‘Why can’t I go to the dance?’
She asks Anna. I decide it isn’t my problem. Being left alone is the sort of thing she usually has tantrums over. But she’s more than happy to be alone with Betty Nevan, so I’m sure she will get on fine with Mrs Keane. I’ve met her on the road once or twice. She seems lucid enough.
‘Dances are only for adults. You can go when you’re grown up.’
Anna roots through her handbag while speaking, not giving her full attention to Peggy.
My God, I was mortified carrying that thing home for her on Monday evening. Betty insisted I took it with me. I don’t know why Anna couldn’t have just called down for it herself. Even though it was stuffed inside my coat, I was frantic with the idea that somebody would catch me carrying a handbag.
Tying my tie, I watch from the corner of my eye as Anna puts her chin on Peggy’s head. Trying to seem sisterly, perhaps. Looking at their reflection, as though something is missing.
‘We’re more alike every day.’
Anna says. And I hope, for Peggy’s sake, that isn’t true.
Anna
THE NERVES HAVE MY BONESrattling. I want to get down to the parish hall as quickly as we can, to scope it all out and know exactly what I’m getting myself into. It’s as daunting as our first evening here, like going down to John Moore’s house all over again. I reach into my handbag and stroke Betty’s headscarf, trying to settle myself.
Cold, pale grey air all around me, all in front of me. The sort of foggy night that you might meet Jackie the Lantern in. Before dropping her off at Minnie Keane’s, we take Peggy down the sea road to watch the big waves for a little while. She twirls her hair for the whole walk, even when Jack holds one of her hands. Isn’t it pretty, the sea? Unpredictable and dark, and so full of life. The ground beneath us mosaicked by crushed mussel shells, blue and white. As the sea churns out creamy foam, I think of England and what I have heard of their seasides; little carnivals.
‘’Twould put a thirst on you. Seafoam always puts me in mind of a pint.’
Jack says to nobody in particular. The ocean air is wetting us. My hair begins to feel greasy on my neck, behind my ears.
When we get down to Minnie Keane’s little terrace house, warm light fattens the windows. Outside, four or five children are running around in the mist. Minnie Keane waves at us from the door, and Irealise that she is a total stranger. Something about Betty mentioning her name made me feel like I knew her. Like it would be fine to trust her with Peggy. Well, she is smiling, she seems fine. The other children seem happy, I’m sure Peggy will be grand.
She refuses a kiss when we leave, and I pretend not to be upset by it. I could do with a hug and kiss this evening.
We had to have three conversations with Jack before he agreed to let this woman look after Peggy. Tom called to her house yesterday to check her out and make sure it was all okay. I appreciate that this woman is a stranger, but she’s hardly a witch.
‘She’s not going to eat Peggy, is she?’
I try to make Jack laugh. But with his little Peigín, there is to be no joking.
We turn and leave her, and the mood shifts altogether. How strange. No longer are we three siblings walking down to the parish hall. Suddenly, we are three separate adults, heading in the same direction by coincidence. Each with plans for the evening that don’t involve each other. It scares me to think of what they might have in mind for themselves, and so I allow myself to be taken with thoughts of dancing with Betty.
Jack
EVEN THOUGH WE WALK ONwithout speaking, they feel too close to me. So close that they might as well be on my back. I try to walk ahead, but they catch up. Such a thick silence. Tom must feel the weight of it, too, because he is the one to break it.
‘We’ll have some craic tonight.’
I hear him from behind me, bolting his words with joviality. I don’t bother turning around to give him the reaction that he wants. Unfair, I know. You would have given him a big smile and listed off two or three things that you were excited for. All your endless patience, which I once saw as performative, but now understand as a gift. If I could capture your grace and make it my own. If I could show you how I’m getting on. If you could say to me, ‘Yeah, Jack, Teresa is stunning, go for it.’
When we arrive, the parish hall is lit up, almost moving with people. We get in and pay Father O’Brien, and I’m hit with the warm wave of all of Ballycrea crammed into one room. Perfume and sweat. Not far from the carry-on we would have had in Kilmarra.
The single lads lined up against one side of the room, and the single girls lined up against the other. Catching up with each other, pretending they aren’t afraid of the other side of the room. Like children. Normally, myself and yourself would have been one of the firstcouples to break the ice and start dancing. As this thought warms me, I realise I have to send myself to the line of single lads and immerse myself in their nerves. Naggins are pulled from breast pockets and sucked on, even with the disapproval of the women. There was a time I would have joined them for a sly sup. Thanks be to god you grew me up out of that carry-on. I know some of these lads from Doyle’s: Jim Ryan and his crew. If I’m lucky, they won’t know me. If I’m lucky, I’ll get through the night without hearing a cover of ‘I Feel Fine’.
There’s Bill and Betty, talking to everybody that passes them. As though he is the Lord Mayor and they are welcoming people into their grand home. The band introduces themselves. Some jazz trio I have never heard of but who have stirred up some excitement with the locals. Who will no doubt turn to playing polkas on the saxophone. It’s all very familiar, really, and it settles me. No matter how far I go from home, most things seem to stay the same.
Nights like these put me in mind of you. Of course they do. Coming to your door and collecting you. In your nicest dress, in your sister’s satin shoes. A vision. Glowing. Goddess of Kilmarra. What I wouldn’t give for one more night like that. To feel your dress creasing under my hand. To wear the lipstick off you. It’s so sweet to miss you.
Thoughts like this will come to me all night, I suppose. Countless fragments of you, yet never enough to amount to the whole of you. And I’m hit with the fear that I’m only a short sideways step away from becoming like Jim Ryan and his crowd of sad old bachelors, hanging around the hall, looking to snare any young one who is too polite to tell me to piss off. I take a drink, and then I take another.
One of us has to be the first to chance it, so I approach the women against the wall and ask one of them if she will go for a dance with me. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just what a man is supposed to do at a dance. I dance with one, and then another. What harm is it to leaninto them when they talk? To be closer than is proper, to know the taste of their breath and the heat of their words as they speak. What harm could it really do to let somebody touch me? It’s only a feeling. Just to remind me that I am alive. Yes. How easily I forget that I am alive. Teresa approaches me, but I cannot handle the lovely panic her attention would bring me right now. As one song ends, I find Anna against the wall.
‘Come on, girl.’
