The Insect Rosary

by Sarah Armstrong

  ‘What?’

  I lowered my voice, ‘Someone is in Cassie’s room.’

  She propped herself up on an elbow. ‘I learned to drive a car today. It was the most exciting thing I’ve ever done. You wouldn’t understand but you’re trying to show off, to make out you know something you don’t. Do you understand what it means if you’re right?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Nothing. What could you do if it was true? Who are you going to tell?’

  I blinked and looked down at my knees sticking out of my nightie. I needed Nancy to grow a bit more so I could have hers.

  ‘I could tell Dad.’

  ‘Tommy says he may be English but he married into this family and he knows the score. I wouldn’t tell anyone, if I were you. You have no idea.’

  She lay down and arranged her hair around her head. It would still be tangled in the morning. She looked at me, rolled her eyes and then closed them.

  ‘Light,’ she said.

  I edged into bed but didn’t lie down just yet.

  ‘Nancy, did he tell you what Skull Lane was?’

  She opened her eyes. ‘As a favour, I won’t tell him that you said that.’

  I turned off the light.

  24

  Now

  Nancy found Elian lying on the bed listening to music on his phone, his face lit up by the screen. She thought about turning the light on but thought this may be a conversation best held in the twilight. She signalled for him to take the earphones out. He removed one earpiece.

  ‘I don’t really want to say anything,’ he said. ‘It’s,’ he made a flat movement with his hand, ‘never going to happen.’ He closed his eyes.

  ‘I’d like to talk about it.’ Nancy could hear the music still whistling from the earpiece. ‘I think there’s a lot of potential here.’

  ‘I don’t.’ He pulled out the other earpiece and paused the music. ‘I hate this country and I don’t intend, not in a million years, to live here. It’s cold, it rains all the time. It’s utterly miserable.’

  Nancy bit her lip. ‘When did I agree that I would always live in your country forever and ever? I never thought that my opinion would count for so little in our marriage.’

  Elian laughed. ‘What? You never said you wanted our family to emigrate. You never said, you know, one day, when we’re all settled, we need to go back to the UK. I met you in the US, dated and married you there, had a kid there, and not once did you say anything like that. Now that I have spoken to Bernie and Adrian I wouldn’t ever consider it. The things they say about London . . .’

  ‘That’s just English people. They always complain about everything. It doesn’t mean that they mean it. When I talk about Michigan I’m the same.’

  ‘Really? I’ve never heard you talk about home like that. Are you saying that you’re miserable, that all this time you’ve hated our life?’

  ‘No. I just said, it’s how English people go on.’

  Nancy sat on the commode chair and Elian fiddled with his earpieces, winding them around his fingers. Nancy knew this look of his. Petulant. His wishes were being ignored and he needed to show that on his face. He did it most with his mother, his eyes filling with tears, if she wasn’t totally enthusiastic about what he was saying. She never supported him, he would claim, and slump from the room. She always followed him. Nancy refused to and knew how long he could hold a grudge for. She didn’t have time for that.

  ‘It’s not just for me. Think about Hurley. Don’t you think he’s been a different child over here? He is really benefitting from the space and exercise. He had that one bad day, and God knows those girls are provocative.’

  ‘So it would be their fault?’

  ‘Don’t change the subject.’

  ‘His counsellor thinks that you excuse too much of his behaviour.’

  Nancy looked away.

  ‘You can’t blame people for provoking him,’ said Elian. ‘What did we do to make him smash up his room the last time? What did you say to make him skewer the TV with the baseball bat?’

  ‘They were problems that he brought home with him.’

  Elian snorted.

  ‘I’m serious. He needs somewhere like this.’

  Elian shuffled back up the bed, pushing the cushion behind his head. ‘There are farms in Michigan. Many more farms than here. You have to understand there is nothing special about this place, other than your connection to it.’

  ‘I fucking hate America. I hate the counsellors and therapy and drugs and “special ed” and politically correct ways of naming what’s wrong with Hurley. What if he just needs to be away from people? Not everyone can be sociable, not everyone has to be comfortable with public speaking. What’s wrong with being quiet? Being shy and awkward have become personality defects and have to be treated with drugs. Being overactive is a personality defect and that has to be treated with drugs too. The whole way of looking at people is wrong.’

  Elian crossed his arms. ‘You hate America?’

  ‘You only hear half of what I’m saying, do you realise that? You said you hated this country, anyway. I can say it too.’

  ‘But you don’t actually live here. You and your husband and child live in the USA.’ Elian looked out of the window at the clouds, the monkey puzzle trees, the drive dwindling away between them. ‘Are you giving me some kind of ultimatum?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘When I go back home with Hurley after my,’ he made quotation marks with his fingers, ‘“holiday”, are you staying here?’

  She’d already said, ‘Hurley’s staying with me,’ before she realised how the discussion had escalated. ‘You expect me to ferry him around all the time because you’re too busy. Why would that suddenly change? Maybe you could even get a transfer to Belfast. It’s not far. We can get the broadband set up and you can have a whole bedroom for your office. I can have a whole bedroom for my crafting.’ She remembered saying that Donn could stay on, but pushed that thought away. ‘There’s plenty of room for your parents to visit. And then we can have holidays from here to all the European places you want to go. Italy and Greece and France, they’re so accessible from here.’

  He was staring at her but it was too late to sell him the idea. He looked almost amused.

  ‘He doesn’t even want to sell it to you.’

  She walked to the side window. ‘Look out here. There’s a prehistoric monument that’s never been excavated, right here in the field. Come and look at it.’

  He wrapped the earphones around his phone and dropped his feet onto the floor with a sigh. He stood upright, stretched, and then walked around the bed and out of the door.

  Nancy looked out of the window. She watched the idiotic sheep eat their way through the dusk, across the field for the twentieth, thirtieth time that day. Fucking Elian. Fucking Michigan. Fucking stupid people in general.

  Somehow, accidentally, she might have just ended her marriage.

  She looked around the room. If she was going to be honest with herself, she couldn’t see this as her room. She couldn’t see it as her house and her driveway. She couldn’t buy anything without selling their house in Michigan. She had put everything on the line, maybe over the line, on an emotional whim. She was running away from being told what a bad mother she was, what an inconsiderate wife and incompetent craftswoman. She could sit in her basement for hours and come up with no ideas of her own, before trawling the internet to find other people’s ideas that she could adapt.

  She sat on the bed and looked at the monkey puzzle trees. Was this a mid-life crisis? Was she one of those women who went on holiday and threw everything up in the air for a sniff of youth or difference? She’d pottered along for years, doing whatever came next.

  She let her body fall backwards onto the blankets, uncomfortably screwed up beneath her back. The ceiling flashed at her and she frowned, wondering what it meant, before she realised. Headlights. She could hear the car now. Donn was back. She tried to summon the energy to pus
h herself from the bed, and failed.

  Nancy heard footsteps downstairs and the patter of smaller feet up the stairs. The girls had been sent to the bedroom. More steps and a door. Hurley was in his room too. The ground floor had been cleared for the adults, just like when they were children. She closed her eyes, focusing on what she could hear, but it was all vague murmurs and slight bangs. She shivered.

  She pulled a cardigan from one of the drawers and tried to shake her arms through the sleeves which were folded inside. Her hands emerged and she stood still, trying to slow her breathing. Then she knocked on Hurley’s door. She waited for him to answer and then went in anyway.

  ‘Hi,’ she said.

  He was sitting on the bed, looking out of his window at the yard. She sat beside him.

  ‘Everything’s gone a bit funny today, hasn’t it?’

  He tilted his head towards her, but kept his eyes on the window. ‘What have you done?’

  ‘After dinner I wanted to talk to everyone about buying the farm. Bernie went mad and then Dad went mad. Donn said no anyway. It’s all a bit of a mess, but it’ll be fine.’

  He looked at her now, a strangely knowing look which let her know he knew she was lying.

  ‘Could you imagine living here, Hurley?’

  He shrugged. She tried to think of a way of putting it which wouldn’t sound leading if it was quoted back to anyone.

  ‘Where would you like to live, if you could live anywhere?’

  He thought about it and then smiled. ‘The North Pole.’

  She smiled and said, ‘OK. There’s not many people there. Wouldn’t you be lonely?’

  ‘You’d be there, and Dad.’

  She put her arm around his shoulders and squeezed gently.

  ‘I’d better go downstairs.’ She stood up. ‘There might be some shouting, but I want you to stay calm, OK? Practise your breathing exercises.’

  He looked at her and nodded.

  She left the room, closed the door, and walked down the stairs. She ran her hand along the banister, sticky with old varnish, and held onto the large ball at the bottom. Three deep breaths and she was ready.

  When she opened the parlour door she saw only Donn and Bernie. They sat at either end of the parlour table, all the dinner plates still in front of them. She remained standing by the door, next to the grandfather clock. Someone had asked a question, someone was waiting for the other to respond. She couldn’t tell which.

  Bernie turned her head towards Nancy. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I want answers.’ She turned to Donn, ‘Is the farm for sale? And can I talk to you about buying it?’

  Bernie snorted. ‘Go away, Nancy. No-one cares about what you want.’

  ‘It’s my business too, Bern-a-dette.’

  Donn shook his head.

  Nancy stood firm. ‘Have you promised it to Tommy? Why him? Why didn’t I know he was Sinead’s godfather?’

  Bernie looked back to Donn. ‘Bet you wish we were all like that, don’t you? Forgetful, stupid, wilfully ignorant, whatever you want to call it.’

  Nancy sighed, ‘Will you just tell me what you want me to say?’

  ‘I want you to tell the truth about what happened.’ Bernie turned to Donn, ‘And I want you to tell me what went on in Cassie’s room. Everyone clear on that?’

  ‘Bernie, don’t.’ Donn’s voice cracked. ‘Don’t ask me anything.’

  Nancy thought he would cry. Her arms and resolve fell away. She stood by the clock, counting the ticks and squeaks, watching them do nothing. The fire was long dead and the room was cold with draughts from the doors and windows. She could hear the murmur of Elian and Adrian talking in the front room. They were entirely still, Bernie’s hands clasped in front of her as she leaned into the table, Donn’s hand loose in his lap as he leaned backward against his chair. Nancy wished she could sit as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other.

  Nancy spoke. ‘I don’t know what I can say that will make a difference. You say I didn’t tell the truth. Beth says Tommy is family. Mum says nothing. Cassie’s room, Bryn’s field, the Tardis stable, I don’t know what you need to hear.’

  ‘That’s right, Nancy,’ said Bernie, ‘it’s all about you. Let’s leave Donn to think, and go and prompt your memory.’

  25

  Then

  The best room was unlocked. I saw the door open and close from my seat on the stairs and caught a glimpse of black walls and pink blossom. I had looked in through the front window often enough but the curtains were always pulled to stop the furniture fading. Now it was open it meant there was someone important here and I waited to see who it was.

  Mum came out of her room with Florence in her arms.

  ‘I told you to get dressed.’

  I looked down at my jeans. ‘I am.’

  ‘Properly dressed. Skirt, socks and shoes, please.’

  ‘Are we going outside?’

  ‘You have to get your shoes on, stop arguing.’ She herded me back to the bedroom.

  ‘Who is it down there?’

  ‘Your great-uncle, Father Seamus.’

  ‘Who’s that? I’ve never heard of him.’

  She sighed. ‘Just get dressed, please.’

  Nancy was sitting on the bed, Sunday clothes already on. I fished out my skirt from underneath a couple of tops and stood waiting for her. She hummed and walked out. I dressed. She was waiting for me on the landing, dragging her hand over the bannister. She whispered right into my ear.

  ‘Bernie, you have to cover for me. I’m going out.’

  ‘No. If I have to go in there, you do too.’

  ‘Bern,’ she hissed, ‘I have to go. I promised.’

  I looked at her. She was trying to look friendly but she still kind of sneered like she was so much older and important.

  ‘You just wait outside the door until I’ve gone out the back, OK?’

  I shook my head. ‘If you go I’m coming too.’

  ‘You’re such an idiot, Bernadette.’

  Mum shouted up, ‘Bernadette! Nancy!’

  ‘We’re coming!’ I shouted back and pushed Nancy in front of me so Mum could see her up through the banister. By the time we reached the bottom of the stairs Nancy had her Sunday face on but I could feel she was angry and stayed out of pinching distance.

  Sister Agatha was in one of the armchairs by the blazing fire and Father Seamus was spilling over the other. She gestured to us in turn.

  ‘Father, this is Nancy and Bernadette.’

  He smiled and nodded at us. ‘And how old are you two?’

  ‘I’m twelve and she’s ten,’ murmured Nancy.

  He shook his head and held out his hand. ‘The wee African children I look after are only this big when they’re twelve,’ Nancy’s shoulder, ‘and this big when they’re ten,’ half way down her arm. ‘I hope you thank God every day for all the food you eat and all the clothes you have.’

  Nancy said, ‘Yes, Father.’ I nodded, hoping he wouldn’t ask me anything. There was a small sofa we could have squeezed onto but we carried on standing between him and the door. He smiled and nodded. I fidgeted. Sister Agatha scowled.

  ‘Go and see if your mammy needs any help with the tea,’ she said. ‘And close the door.’

  Nancy got to the door before me so I had to close it. We went to the kitchen where Mum gave Nancy the tray and me the plate of sliced fruitcake. She carried Florence. We walked back in silently and placed our offerings on the table. Sister Agatha poured the tea and gave Father Seamus one of the best side plates with the biggest slice of cake. The rest of us helped ourselves. Mum and Nancy sat on the sofa. I sat at Mum’s feet in kicking distance of Florence’s legs.

  Father Seamus said grace. I bit my lip to remind myself not to look at Nancy because I could feel the laugh bubbling in my stomach and hear the flicker of Sister Agatha’s eyelids as she watched me from the corner of her eye.

  ‘Amen.’

  His cake disappeared in three wet bites. Sister Agatha k
ept hers on her lap, to show him she could resist temptation probably. I picked at mine, fingertip sized crumbs, trying to make sure there wasn’t so much in my mouth that I wouldn’t be able to swallow it down before a giggle. I didn’t trust myself to look up from my plate.

  I couldn’t help it, whatever Sister Agatha thought, but I was supposed to be ashamed of it. My teacher complained that I did it at ‘totally inappropriate moments,’ but that was probably what had made it so funny. Mum got it. She hadn’t forgotten how to laugh.

  It felt a bit safer so I looked around, keeping my head down. There was a wooden box with a record player in it, but it looked different to ours. There was a handle on the side so you could wind it. I could feel Florence wriggling on Mum’s lap and she caught me on the ear with her hard red shoe. I rubbed my ear, but still didn’t dare turn round.

  Father Seamus talked so much that Sister Agatha had no excuse not to eat.

  ‘The only way,’ he said, ‘to properly eat a mango is waist deep in water. It’s true, Agatha, you wouldn’t credit it. The fruit of God’s gardens out there,’ he pointed to hot countries, ‘is so fecund and ripe and juicy that a knife and fork are just impediments to joy. Of course,’ he lowered his voice, ‘these low moral standards for civilised behaviour come across in other, less welcome ways. But you haven’t eaten a mango properly unless you’ve stripped off in a hot lake and torn it apart with your teeth.’

  Sister Agatha crossed herself. I felt a bit sick, thinking of the unleashed stomach of Father Seamus bobbing in the water.

  Father Seamus and Sister Agatha moved onto sinners. Sister Agatha liked her world to be full of sinners and Father seemed to be enjoying making her gasp and call for heaven to help them. I didn’t think she meant it. Mum said nothing, except the odd whisper to Florence.

  Sometimes the relatives visited us in England, missionaries from far away breaking their journeys back to a ‘home’ they expected to be forever unchanged. Except for the Protestants. They always expected them to have fled in the meantime and were surprised to find them still there. I quite liked Protestants secretly. There was only one other Catholic at my school and he was an idiot, but I didn’t think I was allowed to say that so I didn’t.