‘I’m sorry if I upset you.’
He sounds genuine, and yet, I wonder whether I should believe him. I link his arm, squeezing, and give him back the pipe. I hope he’llunderstand, I hope he’ll hear me without talking. Please, Tom, let’s just enjoy the quiet.
The breathing of the world, the howling of a far-off dog. On a hill in the distance, a house flickers its lights, winking at us both. And before us, two or three more houses light up. Life everywhere.
It’s always like this with Tom. We are always building to a crescendo that is never reached. I fall away from the fight, just like he wants me to. And it remains within me, dull and deep, like a toothache.
Thinking over it again, I manage to find the humour in it. He is so eager to move on from the past that he has created a second past for us, and now we have two of them to manage. Beyond this, there will be no more mention of Miltown. Tom will sort it out with Peggy and Jack. It will just be another thing that we never talk about.
I take in the night. I watch the navy world come alive with electric light. The cold air and the taste of it. For the longest time, the only constant in my life has been the dark blue of the night sky. Looking down on me as I woke up. Filling the gaps around me as I slept. The edges of clouds, the edges of my body, coloured navy. Inescapable, soothing darkness.
A sudden tingle starts in the back of my mind and races to the front. That woman’s singing voice echoes within me. Acting as a harmony to each of my thoughts. The shapes of her mouth. The flex of her tongue. Only something to think of. A fizzing thought to end the night on. Yes, for a long while there was nothing besides the navy sky.
But tonight, stars.
Betty
‘AH GIRL, WHAT KIND AREthey, arriving in a donkey and trap?’
Ciara runs the Hoky over the carpet, not looking up as she speaks to me. Since her guests arrived, she has been waiting for them to leave so that we could dissect them. To Ciara Moore, the O’Learys are nothing but a bit of fresh meat. Once she gets the measure of them, her interest will dry up.
‘It was a pony, not a donkey.’
I feel I need to stand up for them. I can’t say why. The majority of Ballycrea has been subject to Ciara’s opinions, it’s harmless really. She helps the housekeeper at the local convent most afternoons, making tea and sandwiches for the nuns. Her way of making up for all of her hissing gossip, I suppose.
‘Small difference, what year are they living in? Very strange people, I think. I’m staying away.’
Of course, she isn’t going to stay away from the O’Learys. Nobody is. Nobody could, in a town of this size. When she realises I’m not going to indulge her, Ciara changes tack.
‘You’re very good to stay and help with the cleanup.’
From the moment I walked in the door this evening, we both knew that I would be staying late to clean up with her. When the crowd started to thin, Bill and John stepped outside. I suppose they thinkthey’re doing us a favour by keeping out of the way. At my house it would be the very same, with Ciara staying back to help, and the two lads stood outside.
‘He wasn’t bad looking, was he? The oldest lad, Tom.’
She smiles, watching me from the corner of her eye. As though her husband isn’t only a wall away from her.
‘I thought you were staying away?’
Tom wasn’t bad looking, but they’re all good-looking when compared to John Moore.
‘That child was only gorgeous. She was weak for the pups, Ciara.’
I say, carrying the chairs back over to the kitchen table. It’s hard to put an age on the little girl. It’s hard to put an age on any of them, really, they all look a little bit older than they say they are.
‘Well, it’s the first time I was grateful for any of those pups. Otherwise what would the poor girl have done all evening? What were they thinking, bringing her out so late?’
The youngest of Ciara’s children is seventeen now, and heading for Bessborough in September. I suppose she has long forgotten the years when she would walk through the square with three of four children hanging off her. I suppose she feels fit to judge the O’Learys, now her own children are finished with her. Having never had a child myself, I feel it isn’t my place to speak.
‘They’re probably up to ninety with moving house and didn’t think. Or maybe she’s too young to be left on her own. Tom is a nice lad, alright.’
‘He was tense though, on edge like.’
‘If you’ve nothing nice to say, Ciara, then say nothing at all.’
I don’t know where I picked up this way of talking like a teacher. Like a mother. She puts the Hoky away and folds her arms, sighing.
‘He was a nice fella. A bit too glad to talk about himself, but he was grand.’
