by Liz Lyons
CHAPTER THIRTY - SIX
Alison was doing her best to prepare herself for the expected ring of the doorbell, but she was overcome with nerves as she made her way from the kitchen of her new house to the front door. Colm had taken Lucy and Tom to see a film in Cork and had promised them treats afterwards so Alison knew that she had plenty of time with Ciara. It had been a risk suggesting Ciara come to Cork but she had readily agreed. She had flown in to Cork airport from London that morning, where Colm and an overexcited Tom had picked her up. They had left her bags at Lantern Lodge and Colm gave her the keys to an old car that he hadn’t yet got round to selling. He was glad he had kept the insurance up and Ciara too was happy to be able to arrive at Alison’s house under her own steam. Colm wished her good luck before he and Tom left to collect Lucy. Iris Lifford was due for one of her flying visits, and he counselled Ciara to be gone before his whirlwind mother roped her into redecorating or making dinner enough to feed twenty, which were her favourite occupations when she visited her son and grandson. It didn’t matter that Colm told her every time she came to Lantern Lodge that she was to relax and take it easy and that he had come to enjoy cooking so she wouldn’t starve if she would just wait for him to make dinner. She couldn’t help herself and seeing as he couldn’t stop her he’d given up trying. Ciara had only upped her domesticity a notch or two, from non-existent to passable, so she was in no real mood to tussle with Granny Lifford over the Marigolds or the bleach. Better to pour Colm’s mother a glass of wine before dinner and congratulate her on a job expertly completed. Before she could get to that glass of wine, however, she had to survive a visit with her friend whom she hadn’t seen for eleven years. When Ciara came to think about it, Iris Lifford might be very lucky indeed to get anything from the first bottle if today went badly.
Nothing much fazed Ciara any more. She was good at her job at the language school despite the fact that teaching bored her rigid. She had travelled a bit and shaken off the Leachlara birthmark that she felt as a handicap when she had first left, young and innocent but energized by a compulsion to flee at all costs. Still, on the point of confronting Alison, her first true adult friend, whatever composed confidence she had managed to cultivate in the intervening years seemed to fracture as lunchtime grew closer. Colm had carefully written out directions to Alison’s house, which turned out to be only a few miles of convoluted country lanes away from Lantern Lodge.
Colm said she would spot Alison’s home immediately. Her new stone house stood out in the sea of identikit bungalows that trimmed the road like braid. To the side was a room almost entirely of glass reflecting the rich colours of the garden. The house was the first thing they spoke about when Ciara arrived on the dot of one o’clock. It seemed an easy and neutral topic, unlike much of what else they might have to discuss.
‘It really is beautiful, Alison, really smart and yet cosy-looking. How did you find it or did you have it built?’
‘Colm found it for me. He knew I wanted to move out of Michaelmas and when he saw this was for sale he brought me up here to see it. I put an offer in before we even left that first day. An American writer had it built as her retreat, but when it came to it she found Caharoe just too small and quiet. She still calls from time to time. It seemed to matter to her that I fell in love with the place. I think it compensates for the fact that she didn’t go through with her plan to base herself here. She’s very New York though. Caharoe must have seemed like the end of the world.’
‘It’s pretty different from Michaelmas. Do you miss living in the town?’ Ciara was looking at the house and, while she could appreciate the fact that it was beautiful, she knew she could never live in the middle of nowhere again. Leachlara had cured her of that. From the minute she left she hankered after the city, with all its attendant buzz and promise. Noise and distraction remained her salvation.
‘It’s different to Michaelmas, that’s for sure, with none of the nooks and crannies and the crooked walls, but I knew I could make it my own. Apart from the time I spent with you in Dublin I lived my entire life in that house and I most likely would have been happy to stay there except for what happened. I needed to start again and I couldn’t do that in Michaelmas. I still see all the friends and neighbours that I had in town. They sometimes come out here, braving the absence of street lights, but they prefer me to come into town, convincing themselves that my trip in there is less of a distance than the haul out here! I had been looking, wondering if I would even know the right house if it came up, and the minute we saw this both Lucy and I thought it was just perfect. Or “deadly”, as Lucy would say. It’s her new word. “Cool” is just so last year, you know.’
Ciara laughed and welcoming the opening in the conversation she asked if she could see photos of Lucy. Alison reached to a shelf by the fireplace and took down a bulging photo album, the sight of which made Ciara gulp, though she hoped not audibly.
‘Here, look at this and while I get our lunch together you can pretend you looked at all of them.’
‘What makes you think that I won’t look at every single one?’ Ciara said, annoyed at herself for messing up before they had barely begun.
‘Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because you always had the attention span of a gnat and I guess I am hoping you haven’t changed too much.’ Alison smiled, hoping that a little humour might smooth the way for them to open up with one another.
‘Well, as it happens my attention span is as crippled as it always was but I did think I had got a little bit more skilful at covering my shortcomings.’
Alison disappeared into the kitchen and from the living room Ciara could hear the kettle boiling and the low hum of the radio. It seemed that Alison was still addicted to it. The butterflies in Ciara’s stomach relaxed a little and she looked at the photos of Lucy, the green eyes of Dan and, with them, the echoes of the past looking back at her from every one.
They picked over a lunch that neither had any real appetite for while both tried to work up the courage to talk about Dan. Accustomed to her role by now as his memory-keeper, it was Alison who mentioned him first.
‘I half expected you to come to Dan’s funeral. I knew you would have heard if you were in any contact with your parents. It was big news in Leachlara because of Con and everything.’
Try as she might, Ciara could not get herself to come up with a suitable response so Alison continued, determined for them to discuss what had torn them apart.
‘Without Dan I felt I would hardly be able to stand upright, and for the first time I allowed myself to miss you. I feel so ashamed that we lost contact because of me. It seems such a waste, doesn’t it? I wrote you a letter but I didn’t know where to send it. To be honest, I am not sure I would have posted it even if I had known. Too afraid you might not respond, that you would say my getting in contact was too little too late. I know I don’t deserve much after rejecting all your attempts to make things up.’
‘I would have come, but I had no idea that you would have wanted me there. You made it pretty plain that you never wanted to see me again that night in Aughasallagh and when you wouldn’t take my calls and sent back my letter I gave up. You are right, it is a waste, all this lost time, but you shouldn’t blame yourself about what happened. I drank too much at Mary Abernethy’s funeral and I lost myself in some sort of reverie over the perfect life that you and Dan had. Leda turned up hunting Con and I was reminded once again of how absolutely mental the entire Clancy household was. I wanted to be normal. I wanted some of what looked to be your perfect life and I tried to help myself. I am sorry, I really am. I’m not sparing Dan because he isn’t here to defend himself: it was mostly my fault. He kissed me but I was the one that made the move on him really. Even though he was upset and drunk he still told me to cop on. I took advantage of you not being there and of him being in such a state. He must have told you how it happened. Then I made things worse that night on the beach. My pride was hurt that he had rejected me and so I tried it on again. I wanted to prove to
myself that I could have him if I wanted to. It was drink, stupidity and a crush that had run a bit mad in my head.’ Ciara was on a roll now. Her initial fear of being unable to speak about Dan was now being replaced by a growing panic that she would say too much and offend where she meant only to explain.
‘We didn’t really talk about it. Once I had forgiven him, and I forgave him because I wanted him more than anything, we never really spoke about it again. He never went back to Leachlara, or Aughasallagh either, not for a single night after that, and that put Con’s nose seriously out of joint, but he had to learn to live with it or else never see us at all. When we settled here it was easy not to talk about it because it all seemed so distant. Dublin seemed like another life, as if it had happened to someone else.’ Alison’s expression was lonesome and it seemed to Ciara that she regretted how firmly she had closed the door on that previous life.
‘We were so green, but at least you were always just yourself, Alison, whereas I was going around furiously trying to pretend I was more sophisticated than I actually was. All that gear from the charity shops was my way of trying to create another Ciara, someone who could give a good old lash to the world. Still trying to give a good old lash to the world – with mixed results.’
Alison listened as Ciara unravelled the uncertainty at the heart of all her attempts at bravado.
‘You had me fooled. All I ever wanted was to have a fraction of your confidence, Ciara. In the beginning I never thought I deserved Dan. I thought he was so handsome and gorgeous that he was definitely going to get snatched away from me by someone better-looking or cleverer. You were the only one that buoyed my confidence and self-esteem about him. You kept telling me that he was the lucky one and I was so unsure of myself that I needed to hear that from you. That’s why I couldn’t bear it when you were the better-looking, clever one that I might have lost him to. I couldn’t think straight. I just knew that if I could banish you we might have a chance. I should have given him credit for loving me as I know now that he did. He never wanted anyone else. I found that out in the time we had together.’
Ciara moved from where she sat at the table to the vacant chair at Alison’s side. She felt like giving her shoulder a squeeze but thought some comforting words might be more appropriate. An awkward attempt at affection might ruin the shaky communication that they had just managed to open again. Besides, Alison wasn’t finished talking and Ciara was hungry for her conversation.
‘Do you ever see Leda now? Colm says you are in touch but wasn’t sure to what extent.’ Alison had thought about withholding the information of Dan’s trip to Leda, but if they were to attempt a reconciliation she knew that it was better to have everything out in the open.
‘I know where she lives and I know she is OK. I email sometimes just to check in with her but to be honest I absolved myself of guilt about her wayward behaviour a long time ago. I had to, because every stunt she pulled seemed to outdo the last and I had to admit that, try as I might, I had no control over her. What she did to Colm and to Tom was the last straw, walking away from them like they were of no concern. I told Colm that he was better off without her but that doesn’t change the fact that what she did was unforgivable. She seems to have settled a bit, met this rich banking guy in England and they got married in Mauritius a few weeks ago. Never met him but he sounds impressive – or should I say the width of his wallet does? Leachlara was deprived of a good gawk at a Clancy family wedding and I guess she was thoughtful in that regard, because I don’t think the Clancys are capable of squeezing out a respectable family occasion. The wedding feast of Cana wouldn’t be in it with the need for miracles to keep the drink flowing with my dad on the premises. I don’t intend testing them on it anyway, if I ever do take the plunge over that unlikely cliff.’
Alison got up and pulled two glasses from the painted dresser next to where they were sitting. She took a corkscrew from the drawer and a bottle of red from the racks that lined the side of a kitchen cupboard.
‘I suppose this should have been breathing, but I think a glass or two might help for the next thing I have to tell you.’ She poured a generous glass for Ciara and a meaner portion for herself. She still didn’t drink much, had never found the taste for it, though she had tried when an anaesthetic against heartache would have been a valuable discovery. Ciara listened rapt as Alison explained about Leda’s attempt to blackmail Con and how it had led to him being close to bankruptcy. She told her that was where Dan had been the night he had died, delivering money to her sister, attempting to buy her future silence.
‘Oh, sweet divine Alison, I am so dreadfully sorry. I had no idea. How much did she take him for?’ Ciara gulped the red wine that Alison had poured, grateful for its warmth, washing away the grit that seemed to have lodged in her throat.
‘Not much really in the scheme of things, one hundred and fifty thousand euros, but he is in the middle of a very large settlement with the Revenue for tax evasion, which includes massive penalties and fines that will see most of what he had disappear. He doesn’t seem to care, to be honest. He still has his TD’s pension – not sure what you would have to do to be stripped of that – so he is not exactly destitute, but he does worry that Leda will come calling again when this money runs out. Could you talk to her? It might make a difference if she knew you know everything. Whatever you think, it was plain she was always fairly terrified of you.’
Ciara promised to talk to Leda and threaten with every ounce of menace that she could muster to throttle her if she so much as picked up the phone to Con Abernethy again. She could still remember how much she hated the man, but Leda was now no better than him. Whatever high moral ground she once occupied as the wronged party had been levelled by her own bad behaviour, her willingness to sink to any depths to get her hands on some cash.
They talked while dusk fell stealthily outside, never bothering to switch on the kitchen lights. A lit lamp from the sitting room cast enough glow through the open door for them to see each other where they sat at the kitchen table. When hunger struck they plundered the well-stocked snack tin, with Ciara going into paroxysms of delight when she spotted Lucy’s favourite Macaroon bars in the bottom. ‘Jesus, I used to eat these by the lorryload in Leachlara. Let me see if they are still as good.’
She filled Alison in on a decade spent mostly outside of Ireland on the run from home, from boredom and from settling down. Her job at the language school was frustrating her and she was thinking seriously of setting up on her own, finding a premises and doing up a website to canvas for foreign students.
‘To be honest, the teaching end of it is doing my head in. I’m not sure how much longer I can feign delight and pride when someone manages to conjugate a verb properly after months of trying. My patience, as you well know, has always let me down. I fancy a stab at running the show, and I’m sure I could get a loan to cover the rent of the premises if I do some creative accounting and perhaps change my name by deed poll. It’s worth a shot, and if I got good teachers, word of mouth would have the place up and running after the first batch of students.’
‘Sounds great, Ciara, and I know you would be brilliant at heading up your own business. You’ve got balls and even when you are terrified you still put on a brave front. You should go for it. If the name change and the creative accounting don’t come through for you, give me a call. I could help you out with some start-up money, maybe not all of it but some at least.’
‘Oh, there is no need for that! I really should be able to round it up myself. Thanks for the confidence boost though. I need a good kick to get me going.’
‘So any interesting men on your travels then? All you have talked about is work. Is there a special someone that keeps you in London?’
Alison knew it was a bit rude to ask such a direct question when Ciara had not volunteered any information about her personal life, but they had an abundance of time to make up for that bypassed the need for good manners.
‘No one at the moment and I have p
artially given up on men because I have such lousy luck with them. If I had met you six years ago I would have sworn on my life that I would be settled in Spain by now with this guy José that I spent nearly a year with there. He was gorgeous, sensitive and we got on great but at the end of the summer season he hightailed it back to his home village. Apparently I scared him. That was one amongst a veritable fucking bouquet of his reasons anyway. So I left Spain for London and have been over there since without anything much better happening to me. Maybe I am scary. What do you think?’
‘No, I don’t think you are scary. Formidable maybe, but not scary. I bet you someone will come along when you least expect them.’
‘I have been least expecting it for about five years now and, by the way, “formidable” is just the politically correct way of saying I’m scary as hell, but thanks for putting it so nicely. You were so very well brought up always.’
Just then the headlights of Colm’s car flooded the darkness of the kitchen. It was past seven and the movie would have been finished for hours. He had given them as much time as he could before interrupting their delicate reunion. He had rung Iris at Lantern Lodge to check if Ciara had arrived back there but she was alone fussing over what to make Tom and himself to eat when they returned.
‘Tell you what, Mam, push the boat out. Roast the chicken we were going to have tomorrow and throw on a heap of roast potatoes and your killer gravy. I’ll pick up Ciara and Alison on the way and we will have one of your feasts.’