by Claire Allan
Everyone had to learn that lesson, no matter how painful.
‘You’re awful pale-looking,’ Kathleen says.
We are sheltered together on the back porch of my mother’s
house. I’m sucking on my e-cig but it’s still not quite hitting
the mark. I remind myself it’s better than nothing.
Kathleen has ‘tapped’ a sneaky cigarette from Pauline, who
swore she didn’t smoke but always has a box in her bag ‘for
emergencies’. My aunt is clearly not an experienced smoker –
she splutters and coughs as she tries to inhale the warm smoke.
‘Out of practice,’ she says when she’s got her breath back.
‘But it’s either this or a double vodka.’
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I am shocked. With her new sensible appearance, her conserv-ative take on life and the rosary beads she had pulled from her
bag and insisted were to be placed in my father’s hands when
the coffin was opened, I didn’t see her as the double-vodka type.
I don’t even see her as the single-vodka type, if I am honest.
Her hand is shaking ever so slightly as she lifts the lit cigarette to her lips one more time and inhales again, exhaling more
naturally this time.
‘It’s all too much at times, isn’t it?’ she asks, looking out at
the small patch of lawn that makes up my mother’s garden.
‘It is,’ I agree, asking for a drag of her ‘proper’ cigarette,
enjoying the hit of the warm smoke at the back of my throat.
‘I’m nervous. Of seeing him again, you know. Is that silly?’
‘Is that what has you so shaken up?’
I nod. I’ll not tell her about the set-to I’ve just have with
my mother, even though the sting of her hand still burns at
my cheek.
‘Among other things,’ I say wryly.
‘Do you think they have any evidence?’ Kathleen asks. ‘I
mean, you see these shows now on the TV and they always
catch the killer. There’ll be a hair, or a fingerprint, or a drop
of blood or something . . .’
I shake my head. ‘I don’t know. I’m trying not to think about
it much. I’m still hoping they’ll come back and say they made
a mistake.’
‘Do you think they will?’ Her eyebrows raise. ‘I thought it
was all pretty conclusive at this stage. They wouldn’t release his body if there was any question.’
Her expression sags again as she speaks. Almost as if she
allowed hope to flicker in for the briefest of seconds before
the reality of where we are sets back in.
I suck on my e-cig before sending a billow of fragrant steam
into the air.
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‘I don’t get the impression they are minded to drop the investigation any time soon,’ I say.
She sniffs at the air, drops the half-smoked cigarette to the
ground and grinds it out with the heel of her shoe.
‘What if they can’t pin it on anyone? What do you think
they’ll do? Will it be worse if we don’t ever really know what
happened?’
She looks sad. Lost. Dad was her only sibling. She has him
on some unobtainable pedestal and while I’d love to knock it
out from under him and tell her the truth, not even I would
be that cruel.
‘I don’t know,’ I say with a shrug.
I can’t think straight any more. I’m exhausted with thinking.
I’m exhausted by it all.
My mother’s voice from the kitchen, announcing that she
needs us to discuss a floral tribute, disturbs us. I take one last drag from Kathleen’s cigarette before handing it back to her.
‘I suppose we should get on with this,’ I tell her.
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Chapter Thirty-Eight
Heidi
Now
I’m back at Aberfoyle Crescent, picking through a house that
has been picked through by the police a number of times
now. There is dust from where fingerprints have been taken.
Things have been placed back on the chest of drawers, or
on shelves but just not quite in the right order. Kathleen
wanted me to pick up some things for the wake. A framed
picture of Joe at the library, one of his silk hankies to place
in the pocket of the suit jacket he is to be laid out in. His
prayer book, so that she can help Father Brennan choose
some of Joe’s favourite readings from the Bible or prayers for
the funeral service.
I’ve been looking for it for twenty minutes now, looked in
all the usual spots, but it can’t be found. I don’t actually recall the last time I saw it, but then it had become such a part of
him, I’d almost stopped noticing it at all.
‘I’m really sorry,’ I tell her over the phone. ‘But I haven’t
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seen it and I’m not sure where else to look. Unless maybe the police put it somewhere?’
‘Why would they do that?’ she asks, an accusing tone in her
voice.
‘I don’t know,’ I answer. All I know is that I can’t find it and
I don’t want to be here for any longer than I need to be.
I hear Kathleen have a muffled conversation with someone
in the background before her voice comes back on the line.
‘Ciara seems to think she saw you with it, but sure, maybe
she’s mistaken? These things happen.’
There’s a tone in her voice that lets me know she doesn’t
quite believe me.
I have pulled open every drawer in his room and in the living
room. Opened every cupboard and wardrobe looking for it. As
the clock moves closer and closer to the time Joe’s remains will
be brought back to Marie’s house, Kathleen is becoming more
frantic. I’m tempted to tell her it’s okay to use whatever prayers she sees fit. It’s not like Joe will be able to hear them anyway.
‘I didn’t see his prayer book,’ I tell her truthfully. I’ve not
seen it days, come to think of it. ‘I’m not sure what Ciara saw
me with, but it wasn’t that.’
Kathleen sighs. ‘Why is nothing going right?’ she says, and
I’m not sure for a moment or two if she expects an answer.
‘Look, I think maybe just get here to Marie’s. Joe’s remains will
be back soon and we really do need to give a united front.
Things are bad enough as it is.’
Her negativity weighs heavy on my mind as I drive to Marie’s.
Not even picking Alex up from work and having him sit beside
me can calm my nerves. I notice that I’m gripping the steering
wheel tightly. The rhythmic swiping of the windscreen wipers,
battling the sleety rain, gives me something to try to concentrate on, to time my breathing with. Neither Alex nor I talk.
I’ve never been in Marie’s house before, but I can’t imagine,
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despite what she has said, that I’ll be made to feel welcome there. And up until now I didn�
��t think it possible that I could
feel any less welcome than I already have over the last few days.
Marie lives in a terraced house in Lower Creggan. Her home
is clearly her pride and joy, the small front garden beautifully
manicured and tended. Flower beds and garden ornaments guide
us along the concrete path to her front door, which Alex knocks
on while Lily and I shiver behind him.
The door opens and Marie is standing dressed all in black,
face solemn. ‘Alex,’ she nods at him before looking at me. ‘Heidi,’
she says, offering me a half-hearted kiss on the cheek. ‘Come
in,’ she says as Kathleen calls out, ‘We’re through in the living
room.’
We follow her through a small hall into her lounge, where
I notice a row of sympathy cards lined up on her mantlepiece,
declaring how very sorry people are for her loss. It strikes me
as more than a little odd, given how long ago their marriage
ended, but I realise that saying anything to that effect wouldn’t
be received well. So I keep quiet and let Marie continue acting
the part of the grieving ex-wife with aplomb.
‘Here, let me help you with your things,’ Kathleen says, taking
the changing bag from me and trying to help me out of my
coat, even though I’m more than able to take it off myself.
Marie adds, ‘Ciara has just nipped out to the shop but she’ll
be here soon. As will Father Brennan. Joe should be home in
about an hour.’
She looks fidgety, on edge. Her nervous energy adds to my
own.
‘I’ve cleared the box room upstairs for him,’ she says. ‘Ciara
asked that the house be closed, so I figured we wouldn’t need
that much room.’
‘Thank you for doing this for him,’ I say, because it feels like
the right thing to do.
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‘Why wouldn’t I do it? It should be from his own home, but I’ll do my best for him. And I suppose this was his home
for a time, and most of that time it was a happy home.’
Her tone is sharp, her comments pointed. I want to turn and
leave, but that would only give them something else to think
badly of me about.
‘Of course,’ I mumble and turn my attention to my still-
sleeping daughter, taking her out of her car seat and slipping
her out of her snowsuit.
It feels too warm in Marie’s living room. I can’t have Lily
overheating. It’s bad enough that I can feel the first prickles of sweat on the back of my own neck.
The doorbell rings, a sharp, shrill noise that, given that we
are all on our nerves at the moment, makes us jump. Marie
takes a deep breath as if settling herself and goes to answer the
door. I hear her tone, markedly more welcoming than she was
with me.
‘Come in, Father,’ she says. ‘You’re very good to come, and
this not even your parish.’
‘Sure, he’ll be buried from his own church, even if he couldn’t
be waked from his own home. How’re you all holding up?’
Father Brennan speaks in hushed tones. A soft Donegal lilt
that I sometimes swear they train priests in at the seminary in
Maynooth.
‘As best as can be expected,’ Marie replies, although to me
she appears to be in her element as chief mourner. ‘Sure, you
go on in to the living room and I’ll bring through some tea.’
He walks into the room, nodding, as always, to me and then
lifting one of his long, pointy fingers and trying to tickle a
still-sleeping Lily under the chin.
‘A blessing in these dark times,’ he mutters.
I resist the urge to slap his hand away.
Father Brennan is a small man, whose shoulders always seem
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to slump and whose head always seems to be nodding in some perpetual motion so it looks, at least, like he is always listening to you. Joe had a great deal of time for him. I did not. Something about him gave me the creeps – perhaps it was the way he
regarded me up and down every time he saw me.
He sits down and doesn’t even try to make small talk, some-
thing for which I am eternally grateful. He speaks, of course,
when Kathleen comes into the room, asking her how she is.
Telling her it’s an awful business altogether and that he is here
for her should she ever need his counsel.
She thanks him for his time, sits down and straightens her
skirt, and we fall into silence while waiting for Marie to arrive
with the tea.
‘Maybe I should offer to help,’ I say to no one in particular.
‘I’m sure she has it under control,’ Kathleen says.
I interpret that as a clear message that I’m not wanted in
Marie McKee’s kitchen. The front door opens again and I hear
Ciara shout her hellos as she comes in. Once she takes her seat
in the living room I will feel truly outnumbered.
I try to remind myself to breathe.
Ciara comes in, closely followed by her mother.
‘Did you really not find that prayer book?’ Ciara asks as if
I’d not looked hard enough, or had hidden it just to be difficult.
‘I looked high and low and couldn’t see it,’ I say. ‘I’ve not
seen it in days.’
Marie sighs deeply. ‘That’s a shame, you know.’
‘I could have sworn I saw you with it. The day he died?’
Ciara’s tone is accusatory.
I shake my head. ‘No, you have to be mistaken. I did see
his diary, when I was with you, but you took it from me,
remember?’
‘Oh yes,’ she says, ‘because you were prying in it. I remember
now.’
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I blush. I want to say something back to her but I’m aware we have an audience and none of that audience would naturally
fall on my side.
Father Brennan’s head turns between the two us, as if he’s
watching a tennis match and it’s Ciara’s turn to serve.
He interjects, ‘Sure, never worry,’ clearing his throat. ‘I knew
Joe well. We can still make his requiem Mass a fitting one. I
know these must be very difficult times. Very difficult, indeed,’
he says with a shake of his head. ‘But we do owe it to Joe to
try to remain civil to him and I must say, to you all now, that
if anyone feels they wish to chat to me, privately, the sanctity
of the confessional is as good a place as anywhere to get some-
thing off your chest.
‘We know that something very disturbing happened, perhaps,
as it has been suggested, with some good intention behind it.
A merciful release from the suffering that may have awaited
Joe, but that suffering has to go somewhere. And it will eat at
the heart of us all, not least the person responsible. God is good, He is forgiving, even of the most serious of sins. But you must
repent.’
I don’t dare speak. I am holding so much inside that I’m
afraid to.
It seems I’m
not the only one. We descend into silence, only
disturbed by Lily waking and starting to fuss. She needs her
nappy changed and I lift her bag.
‘Where can I change this little one?’ I ask Marie, grateful for
the reprieve.
Ciara is on her feet. ‘I can take her and change her for you,’
she says. ‘You can sit here and talk to Father Brennan about
the Mass, since you knew my father better than anyone. I’m
sure this wee dote won’t mind her auntie Ciara changing her.
Won’t you not?’ she says, cooing at my daughter as if she has
been a permanent fixture in her life.
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She seems terribly eager to get out from under the glare of Father Brennan’s eyes.
I want to tell her to leave my baby alone. Not to touch her.
But I’m aware I’m already walking on eggshells and causing an
even bigger scene could be disastrous.
‘Ah now,’ Ciara soothes as Lily wriggles in her arms. ‘There’s
no need for that! I’ll just get you a fresh nappy on,’ she adds,
reaching for the baby bag.
I don’t want her taking it – it has my phone, my purse, other
random items from my life inside.
‘I’ll get you a nappy and wipes,’ I say, trying to take the bag
from her.
‘Now, Heidi, I’m sure I can figure out what is what myself,’
Ciara says, turning and walking upstairs with my baby and my
worldly belongings.
I am frozen to the spot, unsure of how to react to this ambush
but aware that four sets of eyes are looking at me and waiting
for my reaction, including Alex, who I need to believe in more
than anything. I try to settle myself, turn and nod towards
Father Brennan and Marie before taking a seat beside them.
Father Brennan clears his throat, a guttural sound that has a
hint of phlegm about it. I feel mildly queasy.
‘I know how difficult this must be,’ Father Brennan says. ‘But,
Heidi, maybe you might know what his favourite readings were,
or maybe his favourite hymns. I’ve a soloist from the choir who
is available to do some singing if you want?’
I try to focus on what he is saying but I’m distracted listening
for the sound of crying from upstairs.
‘Heidi . . .’ I hear Marie speak my name.
‘Sorry . . . I, no. I can’t think. He always, I suppose, he liked