The Comet Seekers

by Helen Sedgwick

We knew you were thinking about leaving, she says, and Severine’s eyebrows rise and fall again.

  I thought I’d hidden it well.

  You didn’t need to hide it—

  Apparently I couldn’t.

  That chuckle, those laughter lines.

  I tried to tell you it was a choice.

  And now?

  You have made up your mind.

  Yes.

  Severine thinks it is strange, how much comfort can come from a decision once it has been made. She looks around the room, wanting to sit down, but the only chair is occupied by Great-Grandpa Paul-François, so she sits down on the floor, cross-legged, and the ghosts sit down with her.

  So, who is going first? Severine says. I want to hear everything. I want to know where I have come from.

  It started long before us, says Great-Grandpa Paul-François, finally looking up from his book to join the conversation.

  Before Ælfgifu our family lived in England.

  Before that maybe Rome.

  How do you know?

  Just guessing.

  There’s a good chance we’re Romans.

  But why start there? Severine teases. Before we were Romans we must have been something else.

  And they talk about the movement of great continents, about volcanoes and earthquakes and the start of humankind, the first boats, the first fire, what it must have been like to journey through an ice age, and by the time they have stopped talking it is dark outside and it is late, and Brigitte is there again – she is calmer now she knows that Severine is staying in Bayeux. She might have time, she thinks, after all, even though the world is changing.

  You’ll be back tomorrow? Severine asks as some of the others start to disappear. I’ll make dinner – family dinner – and that’s when she remembers that François must be downstairs on his own. She stands up, knowing that she has to go just as Brigitte has appeared, but she can’t help that.

  I’m just going to check on my son, she says.

  Brigitte doesn’t reply, but Severine thinks she sees a hint of jealousy in the way Brigitte looks at her, before she blends back into the air.

  Walking downstairs, Severine thinks she will suggest chocolat chaud for tonight, but when she reaches the kitchen François is not there. He’s not in the front room either. She checks the clock – it is later than she thought. She has lost track of time. But she will make it up to him tomorrow.

  She finds François upstairs in bed. He’s sleeping, so she backs quietly out of the room and turns off his light.

  Brigitte is waiting for Severine in her bedroom.

  Are you ready now? she says.

  And Severine sits herself up in bed, pulling the covers around her shoulders because there is a cold draught coming from the window and, for once, Brigitte does not burn.

  I’m ready, she says, I want to hear everyone’s story. Are you ready to tell me yours?

  Mine’s not a happy one.

  Pas possible.

  Severine smiles, kindly, she hopes, though Brigitte is not one to laugh at quiet jokes.

  Travelling is not the only way to see the world, Severine says, and this is something that has been slow in appearing to her, but it is no less powerful for that. She doesn’t say any more, she just waits as Brigitte settles herself down on the edge of the bed and begins, at last, to tell her story.

  In the afternoon François sits in the front room with Severine and his grand-mère, who is sipping her brandy.

  I’m going to go to Antarctica, he says, and his grand-mère raises her eyebrows as if she thinks that is a bit too ambitious.

  South America? he tries. To the rainforest!

  And she laughs. Maybe we’ll try somewhere in Europe first, she says, for a holiday?

  She starts talking about Italy, describing ancient monuments and vineyards and how she’s always wanted to go, and François thinks that it would make a good start to his adventures.

  Can we go, Severine? he asks. Please, can we go?

  But Severine’s head is centuries away, in a France as foreign as any country, filled with battles and angels and crackling with fire. If she could just close her eyes she would be able to see it, Brigitte’s world. To breathe it all in.

  Well, what do you say? her mother insists, and she is dragged back to – not reality, that would be the wrong word.

  Sorry, Mama?

  Shall we go, the three of us?

  To Italy?

  Well?

  I can’t go away, she says, I don’t want to leave Bayeux. But you could take François?

  He doesn’t understand why she won’t come, even for a holiday, and for a moment he wants to cry but he won’t. What would be the point when she’s already made up her mind?

  Well, then, says François’s grand-mère. You and I are going to see the Colosseum – Yes, he says, refusing to be sad and clambering up on the sofa – and the Circus Maximus – Yes! – and perhaps we will travel south, she says, to the Sibyl of Cumae. François’s eyes widen and he jumps as he says Yes! and tumbles down onto the cushions and grabs his grand-mère in a hug that nearly, but not quite, spills her brandy.

  Later, while Severine and her mother are standing together preparing the dinner, she says: Be careful what you listen to, Severine. I don’t want to lose my child to this nonsense as well.

  Severine sighs. I fixed the lights in the shop, Mama, she says. I’m running a good business, I look after this house, what more do you want?

  Perhaps you should make some friends, go out . . .

  I don’t have time for friends, she snaps.

  And what about François?

  But before Severine has the chance to reply François has arrived and is saying – Mama, why have you laid too many places at the table?

  As she looks up, she can see the ghosts have quietly appeared and are sitting around the large dining table, each at the place she had subconsciously laid for them. She thinks, briefly, about laughing off her son’s query and taking their mats away but she can’t do it. It would seem dishonest. She doesn’t like hiding things, and she’s certainly no good at it; besides, keeping secrets is no way to protect a child even if you are scared of losing him. So instead three living members and five of the dead members of her family sit down together for dinner, and she knows that when the ghosts start to fade again, one by one, she’ll tell them that she no longer longs to see the world and promise that she’ll be here in Bayeux for their next visit – and her granny will smile, and softly say, I know you will.

  RÓISÍN STANDS OUTSIDE THE BAKER’S, trying to work up the courage to go in. A man passes her on the street, someone from the village. She doesn’t recognise him, although he nods at her as he passes. She avoids eye contact.

  Her fingers crush into her palms. She tells herself it is ridiculous. It is almost autumn, that is all. This chill is nothing more than the autumn air, the anticipation of damp leaves decaying underfoot.

  The bell makes a ding-dong sound as she enters. There is no one else in the shop, and for a moment she thinks the sign should have read closed, but then Keira appears from the back. Her eyes don’t know where to settle.

  Just a baguette, Róisín says. And, perhaps, the coffee-and-walnut cake.

  She doesn’t move forwards to the counter, keeps her distance as if she were talking to an animal in the wild.

  Keira smiles, puts her baguette in a paper bag.

  Just the one slice of cake?

  No, two.

  The slices are boxed and paid for. Róisín finds herself standing out on the street again, lost for breath, a fine trickle of sweat gathering at the rim of her hat. It is too soon for winter accessories, she thinks, leaving the hat in place, turning from the village again.

  She hears a shout – her name – and looks round to see Keira waving to her from the corner. The urge to run takes her by surprise; she’s not a child, she shouldn’t have to flee from her choice or be scared of what this woman might think. Keira doesn’t matter. The people in t
his village don’t matter. Róisín turns and walks towards her, head held high.

  Did I forget something? she asks.

  Keira looks confused, then smiles. Would you like to get a cup of coffee?

  Coffee?

  Yeah, you know . . . She tilts her hand to her mouth as if drinking from a cup, and laughs at Róisín’s expression.

  And Róisín laughs too.

  Sure, sorry, coffee. Yes. Thanks. That sounds grand.

  Tell me about your work, Keira says, her eyes lighting up. Róisín had forgotten that about her – she was always asking questions at school, always seemed like she wanted to be there, to know more.

  At first, I was studying binary stars.

  Keira nods, encouraging her to continue.

  Our sun is on its own, but a lot of stars come in pairs, and orbit each other.

  Do they ever crash together?

  Not exactly, though there can be a transfer of . . . Sometimes material from one of the stars gets sucked into its partner, so one gets bigger and bigger and one smaller and smaller. And it’s useful – it tells us things about them. What I was looking for were systems where one of the stars – the one that had been growing – got so big it collapsed into itself and became a black hole.

  So you can see them, black holes?

  Indirectly. The orbiting star – the one that was shrinking – gives off a particular type of radiation.

  Keira’s grinning. Sure I’d love to see a black hole, she says. Imagine it! And her hands are wide open as if trying to hold empty space between her palms. I wish . . .

  Róisín likes her; she had forgotten that she’d always liked her. It feels good to talk about things without feeling like there’s hidden meaning attached.

  Tell me about the bakery. The cakes are grand . . .

  We’re doing well, she says. Business is good in the summer – you’ve seen the new B&B?

  Funny to think of tourists coming here.

  Keira nods. Funny to think of you coming back. I’m not sure I would, if I could be on a mountain top looking through a telescope at a black hole.

  And although Róisín never looked through a telescope on a mountain top, or saw a black hole – not in the way Keira describes it – the image of herself living that life is so comforting that for a moment she can’t find the words to reply.

  Liam refixes the fence that always blows down, shares out the cattle feed, drives to the market and back again, and can’t shake the worry from his mind that perhaps Róisín doesn’t belong here after all. He could have lain in their hut all night; he doesn’t care about the cold or the rain, or what people might be saying. He had wanted to stay but Róisín – he recognised that impatience in her, and knows, too, that look she gets in her eyes when she’s describing her work, her old work, the sky she still looks to when she thinks he’s not watching her.

  When his dad died there was a moment, sitting by his bedside, when he thought about leaving. But as he reached forward and closed over his dad’s eyes he promised himself he would stay, because that’s what his father would have wanted – yes, he would stay and recreate their home. And he is trying, has been trying, to fix everything, to rebuild what was lost. With Róisín it had seemed possible, though what is possible and what is impossible seem blurred to him, sometimes: perceptions rather than facts. Besides, this was never Róisín’s farm to save.

  Can a home be recreated from a distance?

  He doesn’t know the answer, but he has started considering the question.

  He leans against the shed and asks himself what he is doing here.

  You’re running my farm, his dad says.

  My farm now, he replies.

  Your farm, so it is.

  And Liam turns and half expects to see his dad beside him, that weary look in his eyes; stubborn, too. But there is no one beside him. There is no one left who needs him to stay.

  Halfway back to the farm Róisín stops in the middle of the field and knows she has to turn round again.

  She doesn’t care, she realises, what people might think about her, because the truth of it is that people probably don’t think about her that much at all. She doesn’t care if there’s gossip in the village; she has been worrying about the wrong thing, when there was something far more important to worry about.

  She’d forgotten, too, what it was like to have a sense of purpose, but she has one now. She strides back through the village and beyond the green towards her mum’s house. It is time to face this, while the leaves are still golden and before the snow sets in.

  Her mum’s home is so warm; that is the first thing she notices. It is comfortable too. Welcoming, full of family. As soon as she steps in the door she wishes she had done so sooner.

  Neil lets her in, holds her in a hug while Adele rushes down the stairs.

  How good to see you, she says. Her voice sounds as though Róisín has been living on the other side of the world, not the other side of the village.

  You too, Mum.

  And all of a sudden she is choked up, almost ready to cry. How absurd, she thinks, as she blinks the tears away.

  We’ve been watching the comet, smiles Neil, with the binoculars you got us. Conall’s enjoying it, I think. Aren’t you, Conall?

  They are outside in the garden, the whole family together, sitting on her mum’s new patio chairs, surrounded by late-flowering plants and late-evening sunshine.

  It’s quite something, to see it there every night, he continues. It’s strange to think it will be gone soon.

  Róisín nods. Might be a decade before the next one, she says. It’s been a busy few years, for comets.

  Why is that?

  She shrugs. Sometimes these things just happen, she says.

  Her mum brings out tea and cake, sits beside Róisín and chooses her words carefully.

  Do you miss studying the sky? she asks.

  And Róisín is stunned by how simply the question can be put, and by how obvious – how undeniable – her answer is.

  Two hours later, and Adele is glad she didn’t say anything more – there was no need. She holds her daughter tight, through her sobs; she tells her that it is OK, that it will be OK. She tells her to study the sky, and to travel the world, and to live her life the way she wants to. She tells her not to feel guilty, because it is no one’s fault, and that she tried. She tells her that she loves her.

  Róisín spends the night looking through her telescope, searching for the comet that is now obscured behind layers of cloud and mist.

  Liam comes in to see her once, twice, but he doesn’t stay and he doesn’t return after that. He knows that he is not what she’s looking for tonight. He falls asleep while the sky is still dark, hopes he will wake with her beside him in the morning.

  But as the dawn breaks, Róisín knows she has made her decision, and now it is tears rather than the mist outside that obscures her view of the last of the stars. She packs up her telescope, carefully dismantling each component and wrapping them safely before placing them back in the box.

  OK, Liam says. This is not like when they were children.

  And she looks at him in surprise. Was he expecting her to leave? Does he want this, too?

  OK, he says. You have to do what you have to do. I understand. So I’ll come with you.

  Róisín lets his words sink in. His expression is soft but not excited, and she knows that he doesn’t want to travel or to explore, not the way she does. She doesn’t want to have pushed him to make this offer that won’t make either of them happy. It feels wrong. She shakes her head.

  I can’t sell the farm, he says, still talking, I can’t lose it altogether. But maybe someone will rent it. Or I can bring in management.

  And she is ashamed of how little she has told him of herself, how much she has hidden of her present while they tried to relive the past.

  You don’t understand, she tries.

  I know you came back here to help, he says. After Dad . . . And it was so kind, he says.


  No—

  But now it’s my turn, to do what you need.

  Liam—

  You’re not happy here.

  As he says the words out loud, for the first time, their full meaning hits him and he feels his hand begin to shake. If he hadn’t said it, she would have had to.

  You just need distance from where you grew up, he says.

  No, she says, her eyes already stinging at the cruelty of what she’s going to have to say. It’s more than that. I need distance . . . to be on my own.

  He doesn’t understand; that is the opposite of what he needs.

  I want to travel and to change, she says, and to know different people and become a different version of myself.

  But you are still Róisín.

  I’m so sorry, Liam, she says. I don’t think you should come with me.

  He stares at her in disbelief.

  You won’t enjoy it . . .

  And she can’t bring herself to say what she knows; it is something that she will never say out loud: that she wants to spend her life with people who are driven to explore the world, not those who are willing to follow.

  He says that he doesn’t understand, that he’s sorry he didn’t offer to leave sooner; he lies and tells her that he wants to see the world too – they can see the world together. He shakes his head as she describes all the ways that they are different, revisits conversations they had that were one-sided, different views of the world that didn’t match up, until eventually he stops because her mind is made up and he knows her well enough to know that it can’t be changed.

  Where will you go? he says.

  But she doesn’t know the answer yet. Not back to Bayeux, although she would like to – she was only halfway through her post, there was so much more to learn there, to see – but she’s too embarrassed to go back. She’s going to her mum’s for a while, to apply for jobs and see what opportunities come her way. So instead she tells him some of the cities she’s always wanted to go to – Tokyo, maybe, she says. Or New York, I’ve always wanted to go to New York. I want to be surrounded by people, lights – her hands wide as if trying to hold all that life between her palms, before she realises how thoughtless it is to be talking like this, when he has such loss in his eyes. She looks down to the ground.