Nora sat with her laptop in a busy coffee shop, catching up on email with her family. She finished a long message to her youngest sister, Amelia, and hit Send. Sitting back, she reached for her latte.
It had been an incredible day. She smiled to think of herself considering a day spent first locked in a car with Briana Devlin and then spent in the biggest city in Ireland as incredible, but… You wanted to stretch yourself, do things differently from the way you’ve always done them, she reminded herself.
Briana had arrived at the cottage promptly at seven a.m. She took Nora’s carry-on bag from her and tucked it in the cargo hold of her white Hyundai.
Shannon, taking up most of the back seat, had gently nosed Nora’s ear in welcome as she got into the passenger seat.
“The cottage looks nice,” Briana had noted as she backed up.
“Thanks,” Nora said.
Cheerful flowers and bushes bloomed in beds along either side of the door, courtesy of Sheila’s nursery. Some of the ivy had been trimmed away, and the windows had had a good scrubbing.
“It doesn’t look so lonely anymore,” Nora said with satisfaction as they drove away.
“Lonely?”
Nora laughed self-consciously. “Nothing.” The cottage had been anything but lonely, but she didn’t say that.
Briana drove for a few minutes. Nora noticed she kept glancing over.
“What?”
Briana raised one shoulder. “It’s… You look nice.”
“Thanks.” Startled, but pleased, Nora felt her cheeks warm as she tucked her hair behind her ear, glad she’d left it hanging loose about her shoulders.
For months, when she’d first started letting her hair grow, Amy had complained about it. It became a mantra every single weekend. “You look shaggy” or “Your hair’s a mess” or some such thing. But Nora had already had this half-baked plan in her head—a plan to get away, to spend this summer in Cong, and she wanted her hair long enough to simply pull back without having to worry about it.
It was funny, she mused now, sitting in the coffee shop. Something as simple as her hair had been the first of many little, secret steps—getting her passport, speaking to her supervisor about an extended leave, researching Ireland’s visa and citizenship regulations. She’d scrimped and saved, bringing her lunches from home for months, not shopping for new clothes or going to the movies.
She was still amazed at herself. It had been ages since she’d pushed ahead with something she wanted to do if someone else thought it was a bad idea.
When did that change? she wondered. As a child, she’d always been the stubborn one, insisting on figuring things out her own way. At some point, she’d ceded that independence for peace. It had become easier than listening to all the “I told you so” comments from Mary Fran, her older sister—and later, Amy—if her way didn’t work at first.
Thinking back now, she remembered exactly when it changed—the first day of classes in sixth grade. With Mary Fran only a year older and one grade ahead—but in a different school for the first time in Nora’s life—her teacher, Mr. Williams, had given them quizzes to see what they’d retained from the prior year. When he saw her math and English scores, he’d said, “So, you’re not a copy of your sister.” Her heart had sunk at yet another comparison with Mary Fran, who was pretty and popular and athletic and had a gazillion friends. None of which Nora was good at, no matter how hard she tried. But when Nora got her papers back and saw that she’d gotten a perfect score on everything, Mr. Williams had grinned and winked. In that moment, Nora made the decision to excel in the things that Mary Fran didn’t.
When her dad nicknamed her No-nonsense Nora, Mamma had said, “Leave her alone,” but Nora liked it. She became the opposite of her sister—serious, studious, a loner who preferred staying in and reading on weekend nights rather than going out. Not that she’d had anyone to go out with. Until she met Amy in grad school.
At first, the happiness of their blossoming friendship had felt to Nora like a chance to start over, to reinvent herself, but somehow, even after the friendship had stumbled into a kind-of romance, she was still just Nora. Plodding, smart-but-dull Nora.
And then, the idea of this escape to Ireland had taken root, like a weed that wouldn’t go away. Mamma and Pop had been the only ones Nora confided her plan to at first. They’d been delighted to help—“part of the resistance,” Pop had joked. That was when Pop had contacted Mr. McCarthy and arranged her cottage. When she finally worked up the nerve to tell everyone, her family’s reaction—to her surprise—had been amazement.
“I didn’t want to say anything until…”
“Until it was all laid out, to the smallest detail,” her mother, Mary Kate, had said admiringly.
“Until it was too late to change your plans,” Amy had accused bitterly.
Nora hadn’t pointed out that that was the point. She closed her eyes and sat back with her coffee cup. Here, there was no one trying to arrange her life for her. No one to tell her where to plant her flowers at the cottage or not to put her desk in front of the window because it might rain in, when she loved the way the light shone and the breeze ruffled her papers. Most importantly, there was no one to tell her she wasn’t good enough to write her story. Well, almost no one. Briana’s snarky comment about her coming to Ireland to write a book still stung.
Briana. What was it about her? It was embarrassing to admit—even to herself—how much she liked watching her, the way she moved, bouncing a little with the energy she could barely contain, coiled up inside that tight little body. Even in the car today, her muscular arms and lean thighs had fairly vibrated as if she couldn’t relax if she tried. She could be so abrupt, to the point of being rude, and then so unexpectedly kind.
Nora’s eyes opened. She set her cup down to see Briana standing outside, watching her through the window with a bemused smile on her face. It was really annoying that the sight of her made Nora’s heart race in a way that could not be good.
By the time Nora had her laptop tucked away in her backpack, Briana was standing next to the table.
“How was your nephew’s birthday?” Nora glanced around. “And where’s Shannon?”
Briana grinned. “Probably letting Kieran ride her. He’s been glued to her all day. I think he had a good time.”
She took Nora’s backpack and led the way outside, holding the café door for her.
“We can hide your bag in here where no one will see it,” she said when they got to where she’d parked. She lifted Shannon’s blanket off the back seat and folded it over the bag. “I think we’ll be better off walking from here, and then I’ll drive you to your guest house.”
“Where are we going?” Nora asked, falling into step beside her.
“My sister, Cara, told me about a place near here that most of the tourists don’t know about. It should be a bit quieter.”
Briana stopped suddenly. “Unless you’re after noise and crowds.”
“No.” Nora smiled. “I’ve had a day of crowds.”
They continued on, weaving a path through the people on the sidewalk.
“Are you limping?” Nora asked.
“No.”
And she wasn’t now, but Nora could have sworn…
“How was your day?” Briana asked.
“It was wonderful!” Nora took Briana’s arm without thinking. “Thank you so much for calling your friend. Gemma showed me around Trinity’s campus and got me in to see the Book of Kells, which is incredible. Then I found a few other museums and spent the day going through them, just wandering around.”
She realized she was still holding Briana’s arm and let go. “It was nice, but I’ll be ready to get back to Cong and my quiet little cottage.”
When they got to the pub, Nora insisted on buying the first round, trying a Smithwick’s at Briana’s suggestion. They placed their food orders at the bar and carried their pints to an empty table in a back corner.
Nora watched the families with young children, mixing with older folks—all of them seeming to be locals. A few dogs were lying politely under tables, waiting hopefully for scraps of food to fall. She took a deep drink of her ale and caught Briana studying her.
“What?”
Briana tilted her head. “I just don’t understand you.” She looked frustrated.
“What is there not to understand?” Nora scoffed. “No one else has ever had any trouble.”
Briana shook her head. “I don’t believe that. Or they only skimmed the surface.”
Nora wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so just took another drink.
“You hardly said a word the entire drive here from Cong,” Briana said. “But then you’re fine meeting a total stranger, roaming a city you’ve never been, in a country you’re visiting for the first time.”
Briana frowned, as if maybe she could see the answers if she just glared hard enough.
Nora squirmed under the scrutiny. “I figured if you wanted to talk, you would. I enjoyed the ride, just listening to your music. And I told you, Gemma was delightful. Dublin is nice, as far as cities go.”
“I could never do that.”
“That I can believe.” I couldn’t have done it a year ago. But Nora chose to keep that thought to herself, as she’d then have to explain why.
Thankfully, their food arrived at that moment, cutting off any further interrogation from Briana. Nora dug into her colcannon, but out of the corner of her eye she saw that Briana wasn’t eating.
Briana leaned forward, her elbows on the table, her hands hovering a fork and knife over her steak. “You know what I think?”
Nora dabbed her mouth with a napkin. “I’m not sure I want to know.”
Briana’s mouth curled into a tiny smile at Nora’s icy tone. She cut a bite and chewed slowly.
“I think,” she said thoughtfully as she cut another bite, “that you are a kind of shape-shifter, like a boggart.”
“A boggart.” Nora stabbed a forkful of corned beef. “I thought boggarts become the thing people fear. So that’d be a first. Thanks.”
Briana seemed to ponder that as she chewed. “You’re not that,” she said with a firm shake of her head. “Only you become whatever the person near you expects or needs you to be.” She picked up a chip and jabbed it at Nora. “I need quiet, so you were quiet in the car. Today, you met a complete stranger and were fine in her company for a few hours. Now, you’re in a city full of people, and you can mix and mingle with them like you’re one of them.”
She narrowed her eyes as she bit into her chip. “The question is, what do you become when you’re on your own. When it’s just you?”
Nora stared at her. Even over the noise in the pub, she could hear her pulse pounding in her ears. How the hell had this woman—this irksome woman she’d only known for a few weeks—how had she just summed up everything in Nora’s life that had led her to Ireland?
Kieran took Nora by the hand and dragged her to his room to see his birthday presents.
“She’s nice,” Cara said, refilling Briana’s coffee cup.
“She is that.” Bri eyed her sister suspiciously. She checked that their mother was out of hearing in the dining room. “And just because you made me invite her for breakfast, don’t think there’s any more to it.”
Cara’s eyes, the same blue as Briana’s, widened innocently. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”
Briana snorted and took a sip of her coffee.
“Where did you say she’s from?” asked their mother, Victoria, bringing a stack of plates to the sink.
“Near Washington, DC. But her grandparents were born in Cong. That’s why she’s visiting.”
“Well, that’s nice you’ve got a new friend, isn’t it?”
Briana felt her cheeks redden and caught the wicked grin on her sister’s face. Glancing at the clock, she jumped up.
“We need to get back.”
“Can’t you stay a wee bit longer?” Victoria asked with a little pout.
“No, Mum. I’ll come back soon.”
Briana ignored Cara’s cough from behind her. She went down the hall to find Kieran and Nora sitting on the floor with Shannon as Kieran read one of his new books aloud. His dark head was bowed and one stubby finger traced along as he read.
Briana waited until he was finished. “Well done, little man!”
“Time to go?” Nora asked.
Briana nodded, but Kieran slapped his book shut.
“No! I have more books to read!”
She picked him up and kissed his cheek. “We’ll be back so you can read the rest of your books to us.”
Her eye caught Nora’s, and she felt a bit nauseous at the way Nora’s slow smile made her stomach do somersaults.
Nora got to her feet and followed Briana out to the kitchen.
“Thank you all for having me over,” she said. “It was nice to meet you.”
Victoria took her hands. “You come back with Briana any time.”
It took a few more minutes for Kieran to say his goodbyes to Shannon, but at last, they were in the SUV and on their way. Shannon stretched out, exhausted, across the back seat.
“Your mom and sister are sweet,” Nora said. “I’m sorry I didn’t get to meet your dad and brother-in-law.”
Briana shook her head. “Their Sunday tee time is sacred. Much to my mother and sister’s disapproval. What my mum and sister don’t know is how much money they bet every weekend.”
Nora chuckled.
A light rain fell as Briana wove through Dublin’s streets toward the M4 expressway. She pointed out landmarks as she drove. Nora’s head swiveled to look around.
“This was nice,” Nora said, settling back in her seat as they left the city. “But I’m ready to be home.”
The word caught Briana by surprise. She glanced sideways at the graceful way Nora’s hands rested on her thighs. In contrast, her own callused hands with their short nails were strong but hardly graceful. She double-checked and was glad to see that at least they were clean. Sometimes the deep dirt and grime of the stables was hard to scrub off.
“Tell me more about your life in the States,” she said. But then she remembered the look on Nora’s face in the pub last night when she’d started probing. “If you feel like talking.”
Nora turned to look at her. “No quiet and music this time?”
Briana felt the corner of her mouth tug into an unwilling grin. “Not this time.”
“This boggart thing is hard to keep up with, you know.”
“Yeah, about that. I’m sorry—”
“What do you want to know?”
Briana couldn’t bring herself to ask what she really wanted to know. “Tell me about your family and work.”
“Well, you know my grandparents were born and raised in Cong. My granddad says he made a pest of himself with the film crew when they came. He was fascinated by electricity. He married my grandmother when they were just eighteen and they moved to the States in ’58. He became an electrician and eventually had his own company. They got a lot of work in the building boom in DC when the Metro came along.”
She paused, but Briana said, “Go on.”
“Okay. My dad, Patrick, was the second oldest, like me, but he was one of six. Three of my aunts and uncles are scattered all over the country now, but two others stayed in the DC area, so we had plenty of cousins to play with when the family got together. My mom is Mary Kate. My oldest sister is Mary Fran, and I’m just a year younger. Then there was a four-year gap before Judy and Amelia came along. They’re all married. I’ve got two nephews and two nieces so far, and Judy is due in the fall.”
She stopped again, the rhythmic slap of the wipers the only sound.
Briana waited a moment and then prompted, “And your work?”
“You know I work in one of the libraries at the University of Mary Washington. I went there for my undergrad degree, then got my MLS at Catholic University. That’s when I learned I could only take so much of DC. Then I went back to Mary Washington. It’s a small school. I like it there.” She sighed. “And that about sums up my life.”
“Not all of it.”
Nora’s voice had a bit of an edge to it as she said, “What do you want to know?”
Briana hesitated. This was obviously cautious territory. She never did this with Quinn or the others at the stables. Of course, they knew each other’s whole life histories, so no one ever needed to ask.
As if you have anything for them to ask about.
“Your sisters are all married. What about you? I mean, I know you’re not married now. I suppose. But… has there… have you…”
Briana’s voice trailed off. Nora was smiling at her obvious discomfort.
“You’re not very good at this, are you?”
Briana squirmed. “This being?”
Nora laughed. “This whole talking to another person thing.”
“No, I’m not,” Briana admitted. “Dogs and horses are my usual companions.”
“Okay. I’ll let you off the hook.” Nora took a deep breath and then spoke quickly. “I was with someone. We never lived together. She lives and works about an hour away, so it was always a weekend relationship, maybe a week or two together in the summer. Then she met someone else and decided she wanted to see if it could work. So we ended. Kind of.”
Briana frowned. “What does that mean? Kind of.”
Nora didn’t answer immediately, and Briana wondered if she was pushing too hard, but then Nora said quietly, “Her new girlfriend has a girlfriend. So she was only available during the week. Meaning Amy still expected me to spend every weekend with her.”
“Wait, wait.” Briana gaped a moment as she tried to make sense of this. “She was shagging someone else who was shagging someone else, but she still expected you to…”
“Not that,” Nora said quickly. “We hadn’t… It had been ages since we’d been physical. It was…” She paused.
Briana waited.
“I had become just a weekly habit,” Nora said. “Better than being alone. And I guess I kind of used her the same way.”
Briana wasn’t sure what to say. “How did you get away to come here?”
Nora reached into the back seat to scratch Shannon. “I wanted to for the last couple of years, but I had an old cat I couldn’t leave. How pathetic am I? I stayed with an ex who wasn’t an ex because I couldn’t leave my cat.”
“Not pathetic,” Briana said, glancing over a couple of times while keeping her attention on the road. “Loyal, I think.”
Nora smiled a little sadly. “Loyal sounds nicer. But the end result is the same. For too long, I have lived my life either in response to someone else or according to someone else’s expectations. I settled for what was secure, what wouldn’t lead to an argument—first with Mary Fran when I was growing up, then with Amy. I can’t tell you how good it feels to be doing what I want to do for the first time in my life.” She was quiet for a moment. “You were right.”
Briana frowned again, thinking. “Cara would argue with you that I’m never right, but what about?”
“About my being a boggart. It felt like a slap in the face when you said it, but you’re right.”
She turned to look out the window, so Briana almost missed it when she said, “I didn’t used to be. I was hardheaded and independent when I was little. I was just thinking about when that shifted. And that’s another thing I’m after changing this summer, finding that part of myself again.”
Briana didn’t know what to say.
Nora shifted to partially face Briana. “Your turn.”
“What?”
“I just bared my soul. Your turn.”
Briana’s face burned with what she knew must be a brilliant blush. “Well, there’s not much to tell. I don’t have an ex.”
“No one?”
“No one who lasted longer than the time I was at a race meet.” Briana gripped the wheel harder. “You said I looked like a jockey. I was. For eight, no, nine years.”
Nora sat straighter. “That’s really dangerous.”
Briana snorted. “It is dangerous. But the riding isn’t the most dangerous part. Crooked jockeys who stick your horse. Trainers and owners who dope the horses to hide their injuries. The horses destroyed by being over-raced and treated like machines.”
Her jaw clenched. Even after all these years, it was so damned hard to think about. Harder to talk about.
“My mount that last season was an up-and-comer, a beautiful three-year-old who could have been brilliant. We’d had a bad takeoff over a big brush fence, and he strained one of his hocks—a hind leg. His next race was only two weeks later. The trainer swore to me he was sound. But I could feel it. Just a slight hesitation.”
Her chin quivered. “But I asked, and he gave. He wobbled on the fourth jump. I should have pulled him up right then. At the fifth—”
Her voice broke. Nora reached over to lay a gentle hand on her shoulder. Briana angrily swiped away the tears running down her cheeks. It was a couple of minutes before she could continue.
“We’d both broken a leg, but I couldn’t leave him. I’ll never forget the look in his eyes.” She sniffed. “I left racing after that. When my leg was healed, that was when I found Quinn and Sheila.”
Nora squeezed and then dropped her hand. Briana missed the warmth on her shoulder and wished she’d put it back.
“Thank you for telling me,” Nora murmured.
Nora found herself watching Briana surreptitiously from her peripheral vision for the remainder of their drive back to Cong. They lapsed into familiar quiet, the music on the stereo the only sound. She suspected Briana had told her something she normally guarded very closely, a part of her that she didn’t share with many. Sheila had said Briana was a puzzle, and it seemed a few more pieces had fallen into place over the course of this weekend.
As they approached Sióg Cottage, Nora weighed whether to invite Briana in, but she had a feeling it wasn’t the right time. Briana would need to be alone after the last couple of days, and she was ready for some solitude herself.
“Thank you again,” Nora said as Briana braked to a halt in front of the cottage. “It really was a nice weekend.”
“You’re welcome.”
Briana tugged Nora’s bag from the cargo hold and carried it to the door. Nora reached for her backpack and gave Shannon a parting scratch under the chin. As she turned toward the cottage, she caught a flash of movement from the upper window.
Briana stepped back and followed her gaze. “What’s wrong?”
“I thought—” Nora shook her head. “It was nothing.”
“Are you sure? I can come in with you.”
Nora couldn’t have said later what made her decline when she very much wanted Briana to come inside, but, “No. It’s okay,” she heard herself say.
She waited as Briana got hesitantly back into her car and reversed it, waving before she drove away. Nora turned the key in the door and cautiously pushed it open. When she stepped inside, the cottage felt chilled, and there was that scent like lilac again.
Over at her desk, where the window was firmly shut, her journal and blank book weren’t where she had left them. They lay flopped open on the floor, looking as if something had whipped them off in a fury. Her loose pages were strewn all over, and her pens were likewise scattered across the room.
Upstairs, things were in similar disarray. All the pillows had been swept off her bed and were lying in the corners.
“Well, someone had a hissy fit, didn’t she?”