Mercy of St Jude

by Wilhelmina Fitzpatrick

  Aiden nodded. He was reaching for the handle when, out of nowhere, the doors flew open and they were each hauled out by a uniformed arm.

  The policeman holding Aiden was unfamiliar to both of them. He sniffed the air. “So this is Patrick Hann. Driving under the influence, are you?”

  The other officer, Bob Turner, shook his head. “You got the wrong one, Maloney. That one’s Aiden, the younger brother.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. He’s not supposed to be driving.”

  Maloney shoved Aiden aside and grabbed Pat, twisting his arm behind his back. Pat cried out in pain. Aiden jumped in and dragged Maloney to the ground. Turner rushed to get him off, but not before Aiden managed to pound his ringed fist into Maloney’s face, leaving a bloody scratch across his cheek.

  Maloney jumped up. “Stupid fucking Newf. Get in the goddamn car.”

  Stunned, neither Pat nor Aiden moved right away.

  “Now!” Maloney screamed, his hand on his holster.

  Still shocked but now scared witless as well, they scurried into the back seat.

  The end result was that Aiden ended up with a stint in jail. When he came up for parole, things did not appear promising. Punching a cop was a serious matter. Then Mercedes showed up at the hearing. As a well-respected teacher and community leader, her promise to personally oversee Aiden’s rehabilitation carried considerable weight.

  Anxious to put prison behind him, Aiden, for once, kept his mouth shut.

  Snow drifted down in fat airy flakes to settle softly on the frozen white ground. It would have made for a picture-perfect Christmas Eve but that was already three days past. The pot of turkey soup was finally empty. Gifts had been put away; decorations would soon follow. The time had come to prepare for the New Year, to make resolutions. Sadie Griffin, as always, resolved to keep her family safe, her secrets safer. Sadie had been making the same resolution since her oldest son was born.

  Them stupid little bastards. Hah!

  Sadie snuggled her ear to the phone. She’d been waiting for the call and didn’t want to miss a word. “Uh-huh…yes…go on, they didn’t…ain’t that something…well, not like they didn’t have it coming to them…uh-huh…yes, thanks Bessie, be talking to you.” She popped the phone back on the hook and went to stand to the side of the living room window, slightly behind the curtain. “You hear about them Hann boys?”

  Debra looked up from where she sat on the sofa, the sewing kit open on her lap. “What Hann boys?” she asked, threading a needle.

  “Right. Like you don’t know.”

  “Lots of Hanns.” Debra pulled the needle through a small white shirt.

  “Yeah, sure there are. Too many. Anyway, they got their-selves arrested.”

  Debra’s fingers stopped over a tray of buttons. “What for?”

  “Driving into a cop and then beating on him.” Sadie pulled the curtain a bit more to the left to better see down the road.

  “Really, now?” Debra smiled and picked a button. “The both of them?”

  “Uh-huh. Bessie says it was more Aiden that did it, though.”

  “They in jail?”

  “They were till their father bailed them out.”

  Arsehole Frank Hann. Wonder where he got the money for that.

  Debra examined the button, put it back and picked a bigger one.

  “Vwoom.”

  Sadie smiled at four-year-old Mark who was kneeling on the floor with a pile of cars in front of him - police, ambulance, fire trucks - all lined up perfectly straight and from biggest to smallest.

  “Vwoom.”

  Smart boy, our Mark, smarter than poor Debra. Reminds me of Gerard, except when he tries to talk, of course.

  “Vwoom, vwoom.” Mark’s short, stocky body bounced from knee to foot to knee, over and over as he raced a small blue truck across the room.

  “Careful there, Mark, don’t bang into the coffee table,” Debra cautioned.

  Sadie folded her arms. “Or that cop car there. No father here to bail you out.”

  Debra had just inserted the needle into the button and was about to attach it to the shirt. “Give it a frigging rest, would you, Ma.”

  “Hard to rest with an extra mouth to feed,” Sadie said, keeping an eye out the window.

  “I told you, I’ll get a goddamn job.”

  “You wouldn’t need to still be looking if it weren’t for that Beth Ennis.”

  Debra wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “Despises her, I do.”

  “Her fault you never got that job. Get on at the post office, you got it made, sure.”

  “This is the second time that bitch is after screwing me out of a job.”

  “When it comes to a Griffin or a Hann, the Hann wins every time.”

  Every frigging time. Fed up, I am.

  Debra jabbed the needle through the buttonhole. “Every Jesus time.”

  Sadie’s mouth tightened as a black cat made its way across the yard, leaving little paw holes deep in the pure white ground cover. Sadie didn’t like cats.

  “It’s not fair.” Debra’s voice was whiny, shrill. “She’s no better than me. Just because she got that stupid diploma, thinks she’s the smartest thing on two legs.”

  “Just like her mother. Lucinda always thought she was better than anyone else.”

  “Don’t need no diploma to sort mail. Say your ABC’s, you can do that.”

  “Luck of the Irish. Still, no shamrocks up her arse when she got knocked up.”

  Youngster died, mind you. Not so lucky there.

  “Goddamn Byrnes,” Debra grunted. “Sick of them all.”

  “Then again, she managed to get a husband out of it,” Sadie added.

  “Christsakes.” Debra scratched inside her bra. “Shut up, will you.”

  “Vwoom, vwoom,” said Mark, driving the truck up his mother’s leg.

  “Come here, you, and give me a hug.” Debra swept him up in her arms, tickling his belly and sending him into fits of giggles and shrieks.

  “What a racket. Keep it down, you two.” Despite her tone, Sadie was smiling.

  Arrested. Hah! Talk about a Christmas present.

  1999

  Gerry sips his tea at the kitchen window, staring out into the black arms of night. A large slanted rock across the street looks over the cliff onto the beach below. As a boy he would lie on that rock, ignoring the smells drifting over from the nearby fish plant, and dream of all the exotic places he’d read about in Mercedes’ books. When he was older, he dreamt about Annie Byrne.

  Every time he came home, he hoped he’d run into her. The only reason he’d returned for Cathy’s wedding was because he figured Annie would have to show up to see her best friend get married. “Annie’s not big on weddings, Gerry,” Cathy had told him. “I figured you’d know that.”

  “Gerard?” Sadie’s voice is loud.

  He turns guiltily to his mother. “Yeah…sorry, Ma. What is it?”

  She holds the butcher knife suspended above the cold, wrinkled turkey. “I said you want the white or the dark?”

  “Either one’s fine.”

  “Lots here for a plate of sandwiches to bring along tomorrow. Family funeral, after all. Hah! Some family. Should bring something, seeing how much time you spent there with the old bat…” She keeps muttering to herself as she slices the turkey.

  His mother generally hides her resentment of his and Mercedes’ friendship, unless she’s drinking, at which point all Hanns are fair game. Under the influence of one or two, she makes a few digs or snide remarks. More than that and she’ll start to rant, calling Lucinda names like “Yank tart” or “man-robber,” Mercedes “mercy moneybags” or “dried-up old spinster.” The one time Gerry tried to defend Mercedes, who for her part never said a bad word to him about his family, Sadie went into such a rage she scared him. She remembered none of it the next day. He’s grateful she only drinks at home.

  “…they’ll not be saying I don’t do things proper, goddamn hypocrites.”r />
  “Sandwiches are a good idea, Ma. That’s really thoughtful of you.”

  “Huh? Oh, right, sandwiches,” she says, then after a moment, adds innocently, “I suppose they’ll all be home for it, eh?”

  “White meat sounds good,” he says, ignoring the question. “So anyway, what’s new with you? How are those bunions?”

  “Bunions are bunions.” She looks at him. “You’re looking some washed out, though. Travelling is hard on the body, especially for a funeral. Wonder who’ll be there from away,” she says in her most casual voice.

  Gerry smiles to himself. “Quite a few, I suspect. People had a lot of respect for Mercedes Hann.”

  “Yes. Indeed.”

  “I’m really going to miss her.” He’d last seen her when he was back for Cathy’s wedding. Just as he’d done in high school, he read to her from one of her newly acquired books. Unlike the old days, however, when she would pretend her eyes hurt so he could read and at the same time earn money for supposedly helping her, this time she truly was not up to the task. Still, she refused to go to a doctor.

  “Um-hmm.” Sadie’s head is lowered over the bird. She carves for a while then turns it around so the breast cavity faces away from her.

  “I’m not sure what I would have done if she hadn’t been so generous,” he adds. Despite himself, he is beginning to feel a slightly sadistic enjoyment in the conversation. He really should go to bed.

  Sadie keeps slicing, slowly, methodically. Only a short quick sigh slips out.

  “Yes, she was good to a lot of people,” he continues, “even helped that frigging Aiden get out of jail that time. Now that’s what I call generous.”

  “Cops should have locked them up and chucked the keys. Good call, that was.”

  “What do you mean? What call?”

  Sadie looks startled. “Nothing. Not a thing.” She takes a decisive swipe at the pope’s nose and plops it and the knife on the counter. “There. That’s that.”

  Gerry notices that his mother’s back is slightly hunched. It occurs to him that she had this same roundness to her shoulders the last time he was home, but he’d forgotten it until this minute. He drains his cup. “How about a fresh pot of tea?”

  “Sure, go on. Make you a plate to go with it.”

  He plugs in the kettle, then hugs Sadie around the shoulders. She glances up at him. Her face looks tired; the colour in her cheeks does not match the pallor around her eyes. Whether he wants to see it or not, his mother is getting old.

  “Some scoff here. You must have been cooking for days.” He kisses her forehead and hugs her again. “Thanks, Ma. It’s good to be home.”

  5

  1999

  Pat’s hands are fists. His back is rigid. “That cop thought I was behind the wheel. He as much as said so. Now why was that? Huh? Why?”

  “Let it go, Pat. Besides, Aiden’s better off for it.” Lucinda rises unsteadily, one hand on the St. Anne medal around her neck. “I’ll go keep Derm and Joe company.”

  Pat waits until Lucinda is out of earshot. “Mercedes left that party, walked home and phoned the cops. I’d swear to it on a stack of bibles.”

  “That’s a bit hard to swallow, Pat,” says Annie. “Even I don’t think Mercedes would turn in her own nephew.”

  Aiden gets up from the table. “Well, we’ll never know now.” His tone is harsh, angry. “And I, for one, don’t give a rat’s arse anymore. So drop it.”

  “What do you want to defend her for?” asks Pat.

  “Defend her?” Aiden shouts. “You are such an idiot, Pat!” Turning from his brother, he catches Annie’s eye and mutters “fucking fool” under his breath.

  Pat obviously hasn’t heard the insult. “She did it on purpose and you knows it, too. You just never had the guts to say anything to her.”

  “Come off it, you two,” warns Annie with a glance towards the doorway. “Don’t be getting into anything tonight. Mom’s got enough on her mind.”

  Aiden ignores her. “What would you know about guts, Pat?”

  “More than you, that’s for sure.”

  Aiden faces him eye to eye. “What the hell does that mean?”

  Pat stares him down. “It means I’d face up to responsibility, that’s what.”

  “You don’t know the first thing—”

  “I knows you were messing around with that poor stupid girl.”

  Annie looks from one to the other, surprised that a conversation about Mercedes has veered off in this direction. Then again, Mercedes was all about accountability.

  Aiden groans. “Don’t tell me you’re on about that Griffin slut again. Christ!”

  “You made your bed.”

  “Hard not to when she throws herself at you.”

  “You could have said no.”

  “Like you would, I suppose?”

  Pat crosses his arms. “Like I did.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  Aiden snickers. “Just proves the bitch would go to bed with anyone.”

  Annie can’t sit silent any longer. “For Christ’s sake, Aiden, there’s a youngster involved here.”

  Aiden whirls on her. “Mind your own goddamn business, Annie.”

  “No, I won’t. Pat’s right. You should have done the right thing.”

  “Listen to you,” he mocks, “picking up for a Griffin.”

  “Who happens to be raising a kid without a father.”

  “Fucking Griffins are all sluts and homos and liars. Just ask Dad – he’ll tell you.” Frank Hann had nursed a particular disliking for Sadie ever since she’d accused him of stealing from the church. “Like mother like daughter, I swear to God.”

  “Not like you at all, eh?” Pat jumps back in. “Hand always on the zipper, then not man enough to own up to it when it comes back at you—”

  “Shut the fuck up, the two of you. I’m sick of your sanctimonious bullshit. As for you, Pat, I’m glad Aunt Merce got me off your stinking boat. And even if she did what you said,” he continues, his voice tight with warning, “you knows it wasn’t me she was after. So in the end, whose fault was it?”

  Annie hears a noise from down the hall. “Okay, that’s enough. The last thing Mom needs is you two going at it.”

  Aiden walks to the sink and pours a glass of water. He looks at if for a moment then turns and raises the glass high. “To Mercedes. May she finally rest in peace.” Only his mouth smiles.

  Pat, looking relieved, gives in easily. “Good old Aunt Merce. Dead as a doornail and still pissing off the world.”

  Lucinda comes in, followed by Joe and Dermot.

  “Never known a woman harder to toast than Mercedes,” says Dermot. “She’s like just-baked bread, she is - keeps getting stuck in the toaster until it finally catches fire.”

  Lucinda rolls her eyes but she’s smiling. “What are you like, Derm? A couple of belts of whiskey and out comes the philosophiser.” Her hand clasps his where it rests on her shoulder. “Speaking of bread, I got to get some from the freezer for tomorrow’s sandwiches. Wouldn’t want you crowd having nothing to soak up the suds.”

  She bustles off, yelling back for someone to go keep an eye on the coffin.

  “I’ll be right in, Mercedes,” Dermot calls out as he reaches under the sink. “Stay where you’re to till I comes where you’re at.” His hand reappears holding a paper bag. He winks at them all as he heads back to the living room.

  Pat and Aiden start to follow when Lucinda calls out from the basement. “Will one of you boys come down and give me a hand? This door is jammed again.”

  They stop in mid-stride and glance back at Annie. They shrug guiltily, as if they’ve been caught in the act of doing, or planning to do, something forbidden. Annie is reminded of when they were kids, they with no sisters and her in a family full of girls. A furtive flash here, a quick glance there, always imagining Lucinda or Aunt Kitty looming over their shoulders. Or, God forbid, Mercedes. But how else were they to know wh
at the other half looked like? Her father locked a newspaper over the fly in his pyjamas if he was in the same room with his daughters, and Pat and Aiden only knew their mother’s underwear existed because she hung it in the furnace room to dry; Kitty Hann would never hang her brassiere outside on the clothesline. When it came to s-e-x, there wasn’t a book to be found until high school, and then it was a beet-faced Sister Angela reading it out to them, tight-lipped, cheeks bursting.

  Aiden heads down to help Lucinda. Several minutes later, he returns and places a mickey of rum on the table. Joe’s eyes light up.

  “You’d find booze in a nursery,” says Annie. “Better not let Mom see that.”

  Pat is nodding. “Remember out in Bay D’Esprits. We’d be raiding the empty cabins to see what was left behind, and himself here never failed to find a few beers.”

  “Except at Aunt Merce’s,” says Aiden. “No booze there.”

  “And the only cabin around locked tight as a jail,” Annie adds.

  Pat raises the bottle. “To Mercedes, the first in a long line of women who failed to take a shine to yours truly.”

  “Still no luck with the ladies?” says Annie.

  “Same as ever.” Pat has always been awkward with women, too often saying the wrong thing in an attempt to be more like Aiden, who attracts the opposite sex with little effort. But Annie knows that Pat can be a girl’s best friend when it really matters.

  “I’d propose a toast but I can’t think of a thing to say.” Aiden smiles innocently as Lucinda enters the kitchen laden with frozen buns and loaves of bread. Pat hides the mickey under his sweater.

  Annie looks doubtful. “That’d be a first, Aiden Hann without a word in.”

  Aiden looks straight at her. “Gerry Griffin’s home. We’ll get him to toast her.”

  The words hit like a slap in the face. She should have known he’d get her back.

  “Who’s speechless now, eh?” Aiden smirks.

  “You’d have a few things to say to that bastard, wouldn’t you, Annie?” says Pat.

  She warns him with her eyes to shut up. “So, Mom,” she says with forced calm, “what’ll we do with these buns?”

  Lucinda is glaring at Aiden but when she looks at Annie, her expression softens. “I’m not sure. You want to give me a hand?”