by Tara Heavey
Lance was reading out headlines from the paper. They all crowded around and peered in. It did occur to Aoife that perhaps they should give him and his mother some privacy but, quite frankly, she was too nosy. And Liam would have a fit if she took him away now. In any case, the Prendergasts had buried it with the intention of somebody else finding it, so it couldn’t be that private. And, besides, nobody else looked as if they had any intention of budging.
It appeared, from the headlines, that not much had changed in the intervening years, which was either comforting or depressing, depending on how you looked at it.
‘What else is in there?’ said Kathy, standing on tiptoe, tense with impatience. Lance folded the newspaper and put it to one side. He delved into the box and pulled out a clear plastic package.
‘Money.’ He emptied out coins representative of every denomination and an old pound note.
‘What else?’ said Kathy, unimpressed.
Mrs Prendergast reached down and took out what appeared to be an old photograph. She stared at it for a good two minutes before handing it silently to Uri, who was standing beside her. After several seconds, his face broke into a smile. ‘The apple trees.’
They all crowded around him, except Mrs Prendergast who sat, her face mask-like.
Trust Uri to notice the apple trees. Aoife had barely registered them, recognizable as they were, although less gnarled and more tender. Instead, she was focusing on the three people standing in front of them, smiling for the camera and squinting into the sun. A young boy – Lance presumably – dark-haired and skinny, wearing sixties-style shorts and a plaster on each bony knee. Standing behind him, a protective hand on his shoulder, was none other than a young Mrs Prendergast. It had to be her – the same narrow figure, the tiny waist. But her bearing was less stiff, as was her hair, pale gold and wavy, tied into a ponytail that cascaded over her left shoulder.
‘Kathy, look at Mrs P,’ said Seth. ‘Wasn’t she a fine thing?’
‘That’s not Mrs Prendergast,’ said Kathy, her tone full of derision.
‘Yes, it is.’
‘Then why does she look so different?’
‘It was taken a long time ago.’
Aoife could see that Seth was regretting bringing the matter up. But she was far too interested in the photo to pay much heed. The third figure was a man. He stood a little apart from the others, presumably his wife and son. He was large, attractive, muscular – his face and smile not unlike Lance’s. His hands were on his hips and his shirtsleeves were rolled up. The famous Mr Prendergast.
‘Is that your father?’ Uri asked Lance.
‘Yes.’ Lance sat down again, his face closed.
‘Look, roses!’ Aoife’s attention was momentarily distracted by a cloud of pale pink to the left of the photo. It was tremendously exciting to see this picture of how the garden had once been, if only in part.
One last thing remained in the box. Lance took it out now. He handed it to his mother and she turned it over in her hands, smoothing its face with her fingers. ‘Do you remember this, Lance?’ She was smiling now.
‘Vaguely.’
It was a ceramic angel, faded and old, like something you might put on a Christmas tree. It was blue and white.
‘Your father brought it back from Amsterdam.’
‘It’s a fairy,’ said Kathy.
‘Actually, no, Kathy, it’s an angel,’ said Uri.
‘I didn’t know you Jews believed in angels.’
It wasn’t what Lance said so much as the way he said it. Indefinable. Yet unmistakable. The way he spat out the word instantaneously transformed the atmosphere in the room from wonder to hostility. Aoife felt as if she’d been slapped in the face. She could only imagine how Uri and Seth felt. It was horrible. With great dignity, Uri placed the photo on the table. ‘You’d be surprised at what us Jews believe in.’ He walked out of the kitchen, out of the house and into the garden. The silence in the kitchen grew. Aoife could feel something mounting in Seth beside her. She willed him not to say anything, not to thump Lance. He didn’t. Instead, he glared at the man, then followed his father out to the garden.
Aoife was left in the kitchen with Lance, Mrs Prendergast and the two children, who were examining the angel minutely.
‘How could you, Lance?’ Mrs Prendergast turned to her son.
This time they needed their privacy.
‘Come on, kids. It’s nearly lunchtime. Let’s go and get something to eat.’
‘I’m not hungry.’
‘Me neither.’
‘I’ve got treats.’
‘Yippee!’
‘What are they?’
‘Come outside and I’ll show you.’
They left mother and son to discuss whatever they had to discuss.
Aoife hated the way the garden felt that afternoon – Seth and Uri so quiet. As if the very air itself had been tainted. She wanted to say something but they seemed so unapproachable, each man working in his own space. It was so awful, though, that she had to do something. She eventually went over to Seth, who had finished digging the bed. He was loading his wheelbarrow with an assortment of rocks.
‘Hi, Seth.’
‘Aoife.’ He continued loading the rocks.
‘How are you?’
‘Grand.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ He stopped what he was doing and looked at her, his hands on his hips.
‘It’s just that I thought, you know, what happened inside…’
‘I wouldn’t let an ignorant prick like him get to me.’
Except it was clear that he had.
She let the silence settle between them for a while. Then: ‘It must have been strange for you, growing up Jewish in Dublin.’
‘Not really. Most of the time it made no difference at all. I barely thought about it until my bar mitzvah.’
‘So you had that, then?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘And were you…?’
‘Yes, Aoife, I am circumcised.’
She gave an embarrassed laugh. ‘I suppose everyone wants to know that.’
‘Pretty much.’
‘You must get sick of people asking.’
‘Depends on who’s doing the asking.’
He smiled at her then. Right into the pit of her stomach.
‘What was Uri like when you were growing up?’
‘He was pretty strict. A lot stricter than he is with Kathy. He wanted me and Aaron to “make something of ourselves”.’
‘Well, he got his wish.’
Seth smiled again and cast his eyes down, almost bashfully. ‘Ah, you know. We had our moments. Mostly when I was a teenager. Didn’t want to go to synagogue. Wouldn’t study. Gave back cheek. The usual pain-in-the-arse stuff.’
‘You? A pain in the arse? I don’t believe it.’
‘Yeah, well, it’s true.’
‘And how do you feel about it now? The religious side of things.’
‘Well, it doesn’t do all that much for me, but it means a lot to him. So I respect that. Respect him. More than anyone else, really. He’s been through a lot, my da. And he’s come out of it one of the best people I know. If I can be half the man he is, half the father to Kathy that he was to me and Aaron, well, I’ll be doing pretty well.’
Seth, who seemed to have lost himself in this reverie, came back sharply into focus. ‘Anyway, what are we doing standing around here, woman? There’s work to be done.’ He handed her a spade. ‘Get digging.’ He walked away then – to fetch a bag of compost, or so he said.
Aoife watched him go. A thought came unbidden: I could love this man.
She was momentarily distracted by the sight of Mrs Prendergast coming across the garden. She didn’t look at Aoife but headed straight for Uri. He stopped what he was doing and turned to face her. Mrs Prendergast spoke earnestly to him, beseechingly, her body tense and bent slightly forward, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. When she’d finished, Uri l
ooked at her for a few long seconds. Then he embraced her warmly and the two linked arms and walked towards the house, disappearing together through the wooden door.
‘Did you see that?’ said Seth, coming to stand by her side.
‘I did.’
‘What do you reckon it was all about?’
‘She was probably apologizing for Lance.’
‘She shouldn’t have to.’
‘Well. Maybe she wanted to. Unless…’
‘What?’
‘There could be more to it.’
‘Like what?’
‘Maybe you’re getting a new mammy.’
They both laughed and everything felt okay again. At least to Seth. To Aoife, it was as if the entire universe had been flipped on its head.
28
It was so odd. So unfathomable to her. That moment in time when everything switched. The inner shift in consciousness that altered her world. One minute Seth was a friend, objectively attractive, undeniably useful, mildly annoying, and now she was thinking about him every second of the day. Obsessing about him. Could he tell? Could he feel the desire radiating off her in waves? Her wanton want?
Was it just like Peter all over again? Nature, her body, her emotions tricking her when ultimately all was an illusion? A house of cards that would come tumbling down in the face of reality?
She didn’t know. She tried to ignore it and took refuge in what she did know. The garden.
It was mid-July and this was what the garden looked like. Four quadrants. The kitchen garden – tomatoes, lettuce, runner beans, spuds, Swiss chard, courgettes, cabbages and carrots. Aoife was particularly entranced by the carrots. You could see their broad orange tops poking up through the soil, as if somebody had bought them in a shop and shoved them whole into the ground. She was insanely proud of all her vegetables and privately thought them even more beautiful than the riotous flowers in Emily’s sensory garden, although she had to admit that the girl had performed quite a task. None of her colours clashed, even where you might have expected them to do so. Shaggy yellow daisies alongside violet allium. Bright orange lilies against deep blue delphiniums. Who would have thought? It was like a grand experiment to prove that everything in nature worked in harmony.
Mrs Prendergast’s roses were like something out of a dream – tunnels of archways and trellises. Uri’s fan-shaped fig tree dominated the back wall of the orchard. The apple trees sported their little green orbs, and there were alpine strawberries, rows of them, raspberry canes, gooseberry bushes, cultivated brambles. The dividing herbaceous border grew high and powerful. The pond teemed with life. Everywhere there were patches of glory, yet the garden, still in its infancy as gardens went, had yet to obtain an all-important unity. A vital maturity. All the elements hadn’t quite come together, although they were working on it, nature and the gardeners, in their divine collaboration. All it would take was time. Time they didn’t have. Because one day it happened.
It was a Saturday morning.
‘What’s he doing to the sign, Mummy?’
A man, presumably from the estate agent’s, was up a ladder hammering the words ‘Sale Agreed’ across the for-sale sign. Aoife stood stock still.
‘What is it, Mummy?’
‘Nothing.’ She was grateful he couldn’t yet read.
Aoife walked rapidly over to the man, sorely tempted to kick the ladder out from under him. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
‘My job,’ he said mildly, jumping lightly to the ground and lifting up the ladder as if it were made of air. He walked away from her, whistling maddeningly. She experienced an irrational surge of anger towards him, which the logical side of her brain knew was misdirected. But she had to direct it somewhere, because it was about to consume her. She entered the garden. Seth stood in the centre, in front of the pond, gazing up at the sign.
She went up to him, her new-found feelings for him pushed aside. ‘You’ve seen it, then.’
‘Yeah.’
‘What are we going to do?’
‘What can we do?’
‘Try and talk her out of it. Convince her not to sell.’
‘But she’s already accepted an offer.’
‘But the sale hasn’t gone through yet.’
‘Aoife…’
‘We can’t just give up.’
He didn’t say anything, just looked at her calmly. She found this even more infuriating than the estate agent’s whistling. ‘Seth, don’t tell me you’re going to stand by and let this happen.’
‘Aoife, you always knew it would one day. We all did.’
‘I know. But I always held out a little bit of hope. Didn’t you?’
‘Not really, no.’
‘Then why did you help us?’
‘Maybe I have a weakness for a lost cause.’
‘This is not a lost cause. Don’t you dare call this garden a lost cause.’ She could hear her voice rising dangerously high. A few seconds more and she’d be out of control.
‘Calm down, Aoife.’
‘Don’t tell me to calm down. Patronizing git!’ Seth looked taken aback. Then he laughed, angering Aoife even more. ‘How dare you laugh at me?’
‘I’m not laughing at you, Aoife. I know you’re upset but it’s happened. You have to let it go.’
‘Let it go? How can I do that? How can you?’
‘We have no choice.’
‘There’s always a choice. Always something you can do. I’ll set up a petition. We can go door to door. I’m sure local people will support the garden.’
‘But it’s private land.’
‘Why are you being so negative?’
‘I’m not. I’m being realistic.’
‘I can’t just do nothing. Can’t you see that? I can’t let this all have been for nothing.’ Her voice cracked.
Seth took her shoulders and turned her to face the garden. ‘It hasn’t been for nothing,’ he said. ‘Never say that. Just look at what you’ve achieved. Look at it. You’ve created something out of nothing. This beautiful garden out of a… wilderness. Never say that it’s been for nothing, Aoife. It’s incredible, what you’ve done. You’re nothing short of a goddess.’ He squeezed her shoulders. ‘A green goddess.’
She could feel his breath on the side of her face, the warmth of it. His body stood directly behind hers, so solid, so reassuring. It would be easy just to yield, sink back into him. Why didn’t she?
‘Aoife.’ It was Mrs Prendergast.
At the sound of the older woman’s voice, Aoife stiffened again and swung around to face her, twisting Seth’s hands off her shoulders. At last. A worthy target for her rage. ‘How could you do that?’
‘I take it you’ve seen the sign.’
‘It’s hard to miss.’
‘I understand that you’re upset, but I never misled you.’
‘Not with your words, but with your actions you did.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Getting so involved in the garden. Encouraging us. Your bloody roses. Have you thought about that? Your precious roses. They’ll all be ripped up.’
‘We’ll find good homes for all the plants, Aoife.’ Seth laid a steadying hand on her arm but she shook it off, angry with the whole world.
‘Of course I’ve thought about it,’ said Mrs Prendergast, her tone and expression cold. ‘What I actually came over to ask you both was if you’d like to come to the house for dinner tonight. I’ve already asked your father, Seth, and he can make it.’
‘I’d love to, thanks,’ said Seth, sounding remarkably gracious.
‘Aoife?’
‘I’m afraid I’m washing my hair,’ said Aoife, sounding remarkably ungracious.
‘There’s no need to be like that, my dear. I’m planning to make a special dinner, using mainly produce from the garden.’
‘You’re going to use my vegetables to make your – your last supper. Unbelievable!’
‘I’d just like a chance to explain…’
&nbs
p; ‘What’s the point? Will you be sitting there counting your money? Go to hell, Mrs Prendergast.’ She walked out of the garden, not wanting either of them to see the tears that were crowding at the corners of her eyes. She’d had so much work planned for today. But now it all seemed pointless.
A couple of hours later, she was curled up on the couch feeling sorry for herself. She had given up the pretence of marking papers and was flicking from one channel to the next. The doorbell rang. ‘Oh, go away,’ she murmured, making no attempt to answer it.
After a spell, it rang again.
‘Piss off.’ She covered her face with a big furry cushion and willed whoever it was to give up.
The doorbell rang a third time.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake.’ Flinging the cushion aside, she jumped off the couch and marched out to the hall. It had better not be someone trying to sell her something. She flung open the front door.
Seth. Leaning up against the wall, his arms and ankles crossed, his expression sardonic. ‘For a second there I thought you weren’t going to answer.’
‘What do you want?’
‘You’ll have to work on your Irish welcome, now that you’re back on the oul’ sod.’
‘Sod off.’
She turned and went back into the sitting room. Seth closed the door behind him and followed her.
Aoife was immediately conscious of several things. Her appearance: had her face calmed down yet after her prolonged bout of sobbing? Were her eyes still swollen and was her nose still red? Then there was the matter of the used tissues on the coffee-table. She bent down and shoved the bulk of them into her pocket, just as Seth came into the room. As for the tasteless décor she had inherited from the previous inhabitants of the house, she’d had no time to do anything about that. He’d just have to suffer it.
It occurred to her that Seth had never been to her house before. ‘How did you know where I lived?’
‘I didn’t realize it was a state secret.’
‘It’s not.’
She sank down on the couch and folded her legs under her. Seth sat in the armchair opposite. It unsettled her to have him in her home.
