A History of Loneliness

by John Boyne

  She frowned, apparently uncertain what I meant by this, and turned to look at her mother with a quizzical expression on her face.

  ‘We won’t disturb you,’ said the woman. ‘You were reading.’

  ‘So were you,’ I said, lifting her book now and examining the cover before tearing a corner from a newspaper on the table and using it as a bookmark, replacing the book the right way up. Her mouth opened as if she wanted to say something and I realized that this had been an arrogant move on my part. Who was I, after all, to tell her how to keep her place? ‘Sorry,’ I said, embarrassed, but she dismissed my apology just as the boy, Ezra, let out an extravagant yawn.

  ‘He’s tired,’ I said.

  ‘We’ve had a long flight. We just want to get home now.’

  ‘Where were you coming from?’

  ‘A visit to my mother and her husband.’

  ‘Your mother and her …?’ The phrase struck me as odd, but then I made sense of it. A widow, or divorced. Remarried, just like Beate Ramsfjeld. ‘Your mother and her husband,’ I repeated, nodding. ‘A pleasant trip?’

  ‘A long trip. Six weeks. Too long.’

  ‘Might I ask where they live?’

  ‘Jerusalem,’ she said, smiling a little.

  ‘A beautiful place.’

  ‘You’ve been there?’ she asked and there was something in her voice, a foreign twist that I could not easily identify.

  ‘I haven’t,’ I admitted.

  ‘Then how can you know?’

  ‘I meant it in the sense that I’ve heard it’s very beautiful. I know people who have spent time in the city. I’d like to go myself, one day.’ She nodded and stared at me, and for some reason I found myself beginning to babble. ‘I haven’t been anywhere much, to be honest,’ I told her. ‘Only Italy. And Norway. I just got back from there, as it happens. Tell me what Jerusalem is like. Is it how I imagine it to be?’

  ‘I don’t know what goes on in your imagination,’ she said and I laughed, then stopped myself, for perhaps she hadn’t meant it as a joke.

  ‘I think of it as being very warm,’ I said.

  ‘Ah. The weather,’ she replied, nodding. ‘Yes. It can be warm. And sometimes it can be wet.’

  ‘Shall I leave you to your book?’ I asked, for I had the sense that, unlike her carriage companions, she wanted nothing much to do with me.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, relenting a little as she shook her head. ‘I’m tired too, that’s all. I don’t mean to be rude. It was a long flight back. Seven hours.’

  ‘It’s a long journey for this pair,’ I said, nodding at the children.

  ‘They didn’t mind. It was only their second time on a plane so they were excited.’

  ‘Where did they go the first time?’ I asked and her expression relaxed, revealing pure white teeth and a smile that might have made a good dog break his chain.

  ‘To Jerusalem, of course,’ she said.

  ‘I’m not usually this dim,’ I told her, embarrassed by my own stupidity. ‘I promise.’

  I tapped my fingers against the table and she looked out of the window at the passing scenery. I felt awkward, uncertain whether I should pick up my book again.

  A hand, tapping my shoulder from behind. The old man from a few seats back with the Indo and the peeled banana. ‘I’m going down to the buffet car, Father,’ he told me. ‘Can I bring you back a sandwich?’

  ‘No thanks,’ I told him. ‘I’m grand as I am.’

  ‘Ah, sure you’ll have a sandwich, Father,’ he insisted. ‘What do you like, ham or turkey? Or maybe a bit of raspberry jam on a slice of toast?’

  ‘Honestly, I ate lunch before I came on board. You’re very kind though.’

  He nodded, winking at me, and continued on his way. The woman across the aisle had been watching this exchange and looked, I thought, a little put out that I had been speaking to the mother of the twins instead of her. ‘Anthony has a packet of Tayto in his bag,’ she told me now. ‘You’ll have them if you’re hungry, won’t you?’

  ‘No!’ roared the boy in horror and the woman leaned across and slapped him across the arm, hard.

  ‘Be quiet, you,’ she said.

  ‘Ah now, there’s no need,’ I said, upset by this. ‘I don’t even like crisps,’ I added, turning to Anthony, who was looking at me with fury in his eyes as he decided whether or not to cry.

  ‘Well if you change your mind, Father,’ said the woman, ‘you only have to ask.’

  ‘I won’t. But thank you. You’re very kind. As are you, Anthony.’

  ‘Does that happen often?’ asked the woman opposite me after a few silent minutes had passed, keeping her voice low so as not to be overheard. ‘Do people try to feed you wherever you go?’

  ‘Unfortunately, yes,’ I said. ‘Sure I’d never have to step inside a grocery store if I didn’t want to.’

  Years later, I would think of this moment whenever I heard the story about Jack Charlton paying for everything he bought in Ireland with a cheque. Sure who would ever cash it? They’d frame it and hang it on the wall. The man never had to put his hand in his pocket once. Now, however, the woman shook her head, an expression on her face that suggested she didn’t know why people would behave in such a fashion. I was unaccustomed to such disinterest, intrigued by it, even. This was not the respect that Tom Cardle had spoken of in his letters; if anything, she seemed distrusting of me.

  And who, in 1980, ever had cause to distrust a priest?

  ‘Do you call it the homeland?’ I asked her, anxious for some reason to lower whatever barrier seemed to exist between us.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Israel,’ I explained. ‘Do you call it the homeland?’

  She thought about it for a moment. ‘My mother does,’ she said. ‘And my stepfather. I don’t though, no. I’ve only been there twice. It would seem ridiculous to call it home.’

  ‘You don’t like to go?’

  ‘The air fares are very expensive,’ she told me. ‘I can’t afford it.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I saved a long time for this trip. I wanted Ezra and Bina to meet their grandmother.’

  ‘Bina,’ I said, smiling at the little girl, who, like her brother, had now fallen asleep. The boy’s head, in fact, had slipped on to my shoulder and I had to rotate a little to get him to move away. ‘That’s a pretty name.’

  ‘It means understanding,’ explained the woman. ‘And wisdom.’

  ‘And your name?’ I asked.

  ‘Leah. Which, appropriately, means to be tired.’

  ‘Odran,’ I told her, pointing a finger at myself. ‘And I have no idea what that means, to be honest with you. I’ve always wanted to visit Israel,’ I added, which wasn’t entirely true as I’d never given much thought to the matter. ‘And Sydney. I’d like to see Australia. Someday, maybe.’

  She laughed aloud, making the woman on the other side look over in disgust as if she suspected her of flirting with me. ‘Two very different places,’ said Leah.

  ‘They are,’ I admitted. ‘But there’s something about the idea of Australia that’s always appealed to me.’

  ‘The idea of a place is sometimes better than the reality,’ she said, before waving her hand in the air as if to dismiss the idea. ‘But this is an argument I have been having with my mother during our visit. The idea over the reality.’

  ‘You can’t win an argument with a mother,’ I said. ‘Trust me, I know all about that.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You don’t like it then?’ I asked, leaning forward, for the subject interested me. ‘The idea of a Jewish homeland?’

  ‘I have a homeland,’ she said. ‘Here. Ireland. I wasn’t born here, of course, but this is where we came after the war, my mother and I.’

  ‘And your father?’ I asked, uncertain why I was asking things that were no business of mine. ‘Did your mother meet your father here? Oh no, of course not, how could he have if you came too.’

  ‘She survived,�
� said Leah simply, looking me directly in the eye. ‘He did not.’

  ‘Father, I got you a ham and cheese roll in the end,’ said the old man, returning to the carriage at that moment and placing a clear wrapped package before me. I looked up in surprise, the meaning of the woman’s words hitting home. ‘And a bottle of 7-Up. Do you like the 7-Up? It gives me gas but I can’t stop drinking it. And a packet of King. They had no Tayto. The Tayto are better, but they only had the King.’

  ‘I told you Anthony had a packet of Tayto crisps for Father,’ said the woman across the aisle.

  ‘Sure what harm if he has two?’

  ‘Anthony, give the Father your Tayto.’

  ‘No!’ shouted Anthony.

  ‘Anthony, are we to have a conversation?’

  ‘They’re mine!’ insisted Anthony.

  ‘Eat up that roll there, Father,’ said the old man. ‘Can I get you a Kit-Kat for afterwards at all?’

  To my astonishment, I found my hand banging down hard on the table before me to shut the pair of them up. It sounded loud and aggressive against the Formica, as startling as Mam banging the saucepan against the table in Wexford had been, sixteen years before. ‘I told you I didn’t want any food,’ I shouted. ‘I said I’d eaten before I came on board, didn’t I? Were you not listening to me, no?’

  The old man reared back in shock; he couldn’t have looked more upset if I’d stood up and struck him. Anthony’s mother glared at the old man as if this was all his fault. Leah simply watched, quietly. The children next to me woke, startled. I closed my eyes and breathed for a moment.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, when I opened them again. ‘I apologize. Truly, I’m very sorry.’

  ‘It’s all right, Father,’ replied the old man, looking down at the floor, unwilling to catch the eyes of the other passengers. ‘Don’t be worrying about it.’

  ‘How much do I owe you?’

  ‘You don’t owe me a thing.’

  I decided not to pursue it. ‘I’m sorry,’ I repeated and he smiled and shook his head and returned to his seat.

  ‘God love him, sure isn’t he only trying to be friendly,’ said the woman across the aisle, who had obviously decided to turn on me now for refusing her son’s Tayto crisps.

  If they’d just leave me alone, I thought. All of them. If I could just get a bit of peace.

  ‘You don’t like the attention,’ said Leah and I shook my head.

  ‘I don’t,’ I admitted. ‘It was easier to remain anonymous in Rome. Every second person on the street was a priest there. Here, though … ah it’s a bit much sometimes.’

  ‘They respect you, that’s all.’

  ‘But why? They don’t know me.’

  She tapped a finger to her throat and I nodded, wondering how a small twist of white plastic could inspire so much devotion. I glanced towards the twins: Ezra was asleep against the window now, Bina against her mother’s shoulder.

  ‘Can I ask—’ I began and she shook her head.

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t,’ she said.

  ‘All right.’

  ‘It’s thirty-five years ago,’ she added with a shrug. ‘I try not to think of it.’

  ‘Do you succeed?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘And your mother? Your stepfather?’

  She leaned forward and shocked me by the sudden abrupt change in the tone of her voice. ‘Why do you think you can ask me these questions?’ she asked. ‘What gives you the right?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, feeling a wave of shame through my stomach. ‘I didn’t mean—’

  ‘I know what you meant. You want to tell me that there was a reason behind it all. That it was all part of God’s plan.’

  I shook my head. ‘I am as ignorant of God’s plan as you are,’ I said.

  ‘He doesn’t exist, you know.’

  ‘Who?’ I asked, frowning.

  ‘God.’

  ‘Ah now,’ I said, unsettled by the suggestion, and she smiled a little at my discomfort.

  ‘Don’t get me wrong,’ she continued. ‘The rules you’ve all made up, the idea of living with kindness and generosity and charity, these are good ideas. And if it makes you happy to dress in black and wear a collar and put your robes on every Sunday, then what harm does it do anyone? But he doesn’t exist. How could he? You’re fooling yourself.’

  She said all this in a perfectly calm tone, as if explaining to a child the rudiments of basic arithmetic or the letters of the alphabet. And I did not know how to respond to her. She who had experienced more of life than I ever would. The train pulled into the next station and she gathered her children up and their belongings.

  ‘I’m sorry if I upset you,’ I said.

  ‘You didn’t,’ she said. ‘You couldn’t. You should eat your sandwich,’ she added as she walked away. ‘The old man bought it for you out of respect. And one day that might change. And then there will be no more food for you and your friends. And you will all go hungry.’

  I didn’t reach Galway until late. Tom had told me that the parochial house could be a little difficult to find so we had arranged to meet at O’Connell’s pub on Eyre Square. When I entered, heads turned to stare at me, half-smiles on the faces of the men as I looked around for my double, my twin, the other black-suited man in his mid-twenties, but I could see no priest in the room.

  ‘Odran,’ came a call from the side of the bar and there he was, seated in a corner with a pint in front of him and a copy of that day’s Sun. I was pleased and relieved to see him and tried not to make it obvious that I was surprised to find him wearing jeans and a chequered shirt like any other man might wear. ‘What are you like?’ he asked, grinning as I approached him. ‘Would you take the collar off at least?’

  ‘I won’t,’ I said, shaking his hand. ‘How are you anyway, Tom?’

  ‘Surviving. What will you have?’

  ‘A Fanta.’

  ‘Ah come on.’

  ‘I’m thirsty.’

  ‘Then I know the very thing. Sit down there.’ He walked over to the bar and raised two fingers in a practised gesture and a moment later I saw two pints of Guinness landing on the counter with a couple of whiskey chasers. I exhaled slowly, irritated now. Why would no one believe that I was capable of deciding what I wanted to eat and drink?

  ‘So how was it?’ he asked as he sat down, the drinks before us, and all I could think was that this must be a strange sight for anyone looking over; I had assumed that we’d meet here and be on our way.

  ‘Is this all right, Tom?’ I asked nervously. ‘We won’t get in trouble?’

  ‘In trouble with who?’

  ‘The bishop.’

  He laughed and shook his head as he started to drink, a rich creamy moustache forming above his lip that he wiped away with his fingers. ‘Sure if he was to come in, he’d probably stand us the next round.’

  ‘Ah no rounds, Tom,’ I said. ‘One will be enough for me.’

  ‘The night is young. And so are we.’

  ‘It’s been a long week. I’m tired.’

  ‘Of course, your sister’s wedding. How was it?’

  ‘Very enjoyable.’

  ‘What’s himself like?’

  ‘Great. A really nice fella.’

  ‘Must be nice to have a brother again.’

  I hesitated, my pint hovering in the air. It was a vulgar sort of remark, although not meant unkindly.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Tom. ‘Was that the wrong thing to say?’

  ‘No, no. Not at all.’

  He smiled and shrugged his shoulders, glancing across at a couple of young lads throwing darts in the corner. One must have got a bull’s-eye, I suppose, for he leaped in the air, grabbing his friend in delight and spinning him round, and I noticed Tom watching, his expression falling a little. ‘So how was it?’ he repeated after a moment, turning away.

  ‘The journey down?’

  ‘The Vatican.’

  ‘Political.’

  ‘That doesn’t
surprise me. The dioceses here are like hornets’ nests. I can only imagine what it’s like in Rome. And what’s the new fella like?’

  ‘The new fella?’

  ‘Himself. The boss.’

  ‘Determined,’ I said. ‘Ambitious. He wants to change everything while still maintaining the status quo.’

  ‘That’d be some trick. Can you have a laugh with him at all?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He’s not looking for friends,’ I said. ‘But he’s fierce intelligent. And intimidating too. A little scary, at times. He has a different face for the world than he does for the curia. But then, I suppose he has to. It’s 1980, after all. It’s a new world.’

  ‘You wouldn’t have wanted to stay on with him?’

  ‘A year is all we get, I told you that.’

  ‘But what a year, Odran! You couldn’t have picked a better one.’

  ‘I suppose that depends on your point of view,’ I said. Perhaps there was a part of me that enjoyed the idea of others thinking that I had been part of the drama. Even the cause of some of it. That I had insights I could not share.

  ‘Do you know what I was doing the night the Pope died?’ asked Tom, skulling back his pint like one of those old men who practically lived inside these country pubs.

  ‘Which pope?’ I asked, echoing my words to Harry Mulligan in the school.

  ‘The middle one,’ he said.

  ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘What were you doing?’

  ‘I was having an argument with a couple in Leitrim. Parishioners of mine there. They’d come to see me for the marriage class—’

  ‘I have a dread of running one of those,’ I said. ‘Sure what do either of us know of marriage?’

  ‘The pair of them were the same age as me,’ he continued, ignoring my question. ‘He was a farmer’s son who wanted to be a painter—’

  ‘A house painter?’

  ‘No, a real painter. You know, an artist. Like Van Gogh or Picasso.’

  ‘Ah right.’

  ‘I asked him had he ever shown his work to anyone and he said that he’d had an exhibition in the parish hall a few years before and taken a train to Dublin afterwards to show some of his work to a man who runs some galleries there, only they said he wasn’t ready, that his style needed more development. And the girl chimed in then, saying that the Dubs look after themselves and they don’t care about the rest of us. You should have seen the cut of her, Odran. All made up as if she was going to a disco, not a parochial house. And the little short skirt on her too.’ He gave a little whistle and shook his head. ‘Legs that went all the way down to the floor.’