At First Sight

by Hannah Sunderland

  We’d stumbled back to Carrick’s with Bambi-like legs, all propping each other up with untrustworthy arms. Charlie hadn’t been ready to sleep, or rather to be alone, and so he’d stayed up with Carrick, while I collapsed into my bed for the night. I’d fallen asleep almost instantly after hitting the sheets, but I’d been woken a few times, just enough to register the sound of music being played and glasses being clinked.

  I dreaded to think what state they were in.

  I showered, brushed the whisky-flavoured layer of fuzz from my teeth and dressed in a pair of jeans, a mustard-coloured cable-knit jumper and my trusty pumps. I packed up, pushing my pair of mud-smeared heels, which were the cause of today’s aching feet, into my bag. I put on the bare minimum make-up and braided my hair into a tight French braid. It tugged on my scalp a little, exacerbating the headache already boiling behind my brows, but it was the only acceptable option when there was no hairdryer to hand. I glugged two paracetamols down with some lukewarm water from the bathroom tap and hoped that it would subside.

  Down in the kitchen, sitting at a marble-topped, Pringle-scattered kitchen island, was Carrick. The fact that he’d managed to sleep, face down on the marble countertop, propped up by only a stool, was just short of a miracle. I took a clean glass from the dishwasher, which sat open, and filled it with cold water before going over to Carrick and gently shaking him awake.

  ‘Carrick?’ I whispered. ‘Are you alive?’

  He groaned as he came around and became aware of his thumping head. ‘I think so. Unfortunately,’ he replied as he sat up, squinting against the dim light that came through the curtains. ‘What time is it? Don’t want yer to miss yer flight.’

  ‘We’ve got hours yet,’ I said, chuckling at his fragile state.

  ‘Is Charlie up yet?’

  ‘Don’t think so. I wondered if you could do something for me?’

  ‘Depends on if the thing you want help with requires much brain function.’ He groaned, noticed the water and chugged it down.

  ‘Careful, don’t want to make yourself sick,’ I cautioned.

  ‘Sick? Ha!’ He chortled. ‘I haven’t been sick since 1993. Now, what is it that yer want?’

  ‘Can you just type the name of the graveyard into my phone?’ I said, sliding it across the countertop to him, Maps open on the screen.

  ‘What are yer goin’ there for?’

  ‘Just want to … pay my respects,’ I said.

  He shrugged and typed in the name. I rubbed his head affectionately, refilled his water and left him dozing on the countertop as I put on my coat and slipped out of the door.

  Aughaval graveyard was a field, hemmed in by bushes and trees, with the ever-present spectre of Croagh Patrick hazed in fog in the background. The graveyard was packed to the rafters, filled with stones of different heights, styles and sizes, and it seemed to stretch on forever. It was easily the biggest graveyard I’d been to, not that I’d visited many in my time, but it was still large by graveyard standards. Mum had sent me pictures last year when she’d gone to Père Lachaise in Paris, which I’m sure dwarfed Aughaval in size. I know she was just trying to share her adventures with me, but I couldn’t help but wish that she shared them with me in person and not by proxy. I mean, I wouldn’t have even had to fly there.

  Just before Carrick had nodded off again, he’d told me where Abi was, nestled into the back right-hand corner by a conifer tree. A black stone with silver writing.

  It was so quiet here, with nothing but birdsong and the occasional hum of a passing car to break the silence. I walked amongst the stones, scanning each one and thinking how I might never find her, until suddenly, there she was.

  Up until now, Abigale Murphy had been nothing but a story to me, a well fleshed out, tragically real story. But a story nonetheless. But, as I stood before her tombstone, her name spelled out in silver letters, I finally felt the weight of it hit me.

  Bingo. Yer found me. Abi sat with her shoulder and head propped against the stone casually.

  ‘I thought it’d be rude to come all this way and not pay you a visit.’ I ran my fingers over the carved lines that spelled out the date of when she’d left this world and for a brief moment, wondered what date they might carve on mine. ‘I’m sorry about what happened to you. I really am,’ I said. I didn’t check around for eavesdroppers or worry what someone might think about me talking to someone who wasn’t there. This was a graveyard. If there was anywhere you could talk to inanimate objects and not be judged, it was here.

  I’m sure you are, she said sarcastically. I’m sure there’s nothin’ you’d like better than to have me still around and in your way.

  I looked up at her and stared for a moment as I thought of what to say. ‘You’re right. But if you hadn’t died then there’s no telling that I would have ever met Charlie. We’d have both gone on with our lives, completely ignorant of each other.’ A gust of wind blew in between the headstones, making little air tunnels that caused strands of hair to dance around my face. I watched Abi’s long russet locks, but the wind didn’t touch them. ‘I’m jealous of you, you know?’ I said, finally voicing what I’d been feeling for a while now. ‘I hate that, when I have a moment with him, I can see you in his eyes. It’s as if every new moment he’s having with me reminds him of one he had with you.’

  You’re not in competition with me. I’m dead.

  ‘I know, but when it comes to love, things are rarely ever rational.’ I took a deep, shaky breath and began picking at the nail varnish on my thumb, just so I wouldn’t have to look at her. ‘I don’t want to erase you from his life; you were a huge part of it. Erasing you would be like erasing part of him.’

  My spectral companion looked down at the grass covering her grave, her fingers fidgeting in her lap. It’s not that I don’t want him to find someone else. I never wanted him to be alone forever after I died; it’s just harder to watch him falling in love with someone else than I anticipated.

  I frowned at her words. Her independence from me, some of the things she said and the ways she said them, made me uneasy. ‘It’s also hard to love him, knowing that he’s always going to be in love with someone else, too,’ I said, looking up at her through my lashes.

  Her eyes met mine and, for a moment, we just stared at each other, until I felt the corners of my mouth move into a smile and her lips copied mine. She held my gaze a little longer before turning away and pretending that our tender moment hadn’t just happened.

  What a pair we make. She sighed.

  I sat on the grave until my hands were numb with the cold and my cheeks reddened by the wind. I pushed myself up to standing and felt my knees ache as they straightened back into place. My mother had warned me that one day I’d try to get up and it wouldn’t be as easy as it used to be. I hadn’t thought that that day would be when I was still in my twenties, but there I was, holding on to the headstone while the feeling returned to my toes.

  ‘I’d better get going if I don’t want to miss my flight,’ I said, Abi still sitting beside the headstone, her eyes far away. ‘But I don’t suppose that this will be the last time I see you.’

  I don’t know. I think that maybe the time’s comin’ for us to part ways, she said with a sad, one-sided smile. I think that when even I start warmin’ to yer, it’s time to back away.

  ‘I don’t know if I even want to know the answer to this question, but am I really seeing you? Or is this all inside my head?’

  She looked up at me with her big brown eyes and sighed quietly. I think yer already know the answer to that.

  I felt myself getting rather tearful as I stood in the car park of the airport, with Carrick’s arms around me. Charlie and I had done the other goodbyes, bidding farewell for now to his parents, Kenna and Siobhan and an even more emotional goodbye to Steve the motorbike, ending with Charlie whispering a promise into the handlebars that he would come back for him soon.

  ‘Take care of him, will yer?’ Carrick said into my ear, quiet enough that C
harlie wouldn’t be able to hear from where he stood at the back of the orange death mobile, pulling our bags from the boot. ‘Don’t think that I don’t appreciate what you and Ned have done for him, for me. I don’t know what I’d do without that boy. He’s lucky to have yer lookin’ out for him.’ He took a deep gulp of air, as if he hadn’t taken a breath in minutes and his eyes took on a glazed look. ‘It’s been so good havin’ him back. That wouldn’t have happened without yer.’ Like Charlie, Carrick was very good at hiding his true feelings, but in that moment, just for a second, I saw a hollow loneliness in the azure of his irises.

  I pulled him into a hug and squeezed tightly. ‘You’re always welcome. Promise that you’ll come over and see us again soon? I’m sure Ned would be up for another round of drunk Jenga.’

  ‘Ah, with wine in hand is the only way to play the game.’ He sniffed, pulled away and grinned, his true feelings safely masked behind a smile as he made his way to his nephew and slapped him hard on the behind. They shared a moment, their faces and words hidden behind the opened boot. I knew that Carrick felt guilty about letting Charlie slip away from him yesterday, but he’d been fooled – like everyone else – that Charlie’s grief was waning, that it was about time to move on and be happy.

  Being here had been so good for him. Facing the consequences of how he’d let Siobhan and Kenna find out about Abi’s death, coming back to the set of their love story and seeing the ground that held Abi in lieu of him, had all been incredible milestones in combating his grief. But healing didn’t work like that. Grief simply lasted as long as it lasted, be that a week or a lifetime. There are no quick fixes, no telling when it will be that waking up isn’t the day’s first torture and tears the first chore. There was no way of hurrying it along with words about things getting back to normal because normal didn’t exist anymore. Normal was as dead as Abi.

  I knew that watching Charlie grieve for her would be a long and painful road, for both of us, but I was willing to take it, if he was.

  ‘Hold on to that girl, will yer, Boyo!’ Carrick shouted as we walked towards the glass doors. ‘She’s far too good for yer.’

  Charlie breathed a laugh through his nose and glanced at me from the corner of his eyes. I could see that they were clearer than before, less clouded with pain than they had been only a couple of days ago, and it somehow made his eyes even bluer.

  ‘The man’s right, yer know,’ he said. ‘You’re far too good for me.’

  We had run into a problem at airport security when the guard had reached into my bag and pulled out the snow globe that I’d bought for Ned. The holy water inside sloshed around, making the tiny white flecks dance around in the liquid.

  ‘Yer can’t take this on the plane,’ she said with a scowl.

  ‘But it’s holy water,’ I said, frowning at my own words as they left my mouth.

  ‘Needs to go in checked luggage if yer want to take it with yer.’

  ‘I’ve only got hand luggage,’ I said, flustered.

  The guard, a portly woman, with a belt so tight that it made her look like a balloon that was being squeezed in the middle, leaned forward, brandishing the snow globe for the whole tutting queue behind to see.

  ‘Just tip the water out and refill it when yer get home,’ Charlie said, with a sigh.

  ‘But it’s holy water.’

  ‘Come on. D’yer really think Ned’s gonna be able to tell the difference?’ He raised his brows and quirked his head.

  ‘Fine.’ I sighed. ‘Can I just tip the water away?’

  The guard unscrewed the lid of the jar and tipped the water into a bin underneath the counter, the liquid taking all of the little grains of fake snow with it. She slammed it aggressively down on top of the clothes inside my bag and sent it back through the scanner.

  ‘I was wonderin’,’ Charlie said as we settled into our seats on the plane and the anxiety built up in my stomach. ‘When we get back, d’yer mind if I stay with yer for a while? I don’t think that I can go back to the apartment just yet.’

  ‘Of course,’ I said, my heart leaping a little at the thought of it. ‘I’m sure Ned won’t mind.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, sitting back and heaving a sigh. ‘You were right: I should have gone back home ages ago. I was just runnin’ from it.’

  ‘It’s going to take time,’ I replied. ‘Just be patient and ease will come.’

  ‘Oh, I almost forgot.’ Charlie shuffled his bag from between his feet, before rummaging around inside it and pulling George from inside, handing him to me with a smile. ‘For luck.’

  ‘I don’t think that a bobblehead will have much impact on if the plane goes down or not,’ I said, although the little plastic zombie had brought a smile to my face.

  The plane door was shut and the flight attendants stood to give the demonstration. I swallowed the lump in my throat and braced myself for another mild panic attack. I clutched George with my free hand, my knuckles turning white around him.

  Charlie looked at me, his hand upturned, waiting for mine. ‘You got this, Nell,’ he said as I slipped my hand into his and squeezed tightly. ‘You got this.’

  ‘And my son, Jeremiah, he’s just started working in a Wetherspoons to earn some more money while he studies,’ John, the Uber driver said into the rear-view mirror as the sat nav instructed him to pull up and drop me off on the right.

  ‘Good for him,’ I said, gathering up my bag and sending Charlie an apologetic smile. ‘I hope he enjoys his first year. I hear that Derby’s a great place to study.’

  The car slowed and I popped the door, trying to leave so I could stop compulsively learning the driver’s entire family history. ‘Send my love to your wife,’ I called before shutting the door and wondering why I’d just said that.

  ‘Jesus, woman.’ Charlie sighed. ‘Yer ever thought about goin’ into interrogation?’

  I chuckled as we began walking towards the house.

  ‘So, you’ve conquered yer fear of flyin’, guess that means the world’s your oyster now then?’

  ‘Hmm, I wouldn’t say conquered, more like, put a dent in. But I guess so. I mean, I’m still going to expect death every time the plane so much as wobbles, but I think it’s a good start.’ It was true. Knowing that I had been on a plane and not plummeted to my death had suddenly made the world feel a little smaller. Those destinations that I once thought unreachable were now tantalisingly close. Who knew, within no time at all I could become one of those insufferable people who posts pictures of crystal blue waters on Instagram and starts sentences with phrases like: ‘What I learned from my time hiking in Antigua was …’

  I dropped my bag onto the doorstep and unzipped my bag to find my key.

  ‘You know, I didn’t think it was possible to make this thing any uglier,’ I said, pulling the snowless snow globe out and examining it.

  ‘Just fill it up from the tap and he’ll be none the wiser.’ Charlie chuckled and came to a stop beside the front door as I slid my key into the lock and pushed it open. The sound of loud power ballads floated through the kitchen door and I assumed that Ned was having an after-work chill-out session to the sounds of the one and only Michael Bolton.

  ‘I’ve got some body glitter upstairs from a Nineties party I went to a couple of years back. I might chuck that in with the water,’ I said, walking up the stairs with Charlie following me up to the landing. I let myself into my room, found the glitter in the back of a drawer and tipped the whole thing into the jar. I moved back out to the landing, making my way to the bathroom to refill it, when I found Charlie dithering on the landing, not knowing which way to go.

  I swallowed hard and cradled the jar in my hands. ‘You can have the spare room if you like, or if you don’t want to be alone you can stay in here with me.’ I nodded my head in the direction of my open door and I felt my stomach acid begin to boil. ‘No pressure. Go where you want to,’ I said, moving off to the bathroom and leaving him to make up his mind.

  I filled it up with less tha
n holy water and screwed the lid back on to the newly replenished snow globe. As I made my way down the stairs, I glanced through the banister and saw Charlie taking a seat on my bed. My lips curled into a smile as I descended the rest of the stairs and shuffled towards the kitchen door. I shook the snow globe, checking that it worked and smiling as the glitter rose and fell in an equally tacky manner to the fake snow that now lay in the bottom of a bin on the other side of the Irish Sea.

  Sitting down by the door, hidden in shadow, was Magnus. He trilled an affectionate mewling sound as I approached, barely audible above the familiar sounds of ‘When a Man Loves a Woman’ coming through the door. Magnus moved over to me, rubbing the length of his body against my ankles.

  ‘Hey there, fella,’ I said, bending down to pick him up with the hand that wasn’t holding the world’s most beautiful snow globe.

  I turned my attention back to the door and pushed it with my foot, the music getting louder.

  I stepped inside the room, my eyes widening as I saw the scene unfolding before me. I stood frozen. The two figures unaware that they were being watched for a few seconds too long.

  The snow globe fell from my hand and, incredibly, managed not to smash as it bounced over the kitchen tiles. My newly free hand clapped over the eyes of the innocent little cat in my arms and I pulled him close to my chest to protect him from the horrors I was currently witness to. Ned turned his head in the direction of the sound of glass clattering against floor, his eyes going so wide that he looked like a Hanna-Barbera cartoon. I opened my mouth and gasped as the other person turned to me, their face contracting at the horror of the situation. I inhaled deeply and let out a scream that echoed through the whole house. Frenzied footsteps sounded from upstairs and Charlie ran to my aid, but there was nothing he could do to solve this.

  ‘Oh God. Nelly, close your eyes!’ my mother screamed as she dismounted Ned first, then the table, and picked up her clothes from the kitchen floor.

  ‘I can’t! I can’t!’ I screamed. ‘I want to but I can’t!’ Oh God! So much flesh, so many slapping sounds that would haunt me all the way to a psychiatrist’s chair.