by Tracey Ward
“Fruit,” Dad explained patiently, barely listening. “Vegetables. Bugs.”
“Why would I smuggle bugs?”
“Not intentionally.”
“Weapons,” I added wearily, sick to shit of hearing her and Laney complain for the last two weeks. “Knives. Guns. Grenades.”
“Probably not prudent to say all of those words out loud in the middle of an airport.”
“Bombs.”
“Jesus, Jenna.”
“No one is bringing a bomb into the States,” Mom snapped sharply.
Laney looked up from her phone, tension etched in every line of her face. “It’s not a bong. It’s a vase, I friggin’ told you!”
“Bomb, not bong,” Kellen explained quietly.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Dad ushered us forward impatiently. “Why don’t we all just shut up, shall we?”
“We were lucky we didn’t get stopped for questioning,” Kellen chuckled.
I smiled deviously. “I wouldn’t have minded if Laney had been.”
“She was in rare form on that trip.”
“Meaning she was evil on a stick.”
“She nearly slapped that kid on the tour bus.”
“In her defense he did lean over and lick her ice cream.”
“He was five.”
“Still a dick move.”
“I won’t argue that,” Kellen replied vacantly.
We had reached the baggage claim. His eyes were scanning the crowd, searching for something, for someone he had no chance of recognizing. They were a stranger and they were family. They were his blood and they were no one.
Gently I touched his arm and pointed to the far left. “There.”
He froze when his eyes found the man with the sign standing by the door.
Kellen Coulter was scribbled across a sheet a paper held up between the hands of an older man. He had light hair, brown and graying beautifully in a salt and pepper pattern that rose from his temples. His face was lined hard around his eyes that shone dark and keen as they spotted us.
He smiled, lowering the sign and making his way through the crowd neatly the way only a person accustomed to crowds could.
“Kellen,” he called.
His accent rolled Kellen’s name and made it something so beautiful I could never hear it the same again. I needed to always know it the way this man said it – warmly, thickly.
He offered his hand to Kellen who took it without hesitation. He shook it firmly, nodding to the older, shorter man.
“Owen,” he said by way of greeting.
“It’s good to meet ya, lad. The family’s been talkin’ ‘bout yer visit for monts now.”
“Thank you for having us.”
“’Course! ‘Course. We’re delighted.” His eyes turned to me, his smile widening. “This is your gal, then?”
I grinned, offering my hand. “Jenna. Nice to meet you, Owen.”
“You as well, darlin’. Welcome to Ireland.”
“Thank you.”
“Well,” Owen said, smacking his hands together excitedly. “Shall we gather yer bags?”
“We have them.” I gestured to my deep purple suitcase as proof.
It pushed the limits of what qualified as a carry on, a shade larger than Kellen’s simple black bag, but it made it on the plane meaning we had no luggage to wait for. It also meant no luggage to lose, a nightmare I’d endured before and wasn’t looking to repeat.
Nothing sucks like landing in Amsterdam with no underwear.
“Ah yer coddin’ me,” Owen laughed.
I shook my head, unsure what he meant.
“It means yer puttin’ me on,” he clarified, nodding to my bag. “That canna’ be all ya brought with ya.”
“It is.”
“Ain’t that somethin’.” He slapped his hand on Kellen’s shoulder playfully. “She’s a fine one, Kellen. A real feek and one bag over the ocean? Keep hold of her if ya can, lad.”
“I intend to,” he agreed with a squeeze of my fingers dangling next to his.
I smiled at him, squeezing back.
We followed Owen briskly out of the baggage area, out the doors, and into the fresh Irish air.
And rain.
Owen pulled the collar up on his dark jacket, guarding his neck against the wet wind that blew in under the overhang.
“It’s to be bucketin’ down all day,” he explained, shouting over the drum of rain on the roof and road. “Wet and cold most the week. Ya bein’ from California I can only hope ya don’t drown.”
Kellen pulled his hood up over his head. “We’re good swimmers,” he assured Owen.
“Swimmin’s fine, but can ya run?”
“We’re good at that too,” I promised.
“Good. Grand. We gotta leg it now!”
Owen broke into a run right out into the rain. Kellen and I hesitated only a second before we followed.
I was drenched in a heartbeat. Just two steps into the torrent that was coming down outside that awning and I felt like I’d stepped into a shower fully dressed. My hair plastered to the top of my head, to my cheeks, and I squinted against the onslaught of plump, wet drops that battered against my face as we ran. Owen was a dark mass running ahead of me, Kellen a heady presence to my left, and all around me was the sound of water meeting the earth. I couldn’t even hear the sound of my bag rolling rapidly behind me and I looked back to check and make sure it was still there.
That’s when I tripped.
A curb came out of nowhere and tried to take me down. I lost my footing, started tumbling forward toward a massive puddle, when I felt a strong arm loop around my waist and pull me up.
As fast as gravity was, Kellen was faster.
He righted me on my feet, took my bag handle from my hand, and ushered me ahead of him with a gentle nudge.
“Go,” he shouted over the din surrounding us. “I got it!”
“I can take my own bag!”
“Just let me help you!”
“You don’t have to.”
Kellen surprised me when he released both bags, took my face in his hands, and brought his lips down hard over mine. They were warm and wet, his skin cold against my face from the driving rain, but I melted against him as though it were a hot summer day.
He released me, smiling down with only his eyes. “I like helping you. Stop fighting me on it.”
I grinned, nodding my head between his hands. “Okay.”
He kissed me again briefly. “Okay.”
I could have stayed like that all day. There in the rain with Kellen and his eyes bright like I’d rarely seen. Most of the time they looked so dark you’d swear they were black, but in the gloom of that rainy day they looked brilliantly blue. Deep as the ocean, vibrant with sunlight that shone through them like crystals. I didn’t know for sure what caused the change. More than likely it was a trick of the light and that was all. But if I were to bet on it I’d say the difference was something so much simpler and still somehow impossibly complex. I’d say it was an aligning of the stars that sent a shift through the universe, through the world, through the sky, right down into the air around us that rode in on the rain.
What I believed to be true was this – Kellen was happy.
Chapter Seventeen
Kellen
Owen was my mom’s half-brother, the youngest of three children my grandpa had with his wife before leaving her for a French prostitute. I’d always thought that part of the story was colored by my mom’s bitterness at a woman who’d cut and run before my mom hit puberty, but to hear Owen tell it I was wrong. My grandma was a true and honest whore.
“Not a floozie, but a pro,” he clarified openly, darting us down a long, wet country road.
We’d left Dublin quickly behind, ‘gettin’ beyond The Pale’ as Owen referred to it. He had explained it was an old saying that used to refer to the English occupied areas of Ireland where propriety and social regulations reigned. Now people used it
to refer to Dublin, the largest city in all of Ireland.
“He met her while he was fightin’ in Belfast,” Owen continued. “He lost, incidentally, and drowned his sorrows in a pint and her pristine Parisian box.” He paused, glancing over his shoulder at Jenna apologetically. “I’m sorry, darlin’. That was crude a me.”
Jenna chuckled. “No worries. I work in a tattoo parlor. I’ve heard worse.”
“Right, so he lost the match, lost his head, and nine monts later out pops yer ma. He never brought her round, though. Wasn’t till two years past we heard her name. Madeline, it was, wasn’t it? French name.”
“Yeah,” I confirmed. “My grandma never spoke English. Only French. She taught it to my mom before she left. Then Mom and grandpa moved to Las Vegas.”
“Is that where they went off to? Las Vegas? With the lights and the gamblin’?”
“That’s the place.”
“Aye, that’s bang on. If Da were to go anywhere it’d have to have gamblin’.”
“You didn’t know that’s where he was?” Jenna asked.
Owen shook his head. “We didn’t. Never a word from him after he left. It’s a shame. Young Madeline woulda had a home to come to had we known ‘bout her bein’ alone like she was.”
“Your mom would have taken her in?”
“She woulda. She was family.” Owen looked at me sideways, his sharp eyes taking in my rigid posture. I hadn’t realized I was tensing but the more we discussed my mom and what could have been the more I felt uncomfortable. Anxious. “Just as you’re family, lad.”
I chuckled, trying to loosen myself. “Are you sure? As far as I can see I don’t look a thing like you.”
“It’s all that whore in you,” Jenna chimed in happily.
I smiled, watching Owen glance at us both out of the corner of his eye before he burst out laughing.
“You’re a gas, darlin’,” he breathed between chuckles. “A real gas.”
I wished I could hug her then. I wished I could harness that thing that she had in her, that amazing element that ran through her DNA and made her mix with anyone she came across. Even in a foreign land she was totally comfortable. Completely Jenna.
I couldn’t understand it, couldn’t fathom it to save my life, but I loved it fiercely.
“That’s the gaff, just up there atop the hill,” Owen pointed out ten minutes later. “The one with the fence needs mending, but don’t go tellin’ Sean I said shite about it. I’ll never hear end of it.”
“Are we not staying with you?” Jenna asked.
“Not with me, no. I’ve an apartment with my wife farther up the road a ways. One bedroom and a wretched couch. Sean and his have a spare room for the two of ya. You’ll do better with him but mind the eggs. His wife Sorcha is a grand cook but her eggs are manky. Grit like sand on a beach. Here ya are, home sweet home.”
Owen pulled us to a screeching halt in front of the large stone house. It sat in the darkening rain with glowing yellow windows that looked warm and inviting like something out of a brochure. A shadow moved across the big bay window in the front, paused, then hurried toward the door. It banged open and a wisp of a woman stood in the light, smiling brightly as her blond hair was batted in the wind. When she waved I instinctively waved back.
“That’d be Sorcha, Sean’s wife. Ya two go on up the steps to meet her. I’ll get the bags out the boot.”
Despite the rain I took my time getting out of the car. I waited for Jenna’s door to open and uselessly put my hand over her head to try to block the rain. She smiled indulgently, taking my hand in hers and lowering it to swing between us.
“It’ll be fine,” she assured me, pulling me forward.
“I never said it wouldn’t be.”
“You didn’t have to. It’s in your body language.”
“Can they tell?”
“No.” She gave my hand a gentle shake. “They don’t know you like I do.”
“Kellen,” Sorcha greeted me warmly.
The moment I was in range she pulled me in to a crushing hug that both surprised and calmed me. She released me without ceremony and did the same to Jenna, pulling her in close and saying her name as though they were old friends finally reunited.
“You must be shattered from yer trip,” she said, motioning for us to follow her inside the house. “Come in and warm yerselves. Dry off. Sean! They’re here!” She smiled at us dripping wet in her entryway, the wind and rain pouring in a curtain behind us, dripping off the roof in miniature waterfalls. “And they’re the prettiest couple I’ve ever seen in my life. Do you take after your ma, Kellen? I’ve never seen photo of her.”
“I don’t. Not much. No. Only in the eyes.”
I shrugged my shoulders, unsure if that was enough of an answer. It didn’t feel like it and suddenly I felt like a shit that I came here without a picture of my mom. It never occurred to me that they’d want to see one and I didn’t have many to start with. What I did have I’d never shown to anyone. Not even Jenna.
I had hoped that coming here and meeting this family I’d find more of myself in them, but then Sean appeared from the kitchen all smiles, graying black hair, and dark eyes that were more green than my blue. He was short like his brother, no more than five foot seven with none of the bulk to his body that I carried. I didn’t look anything like them, meaning I didn’t look anything like my grandpa, meaning I probably looked a hell of a lot like my dad.
The thought made me sick in my stomach.
Jenna shook my hand impatiently, snapping me back to reality. I blinked again, looking around the room at the faces that were watching me and waiting.
“I think he’s tired from the trip,” Jenna explained with a smile. “I slept but he didn’t. Kellen, your Uncle Sean was just introducing himself.”
“I’m sorry.” I offered my hand to the man in front of me. His smile recovered from where it sagged in confusion at my blank stare. “Jet lag brings out the worst in me. I’m Kellen. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Grand to meet ya,” he replied politely. When he released my hand he smiled genuinely at Jenna and I was so damn thankful she was there I nearly fainted at her feet. “Are ya hungry? We’ve had our supper but Sorcha kept the pot hot for ya.”
Jenna shook her head mildly. “We ate on the plane. Thank you, though. I’m really excited to taste authentic Irish cooking.”
“I’ll keep it in the fridge for tomorrow,” Sorcha promised with a glowing grin. “Or if ya get a hunger in the night ya can warm it.”
“That sounds amazing.”
“Grand.”
Owen burst into the room behind us, a muttering of curses on his breath as he kicked the door closed and shook his collar down.
“Ma won’t be wantin’ to come out in this shite,” he told Sean gruffly. “I’ll bring her round in the mornin’.”
Sean nodded in agreement. “Bridgette, she’s our sister, she put the babes to bed hours ago. She and Donal won’t be comin’ by tonight either. Best to let ya two rest a bit. Meet the clann in the mornin’.”
“I’ll make breakfast,” Sorcha added brightly. “Bangers, eggs, white puddin’, and soda bread.”
Owen looked at Jenna and me meaningfully.
“I can’t wait,” I told Sorcha.
Jenna nodded with enthusiasm.
We said our goodbyes to Owen, agreeing to see him again in the morning when he brought his mom over for breakfast. I was nervous about that. I was nothing to this woman. Nothing but the bastard grandson of the French prostitute who stole her husband and tossed him aside when she was done with him. What she wanted to do with me I had no idea.
Sorcha led us up the worn wooden stairs to the top floor of the house. We walked down a narrow hallway filled with arched doorways obviously not built with giant Americans in mind. I’d have to duck slightly to pass through any of them. I knew Jenna would be a bit embarrassed that she’d have to do the same.
“Toilet’s on the left here,” Sorcha pointed out, pushing
a door open to show a small, clean bathroom covered in blue tile. “I set out clean towels for ya in yer room. Here ya are on the left.”
She opened another door to show a square room with a tight, tall window flanked by flower printed curtains, dark wood floors, yellow wallpaper, a long white dresser, and a queen sized bed with a thick blue and yellow quilt draped over the mattress.
“It’s nothin’ fancy,” she said almost apologetically. “Probably nothin’ like whatcha have in California, but it’s—“
“Beautiful,” Jenna breathed. She smiled at the other woman. “It’s lovely, Sorcha. Is that quilt hand sewn?”
Sorcha smiled proudly. “It is. My ma and me, we sewed it together before my weddin’.”
Jenna ran her hand gently over the colors. “It’s beautifully done.”
“Thank ya.” Sorcha took a bracing breath before stepping back into the hallway. “I’m sure ya both are tired. I’ll leave ya to it, then. If ya need anything at all Sean and me, we’re down the hall on the right, opposite the toilet.”
“Thank you,” I told her sincerely. “Goodnight.”
“Codladh sámh.”
“What does that mean?” Jenna asked curiously.
“It’s Gaelic. It means goodnight. Or sleep well.”
Sorcha smiled as she closed the door behind her with a gentle click.
The room fell silent. We stood there motionless as we listened to her feet pad down the hallway, taking the stairs back down to the kitchen and living room. She and Sean would probably put out the fire in the hearth, turn off the lights throughout the house. More than likely they had a ritual. A set of steps they did every night together to end the day. The idea was comforting, cozy and warm like the house.
It wasn’t huge and it wasn’t ornate, not like a lot of the houses I saw in Ranchos Palos Verdes, but it was lived in. It had memories on the wall. Pictures of family plastered over every surface, some old black and whites obviously of people dead and gone but never forgotten. It was full of family and life being lived from the smooth dark hand rail on the stairs to the thick smell of beef and vegetables in the air.