Finding Alison

by Deirdre Eustace

  She turned and looked out the window. It was just after nine and already the sky was darkening. Her eyes strayed in the direction of Tra na Leon. She had arranged to go and look around the old Warner place with Kathleen tonight but had changed her mind at the last moment, something telling her that William might be home, that she’d get a chance to talk to him, to explain her reaction to his leaving. To apologise for her anger. But when she had walked along the cliff an hour ago the camper was still locked and empty. Maybe he would come tomorrow.

  She had passed the weekend watching the camper like a child waiting for Christmas. She didn’t go into town, never strayed from the house for more than an hour for fear she would miss him, afraid that the next time she went up to Tra na Leon the camper would be gone and she’d never see him again. By ten o’clock on Monday night she’d begun to give up hope. What if he didn’t come back? Surely there was stuff in the camper that he needed. He wouldn’t just leave it there, would he? Now Tuesday had come and gone and there was still no sign of him. He had definitely said he was only going for a week. She paced the kitchen, no longer able to ignore her growing restlessness. Dropping the folder back on the desk, she picked up her mobile and tried his number for the fourth time that day. It was still switched off.

  She bit down on her lip. Something was wrong, she had sensed it all evening. Seized by a feeling of urgency she switched on her computer. She made a list of all the Dublin hospitals and began ringing round them in alphabetical order. Her search was short and in less than half an hour she had located him in Beaumont.

  The following morning, after a hurried arrangement with Kathleen to care for the dogs and a garbled excuse about a sick aunt in Dublin, she was on the road, without a thought of where she might stay, what she would say to him. She only knew that she needed to see him. And that was enough. She’d had her fill of sudden partings, with no goodbyes, no discussions. Days and nights and years of wondering, wishing. She was damned if she was going to let that happen again. She drove on over the bridge, out onto the main Dublin road and whatever awaited her at the end of it.

  Alison walked the length of the narrow ward, searching each bed in turn for his face. Some of the patients were sleeping, others lay staring ahead of them into nothingness. Only two caught her eye and she smiled apologetically. She felt like a voyeur, like she was invading their most intimate space. She tried to move without making her presence heard or seen, tried not to encroach with her eyes or body movements. But the momentary eye contact she had made with those two patients told more of their story, of William’s story, than a thousand questions could answer. The emaciated frames, the hollowed cheeks, the prominent eyes filled with a kind of innocence and trepidation. Alison was taken back to a similar, smaller ward in another Dublin hospital, to that familiar stare of child-like fear and questioning on her mother’s dying face. Her throat tightened. She swallowed hard, closing her ears and her mind and her heart to the unbearable truth screaming inside her.

  She stepped quietly to the bed by the window at the far end of the ward. William lay sleeping in a T-shirt and shorts, his hands clasped across his chest. His face looked grey and long, the closed eyes sunken. Her heart swelled, gathering every drop of blood in her body to itself. Her head swam, her legs threatening to buckle as she lowered herself onto the plastic chair by the window. Her hand stole to her lips as if to prevent the anguish that howled inside her escaping them. Her eyes moved to the bedside locker, bare except for a jug of water, a glass, and a grey and white stone from the beach. No books, no magazines, no get-well cards. Fighting the swelling in her throat, she looked away towards the car park below the window. Through her misted eyes a sea of cars glinted in the evening sun. A constant dribble of visitors and staff criss-crossed the narrow walkway to the hospital entrance, their path lit by a blaze of colour from the flowers and shrubs that lined each side. Just one wall separating two wholly different worlds, Alison sighed, her eyes returning to the white hush of the sleeping ward.

  Later, when the patient opposite protested loudly to the nurse’s ministrations, William’s eyes fluttered open, momentarily fixing on Alison before closing again. She didn’t speak but moved closer and covered his hands with hers. His eyes remained closed as he lifted his fingers and laced them between hers.

  ‘William?’ She smiled her whisper and his eyes opened slowly. Afraid. Afraid to lose the dream. He gently turned his head to the side to face her, his cheeks lifting in a slow, incredulous smile.

  ‘Alison? I thought I was dreaming . . . ’

  The disbelief and delight in his slow, low whisper tempted her tears but she held on to her smile, defying them. She squeezed his hands, not daring to speak.

  ‘How long have you been there – why didn’t you wake me?’

  ‘Not long. I didn’t want to disturb you, you looked so peaceful. Plus, you’re easier company when you’re sleeping,’ she added, a forced jollity in her low laugh. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘A million dollars for seeing you,’ he smiled, his eyes holding hers as he moved to sit up.

  ‘No, don’t move.’ She shifted from her chair and sat on the bed beside him. ‘So, this is where you’ve been hanging out?’

  ‘You can’t imagine how good it feels to see you.’ His eyes drank in her face, her hair, the loose green shirt, the tiny freckles on the exposed V of her chest. When she bent and kissed his cheek, the subtle smell of honeysuckle, the tickle of her tumbling curls on his skin sent a surge of hot life burning through him. He reached out a hand to stroke her cheek, his eyes looking in through hers. ‘Let’s get out of here for a bit.’ He eased himself into a sitting position.

  They sat on a wooden bench to the right of the hospital door. Other patients in nightgowns and slippers were gathered round on benches and wheelchairs. Some chatted and laughed with visitors, others sat deep in thought, their faces held to the sun. The breeze played with Alison’s hair and she tied it in a loose knot behind her neck. She took a deep breath before turning to face him.

  ‘How long have you known?’ She lifted her sunglasses and looked into his eyes.

  ‘Six months or so.’

  She nodded, slowly. ‘And the prognosis?’ Her questions were straight, matter of fact.

  ‘Two months, maybe less.’

  A hard slap stung her heart.

  ‘And there’s nothing . . . ’

  ‘No.’ He knew what her questions would be. The same ones he had had the first time round. ‘It’s over this time. I’ve been very lucky. Last time I beat it – won myself six years. This time it has the winning hand.’

  They sat a moment in silence, Alison digesting the full and final impact of his words. Her mind raced, searching back for the clues she had missed. That time he was sick, of course she should have seen that it was a whole lot more than a chest infection, would have seen if she hadn’t been so wrapped up in her own stuff. That day when he’d held her in the kitchen – the desperation in his sigh, in his kiss that night on the pier.

  ‘You okay?’ William broke in on her thoughts. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to land any of this on you,’ he sighed. ‘But you understand now why I had to leave the way I did.’ At least now she would know that he hadn’t just abandoned her, hadn’t just taken what he wanted and walked away as she had believed. He remembered her anger on the beach that last morning they parted, her hurt and confusion. But time would have taken care of that, would have allowed her, one day, to look back in fondness at their time together. Whereas this, he could see in the white-knuckled clench of her fingers, in the pain piercing her eyes, in her silence, this was wounding her in a far deeper place. ‘You should have just left it, Alison, you shouldn’t have come.’

  ‘I couldn’t just leave it.’ She raised her eyes, tilted her head back slightly to hold the tears that threatened. ‘Not the way we parted. There were things I needed to say to you, to explain.’

  ‘You can’t imagine the number of times I almost called you, to ask you to come. But I did
n’t want you to see or know this. I wanted you to think of me out there somewhere, to remember me as the person you shared those great times with, not wasting away in some hospital bed.’

  ‘And I wanted you to remember me laughing,’ Alison smiled, her tongue catching the tear that had escaped down her cheek. ‘The way you had taught me to laugh again. Laughing and alive, not that person you met when you first arrived. That last day on the beach – it was like I’d turned back into her. I wanted you to know that I hadn’t.’

  He eased his arm around her shoulder and drew her to him. ‘I’ve replayed that morning a million times. I never meant to hurt you, I wanted to . . . ’ He leaned her head into his chest, stroked her hair. ‘You’ll never know how much that night at the festival meant to me. Your kiss . . . ’

  ‘I thought it had driven you away.’

  ‘What drove me away was how much I wanted you. Oh, Alison.’ He sighed, kissing the top of her head. ‘I honestly thought that by leaving I could protect you.’

  ‘Don’t talk any more, William, just hold me.’ She lay back in the crook of his arms, the sun warming her face, his closeness warming the very core of her.

  The clatter of the tea trolleys scattered the visitors towards home. ‘I’ll go,’ Alison whispered, seeing the tiredness in his face. They were back in the ward and he lay on the bed, Alison beside him on the chair. ‘I’ll call again in the morning, sleep well.’ She kissed his lips and, head bent, walked back down the ward. Reaching the door, she turned to look back at him. He lay turned towards the window, the setting sun stretching its fingers up the bed. She couldn’t see the tears pool in his eyes, slowly trickle to the pillow.

  Alison half-ran to the jeep and, safely inside, she unleashed the hot tears that had bulged and burned in her throat all evening, her whole body shaking with their release. She must have sat there for over an hour, her mind wandering frantically back and forth: back to her mother in her last weeks of life, to the guilt she had felt as she prayed to God or whoever or whatever was out there to take her, to release her and end her misery. Back to her lamplight searches for Sean, willing the beam of the torch to touch him and at the same time dreading what she might find. And back to the pier and how even the magic of the fireworks had been dimmed by William’s kiss.

  Fourteen

  Alison sat in the hotel car park above Dun Laoghaire pier. It was almost 11 p.m. Not much hope of finding a bed anywhere at this hour, she thought, locking the jeep and walking towards the water. The air hummed with the chat and laughter of the crowds gathered around tables outside the hotels and bars. Hard to believe that less than two weeks ago William and herself had been just like them – carefree and happy, relaxed in the buzz and seduction of midsummer. How had he hidden it so well? She turned off the main street towards the harbour. A wolf whistle followed her from three men at the corner. Ignoring their beer-fuelled courage, Alison carried on, head bent, towards the pier.

  She climbed over the storm wall and down onto the rocks. The incoming tide whispered its welcome, its hypnotic pull and fall drawing her like a magnet. She unknotted the cardigan from her waist and, pulling it tight over her shoulders, huddled down into the darkness.

  She wondered if he were sleeping now, pictured him alone in his bed under the window. He had looked so out of place, so totally alone when she’d looked back down the ward as she was leaving. He didn’t belong there. The image of him swimming naked in the cove at Tra na Leon returned to her. He had seemed such a natural part of the place, the water and the sun caressing him, making him their own. There had been an energy about him that morning, an air of celebration, a total abandonment to life that had triggered something forgotten in her.

  She lit a cigarette and, inhaling deeply, tried to concentrate on the hiss and lick of the tide in an effort to calm and untangle the questions that circled endlessly in her head. Would it have been better for both of them if she had left things as they were, accepted their parting and not gone in search of him? Could she cope with another death, with reliving her mother’s last weeks, Sean’s disappearance? Had she the strength, the courage to stay? To walk away? Would she have come if she’d known what she was going to find? Honestly?

  The following morning, after a quick wash in the hotel foyer bathroom, Alison sat down to a light breakfast in the dining room. Despite just a few hours’ sleep reclined on the passenger seat of the jeep, she felt strangely energised. She secured a room at the hotel for the next two nights and took a brisk walk along the pier before driving straight on to the hospital.

  William was sleeping. Alison moved to the window as the sound of an aeroplane taking off from nearby Dublin Airport shattered the silence. She tried to imagine what it must be like for William, lying here day in day out, watching those planes, filled with expectant holidaymakers, crossing his patch of blue. Did he wonder about the journey that he was embarking on: where he was going, what, if anything, awaited him? A shiver of cold fear rippled right through her at the thought of entering the absolute unknown. Alone. With no map, no language, nothing to . . .

  ‘Good morning, dear. William? William, you have a visitor.’ The nurse’s chirpy call broke into Alison’s thoughts and she turned from the window as William stirred, his eyes and his smile fixing on her.

  ‘Look at that day,’ she smiled, moving to his side. ‘Do you think you could come out for a couple of hours?’ Her eyes entreated the nurse, who was still hovering.

  ‘What are the chances, Mary?’ William winked at the nurse and she caught a glint in his eye that hadn’t been there before.

  ‘I don’t know, William. Are you seeing Mr Fogarty this morning?’

  ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘I don’t see any reason . . . I’ll just have to check with his team. Leave it with me a moment.’ She returned William’s wink and soft-stepped back to the nurses’ station.

  ‘What do you fancy doing, if you can come?’ Alison sat on the bed beside him.

  ‘Okay, William, three hours max,’ the nurse smiled, checking the watch at her breast. ‘It’s almost twelve now, so we’ll expect you back by three.’ She disconnected the drip and secured the cannula in his arm with a plaster. ‘Lunch before you go?’

  ‘No, thank you, Mary. I’m sure she’ll feed me.’

  ‘I’ll leave you to get dressed.’ Alison moved away from the bed as the nurse drew round the curtain. ‘I’ll just pop downstairs for a moment, I want to make a phone call.’

  Alison stepped out of the lift and crossed the foyer to the main door, searching her mobile from her bag.

  ‘Hi, Kathleen?’

  ‘Alison, how’s it goin’?’

  ‘Good, are the dogs all right?’

  ‘I had them out for a run this morning and I’ll tell you, a bit more of that and I’ll be fitting into that dress in no time! How’s your aunt?’

  ‘Good, thanks. Listen, Kathleen, I’m going to be another day or two, do you mind watching them for me?’

  ‘No problem.’ Alison’s voice seemed heavy, forced. ‘Is everything all right?’ Kathleen asked, concerned.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I just want to spend a little more time. Will you tell Maryanne I’ll be back by the weekend? Thanks, Kathleen, I’ll talk to you tomorrow.’

  And just like that she was gone. Kathleen tossed the phone in her hand. Typical Alison, she sighed, rushing up there at the first call. Didn’t she have enough on her plate already with Maryanne? Surely there must be some other relative closer who could be called on. The only aunt Kathleen ever remembered Alison mentioning was that half-cracked spinster in Terenure – and she hadn’t been running down here when Alison was in trouble.

  She had been so disappointed when Alison had cancelled their plans to go and look around the house on Tuesday evening. Work, she’d said, but surely she could have taken a break for an hour? While Alison did congratulate her on the house and seemed genuinely pleased for her, Kathleen remembered having felt at the time that Alison showed no great excitement about it, no rea
l interest. And why should she, she asked herself now, filling another pint glass with hot water and a slice of lemon. She couldn’t expect others, not even her best friend, to be as over the moon as she was. This was her stuff, her life, the whole rest of the world wasn’t bursting with celebration just because she was. And she had to start being mindful of that. Her world had changed, had been transformed, but Alison’s hadn’t and maybe she was shoving that fact in Alison’s face by constantly talking of the wedding and the honeymoon and the house. But it was hard not to, there was so much going on inside her and it just kept bursting out, she couldn’t contain it! And she didn’t want to. This was once-in-a-lifetime stuff and these would be the memories she would look back on in years to come. But she would be more mindful, she promised, of Alison and of her world.

  Alison was missing that guy William more than she was letting on; Kathleen knew by the way she always changed the subject – quite snappily at times – whenever Kathleen brought up his name. Right from the start she had copped that Alison fancied him but just wasn’t giving in to it – just as well, Kathleen supposed now, the way he’d just upped and left like that. Maybe the break away from the place would do her good, could be exactly what she needed. She tipped back her head, emptied the glass and stood it on the sink. Only six more to go to reach the day’s quota.

  * * *

  Approaching Killiney, William rolled down the window and took a deep breath through his nose. ‘Now, that’s what I call medicine,’ he smiled, the salt air filling his lungs. Parking close to the beach, Alison busied herself taking a fold-up chair from the boot while he eased himself slowly from his seat. Already the crowds were about, the afternoon sun peacocking in a cloudless sky. They found a quiet spot over to the right of the walkway. Alison kicked off her shoes and unfolded the chair for William. She bent down and slipped off his sandals, the hot sand hugging his feet.