The Last Will of Moira Leahy: A Novel

by Therese Walsh

  We stood there, awkwardly, not sure what to do, where to look. Maybe he wanted to say something meaningful, to acknowledge that this horrible, shameful thing involving all three of us so intimately was finally over--or maybe he hoped I'd be the one to express it. But I was having a hard time finding words, just then. I remembered Moira's request--help him to forgive me--but still I could do no more than walk away, out the door, out of the building. I only breathed again once my feet tread over the snow-covered path that would take me home.

  * * *

  AT SOME POINT OVER the years, my parents had added a screened-in porch to the back of our house. After the service, I sat out there with a kerosene heater and watched as sleet fell, the wet crystalline mess of nature splat-sticking to the wire.

  "Maeve?"

  Kit's face appeared beyond the mesh door. I motioned her in. She sat beside me on the bench.

  "He told me," she said without preamble. "Ian told me he raped you."

  My stomach fell as she put her hand on my head. Rape. What an ugly word, what an ugly act. I didn't want to think of it, not ever again.

  "Maeve, oh, Maeve, why didn't you ever tell me?"

  "How could I? He's your brother. You love him."

  "I should've known what he was capable of." The tears in her eyes were angry ones, I knew. "I could've helped you!"

  "You couldn't have. You shouldn't even know."

  "I can't believe this! I think he wanted me to absolve him. I don't know if I'll ever be able to speak to him again."

  "Kit, don't," I said sternly. "It's not about you, and it happened a long time ago."

  Tears streaked down her face now. "But how could you not tell me? Why didn't you trust me?"

  "He's your brother."

  "And?"

  I felt the room shift as I stood and walked to the screen. "He didn't know it was me."

  "Wha--How do you--"

  "He didn't know it was me," I said, with conviction this time. "He thought I was Moira. They'd been lovers. It was an accident."

  "Rape is rape, Maeve. Did you say no?"

  "Yes, but--"

  "No 'buts'! You sound like you're defending him!"

  I did. How unlikely was that? "I've hated him for a long time for what happened, but he didn't act in a vacuum. I just ... I just don't think we should blame Ian for everything."

  Silence.

  "He thought you were Moira."

  "He thought I was Moira. And he thought Moira was me."

  "Oh, God."

  We stood together for a long time in the cold, until the dark came and I made Kit go home, back to the warmth and to her brother. Better to face the things that make you want to shrivel up. Always better.

  I remembered the Ghost of Castine and thought I finally understood why the drummer boy had left his field for a dungeon.

  "It feels safe there, doesn't it, little boy?" I said to the night. "Safe, closed off from those reminders of pain and suffering. It seems easier not to face the blood field."

  I listened to the rhythmic pelting against the screen, so very much like drumbeats.

  "I MISS YOU," Noel said when he called a short while later. "I wish you'd let me come."

  "I'm sorry." I sat on my bed and felt the weight of the day sink me low. "It has nothing to do with you. It's me. I just have to be in this world for a little while."

  "Can't I pay my respects to that world? Sorry," he said before I could respond. "I just want to hold your hand."

  He had returned to Paris that afternoon, and he was ready to pack his things and make his way to Betheny. His time with his mother hadn't been easy; he'd learned hard details about her life, what she'd been through. But they'd reconciled themselves to the lives they'd had and focused on the lives they still had to lead. Lives they would be a part of, each with the other--though she planned to stay in England.

  "Give her time to face her fears," I advised him. "You planted the seed. Leave it awhile. And if that doesn't work, you can always start haunting her dreams."

  "Sense of humor still intact, I see." He wasn't laughing, though; I felt his desire and need even over the phone.

  Oh, Noel. I can't. I just can't. Though I hadn't fallen apart, I felt depleted. How could I give more?

  "I'm here for you," he said. "Remember that I'm here."

  I stared up at the bare ceiling. "I won't forget."

  * * *

  MY MOTHER FINALLY spoke to me the day after the funeral.

  "Would you like some lasagna?" she asked. "I'm sick of chowder and lobster pie."

  "Yes, I'd love that," I said, surprised. "Can I help in the kitchen?"

  "Don't trouble yourself," she said, and left.

  That night, she asked me to pass her the salt. Two minutes later, she asked me to pass her the pepper. I thought I caught the hint of my father's smile.

  days later, the sun made an appearance and tempted me down to the beach. I sat on a boulder the color of elephant skin and looked out at the great blue-gray and beyond. I knew Moira was out there, somewhere, playing our music on the sea. She was there, calling for me with Poppy, bobbing in the water. She was there, picking rocks from a distant shore--smooth ones, pebbles of the darkest berry blue--and laughing at the stupidity of boys. She was there, she was there, I reminded myself, even though I couldn't hear her anymore. She was there, she was there. I had to believe it.

  "Maeve?"

  "Mom. Careful," I said as she picked her way down the stairs leading to the beach. Wind had stripped the steps of their snow, but sometimes ice covered the wood.

  I waited, curious and alarmed, for her to approach. She'd grown so thin, her hair long and unkempt and streaked with gray. I knew her days had been filled with Moira--caring for Moira, reading to Moira, crying over Moira. And I'd been jealous of that attention once, the attention she'd paid to my comatose sister.

  She sat beside me and looked out at the sea. I looked at her for a while, then turned my face toward the water as well. I'd stopped waiting for words when they finally came.

  "I dream of her," she said. "Maybe it's not Moira, but I think it is. She's just a little girl. Looks like both of you and neither of you at the same time."

  My eyes watered. "What does she want?"

  "I think she wants to play," she said, and it occurred to me, as we both laughed and cried, that maybe this girl who seemed like Moira yet wasn't her was still our family. The baby my mother had lost, maybe, or my sister's tiny child--Ian's daughter, the one my mother didn't even know about. I remembered what Sri Putra had told me: No light was ever lost.

  "I'm glad you dream of her."

  "I found something," she said. "It's been so long since Moira's been sick." Sick. Like a cold, the flu, a bout of fever. "It was time to tidy a little, donate some of her old clothes."

  I nodded, could see the therapeutic value in this for my mother even as part of me rebelled against the idea of her throwing out anything of Moira's. Let me go through things, I thought. Let me take pieces of her. Her stuffed bear. The laughing stone with the silly face she'd found on this beach. The T-shirt with her name on it. That wooden bird she'd carved with Daddy. Don't throw her away.

  "A whale," my mother said, pointing out at the bay. I looked in time to see a fin disappear into the water. "I forget sometimes how deep the Penobscot is. I spend so much time beside it that I don't come out here to sit and look or think about what's under it all. I should do that more often."

  I watched the complicated turn of her expressions, unsure exactly what to say.

  "I found this," she said, and pulled an envelope from her pocket. Moira's tabby-cat stationery. My lungs deflated as she pressed the letter into my gloved hand, held there for a prolonged moment before letting go. "Read it when you can. When you have time." She waited a few beats before standing, then laid her hand on my shoulder and squeezed. "It'll be all right."

  I nodded, mute.

  "It's freezing out here," she said, casting one last look at the sea, breathing it in. "I
'm going to head back."

  "Be careful." I watched her walk up the stairs, all the while consumed with one fact: I had a letter in my hand from my sister. A letter. Once my mother was out of view, I opened the envelope's already unstuck flap and pulled out the paper.

  Dear Ian,

  My insides sank a bit. I'd hoped the letter would be for me--words from the grave, of illumination and everlasting love. Still, I read on.

  Dear Ian,

  This is the hardest thing I've ever had to do.

  I need to tell you something that may make you hate me, but I have to take the chance. Things aren't what you think they are. In fact, things are very different than you think they are. Before I tell you what is different, I want you to know what is true about us. I know that sounds terrible, and I guess you'd be right to be scared about that sentence, because so much isn't true. But let me start with the good stuff.

  We have shared so much together. You have taught me a lot about who I am and what I want to be. I admire you so much. I love you, Ian. That is true, and I hope that no matter what you believe about me after you read this, that you realize my love for you was always real. One of the most real things in my life. Along with the love I feel for my sister, Maeve. Yes, you read that right, my sister is Maeve.

  You see, Ian, I am Moira. The girl you've been kissing and meeting with, the girl you've been loving and who's been loving you back is Moira. The boring sister. I don't have a good excuse to give you. Why did I do it? Why did I take the saxophone stone that day and let you believe I was Maeve? Why did I meet with you and let you think you were kissing her? I guess the answer is that I wanted to kiss you, and I thought if you got to know me--no matter what my name was--that you could love me, too. But that doesn't make what I did right.

  I know you love Maeve. Maybe you love me, too. Maybe you love us both. I hope so. But I know you love her because of her cool personality and the way she runs off with you and Michael to dig up treasure and play football and stuff. And I know you love that she's going to get a recording contract and leave Castine someday. I wish I could play the sax, but my mother wouldn't let me try. Oh, well. I wish you liked the piano, but I guess not everyone does, huh?

  What I'm trying to say, Ian, is that I love my sister, too. And I love you. And this lie is getting too big for me. I don't want to hurt any of us, including me. I don't want to hate my sister for being someone you like. It hurts me. And it hurts her. And I feel that hurt in a way I could never explain.

  So I'm sorry, Ian. If you love Maeve, you should just tell her and see what happens. I'll try to stay out of your way. If you can forgive me, and you think you love me, then I will be the happiest girl in the world. I would like that more than anything. You and me. Ian and Moira. I'd be proud to hold your hand at school or anywhere else. And we can look for a new stone together--one shaped like a piano this time.

  I love you. I hope you can forgive me someday.

  Love, Moira

  I shattered. Broke like I'd never cried before. A thousand glass-shard tears filled my eyes, and I bled them out. Oh, Moira! Why didn't you send it?

  I stumbled up the walk and slid twice on the stairs, caught myself with the rail. Once on flat land, I ran over the path. Ian stood there in the drive, packing his car.

  "Maeve," he said, noticing my approach. "What's wrong?"

  "Read it."

  He stared at me as I staggered before him, drunk on grief and regret, and then looked at the paper I'd thrust into his hand. I waited until I saw the words hit home. The admission that she'd pretended to be me. That she loved him. That she loved me. That she hoped he loved her. That she was sorry for all of it.

  Misery scarred his features as well. "Jesus. You just found this?"

  I nodded.

  "Come here," he said, and I let his arms encircle me. What strange war comrades we made. What a strange war it had been. "I'm sorry, Maeve. Believe me, I'm so horribly sorry."

  I pulled away, gripped his arm. "Forgive her."

  "What?"

  "You need to forgive Moira. It's important. Forgive her."

  "I forgive her," he said. "I forgave her a long time ago." The wind ruffled his hair as fine lines grew around his lips. "Can you ever forgive me? Would she? Not a day goes by that I don't regret ... everything."

  He looked me straight in the eye, and I didn't look away.

  "You hurt me, Ian, and you hurt Moira. But I know you didn't set out to hurt either one of us. I think we've all suffered, more than enough."

  Open the door, said the voice of my memory.

  "Ayuh. I forgive you." I heard the caw of a bird and finally understood. "We forgive you."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  ALPHA AND OMEGA

  I took a leave from the university, over the objections of the dean of my department, several of my colleagues, and Kit. My parents nodded when I told them, seemed to understand, though my father took me aside later and asked if I was sure, if I was all right, if I needed to talk.

  "I just want to stay, Dad. Not forever. Just for a while longer." I had the most overpowering urge to see flowers in bloom again here, to be around for the moment the snow would clear away at last, the rains would come in earnest, and the trees would ripen with flowery fruits.

  Noel also seemed to understand. I couldn't bring myself to speak with him for long or even often--once a week, maybe twice. It was a step back for us, this silent wait for me, wait request I made of him again, and I didn't always know that either of us would stay true to it. I had a difficult time seeing beyond Castine.

  I did keep my appointment with the neurologist in Bangor. Dr. Philip Heath ran tests, gave me an MRI, took my blood, and made me fill out endless paperwork. In the end, he proclaimed me fit and well--though he asked that I call his office immediately if I ever experienced another waking dream or heard abnormal sounds. I agreed that I would, but I knew his definition of abnormal would differ from mine.

  One day, I walked to the corner store for some essentials--milk and eggs, some coffee. Before I left, a package of glow-in-the-dark stars caught my eye. "With Adhesive! Guaranteed!" the sticker promised. I added it to my pile of goods and left for home.

  I worked that day to cover my bedroom ceiling with those stars. Sure, I'd nicked the idea from Sri Putra, but I wasn't a complete copycat. I made constellations: Cygnus, Corvus, Orion, Gemini. Over my sister's bed I made Virgo, for our birth month.

  At night, I'd drift off to sleep with my eye on those stars. Moira, I'd think. Bloo. Are you there, riding Delphinus's back? Where is your light? Where have you gone?

  In my worst moments, I grieved over the wasted years when she'd lain comatose, when I might've felt her spirit join mine if I hadn't been so fearful and closed. Now my mind was home only to my thoughts and my voice.

  But I dreamed of Moira every night.

  There were no doors, no water, just her and me. Usually in the sunshine, sitting in the grass, playing our music or looking at the clouds. Sometimes we were young, sometimes old--with white hair and sagging breasts and false teeth that we would pluck out of our skulls and laugh over. Sometimes we would speak our language, and I would grasp it for a second as I woke, then lose its meaning again, like a slick eel diving back into the deep. But that was all right. I knew I'd catch it again.

  THE SUN BEGAN to show itself on a more regular basis and wake me early in the morning. The snow did melt. Birds returned from their hideaways. Buds appeared as white-speck life on the otherwise bare and winter-ravaged branches. And Moira's roses, my grandmother's old yellow blossoms, tight and closed at first, unfurled in the warm rays.

  One afternoon, I felt particularly restless. I retrieved the keris from its place beneath my pillow. (My mother no longer asked why I did this unusual and seemingly perilous thing.) I went onto the front porch and sat in a splintery rocking chair with the blade on my lap. The thin white scar lines on my palm reminded me that the keris was a true weapon, so I took care with it, sheathless as it was.
r />   I rocked and studied the new spring colors as my fingers traced over the curves of the blade and the resilient blood mark--something I'd done so often, I could probably do it in the dark. I'd just lifted the keris and looked through the aperture when the mailman approached our door with a package in both hands.

  "A big one," he said, and asked me to sign for it.

  My pulse leaped a little when I saw my name on the box, but it wasn't until I was alone with it that I realized it came from Noel, postmarked Betheny, New York.

  I hurried to the kitchen and grabbed a pair of scissors, then went back to the porch and scored along the edges of the box. I tore and cut at some difficult tape before managing to open an end. Beneath wrappings of silver lay a beautiful wooden case. Waves of shock eroded something in me as I took it in, what it was, and what it meant. And then I flipped open the duet of latches and looked at the instrument that sat like a golden moon against a thick pile of midnight velvet.

  Noel had sent me a saxophone.

  I stroked the smooth mother-of-pearl keys with the tip of my finger and took in the engraved lettering of the brand-new Selmer. I opened the note.

  Dear Maeve,

  Call me selfish. I want to hear you play your instrument again sometime soon. Everyone needs their paper and paint--especially a red woman like you.

  Yours, Noel

  p.s. No throwing this in the ocean.

  It was the closest he ever came to pressuring me back.

  I HAD THE most fantastical dream that night. A man, very like Sri Putra in appearance, sat on a dirt floor near a great stone hearth and blazing fire. In his hand he held metal tongs and worked something--a blade, I realized--hot, alive, over the flame. His arms curled and wrists bent as he muttered words I could not understand.

  This keris he then passed on, and so it went from man to man. Finally, a young Sri Putra gave this blade to a man with a straw hat and sunburned skin. The man was Poppy.

  "Thank you for saving my wife," Sri Putra said, and Poppy nodded before the scene changed again.