The Island Child

by Molly Aitken

  As I wandered, the sea loudly shushed. I crawled into the open mouth of a fairy hut and lay down in the quiet.

  * * *

  In the dark someone was calling.

  My head rang. Arms stiff, cold. Little bells jingling close by, the sweet voice of my sister calling me away.

  A scuffling. Someone coming in. Michael had come back. My heart lifted and I tried to sit up. A word whispered. A cheek against mine. None of the prickle of Michael’s beard but the smooth skin of all island men.

  Leave me, I said. No.

  I lunged up, but the ground smashed into my head and sparks stung my eyes. A heavy weight on my chest. Tears or rain on my neck. Above me, someone with no face.

  I pushed up, but my arms were pinned to my chest. Fingers tugged at my skirts.

  A fish smell in my nose.

  Teeth nibbled my mouth like a child testing, playing. Kind and soft and I laughed at the tickle of it. A hardness struck my cheek and I was seeing lights again.

  I pushed, somehow I pushed.

  Sour mouth. A strange laughter in my voice, but not my voice.

  I would crawl. That’s what I’d do, but the weight was so heavy. I shoved, but only at air. Heat and weight pressed on my legs. A ripping sound. My beautiful new blue skirts. I was so angry. I yelled, but it turned into a scream.

  Fire tore up from the gap in my legs and burst into my spine, my skull. I kicked and twisted and bit, and tasted blood in my mouth. My skin scorched. I needed out of it, out of this place, this body.

  I swallowed sour, but it kept coming up. I spat and it dribbled down my neck. I watched for fairy lights. I saw none. I listened for the bells but none came.

  I heard sobbing and I was sure I was dead. Someone had stolen me and dragged me down to the underworld, to the dark of pain and nothing.

  The weight on my chest lifted. My mouth was thick, bruised. I snapped my neck to one side and spat an evil taste from my mouth. My legs didn’t work.

  Hush, hush, hush, said the sea, but I was screaming.

  Sobbing. I touched my cheeks but they were dry. I think the shadow touched me. I think he pulled my skirt back down. But it didn’t matter. I was gone.

  He must have left my body too.

  * * *

  I stood on a cliff. Far away, a flicker. Mam would be boiling water on the hearth and humming some tune her mam taught her. The doors would be shut against the dark and she safe in the bright of the lamps. I wanted to hurl this body into the sea like a stone. I crumpled to the ground, rocks slicing my arms and chest, and the flicker of Mam’s light across the water went out. I was alone in my body.

  The wet sucked my skirts to my legs and belly. Day came clear, as if night had held nothing, as if it was nothing but the passing breath of darkness. Only it stayed in my body. It clung moist in my clothes, my skin. I needed off with them all. I peeled my nails back – tearing. I could toss away my skin and let it float on the water.

  As I was rowed off and the island shrank I saw her, the naked body, still sat on the cliff. Empty.

  A river lay between the green world of her mother and the grey of her husband. No living person could cross it. The waters, deep with the memories of all the dead, were poison. The girl could only cross with a guide, so her husband lifted her into the belly of the boat. She knew it was too late to change her mind and return home and still she looked over her shoulder to see if her mother was chasing after her. But when she looked her home was gone like a candle blown out.

  On the journey across the river she went hungry but forced herself to keep her eyes ahead and not look down at the swirling mist, the nothing of the dead waters. The acid in the air burned her nose. She blocked her ears to the shrieks that ripped up from under the hull. In the end, she squeezed her eyes shut and waited for it to be over.

  No-Body

  Galway is silent at night. A fine mist of rain shrouds me. As I walk beside the canal, the street lamps drip pools of light. I stop and stand outside them to think in the dark.

  A swan is sleeping on her nest, sheltered by a tree, her head scooped beneath a wing.

  I need to sleep too, to have strength for my return to the island, and to Éag.

  I can’t stop remembering Joyce, but I always drift back to the early times, when she was too little for me to lie to, before she could really hate me. These are the memories that keep me going, keep me here.

  I walk the streets of Galway all night, heading out to Salthill along the water and then back to Kate’s, but I don’t go inside to get my bag. I just start the rental car and drive out to the pier.

  As the ferry bumps away from the mainland the waves swell and beat and burble, flipping my insides round and round. It will arrive too quick; already the hills of Clare are shrinking.

  When I left Inis with Pat, Mam stood on the beach and watched me disappear. Pat said later she didn’t move from the spot. I didn’t cry for her. When you are broken with pain, when the loss makes you want to walk into the dark and silence of the lake, sometimes you still can’t cry.

  I look now at the mainland, the sea, the sky, anything but the island, which I sense is growing in front of me.

  There are specks of blue in the sky. I cling to them even as they slide away.

  Joyce used to sing when I put her down to sleep. She’d nuzzle her head against the baby pillow, shut her bright, lively eyes and pretend she was dreaming but as soon as I left the room I would hear her voice. She couldn’t talk yet, she was only just two, but I would stand outside her door to listen to the squeaky la la la of her songs, and when Pat passed we’d laugh. She brought us together. But then he would open the door and go to her, and I would walk back down the hall and lie alone on my bed.

  Seaweed

  Dad took my hand in his, led me along the cliff and down a crooked path to the beach of broken shells. Tears ran down his rough, grey cheeks. It was Kieran who lifted me into the boat. The men kept their heads down. I lay in the bow, pulling in all my edges.

  Hands held me up on the road from the pier to home. Clean washing flapped on the line. Inside, Mam was bent over the fire, stirring the flames with the poker.

  ‘So the lot of you are back.’

  She turned, her hand flapping to her throat. Her knuckles were red and the skin was cracked and wrinkled.

  ‘Ardàn,’ she said. ‘Kieran, get out of here.’

  They let go of me and I was clutching at nothing.

  She banged about the kitchen, setting water to boil on the fire. I stood by the door, scraping at my skin with sharp fingernails, and watched the floor, the table legs. She dragged me to the tub. It wasn’t set up in the bedroom like usual but in the middle of the kitchen. She pulled my dress over my head and tossed it on the fire. The red flames licked up the sea-blue fabric.

  She pushed me into the scalding water, forcing the breath out of me. She tore my skin with a rough brush. The tears began to fall.

  ‘Stop that.’

  ‘Mam?’

  The scrubbing got fiercer but I couldn’t stop the tears. The slaps were no surprise. My head bounced off the back of the tub.

  ‘You let him. You filthy whore.’

  Nails scraped me. The tears kept coming. It was Dad who had to pull my mam off me.

  * * *

  Sleep didn’t come.

  I stayed in the little room, afraid of Mam in the kitchen, more afraid of who was outside the cottage, what faceless man passed on the road. Any one of them could’ve been him.

  Days ground by. Enda sat with me on the bed and chatted, telling me little things. He was going to be a priest. He asked me to pray with him, but prayer turned my mouth to dust.

  ‘Oona?’ Enda whispered. ‘Will you talk to me?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Michael was with us most of the night on Éag.’

  I stuffed my fingers in my ears. I didn’t want to hear.

  The little room became my cell. I sometimes slept but in my dreams I was on fire. I woke screaming.


  I woke and ran.

  * * *

  The water bit my legs. My skirt sucked and sloshed, pulling me further out. I watched the horizon and pictured myself in a new country, a new life, a new Oona. The answer was so simple. I would leave.

  ‘Oona.’ The sea was calling me.

  I took one last gulp of air and slipped under. The cold, the dark, wrapped around me. I was with her, my sister. I reached out to her, to comfort her, and felt her arms wrap around me. She whispered my name.

  I pushed at the weight on top of me, struggling, and light and air burst through the dark. I was coughing and a stone weight pressed on my chest and I shoved at it and crawled across the sharp rocks. My eyes stung and there he was, beard dripping onto me.

  ‘Oona?’

  It was him. Michael. His fingertips were fumbling about my chest.

  ‘Get off me,’ I cried, and slapped his hands away.

  ‘Keep breathing.’

  The rocks were slippery but I hauled myself up.

  ‘Here.’ He offered me a hand.

  ‘No.’

  I stood to face him on my own. He was drenched and trembling. It began to rain and he lifted the camera hanging on a leather strap around his neck.

  ‘I think I might’ve lost all my photos,’ he said. ‘You can’t get a camera wet.’

  ‘Why did you jump in the sea then?’

  ‘You were—’ He pointed at the waves.

  ‘You don’t know me,’ I said.

  ‘Will I take you home to dry?’

  ‘No.’ My teeth chattered.

  ‘I’m leaving tomorrow on the ferry,’ he said.

  ‘So am I.’ It was sudden but it was true. The sea had thrown me out; my sister hadn’t wanted me. I would travel away from them both. I would be that other Oona.

  He nodded. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Anywhere else.’

  ‘You could come with me.’

  * * *

  Sleep never came. I left the cottage before sunrise. My brothers were still sleeping, and I didn’t wake Enda; if I did, if I told him I was leaving, I knew I wouldn’t go. I met Michael on the pier and almost felt glad to see him. He’d spent the night at Bridget and Daithi’s and was fresh and rested and smiling. It was a lovely smile and it made me sad. He was with two men I didn’t really know, who were there to row us out to the ferry. I felt them watching me, but it didn’t matter: I would be gone soon, for ever.

  ‘I didn’t know if you’d come,’ Michael said.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  One of the men pointed out that the ferry wouldn’t be in the bay for a while yet. We sat in silence, waiting. A few more people gathered on the pier and I tried not to look at them. Eventually we were rowed out.

  From the back of the currach I looked out at the grey-green back of the island, the old whale, for the last time. Along the thin stretch of yellow beach Mam was running towards the pier. Her red skirt slowing her. The small smudge of her blank white face was the last piece of the island I saw before I turned away.

  ‘So,’ said Michael. ‘How far would you like to come? To Dublin?’

  ‘I want to come all the way to where you’re from.’

  ‘There’s not much there and we don’t know each other.’

  ‘Please, you could marry me. I wouldn’t be a stranger then.’

  He coughed. ‘You want to be married?’

  ‘Please, Michael. I need to leave.’

  He looked me in the eye and I didn’t look away. There was nothing left in me to see.

  ‘Okay, I’ll marry you.’

  * * *

  We landed in Galway and stopped in the church where Christopher Columbus prayed before he journeyed to America. The priest was in a panic with us. He’d never had such little notice for a wedding. For a start, he said, the banns hadn’t been read and what about my parents’ permission? Michael said words to him quietly but the Father shook his head. It would be done on the boat to America instead, Michael told me, and asked me again if I was sure and I said I was.

  The city was full of noise and heaved with more people than I’d ever seen. My breath came in raggedy gasps. I wondered if I should stop at Kate’s work, to be warmed by her familiar face, but I stopped that notion. She’d ask me questions, and when I answered she’d make me return to the island, to Mam.

  I could tell Michael was getting unsure when he started pacing up and down on the steps of a bank where we were waiting for the bus.

  ‘How old are you?’ he asked.

  ‘Nineteen.’ I didn’t even blush at my lie.

  On the bus to Dublin I pictured lots of things: what food we’d have at the hotel, what a hotel looked like, whether there would be buildings as tall as the ones in Galway; but beyond Dublin my mind couldn’t stretch. He tried to describe it to me. How big the ‘ship’ would be at Holyhead. How long the ‘crossing’ was. I know boats, I told him. But, he said, you don’t know any like this.

  * * *

  We stopped in at a hotel with red carpets and gold doorknobs. There were long mirrors just inside the door. Reflected back at me was a short girl with wild hair and a blackbird’s eyes.

  The man at the desk asked twice if we were married, and Michael got annoyed. It was the first time I saw his stillness ruffled. I climbed the stairs slowly. You could fit a cottage in the bedroom. The bed was big and white and looked soft like a cloud. I didn’t go near it. My eyes were heavy and I stood blinking and bleary in the bright light hanging on a string from the ceiling.

  ‘I’m sorry I can’t really afford two rooms,’ Michael said. ‘I’ll sleep on the floor. Are you all right?’

  I nodded and he went into a small room and shut the door. I dragged off my dress and put on my nightie, but even though it was warm in the room I shivered. I stared down at the street where cars shone their bright lights and flocks of people hurried by. The door of the little room opened and he stood there in the blinding light. He treaded towards me.

  I stood still.

  He stepped closer. He was smiling. I looked away.

  ‘Don’t get any closer,’ I said.

  He halted. ‘I just wanted to look out the window.’

  ‘I need to go.’ I rushed past him into the small room.

  It was strange and white and shiny. I ran my fingers along everything and tried to figure out where I could piss, and where I’d get some water. I fiddled with things. He’d want to touch me. I let the cold run and scrubbed my body until it hurt and shone pink.

  He’d taken up my position on the windowsill.

  ‘Do you believe in fairies?’ I asked.

  He laughed, but his face was serious. ‘I don’t.’

  ‘Do you believe in God?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’ve not met many people who are brave enough to believe in nothing. Do you not find it scares you? What if you’re wrong?’

  ‘You mean am I afraid of hell? No. Things in this world scare me more.’

  ‘I know what you mean.’

  ‘Do you believe in hell?’

  ‘I do. Sometimes.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have . . . you know, touched you.’

  ‘I know.’

  I walked slowly to the window and sat, leaving a good gap between us. We were quiet for a while. He gazed through the glass, at the building opposite. A little smile crept up his lips and he began slowly to shake his head and chuckle.

  ‘This is the weirdest thing I ever did,’ he said.

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘Why did you come with me?’

  ‘I always wanted to go to America and I liked you and your beard.’

  He stroked it. ‘Glad you noticed. I’ve worked hard on it.’

  He lay down on the floor, yawning. I lowered myself onto the bed.

  ‘I was afraid to go on my own,’ I said.

  ‘It scares me too.’

  ‘You can come up.’

  ‘No. I’m all right.’

  ‘You won’t be in the morning. You’re a
tourist, you’re used to sleeping on a bed.’

  He lowered himself down beside me and rested rigid as a plank. In the yellow light his chest rose and fell gently, and I wondered what it would’ve been like to lie in this bed with him as the old me.

  The morning after, we bought new clothes: a blue suit and a straw hat. He laughed at my choices but said they were ‘just great’. Next, my photograph was taken in a studio off Grafton Street and brought with my documents I’d taken from the dresser in the kitchen before I left to make me a passport. We got the night-mail boat, Princess Maud, to Holyhead. There were some folk from the West onboard and I was able to speak Irish with them. It was only then I thought of my brothers fighting over dinner for the last lobster, the clock ticking above the fireplace and the smell of Dad’s pipe smoke. My eyes stung in the wind on the deck.

  I never even left Enda a note.

  The first day on the big boat to America, Michael got the captain to marry us. That night we went up on the deck and looked at the stars, the same as the stars I used to see on the island.

  In a cabin with bunks I threw up in the bucket on the floor. I wiped my mouth and took the drink of water he offered me and went to sleep in the bottom bunk.

  The next day, when the boat was in the Atlantic, I threw up anything I ate and lay in bed shaking. He came to tell me what had happened, what he’d seen, and I listened. It was all so new. He told me about Saint Patrick and I couldn’t stop laughing that he, a Canadian, was telling me about my country’s saint. My dad loved him, he said more enthusiastically than he’d said anything before. Soon I named him Pat when I was teasing him. Soon it had stuck.

  I decided to get well. I decided to forget.

  Cold Wings

  I was a bird dropped out of her nest, tumbling on a sharp wind. I didn’t weep much in the New World. I held the shock of it inside.

  We were released from the boat into the sticky air of New York. Red-yellow-white cars flashed past, screeching and honking when I stumbled off the sidewalk. Sidewalk. There were new words Pat reeled off as if I knew them. Train, trash, chaps, attorney, diner. I got tired of the sound of myself asking him what he meant. I just nodded and soaked it all in. I had finally arrived in America. I was free and I searched in myself to find a sense of soaring, but instead I was falling. It wasn’t the beautiful country of many trees I had pictured; it was full of people in bright clothes and strange hats and dark glasses. There were neck-creaking skyscrapers that shot up like giant pins to pierce the sky. I longed to stand on top and see out across the whole world. But we never went up. We never saw the sea again either, even though we stayed for two days.