The Visitors

by Patrick O'Keeffe

  —Thank you, my dear.

  I turned the music all the way down.

  —Hang a right. Follow the tracks out of town, Zoë said.

  She turned to him and said her mother’s father was a freight train driver.

  —He was born in Martins Ferry, Ohio, Zoë said. —My father’s father emigrated from southern Italy. He lived on the Lower East Side of Manhattan before settling in the Bronx, which is where my father was born.

  —Don’t know much about my people, he said.

  —My mother’s father was a devout Baptist, but when my mother became a teenager she could not abide the religious stuff, Zoë said. —She told me she put it all behind her the day she went to college in Boston. She went there on a scholarship and met my father her sophomore year. He was also on scholarship. They traveled to Italy together their junior year. My mother used to say that in Italy you really fall in love and you stay that way—

  —Drove a truck once, he said.

  —How cool, Zoë said.

  —You drove it where? I asked.

  —Drove all over. Drove it five years, he said.

  —And what did you do after that? I asked.

  —Worked with horses out in California. Ended up in Lexington, Kentucky, for a time.

  —I didn’t know you had anything to do with horses, I said.

  —You and Walter aren’t friends that long, my dear, Zoë said.

  I looked over at her. She smiled and put her sunglasses on. In the mirror he was staring out the same window. He and Zoë began to talk about horses. Zoë knew about them. We passed the laundry where I washed the flour from my work clothes, the coffee shop where Zoë and I often met, and where I sometimes met other people from the university. And we passed the brightly lit liquor store where the large bottles of Chilean wine were the cheapest in town.

  Zoë took off the sunglasses and told me to hang a hard right at the next light. I did and we were in a neighborhood I had never been in before. The houses were painted in bright colors. Trimmed shrubs and flowers grew in the smallish yards. Children’s bicycles lay flat on the sidewalks, but there were no children in sight. The bicycles were pink and yellow. Ribbons hung from their handlebars like feathers from a headband. Maples blocked the sunshine. Their shadows moved coolly over my face. Next we were driving down a narrow street of small decrepit houses that all looked the same. Yards were barren patches. No trees grew on the sidewalk, and the tiny porches were chockablock with all manner of shit. Adults sat talking and smoking on porch steps. Their feet were almost on the sidewalk. I drove slowly. I was afraid I might hit one of the laughing children who ran along the cracked sidewalks and into the street.

  —I think my mother misses where she grew up, Zoë turned to him and said. —As she’s gotten older she does. I wish she married again. But she won’t. She lives in a gorgeous house. The house I grew up in. My mother still finds it hard without my father. When he left, her life shrank. She says she’s too old to begin again, but she will live for thirty more years. She takes care of herself. But you must miss home, Walter?

  —Don’t think about it much, he said.

  —And you, James, of course, you do—

  —I ran away, my dear, I said.

  —New information, my dear, Zoë said.

  —Your driver is a white dude from Western Europe. His life is a long, sweet wank compared to many Americans—

  —Get over yourself, my dear—

  —I’m sorry, my dear—

  —Me, too, my dear.

  We had left the town and were driving down a wide two-lane, freshly tarred road. You could see glimpses of the large houses behind ivy-covered stone walls. Lazy American flags hung on poles at the end of driveways with shut iron gates. The yellow line down the middle of the road was dazzling.

  Zoë asked him about a turn. He told her and Zoë said she’d let me know. They both guessed it was five or six miles ahead.

  —Dad was a preacher, he then said. —When I was born. So Mom used to say. Didn’t stay a preacher for long, don’t think.

  —Where was this, Walter? Zoë asked.

  —Florida, he said.

  —I should visit my aunt there, Zoë said.

  —You and Walter have so much in common, I said.

  —I won’t, Zoë said, and sighed.

  —You could, couldn’t she, Walter, I said.

  I glanced in the mirror.

  —Could do, he said.

  —How foolish of me, Zoë said.

  —We could drive down there, my dear. Follow the coastline. I have always wanted to make that trip, I said.

  —It might be a challenge for this vehicle, my dear, she said.

  —Look into the alien corn, my dear, I said.

  —Economics, my dear, but Walter gets to see his aunt, Zoë said.

  —Grateful, he said.

  —An uncle on my mother’s side was going for the priesthood once, I said.

  —More new information, Zoë said.

  —I’ve told you this, my dear, I said.

  —Go right ahead and tell it again, my dear, Zoë said.

  —It happened before I was born. He was in the seminary, but he left it. I don’t know why he did, but he immigrated to this country—

  —Why here, my dear, Zoë said.

  —Here or England, I said. —But England was not welcoming then, but they would have shamed him out of home. And so he arrives here, marries late in life. He ended up in Vermont. Before there, he lived in Butte, Montana. He worked for a mining company. I think he did the books. Maybe the woman he married was from Vermont, and he met her in Butte. They had no kids. They lived in Burlington, I believe.

  —My dad loves that town. He visits it every year, Zoë said.

  —I’ve never been there, I said.

  —Never been up there, he said.

  —He taught in a Burlington high school for the rest of his life, I said. —But at home, because he was going to become a priest, he was going to lift the family up, give my Free State peasants some status. Then a few years before I arrived here, he died. His wife wrote some cousin in my family to tell them, but I forget how it was all found out, but his wife lived for only a year after him, she might have died of a broken heart, but when the failed priest first arrived in this country he used to send money home to the family, then one time he did not send home enough money, and my granduncle, his older brother, wrote and reprimanded him for not sending home enough cash. And they never spoke again. No money. No letters. Nothing. That was the end. But the failed priest wrote poems and ballads. He did when he was young. My mother put one in my bag when I first left for Dublin. I didn’t know it was in there. I’d never seen it before, but I found it folded in my ironed underwear when I unpacked. I still have it. This ballad about boys climbing over stone walls in the moonlight to rob apples from the oppressor’s orchard. Ha!

  —Very intriguing, my dear, and, yes, I would have remembered it, Zoë said.

  —You will remember the cornfields, my dear, I said.

  —Directions are under my control, my dear.

  I hung the right. The sun was behind us. High walls of corn grew on both sides of the road. A quiet and empty road not unlike the ones I grew up around, that country stillness, the wildflowers growing free on the headlands.

  —Left up ahead. Rusty stop sign. Grateful, he said.

  He fiddled with the bill of his cap. His throat made a nervous sound when he stared down at the flowers and shook them. Like when people must suddenly worry that the baby is dead, not asleep. The lovely scent from the flowers filled the car.

  The STOP was fully erased. Outside my window were two rows of trailers. The ground around them was bare. Two skinny dogs slept in a wire cage very close to the road. Flies circled their heads. Cars and pickups were parked haphazardly. Most of the trailers
had antennas that looked like trash can lids turned upside down. I hung the left.

  —Left two miles up. Second turn, he said.

  —No trouble, I said.

  This road was narrow and potholed. Walls of corn growing on both sides.

  —Got one kid, he said.

  —You do, how sweet, Zoë said.

  —Up in Boston? I said.

  —Never once been up that way, he said.

  —Not even once, I said.

  —Not once, man, he said.

  —But surely once, man, I said.

  —Never, man, he said.

  —Never took the bus up there, man, I said. —Drove a semi. Rode up there on a fucking horse, man.

  —Like I said, man, never, he said.

  —Stop it, James! You’re acting crazy and rude!

  She pinched my arm.

  —Bad manners, sorry, man, I said.

  —You should apologize, Zoë said.

  She sighed and stared out her window.

  —You’re kind, he said.

  Zoë turned to him.

  —Thank you, Walter, she said.

  I turned the music up a little. The walls of corn sailed past.

  —Here, I said ten minutes later.

  —Grateful. House on the right, third one down, he said.

  I took the left onto a graveled road.

  —You’re sure you’ll remember all of this, my dear? I asked.

  —I won’t forget any of it, my dear.

  Dust swirled at the windshield. It stuck to my lips and eyes. We rolled our windows up. We passed two small houses before we topped a small hill. Cornfields lined the horizon. The road vanished into them. At the bottom of the hill, on the right, was a white Cape house, with vinyl siding and a dark brown roof. It was about thirty feet back from the roadside.

  —That one, he said.

  —None of it was that hard, I said.

  —A pleasure, Zoë said.

  I stopped before the house. There were three windows. A narrow stained-glass door between two wide windows and a smaller one. The curtains were drawn. Three wooden steps led up to a small covered porch. Hosta in pots on each step. The grass was cut. The unpaved driveway was empty. Cornfields bordered the yard.

  —Sorry for being an arsehole back there, I said.

  I didn’t look in the mirror or turn. I rolled my window down. Zoë rolled hers.

  —All right, man, he said.

  Zoë got out. She lifted the seat. He got out. Zoë sat back in. She shut the door.

  —What a cute little house your aunt lives in, Zoë said.

  —Grateful, Zoë, he said.

  —When should we come back and pick you up, man? I said.

  —Hour and a half. Two. Grateful, he said.

  He had carefully laid the flowers and the backpack on the yard.

  —We’ll just drive around and chat. That’s what we’ll do, I said.

  He backed a few steps into the yard, looked right, and pointed at a line of trees that grew out of the cornfields.

  —River where the trees are. Nice river. Right side of the road, he said.

  —I have sandwiches and water, my dear, Zoë looked at me and said.

  —I never thought of that, my dear.

  —I guessed you wouldn’t, my dear.

  Zoë took the sunglasses off and dragged her fingers through her hair. Her fringe fell over her face. She dug into the tote bag and pulled out the corner of a sweater and wiped the dust from her sunglasses. I turned from them and stared into the still corn and wiped the dust from my eyes and lips with the back of my hand then turned back to him slapping the cap twice against his thigh. He stuck it back on, fixed the peak, picked up the flowers and the backpack, and headed across the yard. I drove away slowly. The shirt crammed Zoë’s mirror for a second. I asked her for water. She passed the bottle. I took a long swig.

  —You okay, my dear?

  —I’m fine, my dear.

  —You’re not, my dear. You looked baffled and you acted very strange back there—

  —Rows and rows of corn, heat and dust, the homeless, sorry again for being rude—

  —So what exactly is the deal with this Walter character, James—

  —You have a lovely way with the homeless, my dear, who would have thought it—

  —A skill one learns growing up in Connecticut, my dear, but what’s going on—

  —He knows this place so well, Zoë. The signs, the river, and I understood that he has never been out this way before. I guessed he was a downright liar, and I’m fully convinced the old lady on the street is a lie—

  —You should be more cautious about inviting strangers into your apartment—

  —I was a little stoned. They say it makes us kinder, my dear.

  —But he does not really seem like a bad guy, my dear—

  —I agree, my dear—

  —Now tell me what’s going on. And then we find this river. I brought a blanket.

  —But what if I don’t want to tell you, my dear?

  —You said before we left you would, my dear.

  —I said might, my dear.

  —Might. Whatever. Just tell me, James.

  I stopped the car, pulled up the handbrake, and looked at Zoë.

  —Walter knows someone I once knew, or sort-of knew. Walter works for this someone—

  —What exactly does he do for him, my dear—

  —I didn’t really ask. All I know is he has to deal with a troublesome bird—

  —I’m confused, my dear—

  —A whippoorwill, Zoë, but this someone wants me to visit him. I don’t even know what part of the country he lives in, but he sent Walter with the message. Someone would think he was being funny. A hilarious caper. But I told Walter I was not going. Someone is the last person in the world I want to see.

  —You’re kidding me, James, right, Zoë said.

  —I’m not kidding, my dear—

  —And this someone is?

  Zoë took off her sunglasses. I fingered a cigarette from my shirt pocket. She pressed in the cigarette lighter. She held it up to the tip of my cigarette. I took a drag.

  —I grew up very close to this someone. He is the oldest son of my father’s best friend, but his father is even more dust than mine is. He arrived in Boston a while before I did, and I’m not sure where to start—

  —Just tell me three things about this someone, my dear—

  —I smell a nice river, my dear.

  —Only three, James.

  —If I tell you, my dear, can we please stop talking about him—

  —Yes, I promise I’ll stop.

  I turned from her and stared into the cornfield.

  —When he was a teenager, he pushed my older sister into a river. He was the first person to show me a condom. I didn’t know what it was, because they were banned. He was a complete prick to me in high school. And the second time I saw him in Boston years back he was with a woman who was not the one he married a few weeks later.

  I turned back to Zoë.

  —I’ve told you more than three things, my dear.

  —And I get why you might not be excited to see him, my dear, but let’s find this nice river.

  8.

  The first time I saw Kevin Lyons in Boston was at the benefit for Eamon, which was held on a Sunday afternoon in the bar on Central Square. This was the second or third week of September. Eamon was in a Dublin hospital. Shortly after the accident, a medical team flew in from Dublin and took him home. Money was raised there and here. The couple who owned the house in Concord gave money. I forget how much, but no one complained. Eamon was illegal. So was his friend. In Boston most of the Irish and those I met from other countries were.

  Nights after his fall,
I’d wake up sweating like a pig and I’d fling the sleeping bag aside, stumble into the toilet, piss for a long time, wipe my face and neck with a damp cloth, then head out to the deck and sit in the armchair that Brendan and I had picked up from the street. Four or five Salvadoran men of different ages lived on the second floor of the house next door. The parties on that deck started after two in the morning, which was when those men clocked out of restaurant kitchens. In a glow of flashing lighters they’d shout and wave.

  —Venido, amigo! Venido, Diego!

  I went over every time. Big, boxy American cars pulled up onto the footpath. Ecstatic voices and quick footsteps rising on the narrow stairs. The deck rocked, like we were on a boat at sea. Candles shivered along the rails. And the loud music, the sweet weed, the laughter when empty bottles crashed onto the pavement below, and then candles quenched, music switched off, and back down those stairs, whose steps were crammed with soggy boots and soiled clothes that reeked of dirty dishwater and rotting food in Harvard Square alleyway trash cans.

  But on nights when the deck next door was dark and silent, I’d sit in the armchair and see my father lagging along the blue corridor, his walking stick tapping the walls like the keys of a typewriter, and I’d see Hannah leaning over the sink, my mother’s worn tea towel draped over her right shoulder, and I’d see Una the way she was in that doorway on Drumcondra Road, and I’d fall into the strangest sleep, where the traffic on Highland, my small flat on Botanic Avenue, with the records playing, the rank smell from the Royal Canal when I walked its south bank to Binns Bridge after dark, the dammed Children of Lir glimpsed from the top deck of a 16 bus, Tess’s voice on the answering machine, saying if she wasn’t so afraid to get on a plane she’d be over to see me, and my mother’s neglected flower garden all became tangled up, and I’d jolt awake to glaring sunlight, flies buzzing around my ears, honking traffic, and unfamiliar voices rising from the street. I would have to be at Porter Square in less than an hour. The other painter and I had jobs to finish.

  The bar was packed for Eamon’s benefit. When I opened the door, someone was reading out a phone message from Eamon’s mother and father: Thank you all very much for your generosity toward our son. He misses you very much. On a day like today Eamon would want you all to enjoy yourselves.