The Playground

by Julia Kelly

  ‘When the snow’s here, can I be an ice-skater?’ Addie said, jolting me back to the present.

  ‘OK, sweetie.’ I said, turning the keys in the ignition and pulling out.

  ‘Maybe I’ll be a good ice-skater. Maybe I’ll be bad.’

  ‘Maybe, sweetie,’ I said, distracted, looking in the overhead mirror.

  ‘What’s your favourite colour?’

  ‘You know what it is. You ask me every day. Blue.’

  ‘Dark blue or light blue?’

  ‘Christ, Addie. I don’t know. Just blue, OK. I’m trying to concentrate!’

  ‘Dus tell me! Dark blue or light blue?’

  ‘Light blue.’

  ‘I’m going to make you a surprise card.’

  I chose the coast road home because I wanted to see the sea. I needed some air and some space. By Sandycove, Addie was gone and I couldn’t reach the toy she’d been given from her godmother to turn it off:

  The Pelican’s beak holds more than its belly can.

  The Pelican’s beak holds more than its belly can.

  The Pelican’s beak holds more than its belly can.

  Nothing’s quite as big as the beak of a Pelican.

  I fell into a sort of nonchalant daze. In hold-ups or at lights I glanced at the tired, preoccupied drivers around me who just wanted to be home and felt happy to be sitting, idling and out of danger for another few seconds. I had a dangerous problem. My left indicator was broken so whenever I was approaching a turn, I had to accelerate to create space between me and the car behind, then swerve at speed around the corner.

  I slowed down. The sea by the Forty Foot was milky still under the moonlight. The road through Dalkey village was quiet, fairytale-like with its white lights linked above all the shop fronts and the yellowy glow coming from the steamed-up windows of Finnegan’s. People were spilling out onto the streets, leaving Christmas presents in bags beneath tables just waiting to be knocked into – full pints, packets of crisps – as they huddled in messy groups in the cold night air for a smoke. I saw a man who looked like Lars, the gentle alcoholic, who used to drink in the park. He hadn’t been around for months. What had happened to him? How come no one mentioned him? How lonely to disappear from a community and for no one to even notice.

  I drove on through dark, quiet neighbourhoods, past the graveyard where my father was buried and Addie liked to play, wheeling her baby and buggy between the plots, not understanding why she couldn’t have the tiny teddy bear sitting on one of them, or the windmill in a jar.

  ‘You don’t need to explain graveyards to her just yet,’ Joe used to say.

  Bray High Street was a riot of lights: a flashing kaleidoscope of lanterns and reindeers and polar bears and Santa Clauses racing through the sky. I wished my little angel could see them. At the traffic lights at the top of the road, I turned and watched neon shapes pour across her sleeping face. I looked at her soft lips and fluttering eyelashes, her mouth covered in chocolate, her little pigtails askew.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Dylan and Juliette were curled up on the sofa; Addie was sitting cross-legged beside them and Juliette was painting her fingernails. They unfurled when I came in, Juliette stood up, tugged her jumper over her bum and blew her fringe out of her eyes. She turned towards Dylan, exposing a large purple love bite on her neck. I didn’t think they existed any more. The sight of it made me nostalgic. It was the sort of thing you used to see on cross-water ferries, on the necks of the female staff serving fried eggs in the morning, after a night of grubby sex, putting you off your breakfast.

  ‘Look, Mama, orange and sparkly.’

  ‘Lovely. Now, pyjamas on this minute. Let’s go! Santa Claus won’t come unless you’re asleep.’

  ‘I’d love to help you, Mama, but I’ve just had my nails done,’ Addie said, spreading out her tiny wrinkled fingers as I pulled her tights off and put her pyjama bottoms on.

  Dylan hopped up and stretched. ‘May I use your loo please?’

  ‘Of course, let me just check that there’s toilet roll.’

  He followed me down the corridor towards the frosted door of the bathroom.

  ‘You’re looking pretty foxy,’ he said to my back in the darkness.

  ‘Oh, thank you,’ I said, both delighted and disgusted.

  ‘You shine like a jewel compared to all the other mums around here. You’re the best looking by far,’ he said, standing too close to me, pupils dilated.

  ‘I’m sure that’s not true, but thank you,’ I said, flattered, flustered, appalled, moving to get myself free. I shouted goodbye to Juliette, told her to call me if there were any problems or to drop down to Irenka, forgetting that she had gone home to Poland to spend Christmas with her family.

  *

  The church was fuller than it had been all year, the chatter louder, its ageing congregation up late in silk scarves, fur stoles and camel coats. Even the monsignor in his gold robes had a spring in his step as he took his place behind the ivy-and-poinsettia arrangement at the pulpit to welcome his parishioners to Midnight Mass. Drunk teenagers tried to hold it together in the presence of their parents as the choir sang ‘Silent Night’.

  ‘There’s Kevin Gallagher,’ Mum whispered, on her knees beside me in our pew, peeping up from cupped hands to see whom she recognised amongst the queue of bowed heads taking their seats. ‘Oh and that’s poor old Stephanie Smith’s mother; she’s had a terribly tough time.’ She tried to remain penitent but found it impossible, being both naturally social and nosey. She was well in with the church, doing readings at the ten o’clock service once monthly and helping to arrange flowers before funerals; she felt on home ground and therefore somewhat entitled to keep an eye on proceedings.

  Bella was sitting on the other side of me on the bunched up end of her best coat, with her bag, a missalette and her mobile phone in a tumbling pile on her knee. She seemed to have surrendered to a life of discomfort since having a husband and children. Her own needs were at the very bottom of her priorities. She smelt of ‘Paris’, a perfume she used to wear as a teenager and which her husband still bought her for every birthday and anniversary, though she now found it a bit cloying.

  All three of us were flush-faced from an afternoon of socialising; bloated from too much food and mulled wine, made up again over old makeup, perfumed over perfume. There was a long, curly blonde hair on the back of Bella’s top that couldn’t belong to her. Mum’s neck was mottled red beneath her pearls. Nuala McMenamin was leaning over our pew, her knuckles whitening as she gripped the bench. She was a skinny drip of a woman – sharp nose, warm onion breath – always energised by incidents, accidents, emergencies, dramas of any sort, always happy to be the first with bad news. Someone had had a very nasty fall, the O’Sheas were burgled the night before last, Joe Lawlor had lost his mind. Mum was nodding too much and looking towards the altar, in that slightly cross-eyed way that she had, willing this woman to stop talking, to go away, not wanting to hear any more. ‘Yop, yop’ Mum said, tutting and shaking her head as Nuala indulged in the details.

  Mum reeled off the Gloria, the introduction to the Gospel, running her thumb from forehead to lip, down to chest, and then the Creed, as if demonstrating to me how it should be done. She’d been saying the same prayers for fifty years and her voice had taken on a sort of weary familiarity, sounding loud at the beginning of each new sentence, then trailing away into something tiny and thin.

  With a cacophony of nose-blowing and throat–clearing, the congregation sat. An altar boy rang a bell, his frayed jeans and tennis shoes visible from where he knelt. Then everyone else knelt, lowering their eyes in the solemnity of prayer and covering their faces with their hands. Mum sat forward instead of getting to her knees, she was tired and uncomfortable in her heels. She wanted to be at home, wanted to be up in bed, with her mug of hot milk and her new P. D. James. She fell asleep beside me during the sermon, gently snoring and woke startled at communion, determined to appear as though she hadn’t missed a
thing.

  Everyone stood for ‘Adeste Fideles’, murmurs, creased coat tails, more coughs. And we boomed it out like Protestants, showing off our Latin, the women all upright, puffing out their chests, their husbands beside them giving it everything, the bald patches on their heads reddening with each note. On the final verse, we started softly like professionals and grew louder as we sang on, the sopranos in the gallery in perfect harmony. Venite adoremus, Venite adoremus, VENITE ADOREMUS! Dominum. We were communally moved by how good we sounded, by our unexpected tunefulness and energy.

  *

  I saw the ambulance first, and as I got nearer, the police car half up on the kerb. There were people in white overalls in our front garden and yellow tape stretched across the front door. Juliette was sitting on the roadside, hugging her knees, chewing on the cuff of her hoodie, wiping her nose with her sleeve.

  I pulled in, ran to her, my heart whacking against my ribs.

  ‘What’s happened? Is it Addie?’ Juliette was red-eyed, trembling.

  ‘No, it’s Dylan. Oh Eve, Billy and him had the worst fight. I tried to stop them but I couldn’t.’ She sank to the kerb; I knelt down beside her and put my arm around her shoulder.

  ‘He’s dead, Eve,’ she said, looking up at me with bloodshot, mascara-stained eyes. ‘He’s over in the playground. He killed him, Eve. Billy killed Dylan.’

  There, in the foggy early Christmas morning light, framed by the fairy lights trailed around the railings of the park was Dylan’s body, beside the see-saw, covered in white tarpaulin. There were three policemen around him, one crouched by his side.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Half a pound of twopenny rice,

  Half a pound of treacle,

  That’s the way the money goes,

  Pop! Goes the weasel,

  Do do do do do do do do do do do do do,

  That’s the way the money goes,

  Pop! Goes the weasel.

  Mum was sitting on Addie’s bed. She had taken off her shoes and her legs were crossed at the ankle. Her toes were wriggling about in pop socks that looked too tight for her feet. Her handbag with everything that she needed for the evening – reading glasses, Rough Guide to the Galapagos, diary, mobile phone – was just below her, on the floor. Addie was snuggled up beside her in her new brushed-cotton pyjamas, the ones we couldn’t afford from Avoca, pink with little kittens chasing balls of wool. Mum’s arms enveloped her grandchild and their fingers were intertwined. Her cheek was resting lightly on Addie’s head and as she sang her little song out of tune, the two of them swayed from side to side. Addie’s eyes were squeezed shut; on her face a sleepy smile. The room was warm and clean, the air filled with Mum’s favourite perfume, the lamplight, buttery-coloured and soft.

  Neither of them had noticed that I was watching. This was how they always sat before a bedtime story but tonight something told me to notice, told me to be grateful. Told me to always remember.

  ‘Go on now, pet. You’ll be fine. Just support her. The poor woman. Now off you go. Oh no, wait, let me give you that card.’

  Although she had never met her, Mum had heard enough about Belinda and Billy from me and had read enough about the tragedy, to feel it appropriate that she write to her. She bent over from where she was lying to fish the card from her handbag. There was a hole under the arm of her M&S cashmere cardigan.

  I put the card in my coat pocket and promised her I wouldn’t be late; she was catching a flight to Lima at noon the following day.

  ‘Kiss and a hug.’ I embraced my little girl.

  And then her mantra whenever I was going anywhere.

  ‘Love you, you’re my best friend, have brilliant fun!’

  *

  The wind was wild that night, buffeting against the windows, whirling down the chimney, sending icy draughts through the flat. Dylan Freeney, beautiful Dylan, was smiling, in his school uniform, on the front page of the Wicklow Times on the hall table. Beside him was a grainy shot of Billy Flynn and a smaller photo beneath of Juliette Larson, looking much younger than she was. Dylan had been stabbed in the heart and had died immediately. Billy Flynn was uninjured and in custody for murder. There was another photograph below their faces, of the park. Yellow police tape surrounded the cordoned-off playground.

  I took the tray of cyclamen, now brilliant pink and blooming, from the table and closed the front door behind me, pulled up my hood, and set off across the square.

  Street lights came on around the neighbourhood. It was getting dark, people were going indoors. A black sweep of starlings searched for somewhere to perch for the night. I gave a wave to Mr Norman who was out on his front porch, reinstating a toppled bay tree, his comb-over perpendicular in the wind. He raised one hand in a salute, turned and went back indoors.

  There had been some changes to the square since Dylan’s death: Irenka moved out just after New Year’s. Donal had been offered a new, permanent position in London. They had had a yard sale and a small going away party, both of which we’d missed. All Irenka had left me was a list of local emergency numbers and some books on childcare.

  Nathan’s house had been finished and stood proud, its name, ‘Little Wave’, wedged in the new lawn; a bright and shining thing in an old neighbourhood. It would take a hundred years to blend in; a youngster surrounded by Victorian grandeur. I supposed I would meet his family soon, now that the house was ready to receive them. Poor old Pamela had passed away, before getting her tattoo, leaving just Edie in the big house. And Arthur from the Cherry Glade had given up going outdoors. He’d abandoned his cart – ‘too risky out there’, he said. He’d bought a portable TV for his room, his eyes too tired to read Westerns, and now he was bedridden in his own small, and ever-contracting, world. The few visitors he had knew to bring him Guinness.

  A bald man I didn’t recognise was standing outside Belinda’s house: huge belly, Manchester United polo shirt, faded denim jeans. He was smoking, looking around him, shifting from one foot to the other to keep warm.

  ‘Are you after Belinda?’ he asked, stubbing his cigarette under his shoe.

  ‘Yes. I’m a friend of hers.’

  ‘Give us a second,’ he said, stepping inside, pulling the door closed.

  ‘Will you tell her it’s Eve?’ I called after him. ‘Addie’s mum. From the library.’

  *

  I handed her the tray of pink cyclamen. ‘I wanted to give you back these.’

  ‘Ah, Eve. You’re very good.’

  I went inside and we hugged in the hall. She was trembling. I could feel her ribs beneath her skin. She wouldn’t let me go. I rubbed her back, my nose buried in her sweater.

  ‘It’s just such a mess.’ She pulled away from me, pressed her fingers against her eyes, squeezing them tight. She couldn’t meet mine. She invited me in.

  The bald man pressed himself against the wall, holding his hands on his chest to let us pass.

  ‘This is Derek, by the way. The other half.’

  We smiled at each other. He offered his hand as I went to embrace him. We ended up doing neither and both.

  ‘I’ll give you guys a minute. Tea?’

  I nodded. ‘Thanks, love,’ Belinda said.

  ‘He’s been brilliant,’ she whispered, as if not to jinx it, pushing the door closed behind her and settling into her seat.

  ‘Don’t know if you’ve heard but Billy’s on remand at a detention centre at Wheatfield Prison. It’s over in Clondalkin. We’re selling up and moving to the North Side. We need to be closer to him.’

  I could hear Derek’s voice coming from the kitchen. He was speaking to someone on the phone, repeating the same information about Billy that Belinda was telling me, only a few seconds behind her, like an echo. How many times had they had to have these conversations in the last two weeks?

  ‘We?’ I asked and gave her a small smile.

  ‘You’d never think this sort of crap would bring people together but somehow it has. He’s the only one who understands what I’m going
through. For the rest of my life it will be like that. And sure we can’t stay around here; it’s not fair on Mimi or on poor Juliette.’

  ‘Juliette’s doing much better now, isn’t she?’

  ‘Thank Christ. Frank’s been amazing with her. And God only knows what hell he’s going through himself. I saw Mr Larson up in Tesco this morning. Didn’t he turn around and go straight back up the aisle as if he hadn’t seen me? I’m having people cross roads to avoid me. Can you imagine the carry-on there’d be in the library if I stayed? All those kids, they’re broken-hearted, though not about Billy I know. He was always an outsider, never part of any gang or group. It used to break my heart at school when they were told to pick a partner and no one ever wanted to be his. And when he’d come home with a bloody nose or a torn shirt because he’d been set upon and had fought back. At the playground he was always the wrong age. Always too young for the other kids or too old. But sure, you and I were always outsiders here too, weren’t we?’

  Derek came in at that moment with the tea and a plate of Jaffa cakes.

  ‘I’ll leave yous to it,’ he said. He squeezed Belinda on the shoulder, told her he was going for a lie down.

  ‘Eve, he stabbed that poor lad three times in the chest.’ She tucked her hands into the sleeves of her sweater, shuddered, began to cry.

  Juliette had told me it all, curled up on the sofa in our sitting room, chewing the sleeve of her hoodie, trembling and hyperventilating like a child, mascara staining her cheeks. She’d said Billy had called over to see me that evening. He hadn’t expected her to be there. Dylan had told him to clear off and Billy’d lost it after that. He’d head-butted him, spat at him, she’d tried to get between them, to separate them. That’s when Dylan had run to the park. Juliette had seen Billy run after him, climb onto the railings, yank at the loose spike and jump down into the playground, but she hadn’t seen anything after that; she’d run home and back to her dad to get help.

  ‘God, it’s so hard.’ It was all I could say, the best I could come up with. I leant over, rubbed my hand on her sleeve.