No word seemed enough to describe him.
Still, I didn’t trust him.
It would have been so easy to be with him that night, to throw myself into his arms and take what I wanted, and in return let him take from me too – but we were both better than that.
“Goodnight, Ciara. Sweet dreams,” he said.
“Goodnight, Teddy Bear,” I said, stifling a chuckle.
He laughed. “I’ll let you have that, just once.”
With the wind howling against the plate-glass windows and rain bashing the roof, I closed my eyes and thought back to times I rode horses in this weather. I had loved it so much. A slick beast between my thighs, his breath steaming into the air, his nostrils flaring every time we jumped. The scent of horse hair mixed with shit and leather… and the wet hair plastered to my forehead, the pumping of my heart as we managed jump after jump through the woods… as we triumphed again and again, me and the beast, who I sat on and who was at my command. There was nothing like the thud of their shoes on the hard ground and the power… and the wild abandon of feeling every muscle and joint of your horse working beneath you, powering you both on – a unique vehicle unlike any other. The rise and fall on the saddle was truly sensual – I didn’t care what anyone said – it really was, but in a way only people that knew horses could understand.
Tomorrow, I decided, we would find my new horse, then ride out and taste the only sort of freedom I used to have. It was the sort of joy I could live off.
Thirty-Two
FOR YEARS SINCE I LEFT home, I’d woken at five a.m. out of habit and it would take me half an hour to sink back off to sleep. Some rituals never leave you. So… when I woke the next day at five a.m., this time I didn’t waste time trying to fall back to sleep. I got up and at ’em.
Edward didn’t wake as I skilfully avoided creaky floorboards, gathering my pile of clothes to dress in the bathroom. He slept deeply and peacefully as I tried in vain to avoid looking at his broad chest and heavy-set shoulders.
Outside in the dank air, I felt immediately at home, and rejuvenated.
Bethan padded around the kitchen in the main house and waved.
“You too?” she asked, as I stepped into the room.
“Hard habit to crack.”
“Makes for catching some lush sunrises though, eh?”
“Does, so.”
She passed me coffee and I eagerly supped it, like a broth to parched lips on a winter ski slope.
“Where’s best to find a filly?”
“What’re you talking about?” She peered at me, inquisitive.
“I want to buy a racehorse. I’ve always had a fantasy about winning the Cheltenham Gold Cup.”
“Jaysus, are you insane?”
I laughed. “No!”
“You could buy one here but with transfer fees and the weak pound, you’d be way out of pocket. You should think about getting a share, than buying one. Have you forgotten how much work it is?”
“I didn’t think.”
“Well, I’m assuming you have a full-time job, if you’re able to afford horses, now?”
I chuckled. “I am quite busy but I was going to employ someone…”
She sighed and put her arm around me. “Did that blond feck lock you up or something?”
“Why do you say that?”
“It’s like when Uncle Jimmy got out, I mean great-uncle Jimmy on Da’s side, from… god, I can’t remember the marriage now… anyway, it’s like when he got out of prison and he was going round, doing all the things he’d always wanted to. Trouble is, he tried to run before he could walk and was back in prison a couple of months later.”
“I’m not Uncle Jimmy. For a start, I’ve never poached anything in me life!”
She giggled. “There’s something to be thankful for but listen Ciara, he seemed weird, you know? Like soulless or sort of,” she wrinkled her nose, “like the way he hung around, I don’t know… lonely.”
“He made my life a misery sometimes. I guess I do feel freed and I don’t know if I’m used to it yet.”
“There’s a reason our horses do so well over there after training here so maybe think about retiring from that other job of yours, then looking into it as a passion… or a profession. Whichever. You know? Anyway for the time being, why not just ask your man to take you to a riding school and you two go and have a little ride through some woods together.” She gave me a dirty look, licking her lips.
“You are such a slut.”
“Oh it takes one to know one.”
“Why didn’t you try to keep this place going, if you don’t mind me asking? It was the only one worth anything round here.”
She shook her head. “Da was dead against it. Him or nothing, at this stables any road.”
“I get it.”
My mind became troubled by the sudden thought of Dante perhaps having set up secret cameras here. Who was to know, eh?
“Ciara, you were never scared of anything so it scares me now that I can see you scared. That blond man really got to you, right?”
I nodded. “Kind of. I suppose I hoped I could change him. I was wrong.”
“Men don’t change, even I know that. Then again, that one you got over there in that cottage, he’s some man for one man.”
“I don’t know him well enough.”
“He said last night he’s a polo man. I mean, what could be more perfect? A man who looks like that, and rides horses! He looks like he’d love to take you wherever you want to go, believe me. It’s in his eyes.”
“I don’t know,” I said, feeling coy.
“Go back to bed,” she said, “I am. Far too much gin last night.”
“Sleep well, Beth.”
The sun wasn’t up yet – but I had an idea.
I went back into the holiday cottage and shouted up to him, “We’re gonna be late, come on!”
“What for?” he groaned.
“You’ll see.”
He joined me downstairs within a couple of minutes and I shoved a big wax coat of my father’s into his arms. “Put this on. Quick!”
I started running ahead of him, taking him through slippery side streets and between houses, the almost-direct route down to the bay. Before long, we stood at the harbour, and in the east the sun began to rise.
“Smell that,” I said, and as the sun got higher, the saltiness of our environ got more pungent.
“Wow, amazing. I’m thrilled there was an actual reason to drag me out of bed.”
I turned to him. “From now on, I’m always going to do the things that make me happy.”
“Good for you.” He smiled lopsidedly, his thick hair all ragged, his cheekbones flush with colour. He took some deep breaths and shut his eyes, letting the air sink into his lungs.
“When we get back, can we go riding? I’m not going to buy a racehorse. It was just a crazy thought. But I’d like to go out riding with you. Do you know somewhere?”
“Yes, of course,” he said, “I’ll ride Bonaparte and you can ride his sister.”
“Bonaparte?” I smiled, watching him enjoying the morning. He still had his eyes shut.
“Yes. He’s old, remember? His sister is my wife’s horse but she’s never really loved riding as much as me. In fact Marie Antoinette, the mare, hasn’t been ridden out properly in a long time. Part of the divorce includes me getting the horses, which are inseparable.”
“She’s hasn’t been ridden in a long while? That’s either a euphemism or just something really sad.”
“Bit of both, I suppose.”
As I chuckled Edward reached out for my cheek, caressing my skin. His crow’s feet bunched a little as he smiled.
“People who love one another should surely know everything about each other?”
“They should,” I said, “they really should.”
“Well I never realised Faith was always lying when she said she liked horses. She was just humouring me. I always wondered why the poor mare never followed directions!
”
“Oh, poor thing.”
I took his hand and pulled him with me.
“Where are we going?”
“Well I’m getting tired of hearing about your wife so let’s see if Sinbad still sails from here. He’ll be going for cockles. They’re delicious.”
“Okay!” he chuckled, taking my hand tight in his.
“Come on, we may catch him. He used to let me sail with him, all the time, back in the day.”
We wandered along the seafront and came to the mooring Sinbad, as he was affectionately called, used to dock at.
The mooring was empty and a plaque left where he used to pull up, every evening, after a full day on the sea. He loved it.
“Oh no,” I whispered, seeing he was remembered, in memorial…
“All this stuff I missed,” I said, “and it’s like, like I was abducted, and the time I spent away wasn’t real. It feels five minutes ago, but it looks like six years.”
Edward pulled me closer, holding my shoulder. “Let’s go.”
I barely noticed where he was steering me but we eventually reached the stables again. He took me inside our little place and started the fire.
When it was roaring, he brought some of the blankets down from upstairs and got me comfy on the sofa. He sat on the floor, close to me, holding my hand – and we watched the fire together.
“Tell me a story, Ciara. Something tells me you’re a great storyteller. Tell me any story you like.”
“You sure?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay…”
***
THERE was a mermaid who lay on the shore of Youghal night after night, singing songs of Irish folklore. She sang them in Gaelic and English, in Latin and German, in Spanish and Italian. They were all of them tales she’d overheard, as she swam through ocean after ocean. Flipping her mermaid tail idly most nights, as she sang, she remained ignorant of the gentleman hiding high up on the cliffs, mesmerized by her emerald green tail, shimmering purple by the moonlight.
She especially loved to sing about her pal, Moby Dick. He was the whole reason she was even in this quiet, sleepy little southern Irish town. She’d heard he was here, that he’d visited. When she arrived, all she’d spied was the Moby Dick bar up on the human side of the land. Moby had been her honest and wise companion on many a voyage under the ocean but one day, he was gone, never to be seen again. He sank, or got lost? She didn’t know.
Then hundreds of years later, a crow landed on a desert island where she was staying awhile and had whispered in her ear that Moby still lived, and had been spotted in Youghal, Ireland. She immediately ploughed through the oceans to reach him… only to find just a pub, in memory of him. Lost at sea perhaps, she would never find him again. So she sang, in her own manner of lament, every night on the seashore. She whelped in her own mermaid language and she slept in the shallow waters by day, avoiding the tourist boats shuttling people across the Celtic sea to spy on whales with no might as great as Moby’s, an albino whale never surpassed – never caught. Perhaps, one day, he’d simply reached his end and sank to the bottom of the ocean, like all greats did – carrying on until they simply could no more. But no-one had ever found his grave for her to mourn at. She was bereft.
SO, one night the man who’d been spying on the mermaid struck up the courage to finally talk to her. Surprised he was the only person who’d noticed her there, night after night, he was also surprised when she seemed unafraid of him.
“Hello, my name is Eric,” he said, and she smiled.
“I’m Ariel,” she whispered, flicking her long red hair over one shoulder, exposing one side of her throat to him.
He knelt down to admire her tail. “I’ve never met a mermaid before.”
“Of course you haven’t. We’re rare.”
“How rare?” he asked, blinking against the light shining out of her silver eyes.
“Just me. I could be wrong, but I think I’m alone now. And the only friend I had is lost… or dead. I’m alone.”
“So that’s why you sing so sadly, every night?”
She whipped her head around to look at him. “You can hear me sing? But only creatures of my own kind can hear me sing?”
“I hear you,” he said, “every night, singing in different languages, some I don’t understand. But I hear the tales you tell, of fairies, changelings, leprechauns, princesses, ghosts, witches, cats and banshees.”
“I repeat tales told to me, that is all. No human has ever understood my song before, however.”
He felt thrilled when she gazed at him. Though it wasn’t an adoring gaze, it was a longing look. He decided something she’d lost had been recovered. At least, that was his interpretation.
He wondered if she needed him, just someone to sing to, someone who might understand her soul’s words.
As dawn crept closer and the tide began to lap at her tail, he realised she would soon swim away. In fact the more the water splashed at her tail, the more colourful she became, dazzling with millions of scales, shimmering of their own accord in a multitude of colours.
“Let’s not lie to ourselves,” she said, “I wouldn’t cut myself in two for you.”
“You wouldn’t?”
“No. I’d rather have one perfect limb, than two broken ones, just so I could stand by your side.”
He loved her more, for refusing to change herself.
“And I would rather have you stay the way you are, than cut yourself for me.”
IN over a thousand years, she’d never encountered a single human being who understood her song – except him. As she swam away, she felt sad, but there was no beating about the bush – he had legs, and she didn’t.
There was no miracle cure for their differences. No fairytale or folklore could make them compatible.
She popped her head out of the water a few feet away from him and waved goodbye, bobbing as the tide rushed forward, pushing him backwards on his feet, closer and closer to the sea wall and the ladder up he would soon need to climb fast.
“Will I hear you sing again?”
“Oh yes, you’ll hear me,” she said, heading for the lair she would slumber in again, until night. “But will my song be enough for you?”
“Oh yes,” he shouted, now far away from her.
He dashed up the ladder, heading for dry land.
She dove the surface, sinking deep beneath the waves. Soon, she was cradled in the bed of an old shipwreck.
AS Eric walked home, he saw an image of Ariel in his mind’s eye, her mermaid tale all slashed, and bleeding. He already loved her so much that he couldn’t risk her one day trying to make herself land-worthy.
So he packed up his house, left Youghal, and took a boat to London.
He never looked back, because he knew he’d saved her, keeping her intact.
Just as she was meant to be.
***
EDWARD turned his head up to look at me, smiling. “What does it all mean?”
“Whatever you want it to mean. It could be a morality tale, or it could simply be a tale of warning, like the tales of old. Old wives’ tales, designed to keep kids scared… or send their imaginations wild. All the fairytales of old, you know? They weren’t pretty.”
“Oh I know that.” He stared at the fire again.
“Maybe people think they make their own destinies, but maybe they’re influenced by tiny little whispers in their ears, which make them do things they would never have thought plausible otherwise. Maybe our journey through life is not wholly led by ourselves, but constructed from the world around us, directing us to the place we need to be. A role for ourselves finds us, maybe. Or maybe the mermaid girl he left behind is me as I used to be, singing a song nobody here understood, and maybe he left me because he didn’t think to look deeper, beyond the fairytale, to the woman. That’s why these tales are so good, because you can look at them several different ways. After all, don’t people read the Bible to take what they want from it?”
&nbs
p; “Now I think you’re talking in riddles! You should get some more sleep.”
“I agree.”
We walked upstairs and crawled into our beds, still clothed.
“Am I sleeping with the Power fucking Rangers?” he said, in such a deadpan manner, I burst out laughing, tears falling from my eyes.
“YES!”
He laughed hard, too.
I loved his laugh.
Looking at each other, laid on our sides, he said, “Would you cut yourself in half to make legs?”
“No. Would you?”
“No.”
“Would you leave me, to save me?”
“How could I save you? You’ll do what you want anyway. I’d be merely here because I couldn’t imagine a day without you.”
I stared at him, wondering if this one man (he was some man) was my final destination? Or was he the catalyst for some sort of change in my life, forcing me into the role I was born for?
He shut his eyes anyway, and so did I.
Thirty-Three
WHEN WE WOKE IT HAD somehow got to midday. After freshening up we sat alone at the tiny dining table, enjoying bacon sandwiches Bethan had just delivered for us. He ate ravenously, as he always seemed to. I enjoyed watching him, his jaw working hard to destroy whatever was in his mouth.
Between mouthfuls, he said, “My horses will be mine in about a month.”
“You expect to be divorced that quickly?”
“Yes, neither of us has contested anything.”
“Wow.”
“We can head up to my parent’s. They will be keeping the horses for me. I used to keep them at a yard, to please her because my parents never liked Faith.”
“That’s sad,” I said, “and also weird that you want me to meet your parents.”
“They will love you,” he said.
“Don’t go running before you can walk,” I warned him, and he brooded on my words, going quiet on me.
The Fix (Nightlong Series Book 2) Page 32
