Free The Matchmaker by Marita Conlon-Mckenna

laughed as Jan passed him up a forkful of the spicy meat and sauce.
    ‘Better even than my mother’s,’ cajoled Josef, his big eyes glistening in the hope of persuading her to ask him to sit down and join them.
    Marta appeared downstairs wearing her big pink dressing gown. Ignoring Josef, Irina made her sit down. She grabbed another plate from the shelf and served her some warm food. She had worked overtime all week with no day off.
    ‘So I work hard, I earn the big money and then I go home. Then there will be time for resting and sleeping!’
    ‘That was so good,’ beamed Jan, licking his lips. ‘As good as my Renata’s but don’t tell her ever I said so!’
    ‘Thank you,’ added Marta, clearing all the food on her plate too.
    Irina smiled. She had a little left for tomorrow when she returned home from the Spar shop where she worked late on a Thursday night. She would put the meatballs away in the fridge with her name written clearly on the container, otherwise Josef or one of the other men would just eat them. Someone had a DVD of a Polish game show and the latest two episodes of her favourite soap
M jak miłośîć
and once she had washed up she would join the throng in the sitting room to watch the continuing story of the Mostowiak family.
    She yawned as she lowered herself on to the multicoloured couch, squeezing in between a skinny girl called Justnya and Piotr Boczkwoski and his girlfriend. Her body ached with exhaustion but she didn’t want to just go straight to bed after working all day. Caroline Dunne had been even more demanding than usual and complained that she had not cleaned the shower in the main bathroom properly and made her redo it. At least she’d been paid, cash in hand, but she was in two minds whether to turn up next week or not. Watching the TV, for a short while she imagined she was back in her own place, in her own town listening to the gossip and chat around her.
    Irina stared at the figures on TV. She laughed as on screen the contestants battled it out for the chance to win a thousand euros and a trip to London. Everyone wanted to win something. Be a winner. Yet life here was tougher than she had imagined: everything was so expensive – rent, food, the bus and Luas and trains – and yet every day more and more of her countrymen seemed to be coming to Ireland, living in rented accommodation in Dublin, Cork, Galway and Wexford. There were many stories of Polish people being successful; buying houses and property and shops and setting up businesses. Some day she would be successful too. Some day her broken heart would mend and she would forget the name Edek Stasiak, and fall in love again!

Chapter Thirteen
    Ignoring the pelting rain Sarah grabbed an umbrella as she and Evie ran helter-skelter down the garden path to the mews. The new tenant was due and her mother had suddenly been called away to the funeral of an old family friend in Wicklow and had asked her to be there instead for the handover.
    ‘Don’t worry about money or anything like that,’ she reassured her daughter, ‘but just make sure you give Angus two sets of keys and show him how to work the heating and the water immersion and the alarm panel.’
    ‘Will do,’ said Sarah, who was curious to meet this Scottish guy her mother had been telling her so much about. His job designing computer games sounded great, really fun, but he was probably one of those computer nerds who never switched off.
    Evie played around the living room and kitchen as Sarah pulled the curtains and did her best to make the place look cosy considering it was such a wet miserable night. She had a welcome bag of essentials with tea and coffee, milk, sugar, butter, bread and biscuits and had flicked on the heating to warm the place up. She loved this house. Her sister Grace had done an amazing job in terms of the simple design and making sure it captured light from all directions. Upstairs she checked the bedrooms quickly before racing with Evie to