p>\n
\u201cEllen,\u201d he calls out.<\/p>\n
The man glances over his shoulder. A softly black face. High cheekbones. Then he turns and leans into her as they continue walking, laughing.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou missed her?\u201d The waitress holds open the door. \u201cI can leave it in lost property?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. I\u2019ll keep it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ll see her again?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes. Of course.\u201d He must. He would. In his pocket the lipstick is the size of a lighter and he thinks of how he always had a couple with him, especially going to gigs with the chance of leaving one aside in error.<\/p>\n
At the till the waitress rings up the bill and the receipt ruffles out. He pays and leaves. Outside, people rush past to bars and theatres and once he might have wanted to do the same. Now he wants to run as though he\u2019s the one to have left something, only not behind but in front of him. A shadow. A ghost of the future or of what he\u2019d hoped would be. He\u2019d been pulled up and jostled by her news. She was a little taller or chubbier. Thinner or with greyness beneath her eyes. She was running ahead of him as she always had and how could he ever catch up. She\u2019d passed out of his life and into her own. All he could do was hold on to what he had.<\/p>\n
Go home. Home is what he has. It won\u2019t change or run off. On a bus heading north, he is free of other people and the oncoming evening and he stops three stops before his own. The small weight of the lighter burns in his pocket when he checks for change. The Turkish supermarket is busy and Atlantic Stores which sells everything is still open. The late-night barber that never seems to close is empty. Inside would be warm and he\u2019d share chat with the men but he lets it go. He wants people. But he wants his own. He slows to drink in what\u2019s left of the day, of the night. He used to get into things quick and was out fast. Wasn\u2019t that the way when you felt you hadn\u2019t enough time even though you were young.<\/p>\n
Chill air swipes his skin and he pulls up his collar. He might have to wait a while to hear. But he had let weeks and months elapse in the past. Now notes rise and filter in and he knows the tune, hears the chords with clarity. He sang it to her, that old song, when she was small, as mournful and discordant as it was. It used to make her cry so he stopped. But the strains of lilting chords rise and then sink, and linger, and won\u2019t let go; they won\u2019t let go. And look: here in the high road, pressed beyond the height of tower blocks and offices, up where the city flings its light, stars are visible. Almost white. He knows songs about stars, too, but they\u2019re festive, all too festive. Wintery and it\u2019s best to keep seasonal, so he won\u2019t use them yet. But stars, the stars. Look at them all. Pressed back beyond darkness, he\u2019s heard there are more stars than one can see. Packed in. Hidden. And he wonders if they also shine out away from him, through waves and curves of constellations, into the galaxy\u2019s farthest reaches where their light is wasted.<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/shanahan.jpg\")
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR The mirror says he\u2019ll do. More than do. He\u2019s made an effort though whether it\u2019s in the right way he can\u2019t tell. Too formal or not? On stage, years fell away and he knew he looked pretty good for his age. In real life he\u2019s revealed. He\u2019ll show he still cares. She\u2019ll see him as he really is. As he can be. It\u2019s not too late.<\/p>\n He runs through the tangle of streets north of Oxford Circus but has to walk west for the church with the steeple. The place she mentioned. He\u2019s early but doesn\u2019t care. Once in his life he should be early. Which door? Smoky grey glass hides something, maybe people. Part of a hotel and at the main entrance a gathering of suited men and women in heels. He tries a door but it is locked, though a smaller one falls open at his pressure and he tips in.<\/p>\n A short story by Deirdre Shanahan<\/b>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44448,"featured_media":117950,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44448"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117948"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":117963,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117948\/revisions\/117963"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nDeirdre Shanahan<\/strong> was a writer of fiction. Her d\u00e9but novel,\u00a0Caravan of the Lost and Left Behind<\/i><\/a>, was published by Bluemoose Books in 2019, and her short story collection,\u00a0Carrying Fire and Water<\/em><\/a>, was published by Splice in 2020. This story was one of two she was preparing for publication when she passed away unexpectedly in August 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"