Past The Bottom of the Hill there was a litter bin, crammed with newspapers and tin cans. I pulled a can out and threw it at him. He ducked, snatched up a coke can and flung it back.
We began a mock fight up and down the main street. There was nobody about, as if the world was deserted except for us. We used the lamp-posts for protection, aiming punches and kicks at each other as we ducked and bobbed. I wanted to hurt him; I wanted to just touch him. What I wanted I’m not really sure. If he had stopped and opened his arms I would have walked towards him; I would have laid my head on his shoulder and embraced him; I would have sat on that kerb all night with him.
We stopped at last, and lowered our heads, exhausted. He came towards me, making the sign for a truce. We touched hands briefly, then we turned and walked up that wrecked main street where no car or person had appeared, across the metal bridge and, with a final nod, into our own bedrooms. When I woke the next morning he was gone. My head hurt just to rise from the pillow. The bedroom door was open. There was a scrawled note on the table.
You were sleeping so sound I didn’t want to wake you. You must have been a lovely baby. Look after yourself kid. Shay
He didn’t like long farewells.
Black skyline of earth breaking up, like clouds the pink flowers forming. They grow between the worn bricks of the laneway by the backs of the houses. They treasured you Katie for your slim hips that could squeeze through any window. A lean-to kitchen had been added; the two youths lifted you up on to it. Don’t look down, just keep on—the window latch comes undone. You are terrified you will get stuck but they whisper urgently. You squeeze, the wood grazes your hips, then you are through. Once inside you feel scared. The quiet dusty room with its sparse, woodwormed furniture. You descend the stairs hurriedly, undo the bolts on the back door. When they enter no one speaks, you know that they can sense it too. You keep together as you sneak through each deserted room. Musty pictures of St Teresa, a schoolboy with a prayer book and crooked fingers in a photographer’s studio. Lining a drawer you find a paper dated forty-five years before. There is nothing to steal, nothing has been purchased in the last quarter-century. The presence of sorrow fills each room with a heavy enveloping vapour. In the bedroom you have left you hear footsteps on the lino; you rush back into the stillness to hear them now on the stairs. The atmosphere has grown oppressive as though the walls were imperceptibly closing in. Is it the pills, the speed? You feel them coursing through your bloodstream, suddenly you want your own body back. Pushing your way down the stairs you see through the hammered glass of the front door the shadow of a figure reaching up with a key. You crest the back wall of the garden, career down the laneway. ‘Who was he coming in? What did he look like on the path?’ you scream at the look-out on the corner. She looks back puzzled and shrugs her shoulders, ‘Who was who? What are you talking about?’
The driver slammed the door, leaving them in darkness as the lorry moved off. Hano watched it till the tail lights vanished at the bend. He hunched down, raised his arms to his shoulders and hugged himself. The stars were extraordinarily clear. A car passed. He closed his eyes, held back tears till it was gone. There was a low wall beyond the ditch. Katie was leaning against it, staring at a row of tree stumps on the bank beyond.
‘Poplars they were. A lovely rustle off them in summer coming home from school. You know, even the fields look different. Seems to be all grass Hano or can you see? They grew crops there once, there wasn’t a rood of it my father didn’t plough and all for other men. And not a field where I didn’t help him lift spuds. Dozens of us in a line filling sacks in the muck.’
He wiped his eyes with a sleeve, glad she couldn’t see, and stood up. The fields stretched uphill to the state forest. To their right a bog lay sullen in the darkness. A line of bungalows were set back from the road. A dog barked in one, sensing strangers.
‘They grow cars instead now,’ he said, pointing to one upturned on the bog, stripped of everything that could be removed.
Katie laughed. ‘There were always cars. Blackie McDonnell on the far road lived in one. Said it was the best thing yet. The laneway is just down here. Two miles, no problem to a hard man like you.’
The largest bungalow had a split roof in a Spanish style with white walls raised off the ground by a base of local stone. The driveway was lit by lamps which ran down to a wooden gateway inlaid with two huge wagon wheels. A high pole had been erected on either side to support a crossbar which bore a sheep’s skull and the words ‘The High Chaparral’ in floodlit letters. The lawn stretched to the bushes by the lane, a cool line of shrubs marking the border. On the slope behind the bungalows they could barely discern the shape of a roofless cabin crumbling in on itself.
‘Mary Roche’s,’ Katie whispered. ‘The only light there ever was a mile either side of this place.’
The sides of the laneway were so overgrown it was like entering a tunnel. The reflection of branches threw crazy shapes on the pot-holed tar and a strip of grass which grew like a horse’s mane down the centre.
‘I suppose you walked it in your bare feet,’ Hano joked, trying to keep the tremor from his voice.
‘Aye, with stones in me pocket to keep me from blowing off the path.’
After a hundred yards the branches grew so thick that all light was blocked out. It was like a laneway forgotten by time. Hano could not believe anyone still lived up it. They slowed down, unsure of their footing in the dark.
‘I’m scared Hano, scared shitless,’ she whispered to him. He took her hand, it was cold. She shivered. ‘I walked it a thousand times without it ever seeming lonely, but it feels lonely as hell tonight.’
‘Don’t know what’s up there,’ he said, trying to reassure her, ‘but it can’t be worse than what’s behind us.’
They walked on, hands raised to protect their faces from the low branches, feet stumbling on the uneven tar.
‘What if he’s dead Katie?’ Hano finally asked.
‘He’s not.’
Hano could barely hear her voice.
‘He’s…not the kind. It sounds thick, but like, he was just one of those unkillable old lads, you know what I mean? You couldn’t imagine that they’d ever been young. The same grey clothes, the same worn faces looking the same age—sixty or ninety or as old as the hills. Never sick, never stopping work, never going beyond the nearest town. Tomas was like a tree or a rock, you know, like a part of the place. Birth or death had fuck all to do with him.’
She spoke as if trying to convince herself.
‘Only outing was Saturday night when he’d walk to the pub in Dowra. I’d see his light come on through the trees when he’d get home around two in the morning. He’d fry bacon, no pan or anything, just throw it up with a lump of lard on top of the stove and eat it with white bread and tea from the shop at the front of the pub. Always said it was the best part of his week. No work on the Sunday except a few hours in the morning. You know, I’d watch for his light each Saturday like a guardian angel, pinching myself to keep awake, sitting up at my window to guide his journey home.’
The hedgerows gave way to trees, the tarmacadam to clay and stones. They were passing through the state forest, tall lines of cheap wood on both sides, the noise of creatures scurrying through the undergrowth.
‘Eight years Katie. It’s a long time. He could go to the police when he finds out.’
Even in the darkness he could sense her smile.
‘Listen, Tomas was the only man to court me. I don’t mean anything dirty, he’d never put a finger near me though I teased him often enough. No, like I’ve known blokes in the city but that’s not what I meant. My father was my father and my uncle, whenever he came back down, was my uncle, but Tomas was a man and I was the only woman he’d ever known. If he’s still alive then I tell you Hano, we’ve come home.’
Hano remembered when he’d last walked through a wood like this, the old woman beside him, clusters of rhododendrons grey in the moonlight. Five years, a lifetime ago,
but the same illicit sensation as now. Katie was tugging his hand, pressing forward, half in expectation and half in fear. The forest ended and the track narrowed, rising to where a new locked gate blocked their way. Katie touched the iron bars, unable to believe they were real. Hano had to coax her to climb over.
‘He could have put it there Katie,’ he said, his voice losing conviction. She ran towards the next bend without replying, raising her arms to her head as she rounded the corner. When he reached her she was standing still, gazing into the darkness in front.
‘The lights Hano. You should be able to see his lights.’
‘Maybe there’s a new ballroom in Dowra. He could be dating a widow with a tractor.’
He shut up and took her hand. If he hadn’t taken it she would not have gone on. She held back as they approached, whispering, ‘Good Christ, Hano, no, no.’ They made out the exposed rafters first, standing like bones against the sky. The bushes beside the cottage had begun to grow through the windows, still blackened in the aftermath of a fire. The front door lay like a headstone in the long grass, scattered knick-knacks of a life littering the overgrown path. They stepped carefully through the nettles to the low doorway. Glass crunched beneath their feet, their fingers feeling black when they touched the walls. The panes were smashed in both tiny windows. Hano was amazed at the depth of the walls. They crumbled under his fingers, made of loose stones and clay. He lit a match and surveyed the debris before the light flickered out. A wooden chair with one leg missing lay on its side. Katie was on her knees, stroking something cupped in her hand. She spoke without looking up.
‘I filled it for him Hano, whenever he’d let me.’
He felt the shape of the smashed pipe she pressed into his hand and wanted to hurl it against the wall. A rat brushed his leg as it bolted for the door. Startled, Hano dropped the pipe, almost screaming at her as she scrambled to find it.
‘Let’s get the fuck out of here,’ he said
She was still kneeling, sifting fragments of wood and glass through her hands. Her head was bowed as though she had forgotten him.
‘He was an old man before you left for Christ’s sake, not a rock or a bleeding tree. Life doesn’t stand still. He’s dead. Dead, Katie.’
The slivers of wood hurt his face when she flung them at him. She grabbed a second handful and held it up.
‘Shut up! Don’t say it. I want him back. I want to talk to him, want to ask him things.’
She stopped and he heard the debris slipping through her fingers. Her voice went quiet.
‘No I don’t Hano. I hope he’s dead, not stuck in a home somewhere. That would be worse for him. It’s only here he belonged, not in some ward full of old men coughing.’
Hano helped her up and steered her towards the door. She put her arms around him, pressing her face against his jacket.
‘Maybe he was dead for weeks,’ she whispered, ‘before anyone found him. Here alone with the rats. Can you imagine it Hano, dying here alone?’
‘There’s nothing we can do for him, Katie. If he’s dead maybe in some way he knows you came back.’
‘Does Shay know, Hano? Can he see us? Do you believe it?’
When she mentioned Shay’s name he began to cry. He no longer tried to fight it, just let it blubber out of him.
‘Jesus Katie, I miss him, how I fucking miss him. I want him back Katie. I don’t want to be alone.’
She was crying too, soothing him as he tried to soothe her.
‘I know Hano, I know. All my life I’ve known. Christ, I miss him too. People keep leaving. If I could only say goodbye to him or to them I could let them go. Told a lie to you Hano. I would have gone down here once, for the funeral. But my uncle wouldn’t let me. Never forgave him…felt if I could just see them to tell them how I missed them they’d come alive again.’
Shay would be in Glasnevin now, his first night underground, the fresh flowers that were strewn down over the coffin crushed under the weight of soil. What would he look like? Hano tried to stop his imagination but the face came, withering up as he buried his head in her hair. Masonry was crumbling against his back. He lifted his face into the sharp night air.
‘Come on Katie, we’ve got to get somewhere warm.’
She stared through the caved-in doorway as he pulled her away, shaking her head when he tried to coax her up the track.
‘It will just be another ruin Hano, like visiting a graveyard. I don’t want to see it. Please.’
He sensed the fear inside her but pushed on. His teeth chattered. There could be frost by morning. She pulled at his hand, trying to drag him back as they approached her old home. Water trickled over rocks to their right, forming small pools as it soaked across the earthen track to disappear into bracken. A few stumped trees grew, twisted grotesquely by the wind. Their feet touched wood as they crossed planks laid across the banks of a black stream and to their right the walls of the house appeared. Katie cried out in shock and dropped his hand.
‘No Hano. Jesus, it couldn’t be.’
‘What’s wrong Katie? What do you see?’
The girl turned back. Her breath was loud in the darkness.
‘Like time stood still. Same as the night I left. God, maybe they’re in there Hano, still waiting for me.’
‘Jesus Katie, you’ve me as scared as you are. It’s deserted, can’t you see. It doesn’t even look lived in.’
They approached cautiously. The house was uncanny. It was a traditional labourer’s cottage, but too perfect, too untouched by time. He thought of the bungalows back on the road, the tumbled-down walls where Mary Roche had lived. What light came from the stars, caught the freshly white-washed walls. Hano expected to see a Ford Anglia parked at the back, girls in sixties dresses coming to the door. A story from childhood troubled him, the witches home in the wood made of bright candy.
‘That was my bedroom window,’ she whispered. ‘Look in for me, Hano. See if there’s a small bed and a wooden dresser with a mirror and a cracked basin for water. There should be red roses on the far wall and chinamen and bridges on the left one where dada ran out of paper. See if it’s the same, Hano, see.’
Katie backed away as he peered in. The floorboards had been polished and two sheepskin rugs put down. The walls were painted to match the cubist prints hung on them. Speakers from a hi-fi were mounted in each corner. The deck rested in a glass cabinet with a video on top. The chairs were of tubular steel with leather seats. He called back to her and she cupped her hands to peer through the glass.
‘We had the loan of a black-and-white television once,’ she said, ‘and dada and Tomas wouldn’t watch it without covering the screen with the yellow cellophane from a bottle of Lucozade to protect them from the rays.’
The fitted kitchen had a microwave, a dishwasher and a tumble-drier. Above the electric cooker two posters hung in German. There was a concrete bunker behind the house. The locked iron doors led down into the earth.
‘The first sign of trouble and they’ll fly in here from Munich or Bonn,’ Hano said, trying the handle. ‘Close the doors, let the big boys get on with it and the locals burn. I never saw one before Katie, except in pictures. Must be somebody’s bolt-hole, holiday cottage in the sticks. It’s nobody’s home.’
‘It was mine once.’
‘It could be again,’ he said, looking out over the black mountainside. ‘There’s probably enough food here to last a war. I’m staying for as long as it’s safe.’
He paused, trying to keep his voice steady.
‘Stay with me Katie, for a while at least.’
They were silent, suddenly awkward like strangers at a dance. Then she reached down and found a rock.
‘What the fuck are you waiting for?’ she asked gruffly.
He took the stone, smashed the glass in the small window, opened it and reached his hand down. There was a lock on the latch of the main window. He fumbled till his fingers were sore.
‘Lift me up,’ she said.
‘You�
�ll never fit.’
‘Just do it.’
He held her legs and watched as she smashed the rest of the glass, then manoeuvred her body through the narrow frame. Her hands reached down to the sink and she tumbled backwards out of his sight. He called her name and, when she didn’t reply, started banging on the glass anxiously until she called him from the door at the side.
‘Hano! We’re in. We’re home.’
He walked towards her, blinded for a moment by the light flooding the doorway, highlighting her body as she flicked the switch.
The bedroom had two long shelves of German books. The few in English were computer manuals. Hano laid the soup bowl on the floor and searched in the drawers for socks and a shirt. Wooden blinds covered the window. Katie stared through them across the darkness of the hillside. He leaned back on the bed, knowing if he closed his eyes for a moment sleep would come.
‘Do you think they’re still here, Hano? Still trapped?’
‘Your parents?’ He thought for a moment. ‘If they are they must be very lost by now.’
‘This was my favourite spot,’ she said, ‘Their window…Felt important to be allowed here. If they were both out I’d stand here, watching for their return. This is where I stood that night, Hano. Eoghan Davitt from across the hill had loaned them his car. I doubt if my father drove more than twice a year.’
She paused, her fingers a few inches from the window pane as if fingering an invisible lace curtain.
‘Cancer. It’s strange, couldn’t say the word for years. She was wasting before my eyes and, you know, I’d no idea why. “Mammy, why are your arms so thin? Mammy, why are you lying down in the afternoon?” Maybe they knew, Hano. Maybe the doctor in the hospital had told them how long she had. You know, my father never spoke much, just worked all his life. Met Tomas before dawn, walked to whatever farmer would have them. We had gas lamps, Hano, one tap, a covered bucket for a toilet. I’d see him briefly at nine or ten at night.’
The Journey Home Page 11