by Doreen Finn
‘Where’s your mom?’
Beth was so close that I could feel her breath whisper on my cheek. ‘I thought she said she’d be here.’
‘She’s getting ready.’
‘Cool.’ A stack of plates was thrust into my hands. ‘Here, put these there, will you?’
Taking great care not to drop anything, I placed the plates where Beth pointed. ‘This is the longest table I’ve ever seen.’
Beth rolled her eyes. ‘That’s my mom. She always has to have everything bigger than we need.’ She dropped a handful of cutlery with a careless clatter on the white cloth. ‘This is just a bunch of tables put together. It’s not like it’s even a proper long table.’
Once again I marvelled at Beth’s constant irritation with her mother. How she publicised it was new to me. It wasn’t the done thing in my family to be openly critical of each other. Resentments were few and guarded. Even if I’d wanted to declare annoyance with Gemma or Sarah, I wouldn’t have dared. Something – a sense of justice or loyalty – kept me from considering it.
Beth slid off, over to her father. I joined Daniel at the crisp bowl. He immediately launched into an idea he had for building a tree house. All we needed was wood. And a tree.
‘Forget the tree house,’ I told him. ‘We need a swimming pool.’
Daniel opened his eyes wide, pointed his index finger in the direction of the pool three doors down. ‘What about that pool?’
Around a mouthful of salty crisps I said, ‘But we can’t fill it, remember?’
‘I know that, but maybe we could try, properly this time?’
‘But we’d need an extra-long hose and where would we find one of those? Plus, hoses are banned.’
Daniel looked deflated.
The house was only three gardens away, but that was a long distance to try and drag a hose that was attached to a tap. Besides, Mrs Doherty next door would hear us, and then she’d be sure to tell Sarah and that would be the end of that.
‘But Megan, it’d be brilliant. No one would have to know.’
‘No one would have to know what?’ Beth had rejoined us, smelling of charcoal.
‘There’s an empty swimming pool three doors down,’ Daniel told her. ‘But we can’t fill it because there’s a ban on hosepipes, and besides, there’s no way of getting a hose that long.’
‘Why not?’ Beth leaned towards us, her voice hushed. ‘Of course we can do it. Nothing is impossible.’
‘But there’s a water shortage,’ I reminded her.
She made a dismissive sound. ‘So what? One small swimming pool isn’t going to make any difference.’
‘But every drop makes a difference,’ I said, echoing Sarah.
Beth sighed. ‘Megan, I like you, but sometimes you’re just too obedient for your own good. You know?’
I didn’t know. I was only doing what everyone was asked to do: to be careful with water. Without water there’s nothing, I had read on the front page of the paper.
Stevie had sauntered over while we spoke, drawn by our hushed, urgent voices. ‘What’s going on?’ Stevie liked to keep his light-brown hair as long as he could without his mother insisting he get it cut. That summer, it reached his collar. He had a habit of tucking it behind his ears, to keep it from falling in his face. Like Daniel, his eyes were the brightest shade of blue.
Beth turned to him. ‘So it turns out that there’s a swimming pool a few gardens away.’
Stevie dug his hands into the pockets of his jeans. ‘So? It’s filthy and it’s empty. It’s not a proper pool. You can’t swim in it or anything.’
Beth leaned closer to him. ‘But we could get it clean and filled. Couldn’t we?’
The implication that this was something that Beth and Stevie could do together, and possibly alone, caused Stevie’s eyes to widen, his face to flush. Beth nudged him.
‘Why don’t we at least give it a shot? There has to be a tap somewhere, and we can borrow Sarah’s hose.’ Beth silenced me with a look when I opened my mouth to object. ‘It’s not like she’s using it, Megan.’
I hushed her. Daniel’s mother sat near us, on the edge of a folding chair, her glass having been refilled by Chris. Her tights were wrinkled at the ankles. My own feet were bare with streaks of white skin where my flip-flops had kept the sun away. My shorts were too short, but Sarah said I’d have to wait for the sales before I got new ones. I wondered how Mrs Sullivan could wear tights in weather like this. She must have been melting. Daniel’s sisters were in their Sunday dresses. They stood beside their mother. Occasionally, she reached a hand out to them, caught a stray piece of lint on their shoulders, smoothed their clothes. For someone so holy, she was always quick with affection.
Two American couples stood in a huddle, furiously discussing something. Snatches of their conversation drifted to me above The Doors and the sweeping laughter of Sarah and two other women who were seated at the table, a jug of something pale and cloudy between them. Margaritas, Judith had said when Sarah asked. Try one, Judith urged my grandmother. You won’t believe how good they taste. The smoke from the barbecue was making me weak with hunger.
‘Ford is a moron,’ one of the American men was saying. ‘A fool. What has he achieved? No, I really mean it. What exactly has he done?’ The contents of the glass in his hand splashed onto the grass, but he paid no heed.
‘But with Nam,’ the other man began.
‘Forget Nam. Nam is over. Over. Finished. Kaput.’ He made chopping motions with his free hand. I wondered where my mother was. She used to love talking about Vietnam.
Chris materialised out of nowhere, rubbing his hands together. ‘Right, I need helpers. Who’s on? Megan? Daniel? I have tons of food to bring to the table. Who’ll help?’
We followed Chris over to the grill, took plates from him as he filled them. Judith began asking people to sit down, anywhere they wanted. She put her hand on my arm. ‘Megan, is your mother coming?’
‘She said she was.’
‘Good, good. I just don’t want her to miss dinner.’ Judith weaved among her guests, touching their elbows, directing them to the long table.
I sat at the end of the table with Beth, Daniel and Stevie. Daniel’s sisters sat with their mother, far enough away from us so that we didn’t have to spend the whole time watching what we were saying. Mrs Sullivan liked to correct us, to tell us to pronounce our words clearly, not to slouch, not to speak with our mouths full. I was invariably included, as though my crimes warranted equal attention to those of her offspring. Daniel was just relieved that she hadn’t suggested we say grace before the meal. She always insisted on grace, even at birthday parties. Daniel was slow to criticise his mother, but saying grace at a birthday party was guaranteed to get your friends giggling.
We ate hot, sticky, spicy meat from the barbecue. We used our fingers, burning our skin and our mouths. It was the most delicious thing I’d ever eaten. I said so to Beth. She shrugged and dropped a rib bone on her plate before reaching for another one.
‘It’s my mom. She’s from New Mexico and she’s all into spicy stuff. She puts green chillies on everything. Plus hot sauce, Tabasco, whatever.’
The world was getting a little bit bigger every time I was around the Americans. So many new words, their sounds exotic, untested. Chillies. Tabasco. The careless shrugging off of Nam . Margaritas. Beth lifted a charred, shrivelled thing from a plate with a fork, dropped it on her own plate. ‘You have to try one of these. Not with your hands, though,’ she chided as Daniel reached for one. ‘You get this stuff on your fingers and then you rub your eyes, you’re spending the night in hospital.’
‘What is that?’ Stevie asked, mistrust curling his lip. ‘It looks like a cooked sock.’
Beth shouted with laughter. ‘Don’t tell my mom that. This is a green chilli. Very hot, totally delicious.’ She broke it up with her fork and ate it.
Little of the food was familiar to me, but I ate with gusto. Flavours, textures, everything new. The adults
were absorbed in their own conversations about Vietnam, about Pol Pot, Northern Ireland, and South Africa. Sarah sat beside a man with a beard who kept her glass filled with margaritas. Sarah, who hardly even drank wine, sipped avidly. Keep it flowing, she laughed. Keep it flowing, whatever it is. Mrs Sullivan kept her hand over her glass of orange, as though the bearded man might lean over and refill her glass with alcohol. Only Communion wine ever passed her lips. Judith chatted with another American woman, the wife of the man who hated Gerald Ford. They were discussing Dublin, how difficult it was to get proper ingredients here, how long the buses took to arrive, a woman they knew whose husband had left. The woman lingered over her wine, sipped it slowly, said how delicious it was. Excellent pairing, she said more than once. Amazing choice . I kept an eye on Judith to see if she was drinking all the wine, but she barely touched her glass. Maybe Beth had been lying.
The seat beside Chris was vacant. He sat with his elbow resting on the back of the empty chair, his chin in his hand. His hair was gold in the dipping sunlight. Gilded, my mother would have said. She still hadn’t turned up. Disappointment prickled my throat. I’d wanted Gemma to be here, to have fun with us. She deserved to have some fun. I knew she was lonely. She didn’t need to say it.
The man who sat on the other side of Chris, the man who had lent him the barbecue, was talking about a book he was reading, but it was clear to me that Chris wasn’t listening any more, his attention suddenly elsewhere. The man didn’t notice and kept up his dissection of the novel about the deep sea, but I turned to see what it was Chris was looking at.
My mother stood on the wooden steps, halfway down to the garden, looking for all the world like one of her attic ghosts. Her hair, dry now and brushed, hung down her back. Her white floaty dress was new, a gift from a friend whose child Gemma had painted. Her feet were bare. Her hands clutched at each other – a sign, I knew, that my mother was nervous.
I glanced back at Chris. He was a panther, ready to pounce, tension in his arms and in the stillness of his shoulders. The man talking about the book spoke on. Snatches drifted to me. His prose is good. Tension sustained. Descriptions of the ocean realistic enough. Movie rights already sold. It’ll make millions.
I waved at my mother. Extricating myself, I wound my way around the snake of tables and went to her. Her green-tea perfume hung between us on the warm evening air.
‘Come on, you’re really late. All the food will be gone.’
Gemma reached out, stroked my face. ‘Sorry, sweetheart. I had a few things to do.’ She stepped down onto the grass. ‘What am I missing?’
I plunged in, telling her about the chillies that looked like socks, the hot sticky ribs, the people we’d never met before, The Doors. ‘I saved you a seat too, over with us.’
Gemma slid onto the folding chair. Before anyone could say a word, the bearded man leaned over, his hand extended.
‘Brad Zimmer. I work with Chris back home, and now in Trinity.’ Gemma shook his hand. ‘So, where do you fit in here, Gemma?’
‘I live here.’
‘She’s my mother,’ I explained. Was I imagining it, or did Brad Zimmer’s face fall ever so slightly at this?
Chris moved into the empty seat beside him. One place closer to my mother. A woman on the other side of Gemma introduced herself as Holly, Brad’s wife.
‘Have you just arrived? There’s plenty of food left.’ Holly splashed wine into her own glass. She looked around the table. ‘Is your husband here?’
Did I imagine the sudden intake of breath around the table?
No one ever asked my mother about her husband. No one ever asked her because everyone already knew the answer: Gemma didn’t have a husband. She was famous for not having a husband but still having a child, for being out in the world with her child and her shame, and not caring. My heart pounded so loudly I was sure everyone around me could hear it. The voices of the guests dimmed, it seemed to me, conversation lulled by Holly’s audacious inquiry. Further down the table, Sarah piled salad on her plate, passed the bowl to her neighbour, laughed at something someone said. Not a single person seemed to understand the import of the question Holly had just posed, as casually as if she’d been asking Gemma to pass the water. Is your husband here? As though to have a husband was the most normal thing in the world.
Gemma sipped from the glass Chris had passed her. White wine, ice cold. Her favourite. She touched her necklace, a silver fish on a chain, and looked at Holly. ‘I don’t have a husband.’
Holly laughed. ‘Good for you! Who needs one anyway?’ She blew a kiss at Brad. ‘Sorry, sweetie!’ She winked at Gemma, and my mother smiled at her and, as though by magic, the din picked up again and everything was restored.
Gemma accepted a plate from Beth. Judith passed down a knife and fork wrapped in a star-spangled napkin. Gemma spread the serviette on her lap. Chris stood and made his way to the record player, and put another record on the turntable. The Rolling Stones. I loved the thump of sound, the energy and Mick Jagger’s voice. Further down the table, Sarah smiled at Gemma, raised a glass. Gemma winked at her mother. I relaxed into my seat.
Later, as night bruised the sky and the conversations had slowed to clusters of drawled murmurs, I lay on my back on the checked rug, Daniel beside me. Our shoulders touched companionably, his T-shirt sleeve soft against my bare arm. His mother had left and taken his sisters with her. Daniel and Stevie had to be home in twenty minutes and Sarah had promised to deliver them to their door. I tugged at my too-tight shorts. Tiredness congregated along my limbs, lay heavy on my eyelids. It was a struggle to stay awake.
From near the apple tree, someone asked what time it was. Late, was the answer. Gotta love these Irish nights, right? And the reply was murmured too softly for me to hear, but it elicited laughter and the clinking of glasses. Beth lit the candles in the jars and they flickered in the darkening garden. Judith cleared away the plates. Chris refilled glasses, ignoring protests from the adults that they’d had enough. I propped myself up on my elbows, glanced around for my mother. The garden, our garden, so unfamiliar now in the inky light. The white line of tables pushed together to create the illusion of one long buffet, the chairs occupied by people I’d never met before, the tiny candles in jam jars. It was as if I had been dropped into someone else’s home, someone else’s life for the night. Over by the French doors, balanced on a stool, sat the record player, more muted now than earlier, but still loud enough to be heard. Bob Dylan whined about being tangled up in blue, his mouth organ sawing through the night. Unseen, a blackbird called out its final song of the day. From a few houses down, another answered its call.
Beth and Stevie sat behind us. For the first time ever, Stevie wasn’t picking on Daniel or trying to annoy me. Beth laughed out loud at almost everything he said, and even I knew that she had to be faking it because little that Stevie had to say was interesting, let alone funny. Beth shook her hair around a lot as she laughed, letting it settle down her back each time, before doing it again. No matter what way she flicked it, it always came to rest in obedient sheets. Mine never did that. It did little, in fact, and until Beth entered my life, I hadn’t given it any thought. But now I was beginning to understand the power of hair. I’d seen it with my mother and now with Beth. Other people noticed. A swing of a female head garnered more attention and a quicker response than almost anything.
My ponytail had unravelled during the party. Not breaking her conversation with Brad, Gemma had gathered my hair in her hands, combed her fingers through its length and braided it, snapping on an elastic around the ends, then dropped a distracted kiss on my head and sent me on my way. Gemma had been kept busy since her late arrival. She sipped from her wine glass, ate the new food with a confidence I hadn’t felt, engaged in conversations. Brad offered her a top-up every time she drank, it seemed. Chris had hovered at the edges, joining in momentarily in the exchanges. Judith had many jobs for him to do and any time he looked settled, she called him an
d asked him to see to someone’s glass, put more meat on the barbecue, fetch a plate from inside. I observed Judith in quiet moments, but she didn’t look sad and wasn’t drinking wine by the bottle. Maybe she was saving that for later.
A match zipped along the side of a box, a small blue flame spurted, a cigarette was lit. Shaking the match, Holly offered Gemma the cigarette box. Gemma shook her head. No thanks, I never smoke. Holly’s eyebrows arched in surprise. Really? Yes, really. The tip of the cigarette was a firefly in the darkness. I followed its movements. Beside me, Daniel was asleep. Stevie and Beth were still talking.
‘Do you want a cigarette?’ Beth offered him.
‘Definitely!’ came the reply.
Beth got up, sauntered over to the table, removed a cigarette from a box and palmed a plastic lighter someone had left there. ‘Come on,’ she said, and Stevie followed her. I got up off the blanket and went too. At the bottom of the garden we gathered, Beth hunched over the task of lighting up. The apple tree cast its tentacled shadow over us. The wall behind us was warm when I touched it.
Stevie glared at me in the glow of the lighter flame. ‘What are you doing here?’
Beth sucked at the cigarette, then coughed.
I knew Stevie too well to let him push me around. ‘I live here.’
‘Go back to your boyfriend.’
‘He isn’t my boyfriend, and anyway, he’s asleep.’ I pointed at Daniel on the rug.
At the top of the garden I heard Sarah call Stevie and Daniel. Boys, time to go home. Come on now.
‘Off you go,’ I said to Stevie. ‘Bedtime.’
‘Fuck off, Megan.’ He took the proffered cigarette, dragged on it and coughed louder than Beth.
‘Hey,’ Beth said. ‘Watch your language.’
Sarah called the boys again.
‘I have to go,’ Stevie said, still coughing.
‘Oh come on, stay a little while longer.’
Stevie wanted to, I could tell, but he also didn’t want his mother calling him from their garden, embarrassing him.
One more drag on the stolen cigarette and Stevie turned to go. ‘See you soon.’