Alison awoke with that same heavy feeling inside and all around her. If only I could stay right here, she thought, eyes still closed. Forget the world, forget everything. A dark sigh rose from the depths of her as she stretched back her neck, arched her body into wakefulness. The dogs pined softly in the back kitchen, somehow sensing her stirring. Turning onto her side, her fingers found the warm dip of her waist, the gentle outward curve of her hip, her thigh, so soft, like a wing, opening. A sharp lick of fire lit her belly, taunting her aloneness. She threw back the covers and padded to the shower. Under its hot stream she scrubbed and scrubbed – at the loneliness, the darkness, that grey hopelessness that seemed to be her constant shadow lately – working the loofah vigorously over and over her body till her skin tingled, tightened, felt some semblance of contact with life.
Dogs fed and watered and let loose to the garden, back in the bedroom she pulled on her jeans and an old shirt. This house needs air, fresh breath, she muttered, pulling open the curtains and unclasping the window. She fixed her damp hair in a knot at her neck. Not bothering with breakfast, she gathered up the empty bottles and jars from the back kitchen. Like so often these days, she felt the need to be away from the house, from its stillness, its deathly quiet. She grabbed her keys, whistled the dogs into the back of the old jeep and bounced down the pot-holed drive to the beach.
The sea cha-cha’d in to meet her, its petticoat held high. Alison noticed the ocean’s dark brown under-dress; how it rippled its grey surface, refusing the sun. The 10th of May, first month of summer, Alison thought, and the sea, like me, is refusing to cast off her winter colours and mood.
The two dogs bounding ahead of her, she strolled towards the water’s edge, catching herself smiling at their playfulness, their joy for life. Five-year-old Tilly, a beautiful, sleek black Labrador, had been Hannah’s tenth birthday present from Sean; Tim was one of the litter of six pups that she had surprised them with last September. Watching them now, she was so glad she had decided to keep little Tim. Tilly had been such a devoted mother that Alison hadn’t had the heart to take them all from her and tiny Tim, the runt of the litter, had been the obvious choice to stay. Not such a runt any more, she laughed to herself now, as she watched him dance along the wet sand.
Along the shoreline the sea had spat up a vile yellow-brown froth in its contempt at summer’s subtle gestures. Alison lifted her gaze towards the freshly greened cliff tops, the tiny knots of purple heather and sea pinks clinging in all their brilliance to the outcrops. Why do they return, she wondered, year in year out, with their whispers of renewal and rebirth, only to be killed off a few short months later? Why try again and again, knowing they will perish, knowing death always has the final say?
She turned from the shoreline up towards the dunes, bending to pick a piece of driftwood from the sand. Salt had bleached away its colour and only in its deepest cuts could you see the remnants of life. Its shape was humped and curved, as if by pain, its face eaten away. Sean. Over three years now in his wet, salty grave. What would remain of him?
Holding the driftwood with both hands, she closed her eyes and pressed her nose to its belly. At the rush of salt and tar, the memories fast-gathered. She saw herself again, running, demented to the strand each morning, knowing each day that this was the one, today she would find him. Walking and searching every beach and cove for miles, cursing the tide and then falling to her knees, the sea sweeping in around her as she begged and pleaded for Sean’s return; Hannah, cold and tired, little legs trying to keep up yet staying a small distance from the mother with the madness in her eyes. Then returning to the water like a ghost each night when Hannah was safe in her bed, her torch light double-checking every nook and turn in the rocks and caves. In case she had missed him by day. In case he had come on the evening tide and was waiting for her.
She opened her eyes and let the hot tears fall, Maryanne’s words echoing in her head: ‘Let him rest, can’t you! Haven’t we seen enough of rosary beads wrapped round the stiffened fingers of young men. Let him rest in the one place he loved!’
Looking out towards the horizon, she drew a defiant hand across her cheek. She was weary of her old grief, of how it had stolen back to reclaim her in the last months, reasserting itself with a vengeance and with a new piercing resentment that, try as she might, she could not shake.
Closure. She hadn’t had closure. That’s what all the books would tell her. Well, fat chance of that!
She turned her back on the heaving sea, on its mocking hiss and pull. Fixing a windblown curl behind her ear, Alison felt eyes on her, almost looking through her. She turned to face the steep cliff to the left. There, halfway up the old mud track, a man stood watching her. As soon as she looked he turned and moved away, his step slowed by a limp on his left-hand side. He was too far away for Alison to see who he was, but her skin felt the prickle of his deep stare.
Reaching the dunes, she climbed the wooden storm steps and leaned for a moment on the weathered railing at the top. Across the yellow bridge, on the little hill overlooking the river, Mick Farrell was painting the outside of his house in preparation for the summer tourists. She could hardly believe it was over twenty years now since she had first come to this place. Her parents had rented one of those very houses and little did she know that morning as they drove and sang the three-hour journey south to Carniskey that she would be bonded to this village forever. Carniskey, ‘Ceathru Uisce’ – the Watery Quarter. The very name and the way it could be whispered hinted at the magic it held. There were a dozen little houses, huddled together in a terrace, their tiny windows squinted against the sun and the winter storms. Alison could almost smell that peculiar mixture of must and wet sand that filled every room of that house; see the maroon swivel armchair in the sitting-room window overlooking the bay, and the sea, swelling and sparkling in its splendour and welcome.
That very first year Sean Delaney had asked one of the local girls to ‘beg Alison to go out with him’. Just six months older than her, tall and tanned, his dark hazel eyes and shy smile set her legs to jelly. He didn’t talk much, seemed more aloof than the others. But just being in his company was enough for Alison. The words and the kisses she could dream.
If she had sung all the way to Carniskey, then she cried all the way home. At fifteen, she’d had her first real taste of loss and heartbreak. She couldn’t ring him – he didn’t have a telephone. But he had promised to write. He never did. When her father called herself and Claire together to tell them their mother was unwell and needed surgery, Alison flung Sean Delaney, the fisherman’s son, to the darkest corner of the back of her mind and poured all her love and attention on to her mother.
And when spring awoke in their tiny suburban garden her father spoke of the sea pinks and how they’d be nodding in expectant gossip now on the cliffs at Carniskey. He put it on the table one evening after supper: the letter from Mrs Phelan confirming their booking of the yellow terraced cottage for the whole month of August. ‘Dr Lawlor says it’s just the medicine you need – a whole month of sea air and sunshine.’ Alison’s heart had swelled and then promptly thumped back into place at the thought of Sean Delaney.
‘Damn!’ she whispered under her breath, her eye catching the hurried step of May Reilly crossing the bridge and turning in the path to the beach. May and her marital woes and endless questions was the last thing she needed. ‘Tilly! Tim! Come on!’ she called to the dogs, the tips of their tails just visible in the tall marram grass. She started down the steps towards the car park. She’d have to forget going to the bottle bank now – May’s telescopic eye would have the bottles counted, their numbers doubled and the whole place informed about ‘Alison Delaney’s little problem’ before lunch. Maybe if May concentrated a little more on her own business she mightn’t have found herself in the mess she was in now . . . Well, no point in giving them extra fodder, she thought, slipping her mobile from her jeans pocket and pretending to be engrossed in a call as she waved hello to May and hurried towards the jeep.
* * *
Hannah bit down on her pen, her fingers drumming its length. A warm smile spread through her, as she lost herself in the memory of Peter’s kiss, the minty taste of his tongue in her mouth. Tonight couldn’t come quick enough. She’d say she was studying at Aoife’s, concoct some project or other. Mum didn’t go in much for detail – much as she thought she was on top of it all, really she didn’t have a clue. Besides, she’d be mellowed with a glass of wine or two by the time Hannah got home and would probably be in bed, complaining of tiredness or a headache and blaming it all on the stress of Nan. Closing her eyes, Hannah ignored the hot tightening in her chest, encouraged her mind to wander instead back to last night. She could almost feel the warm, soft leather of the car seat beneath her, the hot pressure of Peter’s hand on her thigh, his right hand lightly guiding the steering wheel as the car cut the bends on the Aughtford road; the roar of the exhaust as he shifted gear and that faint smell of mint on his breath when he turned his head to direct the words of the pumping rap song right at her.
‘Hannah! Hannah Delaney? Can you grace us with your opinion?’ The sharp edge in Ms Fahy’s voice jolted her back to the classroom.
* * *
Alison parked at the side of the house and sat for a moment, looking at the lobster and shrimp pots, the salmon nets and bright pink buoys littering the back and side gardens. Sean was still everywhere around her. She hadn’t moved or stored the stuff the first year, thinking every day that he’d return, that he’d need them for the next season. As the months wore on and one year gave way to the next, they had become so much a part of the place that she had stopped noticing them. Lately, though, they’d begun to prod at her and sometimes she felt they were looking at her accusingly, making her feel somehow like an impostor. She glared at the sorry, useless collection and rounded the house to the back door.
A sad smile softened her face as she noticed the uncoiled length of rope attached to the post in the garden, the lattice of net falling to the grass below. Joe O’Sullivan. He only ever came now when he knew she was away – she’d given him such a fright that day last October, the day of Sean’s anniversary, when she had let her temper and her frustrations loose on him. But since spring, she would see him often, crouched behind the ditch in the adjoining field, watching, waiting. And heading down the drive, she’d keep watch in the rear-view mirror, smile at his awkward scramble over the ditch, the blue cap perched on the side of his bowed blond head, long legs propelling him towards Sean’s fishing gear. Poor old Joe, ‘Sean’s right-hand man’ – God, how he used to straighten himself up when he’d call him that! Joe would never give up or give in to reality. ‘His Seany’, as he called him, would be back any day now, as far as he was concerned, and no amount of convincing would turn him. And he was as determined as ever to make Sean proud, to have everything ready for him on his return.
Poor old soul, Alison thought, turning to the back door. But then again, she sighed, cursing the salt-stiffened, unyielding lock, maybe Joe wasn’t the one to feel sorry for. At least he lived his days with hope, with expectation. And even if those hopes were never going to be realised . . . well, didn’t they at least give his days some meaning, some light?
She flicked on the kettle, set the driftwood on the kitchen windowsill to dry and slipped her mobile from her pocket. One new voicemail.
‘Alison, this is my third message in two days!’ Eugene Dalton’s voice boomed at her. ‘We need that article, Friday morning at the latest! I’m going out on a limb for you here. Do you want this job, because there’s plenty others that would . . . ’ – a pause for emphasis – then, ‘give me a ring. Now!’
‘Shit!’ Her mobile was out of credit, again. Grabbing the house phone, she punched in the number of the local paper and cringed at the Americanised patter of Eugene’s receptionist.
‘Susie? It’s Alison Delaney here. Can you pass a message to Eugene for me?’
‘Alison, he’s here now if you want to—’
‘No, Susie, I haven’t time. Tell him that article’s ready, but I haven’t been able to email it as the broadband’s down again. I’ll drop it to the office before twelve on Friday. Thanks.’ She hung up, not waiting for a reply. ‘Right, that gives me today and tomorrow.’ She heaped two spoons of coffee into her mug and poured in the scalding water. Sitting at her desk in the window, she punched the computer to life.
* * *
As soon as he saw Tra na Leon, William had known he’d found the perfect spot. Two giant lion rocks guarded the secluded bay and out beyond the glimmering blues and greens, the horizon slept. The cove could only be reached by a mile-long dirt track up off the main beach at Carniskey. Waterlogged and overgrown in places, it wouldn’t encourage many visitors. The thick gorse bushes and high rock crops on the left lent ideal shelter to his old camper van. Yes, this was the place.
Without reason or prompt, his mind wandered again to the figure he’d seen on the beach this morning. There was something about her, something around her that, even from a distance, drew him like a magnet. Gazing out towards the horizon, William squinted as the sun suddenly burst from behind a cloud, setting the sea a-dance with a flood of silver lights. He opened the camper door and stepped inside. Clearing a seat beside the small table, he opened his sketch book.
* * *
Kathleen dried her hands on the dishcloth, leaned her elbows on the counter top and gazed out through the kitchen window. She laughed out loud as she watched Jamie thunder towards the goal posts at the foot of the garden and in his enthusiasm fly arse-over-head, missing his goal chance completely. He shook his head, his dark curls dancing as he straightened, his cheeks ablaze with dented pride as he raced to retrieve the ball. That was her Jamie, her little dynamo, bursting with energy and enthusiasm and always ready to have another go.
And that’s why his bedwetting really confounded her – at seven years of age and completely out of the blue! Every other morning for two weeks now, and she was no nearer to sorting it. She’d tried several tacks: making little of it; avoiding his room in the morning so that he could at least go to school without the humiliation of her seeing the dreaded dark patch; teasing him out, approaching the subject in a thousand different ways but always with the same result: silence and that sideways head-hang of shame that tore at her.
She watched Joe O’Sullivan now, tramping down the lawn with his two left feet, Jamie corralled in one corner of the goal, crouched and ready. Good old Joe. It was only in the last two weeks that he had begun appearing at the school gate again at day’s end. That whole break-in business had really taken its toll on him. What had those guards been thinking to even entertain for one second the notion that Joe could be somehow involved? Sure he’d been seen hanging around outside Maryanne’s place, but that had always been his way when Sean was alive and, God help him, he had continued it ever since, probably thinking he was keeping an eye on the old lady, doing it for Sean. Sure what would the guards know anyway, she thought to herself, throwing her eyes up to heaven, and none of them even from the place. Joe wouldn’t harm an insect much less the Maryanne he adored! Fools. More in their line to get the finger out and find the real culprit.
Although Joe was now thirty-three, like herself, following a fall at the pier when he was just five years old his mind had not developed beyond childhood. Most people looked on him with pity, or worse still as a source of fun. ‘The Trout’ they called him, his full, wet mouth always open as if in constant wonder at the world. Rob had had a quiet word with a few of the ringleaders, had taken to accompanying Joe to the local football matches, to the odd pool game at the hall on the quay, and under the wing of his new ‘best friend’ Joe’s confidence had swelled. Typical of kind-hearted Rob, she smiled, no wonder she had fallen so hard for him.
Rob. His name drew a smile as she skipped to the patio door. That was the effect he had on her: he made her skip rather than walk, made everything in her world bigger, brighter, better. They’d been together a year now – give or take a few weeks – and Kathleen had been more than happy with the way things stood. Truth be told she had never dared dream that life could be this good again. So why couldn’t Rob just have left good enough alone? Why all of a sudden was he so bent on upping it a notch and insisting on them living together?
And what kind of selfish stupidity had made her broach the whole subject of them moving in together with Jamie? All she was doing was teasing it out for herself, she could see that now. It had been thoughtless and unfair to land something like that on the child when she herself hadn’t even known her own mind. Hadn’t and still didn’t, she sighed, wondering if she was putting the bed-wetting down to her mention of Rob moving in only because it suited her. Because it gave her an excuse, an out-clause, meant she didn’t have to be the one to make the decision, at least not yet.
It had been more than a struggle at times, raising Jamie single-handed, securing this home for them; always striving to be upbeat and positive, to prove to the world that she wouldn’t be defeated, that she could make it. And she had. She was proud of herself, proud of the young boy Jamie had grown into. And it would be wonderful at this stage, with Jamie growing up so quickly, to have someone to share it all with, all of it, even the everyday humdrum stuff. But it worried her how clingy Jamie had become in the last weeks, going quiet if she said she was going out, not wanting a babysitter – what was all that about? Hannah had been babysitting for the past six months and they’d always got on like a house on fire – she was so good with him, like a real big sister. A tug of guilt pulled at the corners of her mouth – she really had intended to call on Alison, but things just seemed to have gotten in the way all day. All day and every day since she’d promised to call last week. She’d give her a buzz, definitely, first thing after dinner.
‘Jamie, Joe, dinner’s up!’ she called, holding the door open for them as they sauntered up the length of the garden, Jamie looking up into Joe’s open face, his hands flying and diving in his attempt to explain something. And Joe, his head as always bowed and tilted to the side, that old bleached blue corduroy cap defying gravity and staying put on the side of his small head. Kathleen smiled. Jamie adored Joe. All the children did. She supposed he was their ideal – a grown-up but with a mind like their own who hadn’t forgotten the magic of laughter, the wonder of life. Jamie looked up as they neared the door, smiled at her, that big wide smile that never failed to pierce her heart – his father’s smile.
‘Hungry?’ She ruffled his hair as he passed through the door. He would always be her first consideration, her Number One Man, and it was only natural that he would be a little jealous of Rob – someone else competing for his mother’s attention for the first time in his young life. Everything was fine, it seemed, while Rob was on the outside, but she could see how the idea of him moving in with them could be making Jamie anxious. And she could see, too, that despite his tender age, there was wisdom in his thinking. No matter what promises Rob made to her, to them, no relationship came with a guarantee. The past had taught her that. Was she prepared to gamble all she had struggled for? Prepared to hand Rob her trust, her space, her child? And was she prepared for the other option: losing the first real relationship that had mattered to her in over eight years, a relationship she had built so slowly, so tentatively?
* * *
Six o’clock. Alison turned off the computer and stretched her aching back. She glanced guiltily at the laden ashtray. Stuffing the cigarette pack and lighter into the desk drawer, she opened the window and, grabbing the ashtray, headed out the back door to the bin. Soon. She’d quit again soon. She did it before, she could do it again. As soon as Maryanne was out of the woods and she had secured a steadier income, she’d quit then – and for good this time. She opened the bottom press in the kitchen. Her daughter’s appetite was growing alarmingly – along with her tongue and opinions. At almost fourteen, her long black curls and fiery brown eyes danced with passion and opinion on everything from meat-eating and religion to sex and the unnaturalness of monogamy. A twin personality to her aunt Claire in London, the two were as close as Alison and Claire had been growing up. Alison cringed at the thought of the next dreaded phone bill. ‘I’ll ring Claire, she’ll know’ was Hannah’s mantra every time she had one of her many ‘crises’.
‘What the hell would I know?’ Alison muttered, her head stuck in the cupboard searching for pasta. While she appreciated the bond between her sister and daughter, Alison couldn’t ignore the little green tickle of envy that feathered her heart every time she thought of them. It was easy for Claire to be all glamour and sophistication, living the high life in her arty circle in London. Hannah didn’t have to witness her going through the day to day drudgery of scrimping to get by, having to make do and go without. Putting up with a job she hated and a lecherous boss that scanned her body every time he complimented her on an article – the thought of Eugene Dalton’s bulbous nose and that permanent leer on his fat, wet lips made her squirm. But, as Claire was always quick to point out, there was nothing to stop her upping sticks and moving too. But oh no, she had to stick with her girlish heart and tether herself to this no-man’s-land where the grey sky stoops to kiss the wet ground in a love affair that lasts eight months out of every twelve.
Claire had moved to London a year before Sean was lost and, though she was loathe to admit it, Alison believed that the loss of her aunt had cut Hannah deeper than that of her father. Two years ago they had both gone to visit Claire in London when Alison’s father had moved over there to live with her. Alison would never forget her daughter’s tears at the airport. Claire had begged Alison to sell up, move over to London with them, and Hannah could not comprehend why her mother would prefer to return to Carniskey. On the drive home from the airport Alison had tried to explain to her daughter her need to be near Sean and the sea that had been his whole world. Hannah’s reaction had stung her to the core and Alison would never forget the fire in her young daughter’s eyes when she’d spoken: ‘He’s dead, Mum! Dead! And you might as well be, too! I hate you – and I hate him!’
‘I’m back!’ Hannah closed the front door with the force of a north-east gale and dropped her school bag in the hall, dead centre.
‘In here!’ Alison called. ‘Dinner’s just about ready.’
‘I’m not hungry – I’m goin’ to my room for a while.’
Alison followed her down the hall. The bedroom door slammed in her face. Knocking lightly, she opened the door as Hannah set the CD player – and the walls – pounding.
‘You okay?’ Alison risked, taking in her daughter’s puffed eyes.
‘Yeah, I’ll be up in a minute.’
‘I’m just walking down to check the post box.’ Alison knew better than to risk asking questions. ‘Come and have something to eat then, okay?’
Grunting a reply, Hannah flung herself among the clothes, magazines and childhood teddies that littered her single bed. Lying on her side, she watched her mum stride down the driveway. Why does she always have to keep her head bowed? Hannah’s sigh was laced with irritation. It’s like she’s afraid the whole world is watching her, like she’s ashamed or something! Alison’s red ringlets were coiled and pinned tightly at the back of her neck. She could even be pretty, Hannah considered, if she’d just let her hair loose, take that permanent worried look off her face.
On the school bus home, Danny Ryan had said her mother was crazy. Said someone had seen her talking to the sea last Friday night and dancing with herself in the beam of the moon. ‘Danny Ryan’s an asshole,’ she spat. Still, it would be nice if Mum were a little more normal and didn’t stick out so much. It’s like she does it on purpose, she thought, like she hates this place and everyone in it and wants them to hate her right back! She rolled over onto her back. Why would Mum never considering leaving, then? She’d leave in the morning herself if it weren’t for Peter O’Neill. Peter O’Neill. Aoife had got it all wrong about him and Pamela Forde. They were probably just talking, there was no law against that. Hot nettles stung the backs of her eyes. She hated Pamela Forde, with her big fat arse. Biting down hard on her bottom lip, she cut the music and rushed to the bathroom to splash her face with cold water.
‘Hannah, there’s one for you, from Claire!’ Alison called from the kitchen. She opened the brown envelope addressed to herself, knowing even before she pulled out the slip of paper accompanying the manuscript what it would say. God, she was losing her touch. This was the third story in a month that had been sent back. So, what had they to say this time?
‘ . . . too dark and uncompromising for our publication . . .’ Jesus, did any of them live in the real world? Life wasn’t all pink ribbons and happy-ever-afters. Surely even those duped by the myth of a Celtic tiger had woken up to stark reality by now. Alison balled up the paper, shot it into the bin. She slapped the pasta up on two plates. If this continues, I’ll have to start looking for a real job. Sell my soul to some multinational – if there are any of them left.
‘Oh, Mum, she wants us to come over!’ Hannah, devouring the letter, stuffed her mouth with a forkful of pasta.
‘Slow down, Hannah, I thought you weren’t hungry.’
‘She wants us to visit this summer. Oh, it’d be so cool – can you imagine Grainne White’s face: “Are you going on holiday this year, Hannah? Dad’s takin’ us to Marbella for two weeks.”’ Hannah imitated the high-pitched boast to a T. ‘“Yeah, Grainne, me and Mum are off to London – and we don’t need a man to fund it, so stick that up your ar—’”
‘Hannah, please!’ Alison could barely stifle the laugh. ‘Anyway, I thought you and Grainne were great friends?’
‘Please, Mum, less of the great. She’s okay, but she keeps rubbin’ it in, you know, about money and stuff.’
‘No, I don’t know, Hannah. How do you mean?’
‘Oh, it’s nothin’, Mum, keep your hair on. Sooo, come on, are we goin’? Please?’
‘Oh, Hannah, you know it’s out of the question.’
‘We did it before.’
‘Yeah, and your grandad footed the bill. Honestly, Hannah, where do you think I’d find the money?’
‘It can’t be that much.’ Hannah tsk’d. ‘And I’m sure Claire would . . . ’
‘Don’t even think about asking her.’
‘Yeah, but she’s loaded. I’m sure she’d be—’
‘Hannah, you heard me. I said no, it’s not happening.’
‘So, this is it then, is it?’ Hannah flung the letter down. ‘Stuck in this bloody place for the whole summer?’
‘Less of the bloody, please, Hannah. This place was good enough for your father all his life.’
‘Yeah, and look what it did to him,’ Hannah muttered into her plate.
Ignore it, Alison warned herself, feeling her heart quicken. The subtle suicide jibes had been an almost constant at Hannah’s school until the day an exasperated Alison had burst into the classroom and confronted Hannah’s classmates head on. Another fatal mistake that had earned her the moniker ‘Alison in Cuckoo-land’ and had totally humiliated the child.
‘It’s only a holiday,’ Hannah risked into the silence. ‘It’s not like we’re talking about a world tour. Everyone’s entitled to a holiday.’
‘Entitled?’ Alison gibed, widening her eyes. ‘God, this “because you’re worth it” generation has an awful lot to learn. Things don’t just fall into your lap, Hannah, whether you feel you’re “entitled” or not. The world doesn’t work that way. Things have to be worked towards, earned.’ Conscious of sounding derisive, Alison lightened her tone. ‘Besides, happiness isn’t something that has to be chased after, you can have it, right here,’ she shrugged, attempting a conciliatory smile.
‘Yeah? Just like you?’ Hannah sat back in her chair, head cocked to one side in defiance. ‘Happy, happy, happy,’ she jeered, eyeballing her mother across the table.
‘You can drop it right now, Hannah.’ Keeping her voice even, Alison gathered her plate and moved to the sink. ‘I’m not doing this.’ If there was one thing she had learned in the last few months, it was to walk away before things escalated between them, before words were spoken that couldn’t be unsaid. ‘It’s your turn to wash up – I’m going down to the beach for a walk.’
‘Oh well, surprise, surprise.’
‘Oh grow up, Hannah. There are more people in the world than you, you know. People who would love if their only problem was whether or where they were going on holiday! Your nan, for starters. When were you planning on visiting her?’ Alison tugged open her desk drawer, grabbed her cigarettes and keys, her temper rising with every thud of her heart. ‘And maybe you should stop milking Claire and try earning some money of your own for a change, maybe then you’ll understand how far it stretches! You won’t even babysit for Kathleen any more – what’s that all about?’
Hannah, red-cheeked, made no reply, just scraped back her chair and slouched towards the hall.
‘Don’t you walk away when I’m talking to you . . . Hannah!’ Her blood boiling, Alison stomped down the hall behind her, checking herself as the bedroom door slammed in her face. Fists clenched, she took a deep breath. ‘Stay away from that phone – and get your homework done.’ She grabbed her jacket from the back kitchen and immediately the two dogs sprang from their beds. ‘Stay!’ Alison commanded, her anger ready to spill.
The beach was deserted. A heavy mist draped the horizon and only a few scavenging gulls kept the waves company. She didn’t bother with a coat, didn’t feel the bite of the wind as she strode to the right of the pathway and onto the sand. Her eyelids felt hot and heavy, like the rock lodged in her chest – a great lump of sadness with a sea of anger and frustration crashing around it, yet unable, in all this time, to remove even the tiniest grain.
The tide was halfway out, the tall rock standing in just a skirt of shallow water. She leaned against it. This was the spot. This was where Sean had first kissed her on that, her second summer in Carniskey. She would never forget the magical mixture of excitement and embarrassment as they had sought each other’s lips. She closed her eyes now and tasted again the salt and the sun on his lips. She drew a deep breath, remembering her mother that summer, that anxious look on her face every time Alison went out. ‘Remember last autumn, Alison, remember the agony of the postman’s visits?’ But Alison had explained that Sean had lost her address. Had believed that Alison wouldn’t even remember him when she went back to her life in Dublin. Alison knew by her mother’s raised eyebrows and the slow shake of her head that she wasn’t as easily convinced. But then, Sean hadn’t kissed her. Hadn’t whispered to her in the dunes how he’d seen her face for months in the water. How the leaves and the rain – and even a part of the cliff at Tra na Baid had fallen when she’d left. And how his heart had tumbled with them.
That was the last summer her mother had enjoyed in Carniskey. Although they came again the following year, her illness had only allowed her short visits to the patio and garden of the terraced house. Their father had hardly left her side. They had both slept in the small downstairs sitting room and Alison and Claire would hear them, talk and laugh, cry and lie in silence into the small hours. When death finally called that following November, Alison found her father’s deep peace and acceptance harder to bear than her sister’s angry rebellion. She wondered now had her mother known that Sean had come to Dublin for the funeral. Did she know how he’d loved her then and how he’d carried her heart to healing with his letters and visits?
She opened her eyes as the first star winked from the darkening sky. Maybe Hannah and Claire were right. Maybe it was time to put Sean to rest. To move on, move out of this place and start to live again. Make a proper life for Hannah – and for herself. But how could she? With Maryanne, how could she ever be free of the past, of Sean, of this place? She pulled her cardigan tight around her, shivering now from the bite of the evening air, the grip of the cold water around her ankles. She stepped from the rising water and hurried up the beach.
William Hayden watched from the tall grass in the dunes, his pencil moving furiously over the page. Pain and loneliness haunted every stroke.