“Oh I’m not getting her. Her, I’m leaving in Florida.” She smiles wickedly. “Ring up the airline and change the ticket to my name.”
They hear Ciaran shouting from the study. “Found it!” he’s calling out. “I found it!”
He dashes into the living room, stands heroically in the doorway waving an EU passport.
“What the fuck?” says Kevin.
“Dad!” The look on Ciaran’s face—shocked delight—is priceless. “You said fuck.”
“Terribly common of me.” He steps toward his son. “Is that really mine?”
The photo was taken a few years back. Slightly more hair, fewer lines, a jauntier glint in the eye for sure. But it’s him. He checks the expiration date—this had been worrying him—and finds he’s still got years to go. He had worried for naught. He’s always worrying for naught.
“Well done, Ciaran. Where was it?” says Grace.
“Between two books sticking out the bookshelf.”
“You are an amazing human being,” Kevin says and kisses his son and then his wife and then tracks down Nuala and plants the biggest and most obnoxious one of all on her cheek.
57
The Gulf Coast doesn’t smell like the Irish Sea—no powerful, distinct whiff of seaweed. Less briny, more like a diluted salty waft. The beach itself is different too—expansive and decadent with its vast, flat plains of ridiculously perfect sand. Not like the rough, jagged cliffs and mossy rocks back home, the dramatic vertical drop-offs, the smaller strands, the sandy bits more often than not coarse and wet and unpeopled.
Earlier, Gus had found the Gogartys poolside, cooking their pale Irish skin on Castaway loungers. Basket in hand, he’d invited them for a sunset dinner, if Millie felt up to it? Now he helps her step onto the beach, Aideen following behind them. Die-hard, zealously tanned, oil-ridden sunbathers are milking the last of the day or going for a jog or taking in the sunset, many having brought along complicated and abundant accoutrements—umbrellas, coolers on wheels, beach recliners, fold-up chairs, prams, one giant inflatable red lobster sporting a pair of goofy black shades. Farther down, by a concrete pier, Aideen wanders away from them, feigning interest in a huddle of men sitting on overturned pails, fishing. Gus guides Millie to a picnic table planted in the sand. When Millie removes her shoes, he gawks.
“Is it that they’re mismatched or in need of darning?”
“Both,” he replies. “You are something.”
“Not at’all,” Millie says, thrilled.
To think, four thousand miles across this water is her beloved city. Anna and Mrs. Colding and the others at Rossdale must be well asleep, and here she is sitting on the edge of Florida. She pictures Ciaran and Nuala and Gerard. When Kevin was around Gerard’s age, she remembers how he’d lope up the drive, calling out, “Home, Mum?” and clomping into the house to entertain her with local gossip or a funny adventure he’d had in town. That was a time.
But so is this.
Gus unscrews a thermos of homemade beef stew and dishes it out into Styrofoam bowls he’s brought along. The sky is aglow in color, the sun just dipping into the sea. She wants to lock in every detail of this place; she must tell Kevin and Grace how extraordinary it is.
“Magnificent, isn’t it?” Gus says. “This is why I came back here. I used to surf. Learned when I was at Pendleton. In California.”
“Do you still?”
He laughs. “Now I just watch.”
“Is that not a bit frustrating?”
“Not really. More a matter of adjustment.”
A curious man, unlike any she’s come across. And not just the manners and the thoughtfulness. He seems to her simultaneously tough and not tough.
“Tell me what your home is like,” Gus says. “Describe it.” He keeps his gaze on the horizon as if to give her license to speak freely, without the pressure of eye contact.
“I’m right on the sea.”
“Lucky you.”
Without considering, she says, “You must come visit.” So brazen! What would her Peter think of her now?
“I’d like that.”
She’ll bake him a chocolate cake with almond slices and pour him tea, and Gus will sit in the window seat beside her.
“Any chance you two could stay here longer, make a little vacation out of it? There’s so much you haven’t seen yet. We could rent a boat, go fishing.”
Unlike both her grandsons, Millie Gogarty does not care for worms or the sharp hooks or the sustained silence that seems to constitute fishing trips—a snore if ever there was one—but she’s flattered by the invite. She wonders if she looks cracked; she certainly feels cracked. Did she ever consider, other than a blind date with the Captain, a lifelong bachelor with a hook nose and halitosis, which her bridge crew put her up to years ago, that romance wasn’t lost to her?
“You don’t have to answer that yet. Just think on it a little while.” Gus coughs politely. “Also, there’s been a development in our case.” Millie beckons Aideen to come join them. The Gogartys watch Gus intently as he fights a smile and says, “I don’t want to get you too excited, because it could be a dead end, but my brother got Sylvia’s address.”
Millie’s thrilled, of course, absolutely chuffed, but also her thoughts pleasantly circle back to the moment ago with Gus. He’d like her to stay longer; he’d like to visit her in Ireland.
“How did he find her?” says Aideen.
“He just ran her name, well, her married name, in the system. She renewed her driver’s license in February of last year, and in order to do that, you have to list an address. Now whether she’s still there…”
“Let’s go and pay her a visit,” says Millie.
“Well, hang on,” says Gus. “We might want to just work this through. Say you go over there and knock on the door. She opens the door…”
“And slams it shut,” says Aideen, and they laugh.
The three of them sit quietly pondering, the waves ripping ever closer and darkening the strips of sand between the water’s edge and the huddled humans. At the first hint of evening breeze, Gus moves to Millie’s side of the table and wordlessly places a light blanket around her shoulders.
“What if we could get her to come to the Castaways somehow?” says Aideen.
Gus shakes his head. “With all due respect, that’s a little fishy.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” Aideen says. “And how would we get her there anyway?”
Millie’s mind is snagging on some niggling thought from days ago. She holds up a hand to silence the two of them. She must focus. It was on the Florida Express Bus Service with your woman, Geraldine. The old lady had been talking about the tightfisted ne’er-do-well who lived with her, some idea that her value was in her being dead. Millie says it aloud and, bit by bit, a plan begins to take shape among them—delicious, imperfect, risky—just the sort of plan, perhaps, that suits Millie Gogarty altogether.
58
The trio spends the next morning in Gus’s squat brown Ford staking out Sylvia Phenning’s apartment building—another generic Floridian behemoth. Aideen and Gran are smooshed together in the back bucket seat, Gran shiteing on the whole time and Gus loving every bloody story, every little phrase that sets sail chaotically from her lips. And then, in the middle of Gran waxing on about her tennis elbow in 1984, the door to Sylvia’s unit opens and there she is.
She’s just there.
To see the American again in the flesh! They watch, agog, hardly breathing, while their adversary, in a breezy white tunic and cute metallic gladiators snaking up her calves, steps into dazzling sunshine. With quickening pulse, Aideen cranes for a glimpse of Sean, but that awful snake closes the door immediately behind her. Sylvia bends toward the FedEx envelope Gus had left, at dawn, peeping from beneath her welcome mat, and pops it into her bag and strides out, tapping at her phone the entire journey from her front door down two floors of an exterior staircase to a very expensive, very sleek silver Mercedes convertible (top up), comp
liments, no doubt, of Gran.
“Shit,” Aideen says. “She didn’t read it.”
“Not to worry,” says Gran. “She will.”
The letter, composed by Aideen with much help from Gus and Google, was printed on thick stock at Staples late last night. There had been much debate over its particulars, especially which nom de plume Gus would use. In the end, he’d chosen the name of his deceased high school football coach, who was admired by all during his lifetime for his sense of honor and fairness.
Mrs. Sylvia Phenning
9857 South Main Street, Apt. 509
Clearwater, FL 33764
Dear Mrs. Phenning:
My office has been retained by the Executor of the Estate of Amelia S. Gogarty of Margate, Sea Road, Dún Laoghaire, Dublin, Ireland. You have been named as a beneficiary of the late Mrs. Gogarty in the amount of €350,000.
Please call me at your earliest convenience to discuss claiming your inheritance.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
John W. Howard
Trusts & Estates Attorney
Howard Group, LLC.
Tampa Bay, FL
727-850-3452
They watch as Sylvia’s car reverses from its spot across the lot and glides toward the exit.
“Now what?” Aideen says.
“We have to wait,” says Gran, “and see if she takes the bait.”
When Gus frowns, which isn’t often, Aideen notices long, deep trenches appear on his brow. “Now that we’ve found her,” he says, “I’m almost afraid to let her out of our sight.”
Gran and Gus exchange a look—they are grossly cute—and Gus taps Gran’s knee gently. “Let’s tail her.”
* * *
Sylvia puts on her indicator outside the Belvedere Estates, a high-end inland gated community on the outskirts of Clearwater. Beside a set of gates, a LUXURY HOMES FOR SALE banner flutters in the mild breeze. They watch Sylvia wave to a stout guard who’s manning an adobe kiosk and then steer through the gates and onward. Gus, who’s proven to be such a cautious driver they nearly lost Sylvia at two yellow traffic lights, holds back. After a beat, when they can no longer see Sylvia’s car, he drives up to the kiosk. The guard waddles over with a clipboard under one armpit and leans his bulbous face toward their window, tells them there’s no one here to show them the model unit, but they’re welcome to drive through and get a feel for the place.
Gus and Millie and Aideen creep down a web of lanes lined with beige McMansions of varying faux-Euro designs—Mediterranean, Versailles, English Manor. Some appear deserted, all with identical landscaping—sparse rows of cute baby palm trees have been planted between each mega-house. The air reeks of fertilizer and baking tar. They find Sylvia’s Mercedes parked outside the biggest mega-house of all, 149 Ocean Lane, though there’s no ocean anywhere.
The home is not only gargantuan but also breathtaking in its ugliness. The bottom floor is a mosaic of beige and white and black brick; the second story is painted the color of a mushroom. The garage alone is the size of a disco. Aideen counts a whopping eighteen windows, six columns, and two oversized, elaborately carved wooden front doors, their brass knobs as big as grapefruits. Nouveau, Dad would call it.
Gus whistles. “Whoever she’s visiting, they’re not hurting for cash.”
As they sit in the Ford with the house in view, a message from Dad pings on Aideen’s phone.
Coming to US. Stay where you are.
With horror, she reads it aloud.
“Seems as though your father found his passport,” Gran says. “Don’t look so worried, lovie. I’ll phone him the minute we’re back at the Castaways. I will. It’s time.”
Twenty minutes in, they’re beginning to grow bored and hungry and Gus discloses some anxiety that if they remain here too long, Sylvia might spot them. A discussion regarding lunch options is underway when they hear a rumble: one of the house’s six garage doors is automatically peeling upward and revealing a medium sized U-Haul truck. From inside the garage, Sylvia Phenning emerges. She’s carrying a very large, flat box, which, by the strain of her posture, looks to be heavy.
Gus tells the Gogartys to duck and, slumping a bit lower himself, he narrates what he sees, which isn’t much: Sylvia’s unlatching a lock at the rear of the U-Haul and, with a pull-strap, raising the truck door all the way up.
“What’s in the lorry?” Gran whispers.
“It looks like… I’m not sure. Stacks of big flat boxes. Some of them are wrapped up in moving blankets… Stay down, ladies, she’s closing the door.”
* * *
On their way out, the guard starts to wave them through, but Gus stops at the kiosk.
“Nice, huh?” the man says. “You can get a tour, you know. You just call up.”
“Good idea,” says Gus. “Do you happen to know if the huge one’s for sale? 149 Ocean Lane?”
The guard takes a moment and then shakes his head. “Nope. But I’m pretty sure there’s a few other Ocean Lane houses on the market. I can check for you?”
“Oh, that’s too bad. I thought they might be moving, you know. Saw the U-Haul.”
“U-Haul?” The guard looks puzzled, moist jowls spreading into a grimace like wet folds of dough. “Oh no, no, Mr. Pale’s not moving. Nah, I think he’s just got someone helping him clean out some of his stuff. He’s a big art collector. Or was.”
“Was?”
“I shouldn’t say was. I just meant—he’s not well. He’s very elderly, you know, not one hundred percent.”
This enlightening conversation—Sylvia, the wagon, has clearly found her next victim—is cut short by a sound from within the car. They thank the guard, and as soon as they’re clear of the place, Gus pulls his Ford to the side of the road. The three of them are hooting and giggling and then shushing each other because it’s Gus’s new disposable flip phone ringing, and only one person on earth has the number.
59
At the foot of his marital bed sits Kevin’s carry-on, crammed with enough clothing for three days and zipped securely. As relieved as he is that Grace had consented to him being here once more and as grateful as he feels to not be waking up in a cloud of Maeve’s Benson & Hedges, he’s too wired to sleep. He sometimes copes with these growing bouts of insomnia by searching his laptop for the most unlikely career callings: software engineer, lorry driver, detox nurse. He is mulling over the responsibilities of an accounts payable assistant when the phone beside him rings, his daughter’s name flashing on-screen. Kevin reaches across to rouse his wife as he answers the call.
“Aideen?”
“Kevin, can you hear me?”
Silence.
“Kevin?”
He squawks a shocked “Mum?” just as she, eclipsing him in the annoying way of mobile calls, says, “Can you hear me?”
“Mum?”
“It’s me.”
“Is Aideen with you?”
“Yes, she is and she’s fine. Kevin I wanted—”
“Put her on.”
“Well, she’s not actually here at the minute.”
“Where is she,” he echoes with profound bitterness, “at the minute?”
“She’s just stepped out to buy a bar of chocolate. I know you’re probably very—”
“A bar of chocolate?”
“There’s a vending machine at the motel, you see.”
“What motel?”
“The Castaways.”
“Is that a joke?”
“Kevin, I need to tell—”
“Where are you?”
“That’s why I’m ringing. Aideen and I are fine. We’re safe so you don’t—”
“In Clearwater? Are you and Aideen still in Clearwater, Florida?”
“How did you know? Well, we flew into Orlando, which is about a two-hour drive northeast—”
“Are you taking the piss? You’re after leaving the country with my daughter, you’re after kidnapping—”
“Oh now
that’s—”
“You think I’m in the market for a geography lesson? I should have you arrested.”
Grace sits up. “What’s happening? Is it Aideen?”
Kevin mouths “Mum” and grips his wife’s arm. “They’re still in Clearwater.” Into the phone, he says, “Put Aideen on.”
“I’ll have her ring you tomorrow.”
“I don’t even know where to start,” he starts. “Just stay there. I’m coming to you. I’m landing tomorrow.”
“Now you’re not to come, Kevin. We’re perfectly alright. We’re having fun actually. We’ll be home the day after tomorrow, assuming all goes well.”
“Well with what? I mean, how about—can you just explain why you would take our daughter to Florida? I mean, are you just on a little random holiday? You just thought, oh, I’ll bring my granddaughter for a lark in the sunshine?”
“That’s not what this is.”
“Without any word? You didn’t think we deserved a call?”
“Well, yes, I did and, listen, Aideen wanted to ring you every day but I wouldn’t let her because you would only have stopped us.”
“You’re fucking right I would have!”
Kevin’s wife and mother gasp. His use of the F-word, with Mum anyway, is unprecedented.
“She’s sixteen years of age!” he says. Grace squeezes his hand.
“Calm,” she whispers, “calm.”
“She has school!” Kevin goes on. “You can’t just buy a ticket in the middle of the week… I don’t… and—you know, the other stuff—the shoplifting and the lying and the drama and breaking out of the fucking care home…”
Another one! It’s positively raining fucks.
He is poised to tell her how irresponsible she is, how selfish, and that she has no idea what it’s like to worry that your child is dead, when he thinks of his sister, Maureen, who lived and died when he was too young himself to remember.
“I know you’re upset,” says Mum, maddeningly chirpy, “and I knew you were worried, but I also knew she was fine, Kevin, she’s wonderful. It’s just a few days of school she’s missed. And if you want to know the truth, I’ve a bone to pick with you as well.”
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