7

I’d had a rough night. The rich food and wine from the restaurant mixed with the new pills made for fitful dreams. But I was more than happy to pay the price for that beautiful evening. And with the morning light came a sense of peace. The manner of my death had been secured and the only task that remained was to live the life I had left. All I wanted now was to find a way to make every minute count.

I was still lounging in bed when Edie came knocking a little after nine. I was too tired to dress and settled on greeting her in my robe and slippers.

“Oh no, I woke you,” she said. “Should I come back later?”

“No, no, it’s fine. Come in.”

She was carrying a cardboard tray with two cups and hoisted a greasy white paper bag. “I brought breakfast. Green tea and egg-and-cheese croissants.” She set the food out on the table and dug in.

“So I’ve decided what I want to do this summer,” she said.

“Ah, which lucky cause shall you be championing this time?”

“You. You’re my cause. I’m offering to help you out or just hang, whatever. Now before you say no—”

“I accept.”

She stopped chewing. Her lips were covered with flakes of pastry, and a stray bit of egg had lodged on her chin. “What?”

“I said I accept. Depending on your terms, of course.”

“But I spent an hour working on a speech to convince you.”

“Sorry. Go ahead.”

“It’s no good now. You’re after throwing me all off-kilter.”

“Stop pouting and tell me your plan.”

As I watched her wolf down the last of her breakfast, hope rose up in me like never before and I could barely stand the wait for her to speak. Come on, Edie. Lay it all out. Show me how to make a life worth living.

“Okay, the first thing is to make a wish list. All the things you want to do or see and whatnot.”

“Edie, have you told your mother about this?”

“Nope.” She wiped her hands with a napkin and pulled a small red leather notebook from her bag. “I’m going old school, no digital footprint. Mom thinks I don’t know that she checks my phone. Last week I did a whole text exchange with Colin about how I wanted eyelash extensions, as if. Two days later, she hands me a hundred-dollar bill, ‘just because,’ she said. Anyway, I gave her money to the food bank.”

I sipped my tea. I was instantly sold on this idea of hers, and if her mother got wind of it, so be it. But how to take her up on it safely? How to have her around without scarring her as my body, and possibly my mind, began to fail? It would be tricky. She was so eager, all flushed and filled with purpose. I figured not taking her up on it was the bigger gamble.

She opened her red book, pen poised. “So,” she said, “number one on the list is what? Think big.”

I didn’t know where to begin, but whatever I managed to come up with was bound to be disappointing to her. I had a grand total of five thousand dollars to my name, my emergency fund—not a bad haul for a cleaning woman, but the sixteen-year-old girl sitting across from me likely had twice that sitting in her spending money account. She knew nothing of what it meant to be thrifty. It was an acquired skill honed by necessity and discipline, not much different from a religion, the central tenet of which is “thou shall not want.” Every dollar that had ever made its way to my hands was guarded like the treasure it was, and then cleverly—no, artfully—transformed from paper to elastic. If they gave out degrees for making the best of being strapped, I’d have a PhD. Dr. Delaney, specializing in self-denial and deprivation. Queen of the charity shops and blessed with a uniquely hardy constitution that allowed for maximum output on minimal input—a full day’s work on a banana and water. I’d learned to see my frugality as a reflection of strength of body and mind, of solid character and strong will. I’d never once taken what wasn’t mine, even during the leanest of times, a source of great pride for me. My lucky stumble upon Mrs. Heneghan and Mrs. Cleary had helped carry me this far, but I liked to think I would have made it with or without them, my integrity intact.

Still, I’d often fantasized about owning a home like the one the Cleary family lived in, or any home, for that matter, and I also wondered what I could’ve done with all the time I’d spent over the years scrubbing stains from used clothes and fretting over where my next job would come from. Often, I’d wished for an apartment full of new hardcover books and a fridge full of fine food, a trip to any place where I didn’t speak the language, a university degree. The remedy for such folly was volunteering one Sunday evening a month at the homeless shelter, doling out ladles of canned soup and slices of stale white bread to the truly unfortunate. No matter how bad I thought I had it, there were always so many so much worse off. For me, those poor people served as both consolation and cautionary tale. Every time I passed one of them a tray of food, I’d think, There but for the grace of a few months’ pay go I. Now my little stash felt like a windfall, and I was ready to rip through it, one modest treat at a time.

“All right,” I said. “I’d like a pile of new clothes. Nothing fancy, just new.”

She wrote it down with a flourish. “Next?”

“Give me some time. I’ll get back to you.”

“What about a swishy haircut to go with the new wardrobe?”

“Fine. Number two is a haircut. But clothes first.”

THE NEXT DAY, EDIE drove me to the mall, where Colin was waiting for us. “Impeccable taste, that boy,” she said. He was nothing like I’d imagined him to be, not at all pimply or awkward. Tall and sculpted, more man than boy, a Norse god made over for modern times with his shorn blond hair and smart clothes. He was smiley and gracious, and I immediately saw why Edie cared for him. I shook his strong hand and tried not to think about the two days that Edie and I had spent cleaning up after him.

They whisked me around the mall, chose pants and sweaters and shirts and a denim jacket. I asked for a scarf and Edie chose one that she said made my eyes pop, which apparently was a good thing. Each time I emerged from a dressing room, they clapped and told me I was “killing it.” Then they fixed me up with sandals and sneakers that I was assured were all the rage. Against their advice, I also chose a pair of flat black shoes like the ones I’d seen Hillary wear. Edie said they were mom shoes, but I thought them the best purchase of the day. Colin loaded the bags in Edie’s car, and I watched them hug and kiss in the rear-view mirror. Anyone would have thought them madly in love, and I reckoned in a way they were. They had a way of making me feel more alive than I’d felt in years.

When I got home, I laid all my purchases on my bed and tried on every outfit again. Then I poured a whisky and smoked out my window wearing clothes with the tags still dangling from them.

Two days later, Edie took me to a hair salon. We walked past a bank of elevated recliners where women sat drinking coffee and chatting while other women wearing surgical masks were cutting toenails and sloughing skin off rough heels. I followed Edie up a set of glass stairs to a bright white room with a row of black swivel chairs, each one set in front of a floor-to-ceiling mirror, reflecting the chic stylists and their clients. A tall, painfully thin woman with spiky platinum-blond hair sashayed toward us. She was dressed in a black tank top and shiny red pants, and her left arm was completely covered by a tattooed garden of colourful flowers.

“Frances, this is Debra, Colin’s sister,” Edie said.

“Oh yes,” I said. “I’ve met Colin. He’s a lovely young man.”

“He’s a sweetheart, isn’t he? Now, Frances, have a seat and let’s talk about this hair.”

Edie stood behind me next to Debra, who began picking through my hair. Her fingers grazed the side of my neck and sent a thrill over my skin. She pursed her lips and made a face.

“It’s really dry. What are you using for conditioner?”

But I couldn’t answer. The sensation of her hands in my hair was too strong. Each time she lifted and moved the strands, I felt a flutter in my chest. Then she rested her hands on my shoulders and gave them a playful pat, and the fluttering stopped.

“Are we doing colour as well today?” she asked.

“Just a cut. Whatever you think would suit me best.”

Edie wandered off and Debra led me to a chair in front of a sink. I leaned back and the warm water flowed over my scalp. I’d never been to a hair salon in my life. Why waste my hard-earned cash when I had two steady hands and a sharp pair of scissors? Before Debra, the only person who had ever washed my hair was my mother. I could see her raising the pink plastic cup she used for rinsing. I could feel the edge of her hand pressed against my forehead to shield my eyes from the soap. Then Debra began making small, deep circles with her fingertips, over my temples, behind my ears, at the base of my skull, and I imagined the squid smiling and flapping a tentacle, like the hind leg of a blissful dog getting a belly rub.

When she finished cutting and drying, my hair was no longer my own. It bounced and captured the light when I moved my head from side to side. I happily forked over the money for the bottles of goop that Debra assured me were essential to have from now on, and I laughed out loud at the look on Edie’s face when she saw me.

“Pick up your jaw, little girl. Haven’t you ever seen a beauty queen before?”

“You look so, I don’t know, modern and sophisticated. It’s really beautiful, Frances. Here, let me get a shot of you.” She held up her phone and pressed the button.

She took another picture of me in the car when we stopped at a traffic light, and two more once she’d parked in front of the library. Then she spent five minutes editing the photos and deciding which one she should send to Colin.

“Edie, I’m getting out of the car now.”

“Wait, wait. One more second.” She tapped on her phone, then put it in her bag. “Why do you come all the way over here? There’s a bigger library about a five-minute walk from your apartment.”

“It’s quieter here. Not so many youngsters.”

“Mom’s friend Hillary runs this one. Do you know her?”

“Yes, I do. She’s wonderful.”

She leaned across the seat and hugged me. “You look great. You’ll be driving all the men crazy.”

“Thanks for today. You have a good night and be careful driving.”

As I opened the library door, I heard Edie calling out to me from the car.

“Hey, Frances, number three on the list. Get on it.” She tooted her horn and drove away.

I checked my reflection in the door before stepping inside. Hillary was sitting in front of her computer. I walked toward the desk, but her phone rang, and she got up and took it into the back office. I hung around for a few minutes, picking through the rack of tourist brochures I’d seen a thousand times until she reappeared.

“Hey, Frances. Wow, you look fantastic. Retirement really agrees with you, hey?”

She smiled and went back to her work. I went off to find my chair and decided the next time I came, I’d wear my denim jacket and the pretty scarf and see what she had to say about that.

Later, in bed, I picked up my phone and opened Hillary’s life again. The pictures from her son’s party were already there, the cake expertly piped and on top a candle in the shape of the number nine. Her husband was there too, smiling, looking well pleased with his family. He had the look of class and money about him. Edie had warned me about reading too much into people’s lives as they were presented this way—that people often looked happier than they really were—but to my eyes, there was perfection in those images. Then I flipped through Annie’s life again, long enough to feel her presence in the room. It suddenly occurred to me that maybe Hillary and Annie would be able to tell that someone was looking at their photos. Maybe they’d know I’d been lurking about, prying into their business like someone who didn’t know how to behave properly in a world filled with people.

Many years ago, not long after I’d arrived in the city, I took a job as a housekeeper at a large hotel. One Christmas, a few of the other maids planned a night out, to have a few drinks, take in a local band. I was surprised to be invited along, and somehow worked up the nerve to go. They were a rowdy bunch, and they seemed to know each other well. I had no idea how to blend in with them, so I just sat and sipped a warm beer while watching them carefully for clues on how to act and what to say. With each passing minute, I grew more anxious. I drank a second beer thinking it would help me relax, but instead I felt bloated and queasy. I went to the bathroom to try to steady myself. I was still in the grimy stall when I heard the bathroom door open, then two women talking. I recognized Martha’s voice. She was about my age and often on my shift. She reminded me of Annie, chatty and popular, with an edge to her that I found alluring. Every time she let fly a string of swears, it always made me smile.

“Jesus Christ, I’ll be paying for this night in more ways than one tomorrow,” Martha said. “If I’m too trashed, I’ll have to ask Frances to double up.”

The other woman spoke, but I couldn’t place her. “Why did you ask her to come anyway? She just sits there like a lump on a log, staring at us like a retard.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, she’s not retarded. She’s just a bit off, that’s all. I felt bad for her. But I dare say she’s a bit creepier than usual tonight. Don’t pay her no mind.”

I waited until they left, then slipped out the back door of the bar into the freezing night and rode the bus home alone. The next day, I volunteered for the night shift and started looking for another job. I never saw Martha again, but the sting of her words was as fresh and sharp as if I’d heard them only moments ago. I turned off my phone and swore off looking at any more photos.

The next morning, I went to a neighbourhood café that I’d walked past many times but had never ventured inside. I chose a table near the window and watched the umbrella domes bounce up and down as people hurried along the sidewalk in the rain. I was meeting Edie for breakfast. She burst through the door half an hour late, plopped down in a chair, and caught her breath.

“Sorry, I overslept. Sometimes I feel like I could sleep for two days straight. Did you know that teenagers actually need more sleep than older people? So I’m not late exactly. I’m just exercising my biological rights. How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine. Now I want to exercise my biological right to breakfast.”

Edie waved a waitress over and I took her suggestion for eggs Benedict with smoked salmon and fresh fruit on the side. I decided that if I did wind up in heaven, I might spend eternity eating eggs covered in that yellow sauce.

Edie pushed her empty plate to the side. “Okay, number three on the list. Thoughts?”

I leaned toward her. “That website you got me on. Can people tell if you’re looking at their pictures?”

“Not generally, why?”

“Just curious. I don’t know how any of this foolishness works.”

“I’m pretty sure everybody creeps everybody else’s page.”

A dull ache began to form behind my eyes. “What do you mean, ‘creeps’?”

“You know, just trolling around, checking people out. See, there’s number three right there—getting you up on all the socials.”

I shifted in the hard chair and dug my thumbs into my lower back. Ever since the last seizure, I was stiff and sore more often than not. I soaked in the bath, kneaded my calves and thighs, rubbed my shoulders until my hands were weak, and still I felt like a bag of knots. I had a sudden flash of memory, walking in on Mrs. Cleary laid out on a pop-up table in her bedroom while a young woman rubbed her feet with oil. Sweet Jesus, I’d thought at first, paying people good money to touch you, now there’s the height of it. But then I saw Mrs. Cleary’s face, the picture of peace, like a sleeping child. She hadn’t even noticed I’d come into the room.

“I’ve got number three for you,” I said. “What do you think a massage would cost?”

“Eighty bucks? Maybe a hundred? Mom has a woman who comes to the house. I can get her number for you.”

I shook my head. “No, someone she doesn’t know.”

Edie pulled out her phone and within five minutes had found a guy named Oliver who specialized in people with cancer. Highly reviewed, she assured me. She called and booked an appointment for me, and she offered to get me there and home again. I was worried about having to strip off in front of a man, but the tingle produced by Debra’s hands had set something off in me, like an itch I couldn’t scratch, an ache I couldn’t easily pinpoint. I wanted someone—anyone—to reach for me and work out the kinks.

“FRANCES? I’M OLIVER. COME on back.” He was a compact and well-muscled man with a shaved head and a pair of round silver glasses that seemed at odds with his tight blue T-shirt and stretchy fitness pants. I followed him to a dimly lit room that smelled of something fruity. He reached for the clipboard the girl at the front had given me and looked over the forms I’d filled out.

“So other than the brain tumour, do you have any health concerns?”

“No, that one is enough.”

He nodded. “I see you’ve never had body work before, so I suggest we do some light massage today, just some gentle exploration so I can get a sense of your body and we’ll see where to go from there. How does that sound?”

“Whatever you usually do is fine.”

“I’ll step out and let you get changed. Just take off whatever you’re comfortable with.”

I stripped down to my underwear and slid under the soft sheet. He knocked on the door and I asked for one more minute, then got up and took off my bra and underwear and stuffed them in the pocket of my pants. I scurried back to the table and lay fully unclothed between sheets for the first time in my life.

“Okay, I’m ready.”

Oliver came into the room and I locked my eyes on the ceiling.

“Frances, I’m going to start at your head and work my way down your body. If at any time you need me to stop or change what I’m doing, just say the word.”

I drew in a deep breath. He stood behind me, slid his hands over my hair and cupped the back of my skull with his palms. His fingertips pressed against the bones where my head met my neck. They circled and stroked, and I closed my eyes. There was music playing softly in the background, a meandering melody plucked out on a guitar. And as he made his way around my scalp, down the back of my neck, across my shoulders, I had the sensation of my body expanding in all directions, puffing up with air and floating above the table. His two hands slid down the centre of my chest, then drew apart, then back together and apart again. As my skin and muscles pulled away from my bones, my daughter came to me. I saw her newborn face, smushed and wet, and her tiny flexed body still attached to mine by the corkscrewed bluish cord. Then I saw her toddling across a kitchen floor for the first time and running around a grassy lawn on a hazy summer evening in yellow cotton pajamas, her hair wet and combed off to the side. A school uniform, a Christmas concert, a skipping rope, a skinned knee, braces on her teeth. I saw her walking arm in arm with another girl through town. A black hat with a tassel, her diploma held above her head while she grinned for the camera. A man by her side, a veil of white, a baptism. Glasses raised in honour of her new job. All of it passed before my closed eyes as if it were memory.

“Are you doing okay?” Oliver said.

The sound of his voice startled me back into the room. I nodded and he pumped his hands full of lotion from a bottle held in a pouch at his waist. He worked down the length of my right arm, then took my hand in his. The pressure against my palm flooded me with a pleasure I’d never imagined existed, wave after wave of heat coupled with a desire to laugh and waggle my shoulders just to cope with it. By the time he’d finished my left hand, the sensation had risen to such a fevered intensity that I feared my body would burst into flames.

He pulled the sheet and blanket up and over my left leg and tucked them carefully under my right, keeping my private parts private. He pushed and kneaded along my thigh and calf, and with each stroke of his hand I heard my mother’s voice, her song high and clear. I could see her standing at the sink with her back to me, her body swaying as her tune flowed out through the open window toward the sea beyond. I could smell the bread baking in the oven and the sharp scent of the spruce boughs as they crackled and spit in the fire. She turned to face me and smiled.

Oliver did the same with my other leg, then asked me to roll onto my stomach. He pulled the pillow away and there was a hole cut in the table, a perfect fit for my face. More lotion, more laying of hands, across the expanse of my upper back, deep, almost painful pressure as the tension gave way. When he reached my lower back, I felt the hands of my father around my waist, hoisting me onto the deck of his boat. I could smell the sea and feel the mist on my face, taste the salt in my mouth. I saw the deep lines etched into the wind-burned skin around his blue eyes and his thick, calloused fingers wrapped around the wheel. I heard his booming laugh when I reeled in a toilet seat covered in seaweed. The sound of his fiddle came to me as Oliver worked down the backs of my legs. “Swallowtail Jig,” a cheerful reel that had defined my childhood, rose up in my ears, and it was as if my father had been raised from the dead and was standing, playing, right next to me.

Oliver spoke and I opened my eyes. The carpet below my face was dotted with tears. I asked him to repeat what he said. He told me to turn over and passed me a tissue.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “This happens all the time. Massage can bring up all sorts of feelings.”

I swept my face with my hands and lay back on the pillow. He flipped back the sheet and started working on my feet. I closed my eyes. It was the same pleasure I’d felt when he did my hands, only jacked up to an almost unbearable loveliness. And then I saw Annie, her smiling face shining through the thick fog at the shore.

“Frances, that’s our time for today. Be sure to rest tonight and drink plenty of water over the next couple of days.” He turned to leave.

“Oliver,” I said and reached toward him.

He took my hand in his.

“Thank you.”

He laid his other hand over mine and smiled. “You’re most welcome.”

I rose slowly from the table, not trusting my legs to support me. I dressed and paid for my hour and thought never was there money better spent. I booked another appointment and then stepped into the bright sunlight, where Edie was waiting for me in her little blue car.

“So how was it?”

Exquisite. “Very nice.”

She smiled and pulled into traffic. As we turned the corner onto my street, I noticed the song playing on the radio, young men singing, an Irish drum and whistle, an accordion and a fiddle. A ramped-up, modern rendition, but there was no mistaking it.

“Turn that up.”

“Dad loves this band. He went to high school with two of them.” She pressed a button on her steering wheel and the car filled with “Lukey’s Boat.” She stopped in front of my place just as the song finished.

“Edie, I want to go home.”

“You are home. Are you all right?”

“No, number four on the list. I want to go home.”