Finding Alison

by Deirdre Eustace

  ‘You’re tired of my company already?’ she teased.

  ‘Alison, never!’ He sat the mugs on the table and, taking her in his arms, hugged her tightly. She closed her eyes and drank in his closeness, his freshness and warmth, the feeling of absolute comfort and security that washed right through her. He buried his face in the thickness of her hair, a deep sigh laced with longing escaping from the depths of him: a longing for all he had never had with her and yet could still feel its loss. He pulled away gently, his hands still resting on her shoulders, eyes searching hers, his lips burning to touch the bow that arched and parted hers.

  ‘Alison,’ his voice was heavy and hoarse, ‘dear, sweet Alison. What would I have done these past few days without you?’

  She didn’t speak, reading more in his eyes than his words or his thanks could ever say.

  ‘I’ll miss you,’ he sighed, giving her shoulders a tight squeeze before turning to sit, not trusting his heart or his tongue to hold their silence.

  ‘Then you’ll at least wait till this afternoon?’ She busied herself sugaring her coffee. ‘I want to go up there first, check that everything’s okay for you.’ The determination and authority that had driven her words in the past few days was replaced by a dull resignation.

  * * *

  Alison’s jaw dropped and she stopped mid-stride. Along the side of the camper, bright red paint trickled like blood from the thick, ugly scrawl above. She moved nearer, her step hesitant. ‘Git Out Git Out’ repeated itself again and again along the length of its side, on the door and windows, the paint splashed about on the steps and grass. It must have been done last night, the rain clawing red tears from each letter. She stepped around the back. The generator was upturned and thrown near the gorse. Alison hauled it back into place. Along the back of the camper ‘SEANY’ screamed at her in a large, childish scrawl. She shook her head in a mixture of temper and understanding. Joe. This was his work. It had to be. He was the only one who ever called Sean by that name. If she caught him, she’d have his tonsils! She touched the paint. It hadn’t quite dried but she would have to make a start on it soon before the sun made it stick. She drove back to the house, where she’d left William reading in the sitting room.

  ‘Just popped back to get a few bits and pieces,’ she called from the hall. She filled a basin with cloths, sponges and a bottle of turps. In the bedroom she threw on an old T-shirt and her gardening jeans. On her way back out she popped her head round the sitting-room door. ‘Just going to . . .’ He lay on the couch sleeping, the open book resting on his chest. Alison tiptoed in and covered him with a throw before scribbling a quick note to say she’d be back for him at four.

  Two hours later she sat on the scrubbed step of the camper door and lit a cigarette. Her arms and her neck ached, her hands raw and tight from the water. She would kill Joe when she caught him. What if he comes back and does it again tonight, she thought. That would be all William would need to run him out of the place. Not that he seemed to need any more prompting, she sighed, drawing heavily on her cigarette. Her mind returned for the umpteenth time to their embrace this morning. Had she imagined the desperation in his sigh – in the way he’d held her so tightly? How his eyes had misted over when he’d whispered how he’d miss her? A niggling voice whispered at the back of her mind. He’s going away. Away from here. Away from you. She stamped out her cigarette and began to scrub at the remaining paint with a renewed energy. He’s leaving here, he’s leaving you. The little voice sang with every stroke of her arm, the waves crashing in contempt to the shore below. Alison clenched her jaw. She scrubbed and scrubbed till the camper shone like new in the afternoon sun. She would come back again later, she decided. She’d make some excuse to William and she would catch that little bastard if he came back again and march him straight home to his mother.

  Happy that the generator was working and that the windows and door were secure, she whistled for the dogs and headed for home.

  * * *

  Claire was right. Again. She couldn’t really blame Mum, could she? Hannah sat on the steps of Claire’s gallery and scanned the crowd for her aunt’s red jacket. She tucked her knees under her chin, folded her arms round her calves. She wouldn’t dare treat Claire like that: slamming doors, the ‘whatever’ treatment, filling her with lies and then making her feel guilty when she caught you out. It was easy to make Mum feel guilty, Hannah knew. Knew that she had worked on it too. Claire would send her packing if she tried any of that on her. But Mum had put up with it. Put up with Nan and the hospital and everything – imagine Claire doing that every day. Fat chance!

  She lowered her head, her thick black curls screening her face. She swallowed back the burn that heated her chest and closed her eyes to block out the memory of that night, of P O’N – she could no longer even think his full name, never mind say it! Why had she ever bothered with that loser? And what else was Mum to think after all that stuff with Kathleen and Jamie and everything. Poor little Jamie, she had always considered him her little brother. Some big sister she’d turned out to be, standing behind that eejit, letting him roar like that. She pictured Jamie’s face, the tears springing from his eyes. She hugged herself tighter. She would make it up to him, bring him back one of those dinosaurs she had seen at the market on Little Lane. Funny, she had thought of Jamie the moment she saw them that day.

  And she would ring Mum tonight, she sighed, lifting her head. Like Claire said, Mum had enough on her plate with Nan and all without her adding to it. She glanced at her watch. Five forty-five. Claire had arranged to pick her up after work, but she was late. Again. She looked up the street, pictured Claire tottering towards her on her five-inch heels, shopping bags swinging – though she was supposed to be uptown at a meeting all afternoon – all flushed and breathless with apologies.

  Her eyes wandered over the crowds milling along the footpaths, each with a face like they were setting off on some mission to save the world. A young couple, hand in hand, jerked backwards out of the horn blast of a black taxi. A gaggle of Spanish students, like ducks in their yellow T-shirts, marched behind their guide up the steps beside her. She touched her hand to the spot where the sun scorched the base of her neck, pictured the beach at Carniskey, the surfers skimming the waves.

  ‘Hey, Hannah!’ Harry, a college student who also had a summer job at Claire’s gallery, loped down the steps towards her, his blond fringe dancing.

  * * *

  William waved her off just after seven and returned to the sitting room to lie down on the couch. He felt weak, exhausted all the time, but while Alison was about he had done his best to pretend he was back to some kind of normality. He shifted on his back till the pain eased in his hip. Alison’s spirits seemed to have lifted after her chat on the phone with Hannah but she had seemed a little distant with him all evening. The edge was missing from her humour and whenever she spoke it was as if she was preoccupied, bothered by something else entirely. She was probably exhausted, and who could blame her, all the extra work he had put on her and then that damned generator kicking up and Alison having to haul it to the garage for repair. No wonder she seemed a bit out of sorts; she’d probably be glad to see the back of him in the morning when the generator was fixed.

  He closed his eyes and allowed his mind to wander back again to this morning. He hoped he hadn’t offended her, that she hadn’t felt hurt or rejected. He could almost swear that she burned for that closeness as much as he did. It was there in her eyes, in the full and open invitation of her lips. It had killed him to turn away, to snap the magic, the unspoken yearning between them. But it wasn’t him that she needed. Alison needed to know, to recognise, that she was coming alive herself, and not to confuse that feeling with loving him.

  Besides, it would have hurt her more if he hadn’t pulled away. Their absolute separation in a couple of months’ time would surely destroy her. And he could never die in peace were he to leave behind that legacy of pain.

  He had done his best to hide his di
sappointment when she told him she was going out tonight. He had barely seen her since this morning and when she told him that he had either to spend another night with her or sit in darkness in the camper, his heart had lifted at the chance of one more evening alone with her. But another part of him was glad that she was spending a few hours with Kathleen, getting involved in her plans for the wedding, looking forward. It was just what Alison needed. She had spent long enough in the past.

  * * *

  Alison had parked at the beach and walked the steep track to Tra na Leon so Joe wouldn’t know she was there. She sat now on the narrow bed in the camper, staring into the eyes on the drawing in her hand. She felt a strange affinity with the charcoal image, recognised the pain, the isolation, the deep searching that William had captured so brilliantly in Helene’s eyes.

  A low muttering outside startled her. She sat upright, holding her breath. She could barely make out the low singsong words:

  ‘We’ll have a good one this year, Seany

  Back with us this year, Seany . . . ’

  Joe. She knew it! She rose softly, flicked on the light and burst out through the door.

  ‘Joe O’Sullivan!’ she screamed. He made to run but tripped on the grass, the can of red paint spilling like fresh blood round his head. Alison grabbed him and pulling him up by the shoulders of his coat, sat him on the step of the camper.

  ‘What are you playing at, Joe? Do you realise the work you gave me today?’ She bent to his bowed face. ‘Joe!’ She shook his shoulders and he began to keen like a trapped and frightened animal.

  ‘Look at me, Joe.’ Her voice was high with temper. He shook his head quickly from side to side, muttering. She grabbed his chin and forced his eyes to meet hers. His eyelids fluttered nervously over his bead-like eyes.

  ‘Why did you do it?’

  He stuttered, then howled at her, ‘Seany’s comin’, Seany’s comin!’

  ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Joe, Sean is gone! He’s gone, understand? He’s not coming back. Sean is DEAD! HE’S DEAD!’ Alison could see her words strike his face like blows and, realising the strength and venom in her words and her hold, she let go her grip on his chin and shoulder. She hadn’t wanted to hurt him, just to frighten him off.

  ‘Get out of here, Joe. And if you come back again, I’ll march you down to your mother and she’ll get the guards. They came for you before and they’ll lock you up this time. Mark my words, if I catch you up here again, you’ve had it!’ He sat on, the head, still bowed, dancing from side to side.

  ‘Go on, Joe, get home. I’ll tell no one this time.’

  Still half-sitting, he made a sudden lurch from the step and ran for the track. Safely out of reach, he turned and shouted: ‘You mark my words. He’s comin’! Seany’s comin!’ He threw something from his pocket and ran into the gathering darkness. Alison stepped forward and picked up the wedding photo of herself and Sean. She smiled her sadness at Joe’s determination. At his lasting insistence, his genuine belief that Sean would return. And at how the years had never worn or thwarted his love for him.

  * * *

  The ring of the telephone released William from a hellish dream of burning fields and naked, emaciated bodies piled high along the scorched ditches. He reached for the phone on the coffee table.

  ‘Hello?’ His voice was hoarse, still wrapped in sleep. ‘Hello?’

  The line went dead. He dropped the phone in his lap and ran his hands over his face, wiping the perspiration from his forehead. It rang again.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello,’ a male voice, hesitant. ‘Is . . . is Alison there?’

  ‘I’m sorry, she’s out at the moment. Can I take a mess—’

  The caller hung up again. At least he had chased the nightmare, William sighed, checking his watch: eleven fifteen. Easing himself into a sitting position, he stood and made his way to the window, to the blackness outside that seemed to beckon him.

  Sean felt the bile rise and burn inside him. ‘She’s out,’ he whispered, and then, his voice rising, ‘and some bastard is sitting there in my home!’ He punched his fist into the table, sending the glass smashing to the floor.

  Tom O’Donnell threw back the bedclothes, swung his legs out onto the floor and sat on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands. His heart hammered, beads of sweat gathering on his forehead as the image, clearer than a painting, formed again in the darkness, as it had every night since: the tiny body spread out on the shingle at the foot of the cliff, the torchlight lending the pale skin the luminosity of an angel.

  He cursed the day that Sean had come to stay with them, cursed the night he had spilled his past. But most of all he cursed his own stupidity and foolish judgement for showing him that ad in The Skipper. Had he not a whit of sense? He had seen the depth and the darkness of Sean’s pain, should have known to stand well clear and mind his own family.

  Sean hadn’t worked in over two weeks and the whiskey bottle had become his almost constant companion. He hardly slept beyond the times his head would hit the table in a drunken slumber in the small hours. Days he’d spend alone on the cliff, looking out beyond the ocean, out to the past and how he might change it. The atmosphere in the house was dark and charged and little Daniel had withdrawn into himself with the confusion and hurt of Sean’s rejection.

  Sean had roared at him late one evening when Daniel followed him along the cliff top. Roared at him to go home, that he was a nuisance and he was sick of him following him everywhere like a dumb pup. When Sean returned later with the dark and no Daniel, panic shook the house and within an hour the whole community could be seen combing the cliffs and the strands, torches winking and dancing in the blackness. Just after midnight his mother, who had sat silent and trancelike by the fire for hours, rose without speaking and opened the door, her steps all the time quickening, quickening, till she ran to the small shed at the top of the pier. She tore open the door and the harbour light shone into the cramped interior. And it shone on the small golden head asleep on a mound of salmon nets under the window. Still she didn’t speak, but lifted the sleeping child in her arms, her silent tears unleashed as she carried him home to the warmth and safety of his bed.

  If they had lost Daniel that night, he would have finished Sean off with his own hands. Instead, drunk on relief, he had welcomed Sean back into the house, a house now divided and heavy. Ella made it clear by her silence that she wished Sean gone, while Sean tempted the child with sweets, coloured pens, stories, but a wedge of hurt was planted firmly between them, strangling the spontaneity and trust that had once propelled the child towards his ‘uncle Sean’.

  Sean’s drinking had worsened after that. Tom could see how it fuelled his torment when the child would pull away from him or answer him without looking in his direction. With Sean drinking later and later into the night, something inside Tom refused to let him rest. He was constantly alert, constantly on watch for something. He could feel what he could only describe as a heavy darkness gathering, approaching, in the same way a storm darkens and looms, pulling the sky and the horizon tighter, shrinking the light. That night with Daniel had been a warning. The whole bloody thing needed sorting, needed ending now, and Tom knew he had no option but to ask Sean to leave.

  He heard the crash in the kitchen, groped for his shirt and trousers in the dark, his bare feet light and uncertain on the stairs. He entered the kitchen and switched on the overhead light. Sean squinted in its glare, replaced the telephone receiver with a hurried thump, guilt and confusion thundering his face.

  ‘Don’t ye think ye’ve hurt her enough?’ Tom’s whisper was laced with anger.

  ‘I just wanted to hear her . . . ’

  ‘Ye gave up that pleasure a long time ago when ye left her alone with that wee child.’ He shook his head at the splinters of glass, the pool of golden liquid at his feet.

  ‘I never stopped loving her, never . . . ’

  ‘It’s not about ye, Sean!’ Tom caught him roughly by the shoulders. ‘Wha
t would it do to her? Have ye thought about that? If she knew that all those years she mourned and searched, ye were ALIVE? Think, man. Think beyond yer own selfishness!’

  They talked and argued till Tom’s anger was spent and Sean was sober. They reached a deal. Tom would travel one more time to see Alison, would ask the questions that tormented Sean. And then Sean would leave. Go back on the Spanish boats, go wherever. And forget.

  * * *

  ‘You went to your bed early last night.’ Alison turned from the sink as William stepped into the kitchen. ‘I got back just before twelve – no sign of life.’

  ‘Well, I figured that once you girls got together you’d be at it till the small hours.’ William, lying awake in the darkness, had heard her come in and go straight to her room. Had half-risen from the bed to knock on her door with the excuse of telling her that she’d had a missed call. Old fool, his head had mocked, leaning back down against the pillows.

  ‘So, you ready for home?’ she smiled, a forced breeziness in her voice. She was anxious to steer the conversation away from last night. Away from the awful foreboding that had crept into her after Joe had run off. Away from the panicked feeling that something terrible was about to crash in around her, a feeling so real that it chased her down the steep track in the darkness and home to the safe familiarity of her own bed.

  ‘All set. By the way, some guy phoned last night, just after eleven.’ He scanned her face.

  ‘Guy?’

  ‘Yeah. Didn’t get a name or a message, I’m afraid – I told him you were out.’ Her puzzlement looked genuine.

  ‘Probably some kids messing.’ She dried her hands, folded the towel. ‘There’s been a few of those lately. Anyway, better get going. I checked with the garage, the generator’s fixed and they’ve left it back up.’ She grabbed her keys, the dogs’ heads rising with their rattle.