She nods, but Beth looks uncertain.
‘It’s fine,’ I reassure her, managing a smile. ‘I was just having a moment. Go on, go with Laurel. You know where I am – but keep your phone on, okay?’
She gives me a brief hug, and disappears, the boys trailing after them. I wonder where they’ll go, and briefly register that I should probably have asked. Still, how much trouble can they get into in a place like this?
‘Come on,’ Moira says. ‘With me.’
She detours to turn the sign on the bookshop door to closed, me following her like a little duckling, then we go out into a gorgeous little courtyard garden. It’s a complete suntrap, with a stunning view of the hills and cliffsides, green and yellow tumbling down towards us. Sitting at one of the wooden tables is a curvy redhead wearing a fifties-style dress that works wonders for her figure. She gives us a little finger wave, and pours out another glass of fizz.
‘Rosie, this is Jane,’ Moira tells her. ‘She’s just arrived with her daughter, Beth, who looks to be the same age as your Laurel. They’ve all gone off together.’
‘Will they be okay?’ I ask, belatedly.
‘Depends on your definition of okay,’ Rosie replies, giving it some thought. ‘They’re unlikely to get eaten by sharks, butthere’s every chance they could go feral and eat their way through my chocolate liqueur cupboard.’
‘You have a chocolate liqueur cupboard?’
‘Doesn’t everyone?’ she replies, handing me the glass. It’s extremely tempting, cool and bubbly and undoubtedly deeply alcoholic.
‘I shouldn’t,’ I say regretfully, taking a seat and letting the afternoon sun warm my skin. ‘In case I need to drive later. Find a hotel. I only agreed to this because Beth was so keen – I don’t know if that makes me a sucker, or the world’s greatest mother.’
‘No reason you cannae be both!’ Moira responds. ‘And there’ll be no need for driving. I’ve invited you here, after all. You’ll be staying here somewhere, for sure…’
She turns to Rosie, and grins at her. ‘She found one of the cards! The cards in the books!’
‘No way! Another one? The Hopeful Hearts strikes again!’
My ears perk up at that. ‘Another one?’ I ask. ‘What happened to the last?’
‘We sacrificed them to our lord and god, the Kraken of the deep,’ Rosie says, in all seriousness. ‘In return for a bountiful lobster catch and a fertile harvest.’
‘We didnae do that,’ Moira adds, laughing. ‘But there was some fertility involved… now, where shall we put you? For tonight, you can stay at Kate and Brody’s. They’re back late tomorrow, but it’ll do for now. I have a plan.’
She narrows her eyes, deep in thought. I have only just met Moira, but I already feel like I’m in capable hands. I already feel like if she has a plan, then everything will be fine. Am I being naive and reckless, or am I finally doing what that card told me I could do – relaxing enough to find peace and wonder, and a second chance?
FIVE
RORY
It’s a gorgeous evening, and Bonnie Bay is filled with wondrous sights: the towering cliffs, the soaring gannets, the rocky islands glittering in the distance. Always the same, but always different. I wander the shoreline, jeans rolled up and waves tickling my ankles. I love collecting random items from the beach, shells and driftwood and interesting pebbles.
I’ve been away for a few days, meeting a new client – a businessman from Yorkshire who wants to commission an artwork for the grounds of his headquarters on the east coast. I’m excited about the job and its possibilities, but as ever, relieved to be back here.
I’m letting a few ideas filter through my mind as I walk. I do my best thinking when I’m not trying to. I pause, scoop up a gorgeous piece of shining sea glass from the beach. The colours are amazing, and it makes me wonder about a coastal theme for the new project. The client had started in shipping, he might like that. I could try and source some materials from containers, from docks, from the boat graveyard that’s up by the lighthouse.
My art isn’t for everybody – it’s mainly in metal, combined with natural elements like wood and rock, even moss. Some people think it’s ugly, and the process of creating it certainly isn’tpretty. It involves a lot of welding, grinding, hefting chunks of iron around and swearing. Mainly swearing. Barely a day goes by I don’t pick up an injury, and my body carries the marks – burns, healed breaks, ridges of scar tissue. I could have used watercolours, which rarely fight back. But no, as my dear old mammy used to tell me, I’m a sucker for punishment.
I used to have what most people would see as the good life. Practising law, getting the big bucks, living in a swish penthouse flat in Dublin. I tried to live the way everyone said I should. I worked hard, I went to Mass with my parents when I visited them, I had an active social life. I ticked all the boxes – apart from the one marked ‘happiness’.
It broke my dad’s heart when I gave it all up, and I don’t think he ever forgave me. He died a few years ago, still confused by it. Mum was a bit less distraught, just muttering under her breath about me being a feckless fool but ultimately letting me be. I think she could see that the job I hated was slowly killing any joy I ever had in life. I needed to escape.
There were probably less dramatic ways to do that than quitting my chambers, selling my flat and moving to a different country – but it was the right thing to do. I’ve felt the rightness of it every day since.
I love this place. I love the wildness of the landscape, the kindness of its people – not least Moira in the bookshop that now has a new lease of life – the restless and awe-inspiring combination of nature and humanity. I love coming back to it when I’ve been away, and I love the idea of spending the rest of my life here.
But for some reason recently, I’ve definitely been feeling more melancholy than usual. More aware that I’m alone.
My reasons for choosing Bonnie Bay were complicated, and some of them I’ve never really acknowledged – a sense of nostalgia for the past, for the future I’d planned here but neverhad. A feeling that it still connected me tohersomehow. None of that makes sense, none of it is logical – why come and live in the place that reminds me of the woman who broke my heart all those years ago? Am I a masochist, like my mammy suggested? No. I don’t think so. It just felt right – and it has felt right ever since the first day I arrived.
