Chapter 19

Nat didn’t show for work the day after I told her about Will so I knew something had happened. I tried ringing her but she didn’t answer. I decided to write a ‘closed for lunch’ sign by hand and stick it inside the door and make my way over to her place. When I arrived I pressed the buzzer but there was no answer so I pressed it again. When there was still no answer I took out my phone and rang her. I looked to the upstairs window and there was a light on so I sat on the buzzer again.

“Look, Nat, I know you’re home – just let me in.”

Soon after I heard the latch release and I pushed the door and went upstairs.

She looked frightful. She didn’t need to say anything. I knew that he was gone. I went over and threw my arms around her and she sobbed into my shoulder.

It broke my heart to see Nat so upset over the next few weeks. I was trying really hard to be understanding and to be there for her but I never seemed to be able to do or say the right thing. I would invite her over to ours for something to eat and she and Ben would share a bottle of wine while I stuck with my sparkling water – with a slice of lime if I was feeling really wild. But it was like Nat had changed as a person on the day that he had left her. It was just a slight change and, if you didn’t know her too well, you wouldn’t notice it, but there was a change in her nonetheless. She didn’t have that same enthusiasm and energy for things any more. It was like she was just going through the motions of life. I knew she found it hard to open up to me about it all. I would ask her how she was doing and she would brush me off, saying she was fine, or she would try to change the subject. But something had shifted between us when she had broken up with Will. It was unsaid of course but we both knew it was there all the same. I think it was partly because Ben had actually met Thea. There was just a little bit of awkwardness between them although neither would admit it. I knew Ben was very sympathetic towards Thea and of course my sympathies were with Nat, but I also felt awful for poor Thea. Ben had said there had been a dramatic improvement in Elliott in the days following his meeting with Thea and he could only assume it was because his dad had come home again.

Nat had met Gill, the woman who was seeing a friend of Will’s, for lunch. She heard that he was trying really, really hard to make a go of his marriage but that he had been devastated when his relationship with Nat ended. I was glad to hear that he was making a go of it though, at least for his kids’ sake. If anything good was to come out of it, it was that.

A few days later I came in from work and I sat down to dinner with Ben. He had made a lamb tagine for us, which I practically inhaled I was so hungry. My appetite had come back full swing over the last couple of weeks and I was making up for all the food that I hadn’t eaten at the start.

We started cleaning up after dinner. Ben was cleaning down the worktops while I did the dishes and let them air-dry even though I knew it was a pet peeve of Ben’s. I sat down again at the little table which we had bought in IKEA because its sides could be folded down. We thought we’d do it after dinner every evening to give us some space but after the first few days we got lazy and never bothered doing it any more.

“I have something for you.” He turned away from the cooker where he was busy scrubbing off a tomato stain. He took two pieces of paper off the worktop in the kitchen and handed them to me.

“What’s this?” I asked, unfolding them.

“Tickets.”

“For where?”

“Dublin.”

I looked up at him.

“How dare you!” I said angrily.

“Look, Kate, if I don’t make you go, you never will.”

“When are they for?”

“This weekend.”

“This weekend! But I probably won’t be able to fly.”

“I’ve already checked – the airline will let you fly up to thirty-five weeks and you’ll be just gone thirty-one – but you will need to get a cert from your doctor. It’s only short-haul anyway.”

Typically Ben was Mr Organised. I checked the tickets. We were flying out on a Friday morning and returning on a Sunday. Two whole days.

“Well, I might not be able to get the time off work.” I knew it was lame.

“Come on, Kate – since when have you ever had a problem getting time off? And it’s only the Friday that you need! You know Nat will cover for you for one day, like you do for her when she goes away.”

“You shouldn’t have done this. You think a trip home will fix everything – well, it won’t!” Even just thinking about it made my stomach lurch. My heart was beating wildly in my chest. “You can’t interfere in my life.”

“Kate, it isn’t just your life now – we’re having a baby together, remember?” He looked hurt.

“Yeah, well, I don’t know why you’re so obsessed with raking over the past!”

“Go on – ring your dad now and tell him you’re coming home.”

“I can’t now!” I spluttered. “It’s too late, it’s nearly nine o’clock – he’ll think there’s something wrong if I ring at this hour of the night!”

“Well, then, ring him first thing in the morning, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Chapter 20

The next day in work I was trying to concentrate on the words on the screen in front of me but I was finding it difficult. My mind kept wandering. The thought of ringing Dad and then what I was going to say to him kept interrupting my concentration. It was one of those things where it was actually embarrassing how long I had put off ringing him and now it was very hard to pick up the phone.

At lunchtime Nat went to the deli up the street to get our usual order of sandwiches. While she was gone and I had the gallery to myself, I took a deep breath and dialled Dad’s number. It rang and rang and I was secretly relieved at the reprieve when he didn’t answer. I was just about to hang up when I heard his voice on the other end.

“Hello – 065873.”

He still insisted on repeating the old number back whenever he answered the phone. That was the number when we were kids – there was a six in front of it nowadays. His voice sounded croakier than the last time. Older.

“Hi, Dad – it’s me.”

“Kate? Is that you, Kate?”

I knew he was happy to hear from me and then the guilt wound itself ever tighter.

“How are you, Dad?”

“Well, I’m grand now, Kate – all the better for hearing from you. How are you getting on over there?”

“Great, thanks, Dad.”

“And how’s Ben keeping?”

“He’s good. How are Patrick and Seán?”

“Ah sure, not a bother on the pair of them! Patrick is kept going on the farm and Seán is working all hours in Acton’s. He always was good at the sums, that fella.”

Acton’s was an accountancy practice in the town. It was a third-generation family business and was now run by George Acton, the original founder’s grandson.

“Well, I hope they’re paying him well.” The Acton family was always known around the town for being tight with their money.

Dad laughed. “And Aoife is good too . . .”

“Oh right . . . yeah.”

There was an awkward pause.

“Look, Dad, the reason I was ringing is because, well . . . Ben and I are going to come home on a visit – this Friday actually.”

“Well, that’s great news, Kate – I’m looking forward to finally meeting him.”

“We have some news for you as well.”

“Oh yeah?”

“I’ll tell you when we get there – no point doing it over the phone.”

“Well, I can pick you up in the airport.”

“There’s no need, Dad – we can get the bus or hire a car.”

“I haven’t seen you in so long, Kate – there’s no way I’m letting you get the bus.”

After I had given him our flight details we said our goodbyes and hung up. Nat came back then and handed me my sandwich. But, even though I had been dying for mine, I found I couldn’t stomach it.

“What’s wrong, darling? Did I get the wrong sandwich?” Nat said, noticing my expression. “I asked for the usual – I’ll go mad if they’ve made a mess of it!” She took the sandwich back off me quickly and took it apart to check that it contained the ham, cheese and tomato that she had ordered.

“It’s nothing – it’s just my stupid hormones, is all.” I felt tears prick my eyes and wiped them quickly with the backs of my hands.

“Well, bloody hell, that’s some mood-swing! When I left you five minutes ago you were fine!”

“I just rang my dad.”

“Ah, I see. And?”

“Well, Ben bought tickets for us both to fly home on Friday. I rang Dad to tell him.”

“I’d say he’ll be delighted to see you,” she said gently.

“Yeah, he sounded happy all right. And he’s really looking forward to meeting Ben.” My stomach knotted just thinking about it.

The bell tinkled just then as a rain-soaked tourist came into the gallery.

“Look, you’ll be fine.” Nat took my hand and clasped it in between her own. “You’ll have to face up to it eventually, especially now that you’ve a baby on the way. You’re doing the right thing, Kate.”

“I hope you’re right,” I sighed wearily. I wrapped the sandwich back up in the greaseproof paper and put it in the fridge. Maybe I would want it later.

Chapter 21

It was the night before our trip home and Mr Organised was taking down his suitcase and folding clothes neatly before putting them into it. I had spent the last few days in an anxious mess because of the impending trip. I was snappy with him because he had put me into this situation.

“I’m really looking forward to meeting your family,” he said.

“Look, Ben, just don’t get too excited, okay?” I found myself saying this a lot lately. He was like a child waiting on Santa and I was trying to rein in his enthusiasm.

At my hospital appointment the day before we were just going out the door when Ben stopped dead in the hallway. Two midwives who were walking down the corridor towards us had to separate and walk around him.

“We forgot the letter,” he had said. “You might not get on the flight without it.”

“It’ll be fine, come on,” I said, grabbing his arm to go.

“No, Kate, I’m not taking any chances.”

“Right,” I sighed and went back in and requested the ‘fit to fly’ letter from the doctor.

I was absolutely dreading the trip. I had palpitations just thinking about it all. I had tried explaining it to Ben but he just didn’t get it. He was going around with his big cheery head on him, thinking that I would go home and play happy families with them all and everything would be forgotten about. Well, he was very wrong.

“What do you think I should pack?” he asked me.

“Rain gear.”

“What?”

“It always rains at home.”

“Don’t you think you’re exaggerating ever so slightly?”

“Well, when you’re getting pissed on don’t blame me.”

“Okay but, besides rain gear, do you reckon I’ll need to pack a shirt and some proper trousers? Will we be going out over there, do you think?”

I nearly choked with laughter except this situation wasn’t funny.

“I’ll take that as a no then, will I?” he said impatiently as he hung the shirt he had taken off the hanger back up in the wardrobe. “Aren’t you going to pack, Kate? We’ve an early start in the morning and we don’t want to miss our flight.”

“Heaven forbid,” I muttered under my breath. “Sure all I have to do is just grab my raincoat on the way out the door.”

“Seriously, Kate, I’m not going to be late tomorrow – so if you’re not packed then, tough – you’ll be wearing my clothes all weekend.”

“All right,” I said sulkily, swinging my legs over the side of the bed.

I opened my drawers and took out a few things. I stuffed them into my hold-all before zipping it shut, all while Ben was busy neatly rolling a pair of boxer shorts together and stuffing them inside a shoe.

“There, happy now?” I said.

On the train to the airport the next morning my heart was beating in my chest and the palms of my hands were sweaty just thinking about what lay ahead. Ben seemed oblivious to how I was feeling and chatted away to me even though I wasn’t talking back. He actually seemed to be excited. Well, he was going to be seriously disappointed. Here we go, I thought. I took a deep breath and climbed the steep stairs and walked across the tarmac until we were inside the terminal.

“Can you see our check-in desk?” I asked impatiently.

My case rattled as the wheels bumped over the gaps in the tiles as I pulled it along the concourse.

Ben checked the ticket and then looked up at the board. “It’s desk number seventeen.”

We walked over and got in the queue.

“I’m really looking forward to meeting them all,” he said for what felt like the zillionth time since he had bought the tickets.

I gritted my teeth. After we had checked in, Ben bought a paper in WHS and I tried reading the magazine that came inside it but I couldn’t concentrate on it. I would start reading the first paragraph and then realise that my mind had wandered and I would have to reread it. Finally our flight was ready for boarding and I stood up and got into the queue.

We boarded and of course ours were the seats at the very back of the plane so we had to wait while every other person put their case up in the overhead bins and then realised they’d forgotten their sucky sweets or something equally useless and had to go back out into the aisle and reach up to take their bag down again. Why they couldn’t just stand in until everyone else had boarded and then go out into the aisle to take down their bags was beyond me.

When we finally took our seats I buried my head in my book but it didn’t stop Ben from chatting away incessantly throughout the whole flight. A rosy-cheeked baby in the seat in front of me was playing peek-a-boo with me. She would throw her toy over the seat and I would pick it up and give it to her and she would do it over and over again, never getting fed up of the repetition until it was time for the parents to put her seatbelt on. I couldn’t believe that in less than three months’ time Baby Pip would be here with us, all going well. I thought about Pip and tried to imagine us with a baby doing the same thing but I couldn’t no matter how much I tried. The turbulence, due to high winds, did nothing for my mood.

“See, I told you this was a bad idea,” I said, turning to Ben as the plane lurched once again.

“It’s only a bit of turbulence, Kate.”

It wasn’t long before I could see Dublin Bay in the distance. I looked down through the small window as we swooped in over it. A patchwork of velvety green fields was knitted together with seams of dark-green evergreen trees. The wispy clouds were perfectly suspended as if hanging from invisible strings between us and the ground below. The stewardess went along picking up any rubbish and checking to make sure seat belts were closed and tray tables were up.

“This is amazing.” Ben peered out the window over my shoulder. “Where is that?”

“Howth Head.” It looked lusciously green from up above. I had forgotten what a magnificent sight it was.

“I can’t believe I never made you bring me back here before now.” There he was again, all excited, like we were on a mini-break ready to explore a new country, not a country that held nothing but bad memories for me. The plane descended. The landing gear dropped down and soon after we came to a juddering halt on the runway.

“Tá fáilte libh go léir go dtí mBaile Átha Cliath . . .” The familiar Aer Lingus greeting welcomed us to Dublin.

In the terminal we headed for passport control. It felt so strange to my ear now, hearing the soft Irish lilt all around me. We had brought our cases as carry-on luggage so we didn’t need to go near the cattle mart that was baggage reclaim.

As we walked out through the doors that would lead us into the arrivals hall my stomach somersaulted. If I had been nervous before, it was nothing compared to how I was feeling now. All I saw were a sea of faces as I tried to find Dad’s. I had looked from left to right and back again when finally I saw him step forward.

“Kate, Kate, over here!”

“Dad!” I said, forcing myself to sound happy.

He looked smaller now than I had remembered and his hair, instead of being salt-and-pepper-coloured, was now entirely grey. He was wearing glasses now too – he didn’t have them the last time. He was still dressed the same as always – a beige anorak covered a pullover with a shirt underneath and brown slacks.

“Kate – how are you, my love?” He wrapped me into a big hug before pulling back and holding me in his arms, taking me in.

I could smell the farm off him. Even when I had lived there it was hard to ever really get the smell off your skin. I felt self-conscious and wriggled a little so he dropped his arms. I felt bad then.

“Dad – this is Ben. Ben – this is my dad.”

“Pleased to meet you.” Ben pumped Dad’s hand enthusiastically.

“Kate, are you . . . expecting?” Dad asked.

“Yep.”

“Well, I’m shocked! Congratulations! So this was the news you wanted to tell me! Isn’t that fantastic? When are you due?”

“September.”

“Lovely time of year for a baby to be born – it won’t be too hot or too cold.”

“We’re very excited,” Ben said, taking hold of my hand, but I pulled it away from him.

“Right then, let’s go,” I said.

“Oh yes, this way – follow me,” Dad said.

Outside, we walked along, ducking our heads in the rain.

“I’m sorry for the weather – it’s desperate,” Dad said. “We had a few days of sun in May and it’s been raining since.

“Well, shame on you for not having the sun out for us.”

But he didn’t get my sarcasm and I just sounded mean and bitchy.

I let Ben sit in the front of Dad’s Nissan Micra because of his height. I took the back seat and we set off for Mayo.

“So Kate tells me you’re a teacher, Ben?”

“I am indeed.”

“Great job, teaching! Sure with the paid holidays and a pension you couldn’t go wrong.”

Our parents were poles apart. I think Dad was more impressed by the fact that Ben was a teacher than if he had been the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. In my dad’s eyes, nothing compared to the security of having a state-protected job. I suppose he had seen Ireland in far worse times than I had, but they were back again by all accounts – you only had to lift a newspaper or watch the news to hear tales of Ireland’s woes.

“Are your parents teachers too, Ben?”

“No, my parents are both barristers actually. Well, Mum was – until myself and my sister arrived on the scene.”

“Barristers no less – well, isn’t that something? It’s always good to have a few legal eagles in the family, eh, Kate?”

“It sure is.”

I couldn’t believe there was a motorway practically the whole way home. The last time I was home there was a bit of motorway then the road would go into a single carriageway before coming back to a dual carriageway again. It would chop and change depending on which County Council had had the funds to upgrade their road network. But now it all had been completely transformed. The motorways were all joined together and, instead of getting caught in Friday-afternoon traffic in villages along the way, we cut the journey time in half almost.

As we drove into Ballyrobin village I couldn’t believe how much the place had changed since I was last home. Huge warehouses greeted us on the approach road as well as a red-blue-and-white-box Tesco. There were sprawling new housing estates everywhere.

“Wasn’t that where the paint factory used to be?” I asked, pointing out the window to what was now a half-finished housing estate. The walls were up but there were no roofs and the gate was padlocked. There were huge puddles all along the roadway. It was a depressing sight.

“It was but McCarthy sold out to a developer at the height of all the madness and six months later the whole thing crashed. It’s a ghost estate now – the place is littered with them! This country is gone to the dogs, I tell you – we’ll all have to get off the sinking ship. The last man out may turn out the lights!”

I had seen this kind of thing on the news whenever there was a piece about Ireland but seeing it in reality in the village where I grew up really brought it home to me.

I wasn’t sure if Ballyrobin could be even called a village any more. It was no longer the same sleepy place that I had known as a child. Finally we turned onto the familiar road where I grew up. All the bungalows on this road were the same, our own house included – the front door was on the left-hand side and there were three windows to the right of it. I think their design came from a book of plans that did the rounds in the seventies. When Seán was born Dad had built on a flat-roof extension at the back of the house. That was the only thing that distinguished our house from our neighbours.

As we turned into my childhood home, I almost felt sick. Unlike the rest of the place, here it was like time had stood still. Nothing had changed. We drove past the small lawn to the front where there used to be flowerbeds full of pansies and dahlias in the summertime but I didn’t think they flowered any more.

“There you are now,” Dad said as he turned off the engine, the wipers coming to an abrupt stop.

We followed him in the back door and into the kitchen.

“Sit down there at the table and I’ll put the kettle on. I’m sure you’re parched after the journey.”

He made a pot of tea and put it on the table with three mugs. Coffee wasn’t an option so I had warned Ben not to bother asking. Dad laid down a plate of buttered brown bread in front of us.

“It’s lovely to finally see where Kate comes from,” Ben said as if I wasn’t in the room.

“Well, it’s great to have you here – we don’t get to see her often enough – but I know you’re busy over there, love. Patrick and his gang will be over soon and Seán will be down to see you this evening. You haven’t met little Daniel and Mia.”

He was referring to my niece and nephew, Patrick’s children. I felt an acute wave of guilt wash over me.

“Yeah, I’m really looking forward to that. What age are they again?”

I could see Ben looking at me in disbelief.

“Well, Daniel was six last month and Mia is three.”

“Wow, time flies.” I could feel myself reddening under Ben’s glare.

All the same ornaments and figurines were on display in the glass cabinet. There was a china doll, with pale skin, rosy cheeks and a lacy petticoat, that I had been mad about as a girl. I used to beg to be allowed to play with it.

After we had finished our tea I got up from the table. “We should bring our bags down to the room.” As we walked down the hall to the bedroom, I noticed the navy carpet with its green flecks had been replaced by laminate wood flooring. I glanced briefly at the old family photos that still hung on the wall. I remembered when one large family photo had been taken. We had all been marched to a photography studio in Ballyrobin, dressed up in our Sunday best. Our clothes and hairstyles looked so old-fashioned now. With my blonde pudding-bowl-style haircut I could easily have passed for a boy except for the corduroy dress with the embroidered trim that I was wearing. Ben had a right laugh when he saw it.

“So you’re a natural blonde then!”

It was the first time he had ever seen a childhood photo of me.

“I told you I was.”

“But I can’t understand why you need to fork out a hundred quid every few weeks getting highlights then?”

“And that’s because you’re a man.”

“What do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

I held my breath as I pushed back the bedroom door. The same cream floral wallpaper was still on the walls. It was all a bit dusty and the air was musty even though Dad had opened the window to air the room before we came. All my old books with yellowed pages – from Enid Blyton to Judy Blume and right up to Stephen King – were still on the shelves. My rosettes from my horse-riding days still hung on the wall. But the bed was a double one instead of my old single.

A poster of Jared Leto hung down by one corner.

“What is it about that guy? My sister Laura was mad about him as well.” Ben picked up the corner and tried resticking it with the Blu-Tack that was the still on the wall but it just kept on folding back down on itself so he eventually gave up.

“I was obsessed with him as a teenager – I was convinced we would have been so suited if only I could have met him in real life.”

“People say I look like him, y’know?”

“Yeah, Ben, about as much as I resemble Angelina Jolie.”

“Harsh.” He shook his head.

The rain hopped off the flat-roof extension where my bedroom was in staccato beats.

“I never knew you could play the violin?” He was pointing to my Grade Two exam certificate that hung on the wall.

“I can’t. Well, not now anyway. I hated practising so I didn’t keep it going.”

He continued poking and examining stuff as he went around the room.

“Here, what’s this?” he said as he grabbed something off the bookshelves.

I recognised it straight away.

“Here, give it to me, Ben!”

“No way.” He held it over my head and started flicking through the pages as I tried to reach up and take it back off him. This was where his height came in handy for him.

“Ben, give it to me now!”

And he knew by my tone that I meant it. He handed the diary to me.

I looked at the orange cover, practically covered with inky blue doodles. I sat on the bed and opened it up. I read the date on top of the page: 2nd September 1994. I did a quick mental calculation. I would have been fifteen. As I read through the entry it all came rushing back to me. Suddenly I felt like I was back there again in that exact moment, sitting under that mountain of hurt. I could remember exactly how I had felt when I had written it. I may have escaped it all in London but all it took was something small like this and I was right back there again. Tears brimmed in my eyes.

“I’m sorry, Kate – I thought it was just a silly teenage diary. If I had known I never would have picked it up like that.”

“God, this is ridiculous – I can’t believe the effect all this still has on me.” I wiped my eyes with the backs of my hands.

He came up beside me and draped his arm across my shoulders. “Sorry, Kate, I didn’t realise. C’mon, please don’t cry, this isn’t good for you or the baby.”

“Well then, you should never have made me come back here.”

Chapter 22

Later that evening Patrick and his wife Luisa called over. Luisa was Brazilian and had moved to Ireland to work in a local factory over ten years ago. She had met Patrick in a bar and the two of them had teamed up and got married. I hadn’t seen them since their wedding day and that had been my first time to meet Luisa.

Patrick looked older now. Even though I was a little over a year older than him, he looked years older than me. He had flecks of grey in his hair near the temples. His skin was more lined too, from working the farm in all weather I supposed.

I went to give him a kiss on the cheek but he went for the other side and we awkwardly bumped heads.

“And Luisa – good to see you again!” I gave her a hug.

Her black curly hair was longer now and her figure was a bit curvier but I supposed kids do that to you. I would know soon enough.

I introduced them to Ben and everyone shook hands politely.

“And this must be Daniel and Mia!” I bent down to the children. They were beautiful exotic creatures – I’m sure their Brazilian darkness meant that they stood out from the usual pale-faced children around these parts.

“Say hi to your Auntie Kate.”

But the children remained rooted to the spot. Daniel stared at me open-mouthed and Mia started to hide behind her mother’s skirt, pulling it over her head as an embarrassed Luisa tried to yank it back down again.

“Hi, guys, I brought you presents.”

I gave Daniel a Ben 10 watch, which seemed to do the trick – it was hard to know – but Mia didn’t mask her true feelings when I gave her a Dora the Explorer torch.

“I no like Dora,” she said, her huge brown eyes looking up at me.

“Don’t be silly, Mia!” said Patrick. “Say thank you to your Auntie Kate.”

I could see he was embarrassed.

“No!” she said defiantly.

“She’s grand – don’t worry about it,” I said. “I probably should have asked you what she is into first before I bought anything.”

There was a pause.

“Why don’t you all sit down,” Dad said.

“So I see you two are having a baby then?” Patrick said.

“We sure are.” I placed my hands on my rapidly growing bump.

“When are you due?” Luisa asked me in an accent that now had a tinge of Mayo in it.

“September.”

“Nice time of the year to have a baby.”

“Yeah, not too hot or too cold,” I said, repeating what Dad had said earlier on because it was all that I could think of to say. “How’s the farm going, Patrick?”

“Grand – we’ll be starting the harvesting next week if we get a dry spell at all.” He paused. “How long are ye home for?”

“We’re heading back Sunday morning – Ben has school on Monday.”

“You’re a teacher, aren’t you, Ben?”

“Yes – I teach Year Two.”

“I wouldn’t know what that is.”

“Oh sorry, of course – six-year-olds, like himself there.” Ben gestured at Daniel.

“You talk funny!” Daniel piped up.

Ben started to laugh.

“Daniel!” Patrick chastised him. “You have a bit of the accent yourself, Kate.”

“Do I?”

“Well, I suppose fifteen years will do that to you,” Patrick said.

“Wow! Am I gone that long?” Even though I knew that I was.

He said nothing. He didn’t need to. The words hung there in the air between us.

“Who’s for tea?” Dad said, breaking the silence.

He placed the teapot down on the table with the mugs that he had looped through the fingers of his other hand.

He poured the tea and we all added our own milk and sugar.

Soon after, Seán stopped by on his way home from work.

“Hiya, Kate!” He stuck his smiling head around the back door.

“Seán!” I stood up and walked over to hug him. I was four years older than him but he was still my baby brother.

Was I imagining it or did I catch Patrick rolling his eyes?

“And this must be Ben?” He walked over and shook hands with him. “And what’s the story with this?” He pointed to my bump.

“It’s a baby – duh!”

He laughed. “Well, fair play to you! Congratulations.”

“I hear you’re working in Acton’s?”

“Yeah, for my sins, but it’s grand.”

“Are they still as stingy as ever?”

“Worse. They’re tighter than a camel’s arse in a sandstorm, the miserable gits. Ah, sure it’s handy for the time being – but I’ll give myself a couple of more years and then see where I end up. Who knows, I might even head to London!”

“Well, you’re very welcome any time, you know that.”

“So what are yeer plans for the weekend?”

“I’m not sure really, to be honest.”

“Well, I’m meeting a few of the lads in Doyle’s later – will you and Ben join us?”

Doyle’s was the main pub in the square in Ballyrobin. There were three pubs in the village – one was a tiny old-man pub and the other had a reputation as a rough spot, so Doyle’s was the place where everyone went.

I was just about to make an excuse when Ben interrupted me, “That’d be great thanks, Seán.”

I could feel butterflies in my tummy instantly – God only knew what old faces I would bump into there.

“How about you, Patrick – fancy a few drinks?” said Seán.

“I won’t, Seán – I’ve an early start in the morning.”

“Dad?”

“I might go for one so – it’s not every day that Kate comes home to visit us.”

After dinner, we got changed and walked down to the pub. I took a deep breath as Seán pushed open the door and we followed in behind him. We got a seat in the corner. Seán asked us what we wanted to drink and went up to the bar to order the round. I watched as he chatted easily with a man sitting up on a stool at the bar. He was such a friendly type of guy – everyone loved him. He had been like that as a child too.

“Pity Patrick couldn’t join us,” Dad said.

“Yeah,” I said but really I was glad because I couldn’t handle any more of his disapproving looks, laced with guilt trips. I picked up a beer-mat and started fiddling with it idly.

The pub started to fill up a while later. I recognised a few faces of people from around the village.

As the others drank their drinks I stuck with the sparkling water. Seán entertained us with stories about Mr Acton and we were actually having a bit of a laugh. I could tell that Ben was enjoying himself anyway.

Whatever way Baby Pip was lying, she seemed to be sitting on my bladder constantly these days. Seán laughed at me as I moved past him on the seat to go to the toilet again.

I had just come out of the cubicle and was washing my hands when the girl at the basin beside me looked across at me.

“Kate – Kate Flynn, is that you?”

I turned to look at her – she was vaguely familiar.

“Yeah, hi.” I desperately tried to remember her name.

“Jane – Jane Dwyer. We were in school together.”

“Oh yeah, it’s great to see you again, Jane.” I tried to pretend that I remembered her but I knew she wasn’t fooled.

“I haven’t seen you round these parts in a while?”

“No, I’m living in London now – I’m just home for the weekend.”

“Very nice! What are you up to over there?”

“I’m working in a photography gallery. And you?”

“I’m in the bank – it’s grand – close to home so it only takes me five minutes to get to work.”

“That’s handy.”

Her clothes aged her – even though she was only my age she could easily have passed for a forty-year-old. I suppose Ballyrobin was hardly Fashion Central.

“And you’ve a baby on the way.” She nodded at my bump as she turned to use the hand-towel. She jerked the roll down and dried her hands on it.

“Yeah.”

“Your first?”

“Yeah. How about you, do you have any yourself?”

“I’ve three actually. Gary is four, Luke is three and Danielle one.”

“Well, you’ve been busy.”

“Tell me about it. So when are you due?”

“September.”

“Nice time of year to have a baby –”

“Not too hot or too cold,” I said impatiently.

“Yeah . . .”

I could see her looking at me, as if trying to figure me out. There was an awkward silence between us.

“Well, nice seeing you again, Kate and I hope all goes well in September.” She turned quickly and walked out of the bathroom.

Chapter 23

“What’s the story with the shower?” Ben shouted out from the bathroom the next morning.

“Oh, I should have remembered! I’ll have to turn on the immersion for you. But it’ll take some time.”

Dad still hadn’t progressed to an electric shower. I went and flicked the immersion switch.

Ben came back into the room. “Your family are great, Kate. I’m so glad to have finally met them.”

I said nothing and continued typing the text message that I was sending to Nat to see how she was doing.

The water still wasn’t very hot when Ben finally went to shower and he used up most of it – when it was my turn it changed from lukewarm to cold intermittently so I had to keep jumping back out and then I would stand under it again when it warmed up a bit. When I was finished I climbed back out over the bathtub – the shower head was rigged up over the bath – and wrapped myself in a towel which was rough from years of being washed with no fabric softener.

As I went back down the hall to the bedroom, I could smell the fry that Dad was cooking for breakfast. Ben was lying back on the bed with a towel wrapped around his waist, reading the newspaper he had brought over on the plane with him the day before.

“C’mon, Ben – get dressed. I’m going to show you a real breakfast.” There was nothing like the sausages and black pudding from home. They were probably the only things that I actually did miss.

We got dressed and went along to the kitchen.

“Morning,” I said to Dad.

“Good morning. Did ye sleep well? That bed is a bit springy.”

“Well, I slept great,” Ben said.

“Me too – apart from Ben snoring.”

“Was I? Sorry, love.”

“You’re always the same after a few pints.”

I devoured the breakfast that Dad put on the plate in front of me: rashers, sausages, egg, black and white pudding, and fried potatoes. When Dad saw me getting stuck into it he put a few more sausages into the pan for me.

I buttered a slice of soda bread generously, put a slice of pudding on top and ate it. “Mmmh.”

“I got them in Reilly’s specially for you.”

Reilly’s was the butcher in the village.

“These are great – I can see now why you always moan about the sausages in the UK!” Ben said, laughing.

When he was finished cooking, Dad sat down beside us at the table.

“What are you two at today then?” he asked.

“I don’t know – we might take in the sights around Ballyrobin,” I said, laughing.

“Well, I thought you might like to go and visit Granny and Aoife today?” Dad said seriously.

I groaned inwardly. I didn’t dare to do it out loud. I had thought that I could avoid this one.

“Great idea,” Ben said enthusiastically.

“Well, I –”

“What?” Ben cut across me.

“Well, I thought maybe we might head off for the day. Y’know – I could show you around the West?”

“You can’t come home after eight years and not visit your grandmother, Kate!”

“Right, okay.” I knew I was fighting a losing battle. “We’ll go . . .”

After lunch, Dad drove us to Granny’s house down the road. I was more nervous about this visit than anything else. Dad pushed back the tiny wrought-iron gate and we followed him around towards the back of the cottage. He stopped to pull up a few weeds that had grown up through the cracks on the path. He pushed open the door and I followed him into the kitchen.

Granny was dozing in her chair by the range. She had sat in that chair ever since I could remember. The smell of turf filled the air. I noticed the worn lino had small burn marks from where the sparks had jumped out on to the floor.

“Look who’s come to see you, Josephine,” Dad said softly.

“Hi, Gran.”

“I didn’t hear ye come in!” she said as she woke with a start.

“Sorry! We didn’t mean to scare you,” I said. I knew by her that she was embarrassed to be caught sleeping.

“How are ye?” she said, using her stick to lever herself up out of the chair. She didn’t have a stick the last time I’d seen her.

I rushed over and held onto her elbow to help her up.

“It’s great to see you, Granny.” I gave her a big hug.

She held my face between both her palms and kissed me on the forehead. Once again the guilt caught up with me. The woman was nearly ninety. The soft mushy skin on her face smelt warm and comforting.

“And are you with child?”

“I am, Granny.”

“Oh, that’s great news. Great news altogether.” If she was put out by Ben and me not being married she didn’t show it. She fished around in the pocket of her dress, took out a relic of Padre Pio and started to bless my bump with it. “That’ll keep you safe.”

I turned to Ben. “Granny, this is Ben.”

“You’re welcome to Ballyrobin, Ben,” she said, shaking his hand vigorously.

“Is Aoife not home from college yet?” Dad asked.

“She’s on her way – she rang me before she left – she had an exam today, y’know, Kate. God love her, that course of hers is very hard.”

“She’s well able for it, Josephine,” Dad said.

“Oh, don’t I know it, but my fingers are nearly down to the bone from saying the rosary for her. She wasn’t nervous at all going off this morning – I was worse.” She started to laugh.

The back door opened then and a tall girl dressed casually in a hoody, blue skinny jeans and fake Ugg boots came in. Her white-blonde hair was parted in the centre and it went down dead straight past her shoulders. You could see that it was her natural hair colour. It made her look very innocent and childlike still. She was beautiful in a Timotei-ad sort of way. She had enviably clear skin, no freckles or blemishes. It was like staring back at my reflection. Only then did I realise it was Aoife. The last time I saw her she had been eleven.

“Ah, Aoife, you’re back!” Dad said.

The surprise at seeing me there was written all over her face.

“Kate,” she said but I knew she wasn’t happy to see me.

“Hi,” I said nervously.

“This is Ben,” Gran said then because I seemed to have lost the power of speech.

Ben stepped forward and shook her hand.

“Nice to meet you, Ben.” Her voice was so soft that it was barely audible.

“How did you get on, love?” Gran asked.

“It went well, I think, Gran. I got stuck on a small part but other than that everything that I had studied came up.”

“Well, thank God for that – you see, all those rosaries worked after all!” she said triumphantly.

Aoife smiled indulgently at her.

“I’m sure you did great – she has brains to burn, doesn’t she, Josephine?” Dad said.

“Ah, she does, Noel.”

Redness crept upwards on Aoife’s cheeks.

“Did you have your lunch yet, Gran?” Aoife asked.

“I did, thanks, love. Do you want me to make something for you?”

“No, I’m grand – a few of us got a sandwich in the canteen afterwards.”

“Ah good.”

“I’ll make a pot of tea then.”

“Good girl, Aoife,” Gran said.

When Aoife had made the tea, we all sat down around the table. The Sacred Heart lamp glowed red on the wall above us.

“So, Aoife, what are you up to at the moment?” Ben said.

I shot him a look.

“Well, I’m in university in Galway – I’m studying architecture. I live up there during the week and then I come back home here at the weekends.”

“She takes great care of me,” Gran said. She put her hand over Aoife’s on the table and patted it. “I’d be lost without her.”

Aoife blushed and looked down at the cup of tea in her hands.

“Well, you couldn’t have picked a worse thing to study!” I said. “You’ll probably have to join the dole queue when you graduate.”

I could see Dad and Ben glaring at me but I didn’t care. “I’m just saying that every architect I know is unemployed at the moment.”

But instead of standing up for herself, Aoife just said nothing.

“Well, Aoife will land on her feet, I just know she will. Won’t you, love?” Gran said.

Aoife smiled back at her.

I felt a small twinge of jealousy.

“So when is your baby due, Kate?” Aoife asked timidly.

“September.”

“That’ll fly in.”

“Hardly! It’s already starting to drag.”

I noticed that her eyebrows, even though they were fair, could do with a plucking. She could also have done with tinting them. They were more like two sheens across her forehead.

“So how come we didn’t see you in Doyle’s last night?” Ben asked Aoife, obviously trying to change the conversation.

“I’m not a big drinker actually,” she said quietly.

We drank the rest of our tea without saying much. Granny asked me about my job and we talked about the weather until Dad said that we had better make tracks.

The whole way home in the car I had to listen to Ben singing Aoife’s praises.

“She’s lovely, isn’t she?” Ben, in the front seat, said to Dad.

What was he doing? What had got into him?

“Ah, she is – she’s a gentle soul all right,” Dad said.

I was pretty sure that that was a dig meant for me.

“There are not many young people who would have the patience to take care of an old person like she does,” said Ben.

“She’s hardly Mother fuckin’ Teresa!” I snapped from the backseat.

“That’s enough, Kate!” Ben said sharply.

“Well, she’s not!”

He turned around and glared at me.

No one said anything for the rest of the journey.

When we got home I could tell by the way that Ben was huffing and puffing that he was pissed off with me. He didn’t wait for me to get out of the car and he walked straight into the house ahead of me. Ben rarely got annoyed with me but today it just got my back up even more. This was nothing to do with him!

He stormed down to the bedroom and I marched down after him. Who did he think he was? How dare he just come home for one weekend and think that he knew it all!

I walked into the room behind him and slammed the door shut.

He swung around to face me. His eyes were on fire with anger.

“What has got into you, Kate?”

“How dare you – it’s none of your business!”

“Yes, it is actually – when I’m there watching my girlfriend being so rude to the point that I’m embarrassed by her behaviour then, well, yes, I think it is my business!”

“You don’t have a clue. You can’t just breeze in here for one weekend and think that you know it all and everyone will be all happy families again!”

“No, but you could at least try. That was the whole point of the trip – to try to build some bridges with your family – but I think you have just burnt whatever chance was left of that!”

“Oh, shut up, Ben, you don’t know anything! I never wanted to come home in the first place – in case you don’t remember, this was all your idea!”

“I’ve never seen such a vicious side to you before and I’m not sure I like it very much. I was cringing the whole time, Kate – poor Aoife wouldn’t hurt a fly and you just went through her for a shortcut!”

“That’s it! We’re going home. I’m not going to listen to this shit from the man who is supposed to be my partner and supposedto be supporting me!” I was screaming now and I knew that Dad could probably hear me up in the kitchen.

I took my phone out of my bag and googled the number for the airline. It took ages for the browser to load – the network in Ballyrobin wasn’t the fastest. Finally the webpage loaded and I dialled the number. A woman answered in a polite sing-songy voice. I asked if they had any seats going to London – anything at all? I would even fly to Luton? She apologised that she had only one seat left. All the flights were booked up because of some bloody rugby match. I briefly thought of taking it and leaving Ben to follow me home the next day but I knew that wouldn’t go down well at all so I declined.

“You’re your own worst enemy, you know that?” Ben said when I got off the phone.

“Well, I’m sorry, Ben. I don’t know what you thought was going to happen this weekend but if you think that a two-day trip home is going to fix twenty years of hurt, well, then you’re even stupider than I thought.” And with that I walked out of the room.

I could hear Ben shouting after me. “That’s it, Kate – you just keep on running – run away like you always do!”

I kept on walking past Dad who was sitting at the kitchen table and went straight out the back door.

Chapter 24

I walked along by hedgerows growing rampant with hemlock after the wet clammy weather. Anger put a pace in my steps as I powered along. Drivers greeted me with the one-fingered country salute as their cars passed me.

The weather was drizzly but I hadn’t brought a jacket with me in my hurry out of the house so I was getting wet. I wasn’t exactly sure where I was going to go but all I knew was that I wanted to be as far away from Ben and my family as possible. I wish we had never come home – the whole trip had been a disaster from start to finish. I knew we never should have come back but Ben had insisted and I had caved in.

I felt Baby Pip stretching out inside me. She could probably sense the stress and it wasn’t good for her but she could blame her daddy for that one, I thought bitterly. I passed the ghost estate we had seen on the way in – it was in an even sorrier state now when I had a chance to look at it properly. Half-finished houses were thrown up all over the site like a Lego set a child had got bored with. All the windows and doors were boarded up. Litter gathered up on the wind and blew around in swirls. The whole place looked eerie. It reminded me of some futuristic film where the inhabitants had been wiped out by a natural disaster.

I had reached the village of Ballyrobin before I knew it. The town square was buzzing with Saturday trade and there was a queue out the door of Reilly’s butchers. I thought about going to Doyle’s for a drink and then I remembered that I was pregnant so I couldn’t even indulge in that. A glass of red wine would have been heavenly right then.

The old stone church stood looming at the top of the town. God, I hated that place – it gave me the shivers just looking at it. I crossed over the bridge that divided the town in two and watched the wind skimming across the top of the water, making it look syrupy.

I decided to go into a coffee shop. I pushed open the door and it was a relief to be in out of the wind and rain. My hair was damp from the drizzle and clung to my face in strands. The place was tiny but it was cosy. There was any amount of tantalising cakes and buns on display behind the counter. I ordered a coffee and a slice of carrot cake.

“Would you like cream with that?”

“Yeah, go on.”

I waited while the lady heated the cake and plopped a large dollop of cream on the side. I paid and took a seat by the window and watched the world go by. The hurtful words from the fight with Ben were sloshing and swirling around inside my head. I watched as a man came in soon after. He looked very familiar. Was it Aidan? I watched the man as he ordered a coffee and a muffin. Nah, it couldn’t be, could it? He balanced a mug of tea in one hand and a plate in the other, with a newspaper tucked under his left arm. Then he turned around and made his way to a nearby table. It was definitely him – there was no mistaking those grey eyes. My heart started pounding against my ribcage. He was dressed in jeans and a green polo-neck T-shirt with a jacket over it.

Just then he spotted me too.

“Kate, is that you? What are you doing back here?” He walked over and put his mug and plate down on my table. He leant over and gave me a huge hug. He still smelt the same and suddenly it was like I was transported back to being a teenager again.

“Here, sit down,” I said.

“It’s so good to see you, what has you back in these parts?”

“I’m just home for the weekend – visiting the family.”

“Well, you haven’t changed a bit!”

“Please don’t say that – I hope I’ve left the lank hair and spotty skin behind me, thank you very much,” I laughed.

He sat down at the table.

“So how’ve you been doing?” I asked.

“I’m good – now.” He laughed but there was a serious edge to his voice.

“I’m sorry.”

“You just went!”

“You knew I was going to go.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it.”

“I couldn’t stay in Ballyrobin any longer – you know that.”

“Well, you could have at least kept in touch . . .”

“I figured it would be easier for both of us if I didn’t,” I said quietly.

He let out a heavy sigh. “So what have you been doing since then?”

“Well, I’m working in a photography gallery – it was the first job I got when I first moved over and I’m still there now.”

“Wow, fair play to you!”

“And my partner Ben and I are expecting a baby in September.”

He glanced at my stomach, which was hidden by the table, as if to confirm. “I see. Well . . . congratulations.”

“Thanks. How about you?”

“Well, I married Catherine Byrne last year – do you remember her? She was the year below us in school?”

“Tall girl, curly brown hair?”

“Yep, that’s her. No babies yet but we’re working on it. I’m a solicitor in a practice in Galway – I commute up and down every day.”

“You’re a solicitor?” I almost laughed. Aidan had been wild as a teenager. The pair of us had. I couldn’t imagine him in such a straight job.

He started to laugh then too. “Don’t sound so surprised! It took me a while but I finally managed to get my life together after you left.”

There it was again – the guilt – I knew I should never have come back here. No matter which way I turned someone else had some more in store for me.

“It’s funny how things work out,” was all I could think of to say.

“I called over to your house, you know – that day – and your dad had just found your letter saying you were leaving. The poor man was as stunned as I was. Why didn’t you tell him you were going?”

“But if I had told you or Dad, you would have tried to talk me out of it.”

“I thought what we had was special – I thought I would have been enough to make you stay.”

I could see the hurt in his eyes.

“Look, you were better off without me – I just brought trouble. Look at what you’ve done with your life since I left!”

“Come on, Kate – I was devastated. I waited around for months for you to make contact, thinking that you would change your mind and come back home, but I should have known.” He paused and looked at me seriously. “You can be very stubborn when you want to be.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Kate, seriously, you are the most stubborn person that I’ve ever met.”

“Well, then you mustn’t have met many people!” I knew it was childish.

“Here, remember the time we sprayed graffiti on the church wall and then had to listen to Father Ball in Mass the following week pronouncing how God knew who had done it and that they would be sure to rot in hell?”

I burst out laughing. “Stop! I was sure Granny knew that it was me.”

“Well, maybe the ‘K loves A’ gave it away?” he laughed. “Or what about the time we smoked that spliff right before Irish Paper II and then I got sick all over the exam hall. I failed Irish because of it! I had to repeat the Leaving the following year.”

“Well, I don’t even know what I got in mine because I never even bothered to ask Dad when my results came – but I’m sure that I wasn’t far behind you.”

“Y’know, we were good together you and I,” he said wistfully.

“We were young.”

“Maybe – but we still knew what love was. Do you ever think about . . . y’know . . . what might have been?”

“Hmmh . . .” I said. “Look, there’s no point dwelling on the past because it won’t change where we are today. I’m sorry for running off like that – I really am. I didn’t want to hurt you but at the time I thought it was the right thing to do.”

“I just wasn’t enough for you.”

“Please don’t say that, Aidan.”

“Well, it’s the truth.”

Silence filled the air, heavy between us. Suddenly I became aware of a woman at a nearby table who had her eyes fixed upon us. I felt very self-conscious under her gaze.

“It’s so good to see you again, Kate.” Aidan reached across the table for my hand.

“You too.” I smiled.

We looked into each other’s eyes for a moment, the grey eyes that I used to know so well. But I had moved on – we both had. We weren’t seventeen any more. I pulled my hand back again quickly.

“I think I should go . . .”

I pushed my chair back so that it screeched loudly off the tiles and hurried out of the place.

Chapter 25

I found myself back out in the rain again and, if I had been feeling upset before going into the café, bumping into Aidan had made it twice as bad. I walked back up the street past Fidelma’s Drapery. She still lined the window with orange film to stop the sunlight fading the clothes on display. I doubted she did much business these days but as a child we bought all our clothes there. Every child in Ballyrobin was dressed in clothes from Fidelma’s and then at Christmas time as a treat we would get a new outfit from Dunnes Stores.

I wished I had never come back to this place – everywhere I looked and everywhere I turned there was another bad memory waiting for me. Why had I let Ben talk me around?

It was starting to get dark so I decided it was probably best to go home – I knew Dad and Ben were probably worried about me.

I pushed back the kitchen door and went inside. Ben and Dad were sitting at the table with their backs to me.

“Oh, thank God!” Dad said, swinging around to face me when he heard my footsteps.

Ben stayed as he was. I could sense the tension without even having to look at him.

“Kate, you had us worried sick – the weather is desperate out there and you pregnant and all. Are you okay, love?”

“I’m grand, Dad.”

“Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

“Oh sorry, I think I left it behind in the room.”

“Well, why don’t you go and have a warm bath and get out of those damp clothes – you’ll catch your death in them. The immersion is on.”

I went down to the bathroom as instructed, not because I wanted to but because I didn’t want to see Ben. I hated it when he was angry with me. Turning on the taps, the water thundered into the bathtub. I found a bottle of own-brand bubble bath on the shelf and I poured some in. As I lay back into the warm water I instantly felt myself start to relax. I put my ears under the surface and let them fill with water, enjoying the peace of being submerged and being able to shut out the world. The top of my bump peeked out of the water like a small island and I watched as Baby Pip kicked away. I could see her movements from the outside now. It was comforting to watch her. I washed my hair and then stayed there until the water was gone so cold that I was starting to shiver. I climbed out and towelled my shrivelled-up skin and went back down to the bedroom and put on my pyjamas. I sat on the side of the bed and dried off my hair with the hairdryer.

Ben came in soon after. I waited for him to say something but it didn’t come. It drove me up the wall when he ignored me. He started to pack his clothes back into the case. As usual, Ben liked to be organised and pack the night before whereas I would be stuffing things in my case in the car on the way to the airport.

“Well, I’m fine – thanks for asking.”

“I didn’t.”

“Look, Ben, I know why you are annoyed with me but I told you that coming back here wasn’t a good idea.”

“Listen to yourself, Kate – it’s all about you as usual. I’ve spent the last two hours chatting to your dad who was worried out of his mind about you and God knows you don’t deserve his worry.”

Just then there was a knock on the door.

Ben answered it. Dad stuck his head around the pine doorframe.

“I thought you would like some dinner, love – Ben and I have already eaten but I kept a plate for you?”

“Thanks, Dad. I’ll be along in a minute.”

He closed the door softly again.

“That man is a saint to put up with you!” said Ben.

“How dare you!” I said as I walked out of the room. “You don’t know anything!”

Dad made no reference to the afternoon’s events as I ate the dinner of mashed potatoes, pork chops and carrots.

“So what time is the flight tomorrow?” he asked, setting down a mug of tea beside me.

“Around eleven.”

“Well, we’d want to be on the road for seven so, just in case. You never know what the traffic up in Dublin will be like.”

“Thanks, Dad.” I couldn’t wait until I was sitting on that flight and getting the hell out of this place again.

“Well, it’s been good to have you home, Kate.”

I looked up at him, wondering if he was taking the mickey out of me but his face was serious.

“I just bring trouble, Dad.”

“Will you stop saying that? This is your home, we are your family and we would love to see more of you – and Ben. He’s a grand fella, Kate.”

“Hmmh.” I wasn’t so sure, given that we were not on speaking terms.

“He is, Kate – we had a good chat while you were gone earlier. He’s mad about you, you know.”

“Well, he certainly isn’t acting like it,” I muttered.

“He’ll calm down – he just wants the best for you.”

I said nothing.

“Seán called over earlier to see you again before you left.”

“Oh really? That’s a pity. I would have liked to have seen him before we head off.”

“Well, you’ll just have come home again soon – bring the baby back home to Ballyrobin to see us all.”

“Maybe.”

I wasn’t promising anything.

We all sat and watched Saturday night TV but by nine I was exhausted after the day and I said that I was going to bed. Ben stayed up a bit longer with Dad and I felt him getting into the bed beside me a while later. I waited for him to put his arms around me like he always did whenever he got into bed after me but he just rolled over so we were facing away from each other.

I stayed awake for a while thinking over everything – what a disaster the whole trip had been from the moment we had arrived – and now Ben and I weren’t even talking. The sooner we both got home and away from here the better. It couldn’t come quick enough.

Chapter 26

The next morning the sun had finally decided to come out – it was like an omen. We drove most of the journey to the airport in silence. I think we were all exhausted from the strain of the weekend. It was a relief to be a step closer to being home. Ben still wasn’t talking to me – he had said a polite few words over breakfast but I knew it was for Dad’s sake rather than my own. Once we got home though I knew we could sort it out. That was the problem with this place. It brought nothing but trouble for everyone.

At the airport, we pulled into the set-down bay and Dad pulled the boot lever and got out of the car to help us take out our luggage.

“Well, it’s been lovely to meet you,” Dad said, shaking Ben’s hand firmly. “And we’d love you to come over again soon.”

“I’d like that. I’ve really enjoyed meeting all of you. And be sure to tell Granny and Aoife and the rest of them that we said goodbye.”

I cringed as he pretended they were all best friends now – he had just met them once!

“I will, of course.”

“Don’t leave it so long the next time!”

“Well, safe journey home, Dad.” I hugged him close.

“Before you go, I want to give you this –” He took an envelope from the inside pocket of his jacket and handed it to me.

“What’s this?” I said, going to open it.

“Don’t open it now.” He put his hand over mine on top of the envelope. “Better to wait until you get home.”

“But –”

“Look, I’ve debated for years whether to give this to you or not, but maybe now is the right time. I hope it might . . . well . . . help you to make sense of it all.”

I clutched the faded envelope in my hands and watched Dad get back into the car. We waved goodbye to each other and suddenly I could feel tears in my eyes. I wiped them quickly away before anyone could see them. Wordlessly Ben and I went inside the airport terminal.

High winds and heavy rains delayed our flight by a few hours – the sunshine from the west had yet to make it across to the east of the country. Winds howled and rain hit the runway in diagonal sheets, making takeoff and landing unsafe. There was now a backlog of flights waiting to leave Dublin. We went for lunch while we were waiting. Ben read the newspaper at the table while I sat people-watching. I couldn’t recall a time when Ben had stayed mad at me for this long. Finally, the winds died down and we got word that our flight was ready to board.

I took the envelope back out of my bag after I had taken my seat on the plane. I was so curious to know what was inside it but I had a heavy feeling that it was something big. I knew by Dad’s manner and the way that he had told me to wait until I was at home before opening it, that I should listen to him. Whatever it was, it was important.

Back in Heathrow, Ben hailed a taxi. I was secretly glad we didn’t have to criss-cross London on the train and Tube to get home.

When we arrived at the flat, he left the bags in the hallway and went straight into the kitchen. I followed straight behind him. Pulling back the fridge door, he took out a beer.

“You’re going to have to talk to me sometime, you know?” I said, blocking his path from our galley kitchen back to the sofa.

“Leave it, Kate.”

“You’ve no right getting mad with me – it was your idea to go to Ireland in the first place.”

“You’re so arrogant, do you know that? Your family are all lovely people – I don’t know what I was expecting, to be honest, after everything you’ve told me about them over the years – but it certainly wasn’t to come away not liking my own girlfriend!”

His words stung me to the core. I stood to the side and let him pass. He walked by me, turned on the TV and sat on the sofa with his back to me. I took the envelope that Dad had given me out of my bag and went to our bedroom.

I kicked off my shoes, sat back against the cushions on the bed and studied the outside of the envelope once again. It had a worn look and I guessed that it was originally white but had faded over time. I turned it over and saw that the flap was open. I felt along where the gum should be but the stickiness was long gone as if someone had opened it many times before. I was afraid of what I might find inside. There was something about Dad’s behaviour that made me hesitate.

I didn’t have to open it. Best to let sleeping dogs lie and all that. I briefly thought about throwing it in the bin – I didn’t want any more upset in my life, especially if it was something to do with my family. I’d had enough of that over the weekend and even now I was still putting up with the repercussions of it – I had never known Ben to stay in a huff with me for so long. I knew I could just throw it in the bin now and be none the wiser but I also knew that Dad wouldn’t have given it to me unless it was important. So I took a deep breath and pulled the letter out of the envelope. The paper was neatly folded in half. I opened it up and, as soon as I saw the leaning handwriting, I knew who it was from.

Eva 1992

Chapter 27

We both watched as the test turned positive. Sweet Mother of Divine Jesus, Mary, and all the saints in heaven what was I going to do?

I had just spent the last half an hour convincing Doctor O’Brien that there was no way, no way whatsoever that I could be pregnant. I had sat down opposite him and listed off my symptoms. He had asked me to do a pregnancy test “just as a precaution” but I had laughed and told him there was no way that I was pregnant and not to bother wasting his time.

“It’s a tummy bug, I’m telling you,” I had said.

Because I’d had it for over a week now Noel had talked me into getting it checked out. Never in a million years did I think that I could be pregnant. After three of them. I thought I would have known the symptoms. We were done – our youngest, Seán, was ten years old now, for God’s sake!

“I’m sorry, Doctor, but is there any way – any way at all that these things . . . well, you know . . . can get it wrong sometimes?” I waved my hand at the test, which rested on the desk in front of him.

“I’m afraid not, Eva. There are no false positives.”

I looked at all his medical certs hanging on the white wall behind him, willing him to be wrong. I had been coming to Doctor O’Brien since just after I got married, when I was pregnant with Kate. I had trusted him with my life, especially when Patrick decided to arrive in a hurry and I didn’t have time to get to the hospital – if it wasn’t for Doctor O’Brien, I don’t know what might have happened. I always brought my children to him now as well. He was a man of few words. It was like words cost him money so he chose them carefully and saved whatever was unnecessary. He would often fix his eyes on you, entertaining a long silence as he mulled things over in his head. Sometimes you would wonder if he was even listening but then he would come out with a diagnosis or treatment and you knew he was on the ball once again.

“What am I going to do?”

“Well, there’s not a lot you can do, Eva – there is a baby growing away inside you there whether you like it or not!”

“But I’m almost forty!”

“Yes, it’s obviously a riskier business at this age – the odds of complications go up immeasurably. Down Syndrome, Edwards Syndrome –”

“Jesus, will you stop! I’m barely getting my head around it without worrying about what might come with it!”

“Obviously this has come as a shock to you, Eva, but go home and talk to Noel – you’ll work through it.”

“I’m not so sure,” I mumbled as I rooted around in my handbag to get my purse.

“I’ll see you back here for your check-ups.”

I paid him the money and with that I found myself back outside the door again.

I walked out of the surgery and onto the street in a daze. How had it happened? I was racking my head, trying to think. I thought we had been very careful since we’d had Seán but obviously we were not careful enough. We had purposely had the three of them close in age so that they would all grow up together – ‘steps of the stairs’ people called them. As I walked along I wondered how on earth I was going to break the news to Noel. I felt like a schoolgirl that had gone and got herself into trouble, except that it was my own husband that I was afraid of telling instead of my parents. I was tempted to buy a packet of cigarettes but I had given them up years ago so I knew having one would just make me sick and dizzy. And then there was Mam, what would she think of me having a baby at my age? I walked down the street, locked inside my own thoughts. I passed miserable Mr Acton the accountant putting the canary-yellow steering-wheel lock on his Mercedes even though it was parked right outside the door of his office, the fool! He wouldn’t spend Christmas, that fella!

I nearly tripped over a dog on a lead as I walked. The owner glared at me.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

I didn’t recognise him at all – he was probably a blow-in.

My mind flipped back to Noel then. Things were tight enough already – he was constantly stressed about money. We didn’t earn enough off the farm to raise three children on, especially with Kate in secondary school now and Patrick due to follow her soon. He picked up whatever odd jobs were going around the town – turkey-plucking at Christmas time or getting a few days here and there in the meatpacker’s whenever they were a man short. He had even let out a field last year to another farmer because at least it would be a bit of a steady income for us. It had killed him to break up the small bit of a farm that had been passed down from his own father but he didn’t have much choice.

“Well, how did you get on?” Noel asked as soon as I came in the back door, a gust of wind rushing in behind me.

With force, I shut it closed.

He was sitting at the table, his two hands on either side of the newspaper.

“What? Oh yeah, grand.” I couldn’t tell him yet.

“What does he reckon it is?”

“Oh, it’s some sort of tummy bug.”

“Well, did he give you anything for it?”

“Yeah, just a few tablets,” I lied.

“Did you get the bread?”

“What?”

“Bread – we’re nearly all out – you said you’d pick it up while you were down there?”

“Oh God, sorry, I forgot it.”

“Not to worry – I’ll drive down later. You’re looking very pale – will I put on the kettle?”

“Yeah, thanks, love,” I sighed, sitting down beside him at the table.

“Are you sure you’re feeling all right?”

“Yeah, not a bother.” I forced a smile on my face. Jesus, if he only knew!

Noel headed back out to the fields a while later and I still stayed rooted to my chair. I looked around at the pine kitchen that Noel had made himself. He was good with his hands – give him a piece of wood and you never knew what he would turn it into.

Kate came in from school soon after. The boys would be late today because they had football training after school on a Wednesday. I watched as she arched her back and slid her arms out of the straps of her schoolbag so that the heavy bag plunged on to the kitchen lino.

“How was school, love?”

“Grand.”

She opened up the fridge and stared into it.

“Did you get much homework?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you get the results of your French test back?”

“Yeah.”

“How did you get on?”

“I got a B.”

“Well done.”

She glared at me. “There’s nothing to eat, Mam.”

“Yes, there is – there’s ham and cheese in there – why don’t you make yourself a sandwich?”

“I don’t want a sandwich.”

“Well, what do you want then?” I sighed wearily.

“Pasta.”

“There’s some in the press.”

She put a saucepan of water on the hob to boil. What would Kate say when I told her? I was nearly more scared of telling Kate than Noel – she’d have a conniption. She’d probably be mortified that her parents were still having sex.

“Can I go to Bergin’s on Friday?”

“No way!”

“Why not, Mam? Everyone else is going!”

“I said no – I’m not going over this again. I’ve heard all sorts of things go on in that place and you’re too young – you’re only thirteen.”

“Yeah – but it’s an underage disco.” She said it in a tone that implied I was stupid.

“Kate, I’m not getting in to another argument about it. No means no!”

“For fuck sake, you’re such an auld one!”

“Don’t use that language in this house.”

“What ‘fuck’ or ‘auld one’?” she said as she stormed out of the kitchen, slamming every door she encountered on her way to her bedroom.

Dear God, whoever thinks the terrible twos are bad should wait until they reach the teenage years. Kate had only just entered hers and I desperately wished we could go back to her toddler years again. My lovely daughter had turned into a complete anti-Christ in the last few months.

I walked over to the cooker and turned off the ring. I doubted she’d be back to eat her pasta now.

Patrick and Seán came in together soon after. Both came over and gave me a kiss on the cheek before going to check out the fridge in the same manner as their older sister had. I got up and made them a sandwich each and they ate them before heading down to their room to start their homework. The boys were much more straightforward than Kate – there were no dramas, no fuss – they just did what you told them to do.

Later on at the dinner table Kate breezed in, with no door slamming or shouting. She seemed to have forgotten her earlier strop. I knew that she must want something.

I was passing the bowl of spuds around when she came out with it.

“Can I get a new pair of jeans?”

“You just got a pair in Dunnes a few weeks ago.”

“Exactly!” She sighed. “They’re from Dunnes – I want a pair of Levi’s.”

“Don’t we all? You know we can’t afford them, Kate.”

“Dad, tell her!” she said, turning to Noel.

She always did this, tried to play me off against her father whenever she wasn’t getting her own way with me.

“Well, how much are these Levi’s you’re talking about?”

“Don’t listen to her, Noel – you could buy three pairs of jeans in Dunnes for the price of them.” She was always asking for clothes that she knew well we couldn’t afford. I was sure all her friends were wearing them and it was hard for a teenager not to be keeping up but we just didn’t have the money. Especially now.

“You always go and ruin everything!” She turned to me, her eyes blazing. She pushed back her chair and hopped up from the table, clattering her cutlery off the plate.

“There she goes again!” Patrick said, rolling his eyes.

I had to stifle a laugh.

“Can I have an ice cream, Mam?” Seán asked me.

“Go on.” I was too tired to fight with him.

He jumped up and went over to the freezer.

“Here, give me one and all.” I might as well, I reasoned – I was going to be getting fat anyway.

Chapter 28

“I don’t want to watch the Late Late!”

“Well, don’t watch it then.”

“Well, it’s kinda hard not to, given that we only have one TV.” Kate was forever complaining that her friends had TVs in their bedrooms, kitchens, sitting rooms, loos, garden sheds and God knows wherever else they could put them.

“I bet they’re all there now having fun.”

She was referring to the underage disco in Bergin’s that I wouldn’t let her go to. I pretended that I couldn’t hear her.

“Everyone. As in the whole class. Except me.”

“Will you give it over, Kate?” Noel said at last.

He was normally so mild-mannered that when he did get cross with her, she knew not to push it any further.

We all sat in silence then, watching Gaybo interviewing some singer that I had never heard of.

“Mam, can I go and meet Aidan tomorrow?”

“Well, what homework have you got?”

“Just an essay for Irish.”

“Right, well, you can meet him after you’ve done that.”

Aidan was Kate’s boyfriend. They had been together for a couple of months now, which was serious enough at that age. He seemed like a nice enough fella and Noel knew his dad too which helped.

I let out another large yawn.

“You’re tired, love,” Noel said.

“Yeah, I think I’ll hit the hay.”

“But it’s only half nine,” Patrick said, more out of fear that he would be sent to bed too rather than concern for me.

Seán was already in bed. He had fallen asleep on the sofa and Noel had lifted him into his bed.

“Yeah, well, it’s been a long day,” I said. “You can stay up for another half an hour and then off to bed with you – do you hear me, Patrick?”

He nodded.

“Night, everyone.”

As I lay in bed I wondered how on earth was I going to break it to Noel? We already had our hands full. And going back to the start again – all the night feeds, sleep deprivation, sterilising bottles, puréeing food and running around after a toddler – the thought of doing all that again was wearisome. And it didn’t help that I kept doing the maths on all the different stages – the latest one to shock me was that I would be nearly sixty when the child would be eighteen!

The next morning I had to jump out of bed and run to the bathroom to be sick. I was trying to keep quiet so that I wouldn’t wake the kids.

“Are you okay, Eva?” I turned my head from the toilet bowl and saw him standing in the doorway.

“Sorry, love, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I thought you said that O’Brien gave you something for it?”

“What? Oh yeah. Look, Noel, I have something to tell you.”

“What is it?”

“Best put the kettle on.”

We went quietly down to the kitchen. It was the only quiet time of the day before the three would be up, their noise running and reverberating throughout the house.

“Sit down there and I’ll make the tea.”

“What is it, Eva? You’re worrying me now . . .”

My hand fidgeted with the seam on my dressing gown, unravelling a loose thread. I pulled at it but it just unwound even more, so I let the thread fall away from between my fingers.

“Wait.”

I quickly made the tea and came back with two mugs and put them down on the table.

“There you are now.”

“Well?”

“Noel . . . when I went to Doctor O’Brien yesterday . . .”

“What is it, Eva – what’s wrong?”

“I’m pregnant, Noel!” I blurted out.

“What?” He moved his chair back from the table with a screech.

“I know.”

“But how?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I guess we weren’t as careful as we thought.”

“Jesus, Eva!”

“Well, I hardly did it all by myself, now did I!”

“But what are we going to do?”

“What can we do?”

“But starting all over again – just as they’re growing up a bit – things were beginning to get a bit easier. And the money – sure we can barely afford the three that we have!”

“I know, Noel – I know.” I held my head in my hands.

He came over and put his arm around my shoulders.

“How far along are you?”

“I’m not sure – Doctor O’Brien said I should go to the hospital for a scan to confirm.”

“Dear God – I just can’t believe it. Sure I wouldn’t know what to do with a little baby any more.”

“Can you imagine what Kate will say?”

Noel started to laugh then.

“What? It’s hardly funny!”

“I’m just thinking of how she’s going to react – you can expect World War Three.”

I smiled. “We’ll be the talk of the town. People will think we’re at it like rabbits.” I started to laugh then too.

“That’ll be the least of our worries,” he said.

“I’m nearly forty, Noel – when the child is Seán’s age I’ll be heading towards fifty – when it’s getting married I’ll probably be in my seventies.” I groaned. “And, you know, at my age the risks of everything . . . go up.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Down Syndrome and things like that.”

“Right. I see . . . look, whatever happens we’ll get through it, Eva.” He took my hand in his. “Granted it’s not ideal but I suppose everything happens for a reason. We’ll get used to the idea.”

“When will we tell the children? I bags not telling Kate!”

“Ah there’s no rush – let’s get our own heads around it first and we can tell them in a few weeks.”