Herself Alone in Orange Rain

by Tracey Iceton

  ‘He has and from the fact that you’re asking me about it I’m guessing he has to you, too.’

  She purses her lips as though refusing some foul-tasting medicine.

  ‘And?’ I press.

  ‘I don’t know, Caoilainn. Working for Sinn Fein, I’ve seen the good they’re doing. It’s a way forward that might mean we’ve not to bury another comrade, another friend.’ She returns my squeeze. ‘Maybe we’ve done enough now to be able to talk peace, make peace.’

  ‘What if we haven’t?’

  ‘Haven’t we a responsibility to find out?’

  I think of Briege, how fragile, broken, she looked when I took what was left of her home.

  ‘Yes. But what if Brendan’s right about it being a sell out?’

  ‘Do you really think the leadership would do that to us?’ she asks.

  Ingrained cynicism, a childhood scar, prevents me from being certain of the answer. The ground beneath me tilts; I’m slipping.

  Lunchtime traffic congeals around us. I tell Mairead about the meeting with Kevin. Examined under a suspicious spotlight it could be read as him giving me up for dog meat. I mention the newspaper on my Dublin door, the recent letter. It could be the UFF but it could be something much worse. Panic patters my heart. Mairead rationalises; if the big men were after selling out the military campaign for political power they’d be more decisive about it than just sending threatening letters. But if Brendan’s right about Loughgall they have been decisive. Now maybe they’re regretting it, taking a subtler approach. If… Maybe… Mairead keeps talking, coaching me against Brendan’s paranoia. We’re all in this together, she reminds me, including the leadership, united for a united Ireland. I remind her that just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you. But I say nothing about Loughgall because I don’t want her thinking I’m irrational, even though part of me thinks that myself.

  A young man in a baggy suit perches on the end of our bench, lunchbox on his knee. Mairead asks about Patrick. I blush but tell her.

  ‘Good on yous. I always knew you loved him.’

  ‘But where’s it going?’

  ‘If I’d the power to tell you that all our problems’d be solved,’ she laughs.

  The clerk finishes his sarnie and leaves. We return to our previous topic; she cogently argues the sense of her campaigning for Sinn Fein. But she didn’t do ten years in Armagh without believing in the right to take up arms. Trying to cross a vast ocean in a deflating dingy, our only option is to keep paddling, hoping we won’t sink. Rationally, logically, I convince myself she’s right. Illogically, emotionally, I fret about Danny, Ciaran, Tommy and Joe. If what Brendan suspects is correct, they’re in danger, along with any volunteer who won’t lay down his or her arms without a final, fatal salvo. I should at least tell Liam. He’s got the whole Tyrone Brigade to shield from the blast. But can I even trust him? The answer dissolves into the Liffey’s murky waters.

  It’s late afternoon. The sun has circled us, blinding us now. Mairead gives me a number where I can contact her. We hug again and it’s like our prison parting but this time, although we’re both at liberty, it doesn’t feel like either of us is free: safe.

  I wander the city, sticking to public places, lingering near garda cars, oppressed by panic, raging at myself for not being able to fight it off. The enemy is all those opposed to our short or long-term objectives. We must realise that not all our enemies are so clearly identifiable as armed Brits or RUC.

  As day fades I find a bar, mocked up with harps and Celtic symbols, for those who like their Ireland traditional and Troubles-free. But the Troubles are Ireland’s tradition. I get a Guinness and sit where I can see the front door, fire exit, bar and most of the room. Through a cloud of cigarette smoke I watch but there are no faces I recognise and no one pays me any attention. The pint lasts until after dark. I set off for home.

  Collar of my jacket turned up and cap pulled low, I stroll, glancing aimlessly, studying carefully. Nobody slouches in parked cars or skulks in darkened doorways. I loop around the block, vault the fence of the house behind mine and drop into my own garden like a burglar.

  The house smells foisty, rotten. Dust coats the surfaces; cobwebs hang from the coving. The chill of emptiness pervades every room. Silence booms through the stillness. The first thing I do is check the post piled on the doormat. It’s all junk mail. I try to be relieved. Gathering a few clothes, I hunt for a bag and remember Daideo’s rucksack. Standing on a chair, I lift the loft hatch and drag down the rigid leather satchel. His bits of life are still inside. I stuff my clothes on top and buckle the flap, tracing the etched PWF insignia with a finger. Then I sit in the lounge, waiting for something I might have already missed.

  Ballygawley, Co. Tyrone—28th August, 1987

  I’m back ten days before I visit Ciaran, Tommy and Joe, giving them the same story I’ve told Danny; we’re going to be quiet for a while. If there’s a problem, let me know, otherwise I don’t want to hear from yous. They don’t protest; Briege’s sideswipe with death has them rattled.

  I should’ve seen them sooner but I needed to think, away from Dublin and its portents of ruin. Ten days of thinking and the only clear thing is that it’s pro and anti-treaty again, watching for who falls which side of the line that divides physical force from political posturing. I wish I knew how Daideo handled this in his day. Bits of me are breaking off, blowing away in the wind, leaves from a dying tree. If our own politicos destroy us before we’ve finished the fight what’s it all been for? If we fight on when there’s no need we’re the murderers people have long accused us of being.

  Patrick asks what’s wrong. I convince him everything’s fine; he’s glad of the lull. We make the most of it, him coming down week nights as well as weekends, rush hour traffic all he has to battle for now.

  The first week of September Danny, Patrick and I are in the garden, bathed in an Indian sunset, swilling cold beers and having the craic. The sky displays its plumage; the land slewed at our feet is green and lush. I long to capture this one perfect moment in delicately washed watercolours. Isn’t this what we’ve fought for?

  A V of geese flap left to right, silhouetted against the rose-gold heavens.

  ‘Would you look at that,’ Danny says. ‘Sure, it’s a grand life, flying free like that.’

  ‘It is,’ Patrick agrees. ‘Going where life’s trouble-free.’

  ‘Troubles-free,’ I correct.

  The geese disappear over the horizon. The distant drone of a car nears, loudens. Tyres crunch on gravel.

  ‘Is that visitors?’ Patrick asks, twisting in his deckchair.

  ‘I’ll go.’ I slip into the kitchen, blinking down the cool darkness and stumbling through to the hall.

  Liam is coming in the front door as I emerge from the kitchen.

  ‘Hello. What’re you doing here?’

  ‘I’m wanting a word with you.’ He strides into the front room and stands, back to the fireplace, waiting on me. ‘Patrick here?’

  ‘Aye, and Danny. Outside.’

  ‘Close the door.’

  I do it. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘I’m wondering why you’ve stood your unit down.’

  ‘After what happened with Briege we were needing a break.’

  ‘You should’ve talked to me first.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  He stares at me, grey eyes piercing. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Have you had more threats?’

  I can’t tell him the answer is ‘don’t know’. ‘There’ve not been any more letters, no.’

  ‘Something else, so?’

  The floor cracks, a chasm opening up in front of me. Panicked by the drop, I inch away from the edge. ‘No.’

  ‘Do I need to stand you down, find another cell leader, another volunteer?’

  ‘I’m fine. Just give us time to regroup.’

  He sighs. ‘OK., but we’ve things in the offing. I’ll have to know
where you are soon.’

  Fuck sake, come on, this is Liam. Tell him.

  I can’t.

  Trust him.

  I daren’t.

  ‘I’ll be where I’ve always been, doing what needs to be done.’

  He shakes his head. ‘Come on, Caoilainn, I know you too well to be fobbed off with neat wee platitudes. Whatever it is you can tell me.’

  His voice is soft with concern. I see myself crumbling, leaning against him, imagine the feel of hot tears filling my eyes, hear myself spluttering jumbled doubts, picture him hugging me better. I drag myself out of the tempting vision, forbidding myself to break. I can’t risk it. If he’s on the opposite side…

  ‘Jesus, Caoilainn, don’t you trust me?’

  Isn’t that what he’d say to make me betray myself?

  ‘Don’t be daft.’

  ‘So bloody well tell me what’s going on.’ His voice comes off soothing, sharpens up. ‘Christ, I’m not just your OC, we’re friends. If you’ve a problem let me help.’

  What if he’s the problem? What if I’m the problem? What if the problem is the fucking problem? Acid corrodes me, paranoia eating through my bones, dissolving me. I push him away with the last of my strength.

  ‘I just need to work things out in my head, Liam. You can’t help with that. No one can. I’m sorry but that’s it right now.’

  He rubs his eyes. Tiredness? Irritation?

  ‘OK. Let me know when you’ve done that.’

  He puts a hand on my shoulder. I shrug it off. He winces. The pain of my rejection rebounds on me. I stiffen.

  ‘Fine. I will. Is that all?’

  He shakes his head, a ‘what’ve I done?’ pleading in his eyes.

  I see him to the door. He trudges down the path, stoop-shouldered and head-bowed. I close the door before he reaches his car to stop myself calling him back. How many more doors are going to close before this is over?

  In bed that night a stuttering movie, six years of memories, plays on a screen in my head: the boom and chatter of bombs and guns; the smell of cordite; the bodies, twisted and torn. Actions and reactions rise from the ground, ghostly spectres. I stand on a hilltop, overlooking the land of my past. Viewed from a distance it drenches me in a sublime terror that has lurked, unfelt and unseen, for as long as I let myself see only a sliver at a time. As single details it was manageable but taken as a whole it’s too much for one person to have done: my Sistine Chapel. It’s not a nightmare I can wake from.

  I get up. Sit in the lounge in 3 A.M. chill, picking at an intricately knotted argument. Each time I pull a thread it comes away loose and the knot stays tangled. Are things better now than when I joined? No. And they won’t be as long as the BA are patrolling the streets, the SAS leaping up from hedgerows, the DUP wielding their political swords. Do I believe we should be giving up the fight now? Maybe. Tactics are dictated by the existing conditions. But what the fuck are those conditions?

  I regret nothing. There are things I wish had been different. But they weren’t: aren’t. I can only follow the directions given to me. If they’re wrong I’ll get lost.

  I am where I am. It is what it is. I can only try to survive whatever’s coming and hope the end is worth the effort.

  I creep back to bed and crawl under the covers, huddling into Patrick’s warmth.

  Life becomes abnormally normal. I revert to a domestic existence I’d forgotten I could live. Danny finds a job with a local garage, repairing tractors mostly but better than nothing. Joe, Tommy and Ciaran go about their lives, visiting sometimes but for social reasons. Liam stays away, things between us strained, stretched beyond the point of elastic recoil. Patrick maintains the punishing commute from Belfast. Sometimes he works from the cottage. I finally collect the Norton from Terry Boyce’s shed where it’s been hidden since July. It’s not rideable so Danny recovers it in the works van. Evenings when Patrick is pinned in Belfast we tinker with it together. I fill the rest of the space painting and drawing, regularly driving to Dungannon for materials then sitting on lonely hillsides, painting flowers, wee cottages, sheep-dotted pastures, sunsets and rises, my artistic palette only able to tolerate bland flavours after my Army diet of too little art and too much angst.

  One day, while I’m buying stewing steak, Mr Quinn notices my paint-spattered hands, asks if himself and I are redecorating. I say I’m an artist, pictures. Am I now, he asks, and would I be selling them? I’ve not considered that but say I’ll bring one down next time; if he likes it he can have it for whatever he thinks fair.

  A week later I take two small canvasses, a lilac sunset and a landscape of the Tyrone moors. He buys the pair for a fiver and hangs them behind the bloodstained counter. People see them, admire them. A few locals place orders. Mr Quinn suggests I do more, offers to display them in his shop. I start making pocket money from my brushstrokes, mostly off wealthy wandering tourists. It’s not the grand career Daideo wanted for me. It’s not even the art I thought I’d be painting. It’s so twee, so saccharine, not the conceptual art I used to do; something else I’ve lost: anarchic creativity. But, finally, at twenty-five, I’m doing something that can’t get me arrested or killed.

  The bike is fixed; I tour the countryside on bright autumn days, a sketch pad and pencils in my rucksack, parking at scenic lookouts to cast the view in pale grey lines that I fill with colour later. If I get home first I cook but there are more nights when Patrick or Danny have my tea ready, drying up in the range. They tease me over my slipshod housewifery; I return with quips about their feminine domesticity.

  I think we could go on like this forever, pretending the war is over, the victory ours.

  Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh—9th November, 1987

  Bomb Blast Murders Eleven

  Remembrance Day Service

  Desecrated by IRA

  A huge bomb, believe to be the work of the IRA, has exploded during Remembrance Sunday commemorations at the cenotaph in Enniskillen, killing eleven people.

  Among those murdered were three married couples, a retired policeman and a nurse. Another 63 have being injured, nine seriously. Thirteen children are among those being treated following the blast which demonstrated Republicans’ callous attitude towards innocent civilians.

  It is thought the bomb was hidden in a nearby hall which collapsed during the explosion, hurling debris onto the crowd gathered to pay their respects to those who gave their lives defending Ulster during two world wars. Victims were buried under several feet of rubble, hampering the attempts of rescue workers.

  Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher called the bombing, ‘utterly barbaric,’ and said it was, ‘a blot on mankind.’ Head of the Church of Ireland, Archbishop Robin Eames, who was attending the service said, ‘I wish the bombers could have seen what I’ve seen.’ The Queen sent heartfelt condolences to the survivors.

  Enniskillen’s history of support for Britain’s international conflicts, along with its proximity to the Irish Republic, make it an easy target for IRA terrorists who probably fled to safety across the border.

  No organisation has claimed responsibility for the carnage but an RUC spokesman said there was no doubt the IRA were behind the massacre and appealed for help to bring the murderers to justice.

  Monday dawns bright and frosty. I wave Patrick off and stroll into the village for provisions and deliveries, three more oil paintings wrapped in brown paper and slung over my shoulder. Later I’ll ride to Lough Erne; I’ve an order for a landscape.

  In the butcher’s Mr Quinn greets me with:

  ‘Wouldn’t you never think they’d do something the like of this?’ His jowly face is creased into a grimace.

  ‘Who do what?’

  ‘The Provos,’ he spits. ‘It’s wee ’uns and ould folks, nothing to do with anything.’

  Fear swells in my stomach.

  ‘Haven’t you heard?’

  ‘I’ve not had the radio on this morning.’

  ‘They’ve let off a bomb at Enniskillen, at the war me
morial.’

  My stomach revolts. I rush outside and puke on the pavement, rice crispies floating in a murky pool of tea and bile. He comes to see if I’m OK. I wave him away and sprint home.

  Danny is still in bed. I bang into his darkened room and shake him.

  ‘Get up.’

  His eyes flutter. He brushes me off with a limp hand.

  ‘Fuck sake, wake up.’ I rip back the covers.

  The cold blast jerks him awake. He sits forward with a snap.

  ‘Are we being attacked?’

  ‘Get dressed. We’re going to Fermanagh.’

  ‘What for? Jesus, Caoilainn it’s…’ He fumbles for the clock and groans at the earliness of the day.

  ‘Get dressed.’ I bang out again.

  Five minutes later he emerges from the house. I have the Norton ready and my helmet on. I hold the spare to Danny. He scowls at the rain-laden sky.

  ‘Can’t we take the car?’

  I kick the bike into life. ‘Get on.’ He climbs up behind me.

  I tear down the A4, taking the sweeping corners cranked over, our knees almost grazing the tarmac, blasting by cars and riding headlong into oncoming traffic, dodging and weaving through the morning commute. Horns blare and trees blur. Danny clings to me. I don’t slow down. And it’s buildings blurring, industrial units, shops, houses, a church; my horn blaring as I blast dilly-dalliers aside. I jump two red lights and rail into a side road, abandoning the bike on double yellows.

  Danny leaps off, shaking and gasping, fingers white, frozen into the grip that was the only thing keeping him from bone-cracking impact with tarmac. He pulls his helmet off and fumbles for a cigarette. I light one and give it to him.

  ‘Fuck, Caoilainn, you trying to kill us?’