by Alison Walsh
‘I’ll get Maurice to talk to him,’ she said, crossing her arms, her eyes glittering at the mention of her husband, a big, softly spoken bear of a man with a certain stillness to him that makes others wary. ‘He can’t be making a fool of you around the town. It’s a disgrace, Michelle.’ And I hear the unspoken accusation: why can’t you keep your husband in check? Why can’t you keep him under control? Because it’s what women do: they keep their husbands’ base instincts in check; they apply a tight pull of the reins if they threaten to misbehave. I never believed that, that men were some kind of animal that had to be kept on a leash. Maybe that’s my mistake. That I let him be free.
At the accusation, he steps backwards, and his silver earring flashes in his ear. He purses his lips and clicks his teeth. ‘“God knows where”, eh? Well, anywhere would be better than here, with you, listening to you go on and on at me. Nagging, carping. “Why haven’t we got firewood, John-Joe? Why haven’t you dug the potato troughs? Why don’t you get up off your lazy arse and get a job? Why aren’t you good enough for me, John-Joe?”’ He mimes my voice, a sour expression on his face. ‘Well, you know what, love, at least I’m good enough for someone else.’
‘I’m going to bed. I have an early start. I’m going to Wexford in the morning, in case you’ve forgotten. And you said you’d come.’
He looks blank for a moment, and then his lip curls into a sneer. ‘Oh, of course, the nuclear demonstration, as if the world can’t do without heroic Michelle making her stand. The moral majority herself. Oh, such principles!’
‘The last time I looked, you used to have principles, John-Joe.’
‘That was before I realised they made shag-all difference.’ He lights a cigarette now and blows the smoke out in a cloud above our heads. He flashes the kids a grin and a little wave, as if we’re just having a nice little chat and not spitting insults at each other.
I don’t say anything for a long while, before I blurt, ‘Well, it’s a bit more productive than shagging half of Kildare.’
There’s a sudden, deathly silence, during which I can hear his breathing, a little snort in and out of his nose. He’s really drunk, and one of the goats shifts a bit and gives a little forlorn bleat. Poor goats, I think, ending up here. And then he’s beside me, so close that he has to tilt my head to one side, as he grabs my hair and twists it into a tight knot.
‘You’re hurting me,’ I wail.
‘Shagging half of Kildare, is that it, pet? Well, you’d probably know more about that than me, now, wouldn’t you? With your boyfriend across the way there. Does he have a nice big bed or a little hard single one for a bachelor? Is it a bit of a tight squeeze, eh? Or maybe he’s into sheep shagging or the like?’
I have to twist my head to face him, my scalp now burning from where he’s pulling at my hair. I murmur, ‘Oh, I don’t think so, John-Joe. This seems to be all your idea, this free love. What’s the matter? Are you jealous?’
‘Piss off,’ he hisses, and I can tell that I’ve got him and I feel a dart of triumph.
‘Jesus Christ,’ I hiss. ‘A fifteen-year-old? And it’s illegal, in case you didn’t know.’
His face goes as white as a sheet and he stumbles backwards, knocking into one of the goats, who gives a forlorn bleat. And I feel like bleating forlornly as well. His hands are down by his sides now and he looks defeated.
10
June told herself that it was as if she were possessed, as if someone else, not June, was sitting up into the Land Rover, Pilates gear and gym bag on the seat beside her, and driving down to Monasterard. She always stopped at the bridge, though, and looked out for Mother Duck. If she saw her, she’d drive on. And she always went to see Mary-Pat anyway, so that, in some small part of her brain, she could tell herself that that was precisely why she’d come, and not to spend half an hour in the dingy office of a mechanic’s garage. Half an hour. They didn’t exactly chat, herself and Dave.
That first time, they hadn’t discussed the car. There hadn’t been time. Dave’s hands, large and hairy, had been on her bottom and then on the tops of her thighs, just under the seam of her knickers. ‘Is this what you want, June?’ He’d leaned over her, his breath hot in her ear. She’d tried to ignore the smell of Nescafé and cigarettes on it, tried to concentrate as he’d fumbled at the top of her blouse with his left hand, his right staying put as they’d bent over his desk, a grubby receipt book, stained with oily fingers, and a half-open packet of Marlboro Lights the only two things left on it. She’d thought suddenly of the stains his hands would make on her silk top – would she ever get oil out of it? She’d have to Google it, she thought as she allowed him to push her skirt up and pull her knickers down.
‘Why did you come here?’ Dave had asked her after, as they’d draped themselves over his desk, a pile of invoices pushed to the floor along with June’s handbag and shoes. Neither of them had fully undressed, and Dave’s overalls had hung around his knees. He’d passed the cigarette he’d lit over to her and she’d taken a big pull on it, the way she used to when they were teenagers, but she was out of practice and had ended up coughing and spluttering, Dave banging her back.
‘God, I don’t know.’ June had pulled herself up to a sitting position, pulling her blouse closed over her bra, tugging at a loose strand of hair. Dave wouldn’t be offended by the truth – he’d always been like that: thick-skinned, oblivious to insult, unlike Gerry, who’d take offence at the slightest comment. But the truth was, she did know. Mary-Pat had said it once: it was because Mammy had left that she was so ‘buttoned up. You think you have something to hide.’
‘Will I see you again?’ Dave’s voice had been hoarse and when she’d turned around, her clothes neatly rearranged, her handbag on her arm, he was still lying on his desk, cigarette in hand, a big grin on his face as if all his Christmases had come together. Oh, what have I done? June had thought. What on earth have I done?
‘Get dressed,’ she’d said, before turning on her heel and walking back out to the car.
Now she was in Mary-Pat’s kitchen, pale autumn sunlight streaming in through the windows – what was visible of the windows anyway, with the row of knick-knacks along the windowsill, the walls full of china plates and photos of the kids, and that awful dog, who was currently lurking in the bathroom on his ‘special’ mat. A dog, in a bathroom. Mary-Pat said it was his favourite place, but it made June shudder. She insisted on using the upstairs bathroom, even though it was coming down with potpourri. But now, she felt grateful for the clutter. It made her feel safe, as if she were in a little cave. And she needed to feel safe these days, when everything seemed fraught with danger.
What I was afraid of all along – it’s finally happened, she thought. She’d been running away from it for her whole life, and it had caught up with her anyway, Dave or no Dave.
It was that feeling that had always been with her, that she was the only person in the whole world and that, one day, she’d end up alone. She knew it didn’t make sense logically – she was a twin, for a start, and didn’t they say that twins always had each other? But she’d never been that close to Pi. She’d always felt that there was something between them, a distance, as if they didn’t really understand each other. Didn’t speak each other’s language. Maybe she was jealous because he’d been Mammy’s favourite. Maybe that was it. Mary-Pat had always been beside Mammy when they were children, helping her with the washing-up or with straining that foul-smelling goat’s milk through a muslin cloth to make yoghurt. She was Mammy’s helper and, God knows, Mammy, and then Daddy, had needed her. And Pi made Mammy laugh; June could still remember the two of them, heads tilted slightly towards each other, snorting with laughter at some shared joke. When she’d ask them what the joke was, they’d just shake their heads. ‘It’d take too long to explain,’ Pi would say, but June knew what he really meant: ‘You’re too thick anyway.’ She seemed always to have been standing on the edge of things, looking in.
Everyone in the family knew what to do
, who to be, except her. She didn’t know who she was.
‘Where is that brother of ours?’ Mary-Pat broke into her thoughts. ‘I have to go up to PJ’s in an hour to take over. He’s off to Dublin to some fishing expo.’ Mary-Pat had made a huge pot of tea and was slicing big slabs of fruit brack, which she liberally slathered with butter. June felt her stomach heave. There was no way she could touch that stuff, even though normally she looked forward to it. There was no fruit brack at home, or any other treats for that matter, unless you counted a fridge full of kale, which was Georgia’s latest wheeze, the sight of which June found terribly depressing.
‘Is Rosie coming?’ June asked quietly.
Mary-Pat stopped pouring tea into their mugs and put the pot down on the table. She shrugged.
‘You didn’t ask her.’
Mary-Pat looked guilty. ‘I’m used to it just being the three of us.’
That’s not very nice, June thought, but she couldn’t help but feel relieved.
‘I don’t know what she’s going to do about that fellow,’ and she nodded her head in the direction of the window, as if he was lurking in the back garden and not six thousand miles away. ‘I asked her if she was thinking of going back, but she looked at me as if I had six heads.’
‘Has she said anything more about Daddy?’
‘She has not. And we’ve let the subject drop.’ Mary-Pat shot June a warning look over the top of her ‘I Love Mum’ mug. Have we? June thought. How exactly could we have done that? But she knew better than to quiz her sister.
‘You’re looking very fresh these days, Junie,’ Mary-Pat was saying, lighting up a cigarette and blowing a big cloud of smoke out into the kitchen.
‘For goodness’ sake, MP, everyone goes outside to smoke nowadays.’ June tutted as she got up to open the window.
‘My home is my castle,’ Mary-Pat said nonchalantly, taking a big drag. ‘Tell me something, is Gerry on the Viagra? You look as if you’re getting plenty.’
‘Mary-Pat!’ June felt her stomach flip. She’d seen that ‘look’ before, but on other women’s faces. Doreen Carmody had it when she was having sex with that dentist, and Susie had it too, with that personal trainer in the gym. June had been horrified when Susie had told her, eyes bright, face flushed with guilt and excitement. June knew what she was doing was wrong. So wrong, and if Gerry found out … And yet, she felt it, even as she thought about him, about what they did in the ‘office’ behind the garage, a surge of electricity, a jolt of energy that ran through her. It must be written all over her face.
June blushed bright red at the thought of it. What would her sister think if she knew that June had been pressed against the wall of Dave’s office, her skirt up around her waist, breasts hanging out of that expensive bra she’d bought herself for her fortieth birthday. The thought of it made her squirm in her seat.
‘Are you all right, June? You look a bit flushed.’
‘I just need to use the bathroom for a second,’ June said, getting up and quickly running to the toilet, nearly tripping over the dog in her haste to get to the bowl, which she gripped in both hands as she heaved up the contents of her stomach, what little there was of them. She flushed and rinsed out her mouth, patting it dry with a towel. And she looked at herself in the mirror, two spots of red on her cheeks. ‘You are committing adultery,’ she mouthed, to see what the words would look like spoken from her own lips. They didn’t look good.
As she turned, the dog was sitting in front of her, an anxious look on his face. He came towards June and she shrank back against the sink, but he nudged her hand gently with his head and then he licked it solemnly, before looking at her as if to say, ‘Any better?’
‘Thanks, Duke,’ she said quietly. ‘Good boy.’
He wagged his tail in return.
‘Must be a tummy bug,’ she said to Mary-Pat when she came back to the kitchen, walking over to the sink and helping herself to a glass of water, gulping the contents down, not turning around to face her sister. She looked out the window to Mary-Pat’s back garden, at the ornamental pond stuffed with koi, surrounded by gnomes with fishing rods and a large plastic heron.
‘Did I tell you, Rosie went to see Frances O’Brien?’ Mary-Pat said. June didn’t reply because her limbs were trembling and her mouth felt dry. She sat back down at the table and reached out and helped herself to a bit of tea brack, biting into it, feeling the spicy fruit and the thick butter coat her tongue. She swallowed and felt instantly better, the sugar giving her a little boost.
‘She did? What on earth would that woman have to say to her?’ That woman, who had spent a summer in their home. Who had offered to French plait June’s hair and smooth electric-blue eye shadow over June’s lids. ‘We’re best buddies,’ Frances O’Brien had said to June once, and she’d been thrilled that this woman, who just seemed to pulsate with life, would be her friend. Would spend time with her, the one no one wanted to spend time with because she was too ‘thick’, too slow to keep up with them all. But Frances O’Brien didn’t think so: she thought June was ‘an amazing little girl’. And June had treasured that – even when she’d woken up one morning to find Frances’s place at the breakfast table empty. When she’d asked where Frances was, Mary-Pat had given her a look of such venom she’d felt like hiding under the table. Frances had vanished as suddenly as she’d arrived, and even though she now lived less than a mile away from here, it might as well have been Timbuktu.
‘Lord knows. She was on Rosie’s baptismal cert and she thought she might know something. Wish to Christ she’d let it go.’ And Mary-Pat gave June that look again, the warning one, although June couldn’t quite work out what her sister wanted to warn her about.
She didn’t know what to say, so she decided to change the subject. ‘I’d better go. Gerry’s off early today and we’ve booked La Firenze.’
At this, Mary-Pat looked visibly brighter. ‘Oh, very posh,’ she said, in a mock south-Dublin accent. ‘Well, what is it Gerry always says? “Have fun,”’ and she did an imitation of Gerry that was pitch perfect.
‘Piss off,’ June said. ‘Tell Pi I said hello. I’ll be down to you next week.’
‘What’s with the weekly visits, Junie? Next thing, you’ll be moving back.’
‘Oh, there’s no fear of that,’ June said, picking up her handbag and holding it in the crook of her arm. ‘No fear of that at all.’
She had the front door open when Mary-Pat asked her, ‘June, are you sure you’re all right?’ She turned to look at her sister. She had never been able to lie to Mary-Pat. One look and she’d be blurting out the truth in no time. But she wasn’t about to do that now. If she told the truth, God knows what might happen.
I need to go and see Maeve, she thought, when she got back in the car. She wasn’t sure why she’d left it so long, but now it seemed urgent, something she absolutely had to do. Maybe she was looking for salvation, she thought grimly as she looked at her watch, calculating how long it would take to drive around the M50 and south to Bray, then back home again. Gerry would kill her if she was late. He’d already given out about restaurants having two sittings and how dare they throw you out after an hour when you’d paid good money for your dinner. She didn’t want to upset him – there was a board meeting in a few days at work and they always stressed him out. It was funny, she thought as she drove along, how that part of her brain could still work, could still mind him and look after him and care about him, while the other part … She blinked furiously. At least she could do one good thing today. Just one thing.
The road around the city was empty at this time of day, but June wouldn’t have noticed if it was jammed with traffic: she just kept driving, the white lines of the road markings disappearing under the car as she drove and drove. When she looked around to see where she was, she was almost surprised to see that she was coming up to the roundabout for Loughlinstown hospital, ten miles out of town, the icing-sugar dome of the Sugar Loaf mountain in front of her. It was as if the car had driv
en itself south towards Wicklow. It was funny how that happened, June thought as she drove, how your body still knew how to do the things your mind had forgotten about.
As she bumped off the motorway and down the narrow roads to Bray, June clutched the steering wheel and gritted her teeth, manoeuvring the Land Rover into a tight spot between a white van and an ancient Citroën. The act of completing the task made her feel stupidly pleased with herself. She wasn’t much good at reverse parking. When she got out, her knees were wobbly, her hands shaking as she fiddled with the car keys. She looked at the house, a granite Edwardian block with a white-painted balustrade over the porch and a shrivelled palm tree beside the red front door. ‘Elsinore’ was painted in the fanlight above the porch. It looked grand, shabby and genteel all at the same time, with the two white-painted lions that flanked the front doorstep, a riot of geraniums in pots lined up on either side of the tiled entrance.
The bell played a little tune when June pressed it. It sounded incongruous in the surroundings, a tinny ‘When Irish Eyes Are Smiling’, and when it finished there was silence. June was wondering if she’d have to press the bell and hear the awful song again, when there was a shuffling noise inside. ‘Just coming,’ a reedy voice called from the other side of the door.
Maeve opened it, her black hair, now streaked with grey, pulled back into a bun, her currant-black eyes squinting in the sun. June knew that Maeve was older than Mammy, but wondered if this is what her mother would now look like: her face a criss-cross of wrinkles, dotted with liver spots. Her hands twisted with arthritis. ‘I’m sorry, Maeve,’ she began, ‘I should have called first, I—’
‘June!’ Maeve’s face crinkled up in a smile and her eyes all but disappeared. ‘Musha, for God’s sake, why? ’Tisn’t often we get visitors these days, I can tell you. C’mon in.’
June couldn’t work out who she meant by ‘we’ – Maeve’s husband, Alan, had died years ago – but at the sight of Maeve’s face, she wanted to cry with relief, to grab hold of the woman and hang on to her, sobbing, like a little girl. She remembered her manners then and instead cleared her throat to keep the tears down. ‘If you’re sure?’
