The Sleeper Lies

by Andrea Mara

  A knock on the front door stopped me before I could see what was inside the next one and part of me was glad to leave this dusty, unsettling work for now. As I climbed down the wobbly ladder, the knock came a second time, louder now. I opened the door, expecting to find Bert with a package, or a frustrated courier – it always took them ages to find the cottage – but it was Jamie.

  “Hiya, Marianne, sorry to bother you, I just wanted to check in on you and see if you need any help with the house and the, eh . . .” he trailed off, gesturing with his hand. Death is awkward.

  “Clearing my dad’s stuff?”

  He nodded.

  “I’m good, thanks, I’m done except for the attic. Do you want to come in?” I asked, pulling the door wide and ushering him through.

  He followed me into the kitchen.

  “Will you have tea or coffee?”

  “Tea’d be grand,” he said, standing awkwardly by the table until I pulled out a chair for him. He hadn’t been inside our house since he was twelve years old, back when he was a regular caller, doing homework here because it was nicer than sitting on his own at home while Alan was out on the farm. We had a lady looking after me – Mrs Townsend – right up until I was fourteen: meeting me from school, cooking dinner, overseeing homework. The contrast with Jamie’s upbringing was stark – his mother had passed away when he was small, and because Alan was always in and out between house and farm, he didn’t see the need for a housekeeper or babysitter after Jamie turned eight. So Jamie came here, and the three of us – Mrs Townsend, Jamie, and I – sat together around the kitchen table, doing sums and chatting about school.

  Until the day it all fell apart.

  I glanced over as I made tea, taking in what was different and what was just the same. His brown curls were cut shorter, but the slightly awkward grin hadn’t changed – he always looked like he was about to smile but wasn’t quite committing. He had his father’s heavy brows but, unlike Alan, his blue eyes were wide and soft. Nature and nurture had both missed a trick.

  “Look, I meant what I said about offering help,” Jamie was saying, “but I also wanted to apologise for Alan’s behaviour at the funeral. He had a few jars on him, and, well, you know yourself.”

  I waved away the apology as I put a mug of tea in front of him.

  “It’s grand. He was just trying to make peace.”

  “And going about it completely arseways,” he said, shaking his head. “He shouldn’t have brought it up last week, no more than I should have ten years ago.”

  His eyes met mine, and a tingle of something long forgotten fluttered inside me.

  Jamie and Marianne up a tree, K.I.S.S.I.N.G. They used to sing at us all through primary school – because we were neighbours and because we were friends. And, as I looked at him now, I wondered for a second what might have been if it wasn’t for that day.

  “Don’t worry. You were just a kid, and you were angry. And, you know, part of me feels it was the right thing.”

  He looked surprised.

  “Not the way it happened,” I went on, sitting down opposite him, “but the knowing. It’s important to know the truth, no matter how awful, isn’t it?”

  He nodded, but I could tell he wasn’t sure.

  “Were there any of Hanne’s people at the funeral?”

  His question caught me off guard.

  “God, no! My dad lost touch with her family back around the time it all happened. I know absolutely nothing about them actually.” A fresh wave of regret washed over me. Now he was gone, I never would.

  “Really? No contact at all? But you have grandparents there surely?”

  As he said it, I realised how strange it seemed. But I’d grown up accepting it as normal. My family was made up of Dad, his two aunts, and a sprinkling of second cousins. Dad never talked about my Danish relatives, and rarely about Hanne. It was the no-go topic and, from a young age, I knew not to ask.

  “I guess. Though I don’t know if they’re still alive. That sounds weird now that I say it out loud. But I’ve never had any contact with her family, so I don’t feel a connection to them. They’re like characters in a fairy tale I heard as a kid but can hardly remember now. You know?”

  Jamie tilted his head, frowning.

  “But surely they’d want to meet their granddaughter? Wouldn’t it be a way of helping them deal with losing their daughter?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe. If it was a film, that’s exactly what would happen, and I’d help them deal with their grief and we’d all live happily ever after. But life’s not like that.”

  Jamie looked unconvinced. “I just can’t understand why they wouldn’t want to meet you though. Like, it’s not your fault what happened – why punish you?”

  “But I don’t see it as a punishment – you can’t miss what you never had.”

  Even as I said it, I wondered if it was true. When I was small, I didn’t think about why I had just one grandparent in a nursing home, and lots of other kids had four each, as well as siblings and cousins spilling out the doors. As I got older, I started noticing the differences – the kids who got Christmas presents and Easter Eggs from grandparents or spent Sundays visiting them – but my dad had explained it all. He’d told me the story. Or at least, the sugar-coated version.

  “Don’t you remember that time in Mrs Griffin’s class, when we had to write a story about a granny or granddad?” Jamie said. “And you were crying and eventually told Mrs Griffin you had nobody to write about?”

  I stared at him. I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about.

  “You don’t remember?” he said, reading my blank look. “Maybe you blocked it out. You were so upset. Remember Mrs Griffin sent you and Linda outside to the yard to get some air?”

  “Yeah, maybe . . .” I said, though I still had no recollection.

  “Do you still see Linda? You two were in UCD together, weren’t you?”

  I nodded. “Yep, she’s off doing a year in Australia now and has fallen madly in love with a student doctor. Her parents were petrified she was going to stay in Oz, till they realised the doctor’s from Kerry and only over there for two years.”

  “And how about you?” he asked, looking up at me from under his lashes. “Did you fall madly in love with any doctors from Kerry?”

  I laughed, and shook my head. “Nope, but there are no doctors from Kerry in my office – just geeks who love data more than humans. A bit like me.” I smiled to show it wasn’t completely true. “And what about you?”

  “Oh God no, not seeing anyone,” he said. “It’s not like there’s anyone my age around here.”

  “Oh no, I just meant what are you up to?” I said, feeling my face grow hot. “Like are you working or in college or what?”

  “Oh right, yeah – I’m technically working full-time on the farm now, but I talked my da into giving me time off to do a part-time course in the IADT in Dun Laoghaire. It’s graphic design. Alan doesn’t get it at all – says it’s a course for girls, and a waste of time.” He rolled his eyes. “But at least he agreed to let me have the time, so I go into Dublin two days a week for that.”

  “And is that what you want to do after – work in graphic design?”

  He looked down at his tea, and his shoulders fell. “Nah, I’ll be working on the farm – that’s been the plan since day one. This is just something to do on the side.”

  I watched him sip his tea, eyes still down, and wondered about that – the call of home, the obligation to stay, the pull to return. The cottage drawing me back, Jamie’s farm holding him here, and the faraway country that called my mother, then swallowed her whole, in one merciless bite.

  CHAPTER 9

  The Wooden Spoon was as busy as it ever was at three o’clock on a Friday afternoon – one man treating his son to an after-school brownie, and two teenage girls who’d just got off the bus from Dublin, judging by their A-Wear and Penneys shopping bags.

  Ray was there already and stood to greet me. He’d taken
a table near the back, beside the till, and ordered a black coffee. I asked for the same.

  “I thought everyone here drank tea?” he said, smiling as we sat.

  “Absolutely. I’m literally the only person in Ireland who drinks coffee,” I told him, “and there’ll be a free leprechaun to take with us when we leave to go dancing at the crossroads.”

  He put his hands up.

  “Touché! Although, as cliché goes, the Carrickderg Arms is up there with the best of them. I mean, there’s an actual wagon wheel attached to the wall.”

  “And I bet you’re having the Full Irish breakfast there every morning,” I said, “to immerse yourself in Irish culture, right?”

  He smiled and patted his completely flat stomach. “I’ll have to ease off next week – for my last week I’ll order oatmeal.”

  So it was his final week already. I turned that over in my mind and realised I was disappointed.

  “Did you get everything you need for your book? I don’t want to rain on your parade, but I’m not sure Carrickderg is representative of the whole country . . .”

  He smiled. “Don’t worry – I hired a car and went to Glendalough one day, and up to Dublin city another. Actually, when I was getting gas, I met your friend from the funeral.”

  “My friend?”

  “That guy Alan? When I stopped at the gas station yesterday, he was there too, putting gas in a jeep.” He paused, a sheepish look on his face. “Okay, this is kind of embarrassing, but you look like you’d see the funny side. Alan was wearing a dark-grey polo shirt like the guys you see in gas stations, and in New Jersey where I come from, you can’t fill your own tank – by law, the staff have to do it. So I subconsciously assumed Alan worked there, and I said, ‘Fill ’er up, full tank, please’ to him when I pulled in.”

  I put my hand over my mouth. “No! What did he say?”

  “If looks could kill, I’d be six feet under. He told me to fill up my own effing tank and stormed off into the store.” He shook his head. “It was an honest mistake! I don’t know why he was so mad.”

  “Don’t mind him, he’s always cross about something. And, in fairness, he doesn’t know about your New Jersey law. I’ve never heard of it either. We’ve had self-service here since the early 80s, I think.”

  “Even so – what’s the big deal if I thought he worked there?”

  “Well, first of all because he owns the biggest farm around and has been craving the social standing he thinks that warrants for as long as I can remember. And, secondly, he may have assumed you were being deliberately rude.”

  Ray looked perplexed.

  “Don’t worry, Alan takes offence like it’s an Olympic sport. Forget him.”

  But fate had other intentions – right at that moment, the bell above the café door rang, and Alan walked in. Years later, I wondered how things might have gone if he’d never shown up that afternoon.

  “Don’t look now,” I whispered, “but your new best friend’s just arrived.”

  Alan walked up to the counter and said something to the girl at the till, then turned to face us while she busied herself wrapping two plates of pork-pie dinner in foil.

  I nodded at him, and turned back to Ray, to ask him about his book.

  But Ray was eager to make amends. He stood.

  “Alan, I want to apologise for my error yesterday at the gas station – where I come from all stations are staffed and I made an incorrect assumption.” He stuck out his hand.

  Alan did nothing at first, staring out at Ray from under his hat, dark eyes assessing, stubborn chin firmly set. Then he seemed to make a decision, and took Ray’s hand.

  “No bother. No harm done,” he said, and turned to pick up the two foil-wrapped plates behind him.

  Ray stayed standing, his expression hard to read.

  “So, listen, I’m writing a book set in Ireland, and the main character is a guy from a small town like this one. He’s a legend-in-his-own-lunchtime kinda guy – the main man in town, but he’s never been outside his own locality and knows nothing of the wider world. It’s kind of a satirical black comedy – a departure from my usual stuff.”

  Alan looked blankly at him.

  “And I was wondering if I could interview you – to get a better sense of what it’s like to be a local farmer in a community like this?”

  Ouch.

  I didn’t think Ray meant any harm – well, back then I didn’t – but Alan heard what I heard. His mouth opened and, in deafening silence, Ray waited for an answer.

  “I don’t think he means you’re like the main character, right?” I said, when neither man spoke.

  Ray’s eyes widened. “My God no, of course not! Sorry, that’s not what I meant at all. How ’bout I buy you a drink tonight in Delaneys’ – I can make up for my faux pas and interview you for research at the same time?”

  Alan nodded and smiled, though there was nothing warm in it.

  “Right,” he said. “Eight o’clock in Delaneys’ – I’ll see you there.”

  He took his plates and left, and we sat back down.

  “Doesn’t he pay for his food?” Ray asked in a stage whisper as the door closed.

  “He has a tab. Gets his dinner and one for his son Jamie every afternoon – has done since his wife died, years and years ago. That’s if they don’t actually eat here.”

  “And he’s really the big man in town?”

  “Well, his farm is the biggest. I suspect that used to mean more than it does. It comes right up to our cottage and beyond – we’re surrounded on three sides by Alan’s land. We’re like a little pocket inside his giant coat.” I paused. “I guess I should say I not we. Weird.”

  I took a sip of now-cold coffee to swallow the lump in my throat.

  Ray cleared his. “Hey, how about you come along to Delaneys’ tonight? It can’t be doing you any good sitting at home on your own. Come help me interview the grouchy farmer, and I’ll buy you a drink. Deal?”

  An evening with Alan Crowley and a tourist I hardly knew wasn’t exactly how I’d pictured Friday night, but Ray was right – I’d done enough sitting at home on my own. And, really, what harm could it do?

  CHAPTER 10

  A little after eight thirty, I pulled into the Carrickderg Arms car park and walked the short distance along Main Street to Delaneys’. Alan and Ray were already sitting at the bar, getting on unexpectedly well it seemed, so I slid into a booth and pulled out a paperback – glad of background noise and other humans, but happy too to be on my own for a little longer. Bursts of conversation floated my way each time Ray became animated, and Alan looked less surly than usual – he even smiled once or twice. Maybe the olive branch was working.

  A girl of about sixteen came to take my order, bringing back memories of my time gathering empties in Delaneys’. Except unlike this perfectly made-up teen (“Keeley” according to her name badge) with butterscotch hair and impeccable eyebrows, I didn’t know a bronzer from a hole in the ground and had no idea what contouring was. I still had no idea what contouring was. I remember working for £3.50 an hour and thinking I was rich, and I remember my dad waiting patiently outside in the car as I counted my tips, wishing I could stay on for a post-work drink like everyone else. John the barman used to offer to put a vodka in my Coke when we were getting close to finishing time – “on the house,” he used to say, with a wink, and a flick of his ponytail, though he had no right to be offering anyone drinks on the house, least of all fifteen-year-old staff.

  He was still there, behind the bar, his hair in rivets of gel, pulled into the familiar low ponytail. As Keeley swirled across the floor to bring him my order, I wondered if he was offering her vodka in her Coke too.

  She was back in minutes balancing my sparkling water on her tray, and with Alan and Ray still engrossed in their conversation, I got back to my book.

  Half an hour later, a glass of red wine appeared in front of me. I looked up to find Keeley nodding back towards the bar.

  “John
sent that over – he says you used to work here?”

  I did, I told her, but I’d have to turn down the kind offer of a drink – I had the car outside. Her beautiful eyebrows creased in disappointment, like I’d ruined the gesture, which I suppose in a way I had.

  “Sure leave it here, I might chance half of it,” I said. “Do you like working here?”

  “It’s fine, usually just boring old codgers who never tip,” she said. “Bit of craic tonight though with yer man . . .” She indicated towards Ray with her elbow. “Alan and John are feeding him all sorts of bull about town history and made-up traditions. They’re just after telling him we all wash our faces in cow’s milk every night to ward off evil spirits, and he’s writing it down in his notebook.”

  Just then, the notebook fell to the ground and, as Ray climbed off the stool to retrieve it, he stumbled a little.

  “He’s had a few, I see,” I said to Keeley.

  She smirked. “Oh, he has alright – he’s getting a real taste of Ireland tonight. So will I leave the wine with you?”

  I picked it up and raised it in a salute to John who caught my eye from behind the bar, and off went the girl to serve Mrs O’Shea and her husband Mick.

  Some time later, a crash of glass pulled me away from my book – I looked up to find Ray sprawled on the flagstone floor, broken glass and beer all around him. Alan reached down to help him up and, as he stood and brushed glass from his jeans, he was clearly unsteady on his feet.

  “One too many,” Alan said over Ray’s shoulder to me. “I’ll keep an eye on him.”

  I went back to my book, wondering a little why I was there at all, but mostly enjoying being out of the house.

  Minutes later, Ray slipped off his stool again, though caught himself this time.

  “Don’t fade on me now. man, I still need to tell you about the excitement last year when we first got hooked up with electricity.”