Finding Alison

by Deirdre Eustace

  ‘And while I’m at it,’ he cleared his throat, ‘Cork. I’m afraid it was a bit of a . . . ’

  ‘Lie?’ Kathleen smiled, standing on her toes to reach his lips. ‘I knew it!’ She kissed him again, her lips lingering. ‘Thank you, it’s perfect.’

  ‘Sorry it had to be on the night of your play, but I’d been planning this for weeks and if I had to wait for another full moon, well . . . ’

  ‘But how did you keep it to yourself?’ Something that had always amused Kathleen was Rob’s almost childlike enthusiasm, that excitement he had about life that seemed to have him constantly talking, blurting.

  ‘By keeping away from you as much as I could – it was the only safe bet. I let Jamie in on it, though,’ he winked.

  They both turned to look at him then. Jamie was gripping the lip of the basket with one hand, the other frantically pointing out landmarks to the two attendants.

  ‘He’s in absolute heaven.’ She turned back to Rob. ‘He missed you, you know. He never said much but that look on his face when he walked in to the kitchen with you tonight, no one could find words for that.’

  ‘I made a right mess of that, didn’t I, the moving in thing? It was so stupid. I was so stupid. I should never have asked you, put pressure on you. It wasn’t right,’ he sighed. ‘I won’t be making that mistake again.’

  The hiss of the flame grew louder in her silence. She gripped the top of the basket with both hands, her heart dropping with her eyes to the water below. Rob moved behind her, bent to his knee. ‘Kathleen,’ he slipped the tiny box from his pocket. She turned slowly towards him, the moon lighting her tears.

  ‘Will you marry this old fool?’

  * * *

  Alison sat at the kitchen table and opened her writing at where she had left off earlier in the evening. She re-read the last paragraph and within minutes her pen resumed its furious race over the page. She wrote on with a passion and drive, stopping only now and then to light a cigarette or to gaze momentarily out into the light of the full moon. The lighthouse remained unlit in the window. At two o’clock, exhausted and conscious of an early rise to tend William, she headed for bed, peering into William’s room as she passed. He was sleeping heavily. She set her alarm for seven and switched off her bedside light.

  The ring of the telephone made her jump. Hannah! She groped for the receiver.

  ‘Hello?’

  Nobody.

  ‘Hello? Hello, can you hear me?’

  The line went dead. ‘And goodnight to you too.’ She replaced the receiver, pulled the duvet over her shoulders and buried her head in the pillows. The first heavy drops of rain that the sea had promised threw themselves at her window, the wind gathering itself to drive them on.

  Sean lifted the receiver again and pressed in the first three digits of Alison’s number. He hesitated, then dropped the receiver back into its cradle. He drained the whiskey glass and stumbled to the dresser for a refill.

  Eleven

  William was woken by the hum of the electric shower, the sound of a woman singing just audible above it. His eyes accustomed themselves to the strange room: the dark green walls, the golden drapes, the floral hatboxes on top of the old mahogany wardrobe. His momentary confusion lifting, he smiled as he stretched in the bed, remembering Alison and her kindness. A dull ache and heaviness restricted his left side. He remembered her reading to him last night, her warm kiss on his cheek, the softness of her hand in his. He wasn’t being fair to her, not telling her everything. Lying here in her house, surrounded by her comfort. What would it do to her if she knew the truth?

  It was better that he left today, contact Fogarty on Monday and maybe move to Dublin, closer to the hospital. It was pointless putting off the inevitable, fooling himself – especially if it was going to be at Alison’s expense. No, he would leave as soon as possible and she need never know. Alison knew he was a rambler, would think nothing of him upping sticks and moving on again. He threw back the bedclothes, eased his feet out onto the floor. A faint dizziness threatened his balance. He stood up gingerly, knocking the lamp to the floor as he grabbed the bedside table to break his fall.

  ‘William? William, what are you—’

  ‘It’s okay, I just moved too quickly. I . . . I need the bathroom.’ His words were weighed with frustration.

  When she had settled him back into bed, Alison carried a tray of breakfast to the room. ‘Mind if I join you?’ She smiled, laying the tray on the bed and opening the drapes. William watched the light rain slow-cry down the window pane, the sky beyond low and grey, as if counting down his days. His eyes returned to Alison. She wore that same oversized dressing gown, her damp hair loose over her shoulders. He thought back to the last time he’d seen her wearing it, when she had swayed to Mozart and, later, her brokenness in the bathroom.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ She placed the tray between them as she sat on the bed.

  ‘I was thinking of the change in you since the first time we met – the first morning I saw you on the beach.’

  ‘Oh, that miserable one,’ she laughed, pulling back her hair. ‘I think I’ve finally dumped her.’ She piled marmalade on her toast and took a hungry bite.

  ‘I sold all the stuff, you know, the nets and pots. Wait till you see the garden – its HUGE!’ She chewed hungrily, swallowed. ‘But wait till I tell you the big news.’ She raised a finger to hold his attention while she took a sip of her coffee. William smiled, warmed by her enthusiasm, by the way her energy charged the whole room. ‘Kathleen was on the phone before seven. She’s getting married, William! Rob proposed last night – and get this: in a hot air balloon, over the harbour, by moonlight! Can’t you just picture it?’ Her eyes danced as she detailed the scene, the champagne, the fireworks that Rob had arranged on the pier when they landed.

  William swallowed back the lump that had gathered in his throat, his heart swelling and straining against his chest, as if to free itself from the cage his illness had condemned it to and to soar into the light and the life that Alison painted. She must have seen the change in him then, caught the shadow that dimmed his eyes. She stopped mid-flow, her eyes questioning, fixing on his.

  ‘You feeling all right? How’s the hip?’

  ‘Good,’ he nodded, smiling. ‘That doctor of yours is a real healer. I’m really much better. In fact, I was thinking of heading home today. I’ve taken enough of your time.’

  ‘We had a deal, remember,’ she cut in. ‘You’re here ’til Monday at least and it’s not up for discussion. As for taking my time, I’ve hardly seen you for five minutes.’

  ‘Yeah, but . . . ’

  ‘William, the room’s here. It’s empty. Your sleeping in it isn’t bothering me in any way.’

  ‘But I’m fine, Alison, honest. I . . . ’

  ‘It’s just one more day. God, anyone would think I was torturing you. Anyway, you weren’t so fine when you tried to stand up earlier on. Now eat. And try to have a little patience?’

  They chatted on, Alison telling in excited gushes of Kathleen’s wedding plans, her own progress with the book.

  ‘For the first time in years I feel passionate about something, driven, you know. I can’t wait to get started in the mornings and toss it around in my head at night. Life has a purpose. I feel alive again, satisfied.’

  ‘And you look it.’ William smiled at the fire in her green eyes, the animation in her whole face.

  ‘Thanks for the push,’ she smiled, gathering the tray as she stood. ‘I wouldn’t have started without your words of encouragement.’

  ‘No, you did it yourself. This is yours, Alison. Your dream. Your passion.’ His eyes held hers, that same feeling rippling through her again, that sense that his eyes were licking her soul.

  ‘I’ll just take these back to the kitchen.’ She bowed her head to hide the colour rising in her cheeks.

  Dressed now, she returned to the room with books and a radio. She handed him a small whistle. ‘Call if you need me – I won’t be far
away, so don’t think of trying to escape,’ she smiled, leaving the room.

  When the rain lifted in the afternoon, Alison left her writing and went out into the garden to make a start on her rockery. She mapped out a space running across to the hawthorn tree from where you could see the rocks at the curve of the bay. At the tree’s base she dug a small, deep hole. Back in the house she selected her favourite wedding photograph and another of herself and Sean with a newborn Hannah. Hannah still hadn’t retuned her call. The temptation to ring her had been so strong this morning but she had stuck with Claire’s advice and held back, giving Hannah the space she knew she deserved.

  She wrote their names and the dates on the backs of the photographs, placed them in an old tin moneybox of Hannah’s and sealed the lid with tape before wrapping the tin in a double layer of cling film. Returning to the garden, she placed it in the hole beneath the hawthorn and pressed the moist earth tight above it. She carried the stones from the kitchen: grey, mottled, pink, striped, black – each with its own story and love of the sea – and placed them on the newly turned earth, leaving space for plants that she would choose for their colour, their wildness and strength.

  The rain returned now, big, heavy drops like the tears of a god. Alison looked out towards the sea and as she did she caught a movement at the other side of the ditch. She recognised the blue corduroy cap. Joe. How long had he been there, watching? A finger of red anger uncurled inside her. This was her private space. A special, sacred time. ‘Joe!’ He sprang from behind the ditch and took off like a hare towards the road, one hand gluing the cap to his head. She smiled after him, her anger softening. Joe had been one of the constants in her and Sean’s life together and maybe it was fitting that he was here to share today as well. She remembered the stories Sean had told her of their childhood. Denied a place at the local school, Joe would follow the others there each morning – a bag filled with old newspapers and two prized books on his shoulder – and every morning the door would be shut against him. The laughter when he’d appear at the window, knocking until the master would lose his temper and chase him away. Joe would sit patiently on the wall at the gate, waiting. Waiting until they would pour out at three o’clock and he could follow them home, never tiring of the teasing and the bullying that bought him a place in the crowd.

  Sean had always had a soft spot for him – and for the elderly mother who lived with him in the old coastguard’s cottage. God, how Joe had idolised Sean! She smiled, remembering the way Joe would pull himself up to his full height when Sean would praise the way he’d gutted a mackerel or salted the bait. How his eyes would twinkle when Sean gave him his ‘wages’ at the end of the week. She had loved that in Sean: that gentle, almost fatherly love, that kindness that, no matter what his own mood, Sean never failed to shower on Joe. She brushed the rain and the tears from her face. Poor Joe, he’d probably felt Sean’s loss more than anyone else. All those mornings she had opened the back door to find him sitting there, waiting: ‘Is Seany back yet?’ His eyes would never meet hers and she had always felt that he knew something more, felt that he blamed her in some way. And she had turned on him for it. Roared and ranted at him one morning, pinning him to the wall and forcing his eyes to meet hers as she screamed in his face that he would never see Sean again.

  The wet earth cloying at her boots mimicked the tug at the root of her heart. She knew she had wronged him. Vented her own anger, her own suffering and guilt on the poor lad. He had never come close to her after that, no matter how she tried to entice him, and as time moved on she had given up trying. As the rain drove her indoors she vowed to try again, try harder to put things right with the child-man that Sean had always watched over.

  * * *

  After supper William showered and for the first time in days felt something like his old self again. Later that night as he lay on the couch, candles bathing the sitting room in their half-light, he felt a keen awareness, a heavy regret for all he had missed out on these last years through his fear of attachment, his resolve to never again suffer the loss of someone he’d given his heart to. Soft shadows danced the walls, mimicking the lick and curve of the flames in the open fire. Alison, cross-legged on the rug before him, her head bent in a mixture of concentration and shyness, read from her poems. Her hair curtained her face, the soft curls tumbling to kiss the page in her hands. He smiled to himself at the way she would half look at him to gauge his response, at her girlish lack of confidence. She was beautiful. Beautiful. Not just the face, the long, slender body, but the whole of her: that whole contradiction of vulnerability and strength, pain and passion.

  For the first time since losing Helene, William felt a connection, a deep longing stirring inside him. A yearning that he hadn’t been ready to allow himself to feel, to offer himself to. Until now. Now, when it was too late. His whole being ached to reach for her, to hold her, to love and shelter her delicate beauty. He knew he didn’t have the strength to resist her much longer. When he left in the morning, he would make arrangements for the move to Dublin as soon as possible. She had had more pain in her life than many could bear and he couldn’t – he wouldn’t – be the cause of another hurt that would tear open the wounds that had only so recently begun to heal.

  ‘Will? What did you think?’ She smiled up at him, her brow furrowed.

  ‘Can you read it again?’ Lost in the torment of his own feelings, he had hardly heard a word.

  She began again, her soft lilt knifing his soul.

  Back to the sea

  You feel it wash over your weathered soul

  Its hypnotic roar drawing from your heart

  whispered memories of a little girl

  who was part of this place

  Part of summer evenings

  when shoals of silver sprats

  danced round the root of Gully’s rock

  to kiss your jiggling toes

  Part of the spray and the foam

  that winter-dashed the high slip walls

  and sent seagulls sideways gliding

  towards nooks in the copper stained cliffs

  It played with you too

  leaving its salty kiss on your lips

  that you could savour it, late at night

  in your high mahogany bed

  safe under blankets and coats

  the wind wrestling with the thatch above

  stirring moss-stained mice

  from the thick memory walls of your home

  while your dreams bore you off

  out on the cradle waves

  your spray tightened cheeks spattered

  with the blood and the scale

  and the smell of the catch

  Today again, the foamy fall

  and the spray washing back like banshee hair

  The wind mimics her death cry and knives

  the surface of a mackerel backed sea

  of grey on greyer grey on black

  The cliffs and the stacks stand stern

  never turning their heads

  from the sting-slapping sea

  with her belly of secrets

  They scan the horizon

  dream the return of the man

  who was king of this place.

  ‘You know, for someone who curses the sea, you seem to have a great affinity . . . no, a great love of it.’

  ‘The great love-hate relationship,’ she smiled, and sipped her wine. ‘I suppose you can’t live beside it for so long, share so much with it, without coming to know it, to respect it.’

  ‘Well, it’s certainly inspires your work.’ He sat up on the couch. ‘You have a wonderful talent, Alison, never forget that.’

  Her eyes smiled into his and he locked on them as if his very sustenance could only be drunk from their depths. He cleared his throat. ‘Now, this old man needs his bed.’ He stood to go to his room, to be alone with his thoughts and his longings. With the fears that lay waiting in the darkness.

  * * *

  Next morning, the rocks and c
lay that Alison had so carefully arranged the previous day lay scattered and thrown about outside the kitchen window. Fury weighing her step, she silently cursed the dogs as she strode towards the garden. The hole beneath the tree was freshly dug out, and empty. Would Tim have managed that? Then she saw the footprints in the wet clay. Prints of a man’s large shoe. Cold fingers of fear brushed the back of her neck. Someone, some man had been out here in the dark last night while she lay sleeping. And the dogs hadn’t even alerted her. She hadn’t slept that heavily, conscious that William might call her during the night.

  ‘Problem, Alison?’

  She swung around at William’s call from the kitchen window. He could see her confusion, the tension tightening her mouth.

  ‘Oh, it’s just Tim!’ She walked towards the window. ‘He’s gone and undone all the work I put in yesterday.’ From the side of her eye she saw the little tin box, opened and empty, lying on the yellowed grass nearby. ‘It’s nothing, just a wasted day’s work,’ she smiled. ‘How are you feeling this morning?’

  William was dressed and shaved and looking a lot brighter. She stood under the open window looking up at him, the morning sun playing in her hair.

  ‘Much better, thanks. I’ll be off and out of your way in an hour. Fancy a coffee?’

  ‘Sure.’ She rounded the house to the back door. He was going home. ‘Would you not think of spending one more night?’ she called, kicking off her boots in the back kitchen. What if whoever it was that messed up the garden came back again tonight? ‘There’s nowhere in particular you’ve got to be, right?’ She ignored the part of her that jeered, contesting that being on her own wasn’t the real reason she wanted him to stay.

  ‘Thanks, Alison, but honestly, I’m fine. I can rest at home today, plus there’s some stuff I need to get on with.’ His face was still drawn, his weight loss showing in the way his shirt hung at the shoulders.

  ‘Anyway, I can’t get too accustomed to these comforts. You’re spoiling me.’ He poured the scalding water into the mugs and turned to bring them to the table. The limp was more pronounced than ever and Alison could see the wince in his face when his left side bore his weight.