A Taste for Love Read Free Page B

dad would sit down with a pad and pen with her, and draft and redraft her CV when he came home from his work at the bank.
    ‘Lucy, you must have some idea of what you would really like to do! The sort of career that would satisfy you, the kind of work you want.’
    ‘I loved Phoenix Records,’ she said. ‘It was a great buzz working there.’
    ‘Given the current climate, no one is going to be opening another record store in Dublin – or anywhere else for that matter,’ said her dad, irritated.
    ‘I know.’
    ‘So you need to focus on something else, Lucy, and try to get experience working in a different environment.’
    It was easier said than done. Her reams of unanswered CVs were a testament to that fact.
    She had done a bit of babysitting and childminding for her brother Kevin and his wife Cassie and their baby Sophie, and also for her sister Emma. She loved minding her little niece and nephew. Sometimes, through one of Jeremy’s contacts, she got a bit of work on the promotion side for big gigs coming into the city’s large music venues. It was hand to mouth stuff, and she didn’t know how much longer she could keep it up as week after week friends headed for London, New Zealand, Australia and Canada.
    ‘Something will turn up,’ her mother said soothingly, again and again.
    Lucy knew she was a useless case. She’d loved school, and been happy there, but her exam results had been pretty awful. She wasn’t academic, and had struggled to get through the Leaving Cert, unlike her brothers and sister. She had scraped into one of Dublin’s smaller colleges, realizing after her first term studying marketing and business and French that she had absolutely no idea what she was doing, but enjoyed the social life. She had flunked her first-year exams, and halfway through repeats in her second year came to the conclusion that there was absolutely no point in it, and just dropped out.
    She had tried lots of other things: computers, interior design, tourism, massage, web design … and hated every single one of them. She had racked up a fortune in fees over the years, and still had no idea of what her calling in life was.
    Sure, she’d like to get married and have kids, but that didn’t really count as a career aim. Her sister Emma had Harry, the most huggable three-and-a-half-year-old on the planet, but she still had to work. She and her husband had a massive mortgage on their small house up in Sandyford.
    ‘Lucy, think yourself lucky you are not caught up paying a mortgage like us.’ Emma grimaced. She had given up her Volkswagon Beetle, her fancy clothes, her fake-tan sessions, nail bar and spa treats with her girlfriends, and romantic breaks with Gary in order to keep paying the bills. At least Harry was able to attend the crèche attached to her office, and would start school next year.
    ‘Any news?’ asked Lucy’s mum hopefully, coming into her room with a pile of washing she had brought in from the line.
    ‘Just another letter with a great big no!’ Lucy sighed, feeling sorry for herself. ‘Mum, I can’t see how I am ever going to get a job unless I emigrate.’
    ‘I’m sorry, pet. It’s not your fault. It’s the stupid politicians and bankers that run this country that have brought us to this. Who would believe married men and women with families and mortgages are losing their jobs, and talented people like yourself not even getting called to an interview? Honestly, Lucy, it makes my blood boil. In my day jobs were ten a penny. If you didn’t like a job or your boss you just quit! Upped and left, and usually found something better. There were jobs and opportunities galore. How did we come to this, I ask you?’
    Lucy was so fed up of it. She didn’t want to talk about her problems and set her mum off on another of her regular diatribes against politicians and political parties. Ever since her mum had gone back part-time to study arts in college she had loved talking about politics – which was