Good Eggs

by Rebecca Hardiman

  “Morning.” Kevin enters the house alone, which is curious, closes the door behind him, and delivers a perfunctory kiss onto her wrinkled cheek.

  Millie takes his arm. “I’ve got one perfect egg in my fridge and if you play your cards right I might even boil it for you.”

  “Sylvia Phenning is here—she’s just outside waiting to meet you.”

  “Today?”

  “Yes, well, I tried to ring but your phone appears not to be working.”

  “Someone put it somewhere funny.”

  “Have you checked inside the toilet?” He grins.

  “That was a fluke.”

  “Look, she’s really very, very nice. You’re going to love her.”

  “Love someone bossing me around?”

  “Not at’all. You’re the boss. But listen, you are planning to behave, right?” Kevin stoops slightly so that he can look directly at her. “Right?”

  Millie shrugs and thinks, We’ll see.

  * * *

  Sylvia Phenning turns out to be young, wide of eyes, pale of skin, with impossibly perfect, large horse teeth and lips painted a tarty frosted coral.

  “It’s so nice to meet you!” she singsongs. Half an arm’s worth of golden bangles jingle and clatter as she extends a formal handshake to Millie. During it, Millie feels a tight, covert squeeze, as if Sylvia recognizes Millie’s reticence, but that it’s all going to work out.

  “You brought your luggage?”

  Sylvia taps her suitcase. “Oh, this. Oh, I’m on my way to a friend’s for the weekend.”

  There’s one crisis averted.

  “You’re American?” says Millie.

  “How can you tell?” Sylvia replies and then overlaughs, which Millie perceives to be a very American thing: excessive laughter at one’s own not funny joke.

  “Sylvia’s from Florida,” Kevin announces, as if this is a thing of great wonder.

  “Miami?” says Millie, thinking of Blanche and Dorothy.

  “No, it’s a place called Clearwater. Not far from Tampa.”

  “Oh, but it must be dreadfully hot in Florida! I couldn’t bear that heat,” says Millie.

  If Sylvia is offended, she doesn’t show it. In fact, she smiles and stage-whispers conspiratorially, “I know what you mean. You always need sunscreen.”

  Sylvia seems to intuit the layout of Margate and moves in the direction of the sitting room, where she takes in the piles of rubbishy clutter, the shabby neglect, and goes immediately to the front window, oohing and aahing about the sea.

  Millie hangs back. “Just need to spend a penny.”

  “Huh?”

  She leaves the room wondering how much translation will be required.

  On her way back, Millie catches sight of a luggage tag dangling from Sylvia’s case and, curious, steps closer. It’s a chestnut-colored leather yoke, a beautiful piece. She peels back the cover flap: encased in the tag is a small, lined slip of paper on which letters and numbers are written in a loopy script but, with no reading glasses in reach, Millie’s too blind to make out the inky scratch.

  She does not meditate on her next act, though she’s momentarily choked by that very thought: How many decisions in her life have been made without terribly much deliberation? Ah well, she shan’t deliberate on that. Her fingers hastily loosen the belted tag from the bag. Realizing she’s without pockets, Millie slides the thing into her sizable décolletage, like a bawdy madam securing a tip for one of her girls. She smooths out her blouse and checks herself in the hall mirror. Who, for the love of Peter and Paul and all that’s good and holy, is going to notice Millie Gogarty’s bosom anyway, ample yet woefully obsolete? The young think you don’t mind becoming postsexual, but the fact is, Millie knows, you do. Of course you do.

  * * *

  “This view is to die for!” says Sylvia when Millie returns. “I think I could just look out here all day long. I love Ireland. I’m an Ireland-ophile.” She smiles. “Is there a word for that?”

  “Actually, it’s Hibernophile,” says Kevin. “Though I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone use it. Mum, did you want to tell Sylvia about your day-to-day schedule and all that good stuff?”

  Kevin promptly vanishes to the back of the house, leaving Millie no choice but to point to the sofa drawn up to the fire, the lone defense, except for a tartan blanket, which is in certain and dire need of a wash, against the room’s chill.

  “He likes to order me around,” says Millie.

  “Aww! That’s kind of sweet,” Sylvia drawls. “He must really love you.” She warms her hands at the fire and says, “Kevin mentioned maybe we should mix it up a little, schedule-wise? Like I could do two mornings and two evenings? I could start at nine and give you breakfast?”

  “That’s too early. I’ll still be in bed.”

  “How about ten?”

  “That’s a bit late.”

  “Oh, okay, well, we can figure out a good time—what about, what do you like to eat for breakfast?”

  “I’m too old for breakfast.”

  Sylvia gazes at Millie as if looking at a piteous animal lying injured in the gutter.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  Though Millie does not respond, Sylvia continues. “I’m kind of getting the sense that this isn’t really your choice, is it? To have me come in and help around?” She leans forward and drops her voice, as if they are in cahoots. “I totally get it, believe me. I’m sure I’d feel the exact same way. But you should know: I’m all about honesty, okay? You just tell me what you want me to do, I’ll do as much or as little as you want. I’ll let you kind of lead the way, okay? Does that sound alright?”

  Millie, somewhat placated, nods. Sylvia does not seem outrageously offensive, nor judgmental, nor unkind.

  “I suppose I should’ve offered you a cup of coffee.”

  “I would love a cup of coffee,” Sylvia says. “Why don’t I come with you and you can kind of show me around?”

  Seeing the kitchen from her guest’s perspective, Millie, for the first time in yonks, becomes sharply aware of every surface covered, as it is, by another, dirtier one: here, a dish crusted with bits of mutton and mash, there a mug with a stiffened tea bag. Does the American think it wretched? Even the bowls and plates shelved in a closed cupboard, upon closer inspection, are as in need of a wash as any piled up in the sink or the long-defunct dishwasher. The stench is sour, the bulbs blown, the carpet mysteriously damp, always. On the cooker, where only one of four rings functions, an ancient saucepan sits filled with ancient, burnt milk. It is to this pan that Millie heads, picking up the nearby wrench that she uses to leverage on the last working burner.

  Sylvia doesn’t blink. “What a big space,” she says. “You should see the kitchen where we’re staying. It’s teensy.”

  “You’re married?”

  Sylvia barks in laughter, revealing a surprising flash of silver fillings on nearly every one of her chompers, like a fleet of board-game battleships. “Oh God no! Been there done that. No, no, I live with my sister’s son, my nephew.”

  “Oh? How old is he?”

  “Seventeen.”

  “Is he? Well, as a matter of fact, I have two beautiful granddaughters who happen to be sixteen years of age.”

  “Twins? You’re kidding. We should introduce them. He doesn’t really know anyone here.”

  Millie finds herself humming as she hustles to the jar of instant coffee and then back to the stove, in constant motion, bustling from kitchen to nook and back as if stopping might make Sylvia vanish. She listens as Kevin clomps back down the hall. He sidles into the kitchen doorway, winks at Sylvia, and actually grabs his mother as if in a waltz and dips her. Millie, game, gives a jaunty little kick with her left foot.

  Later, alone in her Peter’s room, Millie sheds her cardigan and blouse and brassiere, and Sylvia’s luggage tag, which she’d long forgotten, falls to the floor.

  12

  Fifth year, Aideen’s, occupies three rectangular dorm room
s on the second floor of Fair House or “Fair,” the residential building overseen by Miss Bleekland, a remarkably tall, stern, plain-faced automaton invariably dressed in a buttoned blouse and long checked skirt that does not fully mask an artificial leg, the mysterious cause of which provides endless fodder for gossip. She conveys disapproval not in tone, which rarely alters, but in cadence, a robotic, pronounced rising and falling of each sentence. Frequently spotted popping mints despite her exhaustive reiteration of the no food, no gum, no sweets rule, Bleekland never smiles, never even hints at mirth.

  Each Fair House dorm room accommodates eight teens suffering from various degrees of homesickness, stress, exhaustion, eating disorder, constipation, or general discontent. Many boarders, it turns out, aren’t Irish. By the end of Aideen’s draining initial day, she’d hardly spoken to any girl in her dorm, but counted at least four Spaniards, one Norwegian, and a couple of Asian and white girls from Zimbabwe and South Africa whose parents are ambassadors or business moguls or whatever it is that rich foreigners do, she thinks, that requires dumping their children in this soulless institution.

  Neither of her meager stowing areas—a drawer and a cupboard—is lockable, so Aideen’s first task is to stash her contraband, which she’s already regretting having brought. First off, she could get caught. Secondly, though she has in her possession enough alcohol to get herself and half the dorm langered, she has never actually drunk more than half a flute of champagne, and that was at Mum’s recent birthday bash, so it hardly counts. In fact, she had disliked feeling so quickly disoriented, so out of her skin. One of the many things she respects about Clean-Cut is that after his California tour, he returned home and declared himself “straight-edge”—no alcohol, no smoking, no drugs—though he then got massive abuse in the press about it. Straight edge in Ireland? You must be fucking joking! Anyway, the idea of her bringing out a bottle of vodka to the girls in her dorm would require the kind of confidence she does not currently possess.

  At lights out one evening, Aideen waits until all are asleep and then slips down the hall and tosses the vodka bottle into the enormous rubbish bin that sits at the end of the vast bathroom. The clunk of its landing is shockingly loud. A younger student whom she doesn’t know shuffles sleepily past her and glances at Aideen, beer cans in her clutches. Aideen waits till the girl’s gone and eases the rest of her loot gently into the rubbish.

  Given the flimsy vinyl curtains that leave sizable gaps on either side of the stalls, Aideen has yet to actually shower at Millburn. This is another problem. There is not enough privacy in the bathroom, nor in her poky bed area. The only way to change your clothes—and there’s no chance Aideen’s going to risk revealing her woeful flat-chestedness to a pack of far more developed she-wolves—is to do so in the toilets. Aideen’s been the recipient of not a few odd looks, and not much friendliness, as a result. All the Millburn girls have been together for years; no one’s too interested in befriending the new girl who probably has B.O., definitely has the odd spot (when it comes to girls choosing friends, looks matter more than anything) and, Aideen is aware, is an outsider.

  Even after a week, she hasn’t grown used to the ear-splitting series of bells that eject the Fair girls violently from slumber. They’re all sleepy-eyed, half-dressed, yawning. With pale streaks of dawn slashing through the windows, the lot of them shuffle down to the dining hall with its hovering stink of fried sausage. The offerings, identical to yesterday’s, include triangles of rubbery grilled bread beneath a glowing heat lamp, pitchers of “juice” (diluted Orangina), and a mess of sunny-side-up eggs, gummy, like the toast, and gross.

  “Total crap,” comes from a voice behind her.

  Aideen, clutching her plastic tray, inches up in the queue and hears, from the same voice, louder now, “My fucking beagle couldn’t keep this down.”

  Aideen turns to discover that the owner of this voice is, as she’d suspected, Brigid Crowe, a very pretty, racy, somewhat intimidating fifth-year who sleeps two beds away from her. Brigid leads the post–lights out confabs, boldly declaring herself to be a nonvirgin and someone who’s dabbled in hash. She is the same girl who Bleekland gave a terrifying earful to for her hammy snoring during prep, three torturous, silent hours of study which take place nightly in this same dining hall—one table per girl to deter talking, though a sophisticated network of note-passing appears in full force. Other than trying to fall asleep in a roomful of strangers honking, snoring, howling, babbling, crying, masturbating, and shifting, prep is probably her most vulnerable time, when Aideen must squeeze tight her eyes and try to resist thoughts of what Mum and Dad and Ciaran and even Nemesis are up to.

  Brigid, who’s made it known she can get fake IDs for weekend clubbing at a tenner a pop, twirls a long swatch of blond hair streaked fuscia with four fake nails, the thumb having presumably fallen off.

  “Yeah,” is the best Aideen can do, with a shy smile. “I’ve been mostly just sticking to tea.”

  “I’m dying for a smoke,” says Brigid. “Want to go out after breakfast?”

  Notwithstanding the fact that she doesn’t smoke and hates the stink of it, Aideen nods, since this is the first invitation that’s been issued to her.

  “Hockey pitch?” Brigid grins naughtily, revealing a pair of deep, cheeky dimples. “Sixth years go out there.” She studies Aideen brazenly. “What’s your name again?”

  As Aideen grapples with the idea of openly smoking cigarettes on a pitch in broad daylight that can be seen from any school window, including the headmistress’s, a younger girl timidly approaches them and explains that Aideen’s wanted in Miss Bleekland’s office.

  “Oh, fuck,” says Brigid with sympathy and what Aideen hopes is a hint of admiration. “Sounds like you’re in the shit.”

  “Aideen.”

  “Sorry?”

  “My name is Aideen.”

  13

  Millie hears Sylvia letting herself into the house at nine o’clock, as she has done all week, with a key Kevin furnished—she is exceedingly punctual, efficient, proactive. By half past nine she’s gently knocking on Peter’s door with a tray, after which begins the glacially paced ritual of Millie getting dressed. Often, midway through, in her bra and raggedy knickers, Millie will sit on the bed and consider aloud the weather, the state of her socks, the state of world peace. Sylvia never rushes her. She is angelically patient.

  Later in the morning, if the weather’s decent, they’ll stroll along the local roads and Millie will chat to each neighbor in turn, eager to introduce her new American friend, “Sylvie” or, yesterday, just “Sil.” Together they greet dogs, toddlers in prams accompanied by impossibly youthful mums or slightly frosty or confused foreign au pairs, the occasional stranger and, more often than not, the O’Learys, a pair of kind, bohemian sisters who never married, on their own daily constitutional.

  One cold, wet afternoon during their second week together, the women are making their way to the promenade. Millie holds forth on a wide range of topics—the necessity of adding sliced almonds to the top of a chocolate cake, how Aideen’s getting on at her new school, JJ’s estranged son who only rings when he needs money, rheumatism, Millie’s cup size. Throughout these soliloquies, Sylvia listens with a focus and earnestness, a genuine interest, which makes Millie feel practically smitten.

  At a dip in the road, the American takes Millie’s arm to steady her. Ahead, Millie hears, but can’t yet see, the roar of a double-decker making its speedy way down the narrow, bendy, pavement-less stretch of road.

  “To the wall!” Millie yells. “The driver’s a madman.”

  The women, laughing in their self-imposed emergency, scramble to the edge of the road and flatten themselves dramatically against the ancient stone buttress. Millie catches sight of the sea, choppy and beautifully brutal. As the massive bus hurtles past them, she turns to see a blur of the driver waving to her and she salutes him in turn.

  “You saved my life!” Sylvia laughs. “Come on, we should head back
anyway. I have a surprise for you.”

  * * *

  The surprise isn’t at all what Millie had expected. It’s not a plant or a tin of Rice Krispies Treats, which Sylvia had brought on the first day. It isn’t a thing at all. Sylvia takes Millie into the kitchen and opens the press beside the sink.

  “Ta-da!”

  Her cabinet is unrecognizable. Its bottom shelf has been scrubbed clean and lined with some sort of blue absorbent mat and every teacup and saucer and mug that Millie owns is not only sparkling clean, but all together, of a whole, and placed tidily one beside the next. On the shelf above, a perfectly neat stack of clean salad plates sits next to an equally neat stack of clean dinner plates atop a sheet of the same blue padding. Order, overwhelming and logical and stunning order, has been imposed.

  With a sort of flourish, Sylvia reveals the next press. This, apparently, is where the drinking glasses are to be kept, and the next, which heretofore contained incongruous items, now houses her baking accoutrements though more beautifully. Flour and sugar are no longer in their paper packets; Sylvia’s poured each into tall glass jars sealed with cork lids, like something out of a home design magazine. Next, the spices, and the pasta and rice, and the tinned goods, and so on.

  Sylvia has disemboweled her kitchen.

  Millie stands in the center of the room, quite agape, tugged by fierce and contradictory emotions. Sylvia had no right to go poking into her things with neither permission nor warning and effect so radical a change. Exactly who did she think she was? She’s just an employee, after all, paid under the table and only here a week or two. Furthermore, what did this unsolicited makeover say about Sylvia’s judgment of Millie herself? That her kitchen was a kip? That she’s a bit of a disaster? This line of thinking—that maybe Sylvia doesn’t understand her, after all, or maybe Sylvia pities her—engenders in her a disproportionate sadness.