The easiest thing to do was to get on the flight with Kerry-Anne and go back to his Boston life, where there wasn’t all this emotion, where he was allowed to live his life, no one saying ‘I have you now’ and trying to place you, no one questioning you.
And no fire.
Patrick felt again for the rings in his inside pocket and his folded-up speech and then turned to Seán. ‘Nervous?’
Seán smiled. ‘When you’ve seen off a bullock or two, you don’t tend to do nerves.’
Patrick nodded. ‘Do you remember that bull that Seán-John Finnegan used to have? God, he was pure evil, wasn’t he? You couldn’t walk past the field without him charging at you.’
‘When you work in the corporate world and you have some manager getting all hot about spreadsheets and the like, you think to yourself, they wouldn’t last two minutes on a farm.’
They grinned at each other. ‘Very few would,’ said Patrick. ‘It’s been good seeing you, Seán.’
‘I wouldn’t have done this without you being here, Paddy. You know that. I miss you, you know?’
‘I miss you too.’ They weren’t used to saying such things to each other. Their mother would tell them that she loved them, and they’d mumble it back, but to each other, never.
‘Would you ever come back to Ireland?’
Patrick shrugged. ‘I don’t think so. I have a life over there. Looks like we could be opening up another restaurant next year. It’s working out for me.’ He paused. ‘I ran away though, I think.’
Seán turned to him. ‘From what?’
‘Ireland. Dad. Me. Everything. I was so determined, so stubborn. Nothing would stop me. Not even…’
Suddenly the musicians launched into an orchestral version of ‘Celebration’ by Kool & the Gang, and from the top of the lawn, Niamh appeared in a white strapless dress, her mother on her right side looking happy and tearful, her father on her left, looking fixedly in front, as though trying not to cry. Kate was walking behind, wearing what looked like a dress you might wear to a particularly glitzy awards ceremony. Her teeth glinted in the sun.
‘Not even…?’ asked Seán.
‘I’ll tell you later.’
The two brothers faced Niamh, as the guests all began to turn around, the musicians were now playing a beautiful slow air, the fiddle soaring around the notes, the box accordion swooping alongside, like two birds out for a fly. Niamh was looking straight at Seán, a big smile on her face, and when Patrick turned to Seán, he saw his eyes were red.
‘Don’t say anything,’ said Seán, under his breath, ‘or you’ll make me worse.’
‘I was only going to say that Mam would have been proud of you.’
‘Shut up!’ Seán hissed.
‘And that you scrub up well… Not bad for a lad from the farm.’
Seán suddenly grinned. ‘I’ve never scrubbed up as well as you. I’ve always been trying to keep up.’
Niamh and her parents had now reached the chairs, still making their stately procession, the music still soaring. Guests were dabbing their eyes with handkerchiefs and taking photographs. Their father was sitting in the third row, his tie a little skewed, but he was here, he had stayed, which was something, thought Patrick. And it was for Seán, his baby brother, the boy who did everything with him when they were growing up. They’d shared a bedroom together, woken up before dawn to milk the cows, walked to school together. He had loved their mother as much as Patrick had.
He turned back to Seán. ‘And the last thing I want to say is that I think Mam is here,’ he said. ‘She’s with us now. I know she is.’
Seán turned to look at his brother. ‘I know she is too.’
And then Niamh joined them. She kissed Seán, the two of them saying their ‘I love you’s and him saying how beautiful she was and her telling him how handsome he was, their eyes shining with tears. And then she turned to Patrick, smiling up at him. ‘Thanks for being here. You’ve made it for both of us.’
He held her hands for a moment, looking at her face, this woman that his brother loved and was his new sister. ‘I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.’
And he wouldn’t have missed it, any of it. He was going back to Boston, changed in some way.
‘And now everyone be upstanding for the bride and groom,’ said the IT manager-turned-celebrant. ‘And doesn’t she look a picture on this beautiful day… I can see you all are dabbing the old eyes, wiping the old foreheads, and drinking down the water… well, I often think that the sun is the light that this young couple are walking towards, their new life together, and the water, well, that’s the thing that will sustain them…’
Seán and Patrick made the most infinitesimal eye contact.
