A Gift to You (8 page)

‘That’s very kind of you,’ I said, ‘but I left it too late to buy one now. There’ll only be rubbish left. I’ve always put up a real tree. My late husband had
no truck with artificial ones. When I saw the one you have lit up in your garden I got a little nostalgic for one, that’s all. But thank you very much for offering, Simon.’

‘No trouble at all.’ He smiled. He had a lovely lopsided smile, just like John had. He waved from the gate and I waved back, warmed by his and Sarah’s kindness. Just before
tea, there was a knock at my door. Simon was there, with
the
most beautiful, perfectly shaped Christmas tree. The scent of it brought back such memories. I felt a terrible pang of
loneliness for my beloved husband. The passing years have not eased the sense of loss; at times like Christmas I miss John more than ever. But Simon looked so pleased with himself I hid my sadness
from him and opened the door wide.

‘I have some lights too, in case all yours aren’t working,’ he told me eagerly, all ready to start decorating.

I was overwhelmed as he set to, positioning it in the bay window, turning it this way and that for the best angle to show off its glory. Sarah came to help and between us we decorated it from
the big box of baubles I had in the attic. They devoured the slices of the baked ham I served them, on thick Vienna roll slathered in butter, which we ate under the luminous glow of the tree, with
the fire crackling and flickering in the grate.

The tree was magnificent, the soft reds, blues, silver and greens of the lanterns reflecting on the baubles as they glistened and shimmered. Despite my feelings of loss and sadness, I was
delighted to have a decorated tree and very touched by my young neighbours’ kindness. I sat up until late, admiring it after they had gone. And only when the glow of the embers had dulled to
dusty grey did I go to bed.

‘Nana you have a
real
tree!’ My grandchildren were ecstatic when they called on Christmas Eve. They have an artificial tree at home. My daughter has neither the time nor the
patience to vacuum up pine needles. The children oohhed and aahhhed, their joyful faces reflected in the shining decorations that swung gaily from the branches. I was reminded of my own children
when they were young. Simple pleasures are still the best.

‘Mum, I would have put it up for you,’ Charlotte, my daughter, chided.

‘I wanted to surprise you,’ I fibbed. ‘Simon and Sarah from next door got it and we put it up together. It was a nice way of getting to know them.’

‘How kind!’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s beautiful, just like the ones Dad used to put up.’ We squeezed hands as grief shadowed us momentarily. ‘I was thinking, I
could cook dinner here, if you’d like?’ she’d offered. ‘Then we’d all be together. And we could enjoy the tree.’

‘Perfect!’ I was
delighted
with the suggestion. Christmas in my own home after all these years. What could be nicer? I slept like a log that night in my own comfy bed, and
looked forward to going to Mass on Christmas morning with my grandchildren, and seeing the crib.

‘Mum must have had an inkling,’ I hear Charlotte say to Sarah and Simon. ‘She was so insistent on staying at home this year.’ I gaze down at them as
they follow the coffin into the church. My darling John is by my side here, and we watch together as relatives and friends crowd into our small village church.

I have never been happier. I am young and carefree again. The New Year is one day old. The Christmas lights shimmer in windows around the village, incandescent in the deepening, snowy gloom. My
tree glows brightest of all. Charlotte was determined to have it lit for me.

They’ve given me a terrific funeral. It’s the hymns that have started them all crying.
Here I am, Lord, it is I, Lord. I have heard you calling in the night.
It nearly makes
me
cry as the soloist’s pure voice floats from the gallery, the notes dipping and soaring over the heads of the large group of mourners that are kneeling in this small country church
where my funeral Mass is being held.

My funeral! How strange to think that I am ‘dead’ and about to be buried beside my husband, when the reality is that I’m
not
dead at all.

It all happened so quickly, really: one minute I was sitting in the armchair by the window doing my crossword, as I did every morning after breakfast, and then I felt a pain in my chest. But
even as I crumpled, my mother and John came and held out their hands to me and I felt myself sort of float out of my body as I reached for them. It was the most indescribable feeling. I felt young
again. I had no aches, no pains, my eyesight was perfect. I felt reborn almost. I turned to look and got quite a shock I can tell you when I saw myself sitting in the chair. Who was that old woman
with the grey hair, head tilted sidways, glasses a little askew, paper slipping out of lifeless hands. Then I realized it was me.

‘Am I dead? I must be if I’m with you and John, ‘I said to my mother.

‘Not a bit of it. There’s no such thing as death; you’ve just passed beyond the veil of forgetting’ she said laughing, hugging me tightly, and I felt such joy to be with
her. My husband smiled at me, held out his arms to me, and my heart melted as I snuggled into his embrace. ‘It was a lovely tree, this year, not as good as mine, but good enough,’ he
teased. ‘Next year, we’ll put up the Christmas tree together.’

It was definitely the most comfortable bed that she had ever slept in, Irene O’Shaughnessy decided sleepily, as she snuggled into her cosy hollow and pulled the patchwork
quilt, which she had made herself, up over her ears. She would make herself a cuppa in a while. There was no rush to get up. She could lie in bed all morning if she chose. She could do just what
she liked. It was pelting rain, drumming on the Velux window in the ensuite in an angry tattoo. She had a great new detective novel to read; what better day than today for a laze in bed with a
book.

The sound of an ambulance siren coming closer followed by a blue flashing light illuminating the grey morning gloom gave her a start. It must be Mrs Andrews again, she thought in dismay, as she
slipped out of bed and padded over to the window. Her elderly neighbour, who lived across the road, was in very poor health and had been whisked off to hospital by ambulance just a month ago, a few
days after Irene had moved into her new house. How different it was, she mused, living in the city with your neighbours so close to you that you could know what was going on as it was happening
rather than hearing about things second-hand at the village post office.

Irene peeped through the curtains as the drama unfolded and watched as a figure was stretchered into the ambulance, followed by an agitated middle-aged woman sheltering under an umbrella. Irene
recognized her as Mrs Andrews’s daughter. The poor woman never had a minute’s peace with her ailing mother. Moments later, the ambulance was gone, siren wailing, and peace descended
once more on the small circle of houses known as Sea View Close.

Irene shivered. She was so lucky to have her health and to be able to enjoy life, unlike her poor stricken neighbour who couldn’t make the most of her lovely new home and pretty garden.
She let the curtain fall back into place again and hurried back to the warmth of her bed. She switched on the electric blanket and arranged the pillows cosily around her. The rain battered the
windowpane relentlessly, the wind moaned and wailed under the eaves but she was as snug as a bug in a rug with nowhere to go and no one depending on her. It was the greatest feeling in the world,
Irene thought with satisfaction, as she stretched languidly and curled her feet up under the hem of her winceyette nightie. She knew that friends and relatives felt sorry for her, thinking that she
was lonely living by herself but her widowhood had liberated her. She was as free as a bird.

Irene sighed. That was a terrible reflection on her marriage. But the truth was, she’d been just as lonely when her husband, Jim was alive. Jim had been a hard worker, a good provider.
He’d left her well looked after. There was no denying that. Her lovely new home was proof that her late husband could not be faulted for looking after her material well-being, but the same
could not be said for the way Jim had dealt with her emotional needs.

Her marriage had been such a disappointment, she reflected drowsily. She had started out with such hopes because she really had loved Jim. And at the beginning, she’d felt that he’d
loved her. He’d wooed her in his quiet, shy way, taking her for long walks along the winding country roads of Waterford, where they’d both grown up. They’d known each other since
childhood but it was only when Jim had become an apprentice to a carpenter in Wexford and left their small village, that Irene had realized how much she missed his quiet, stalwart presence.

When he’d asked her to go to the pictures with him, one weekend that he was home, she’d been delighted. Jim O’Shaughnessy was a challenge and she wanted him. She was going to
bring down those barriers and get under his skin and find out what made him tick. During the following weeks, she’d drawn him out of himself, got him talking about his work, made him laugh
and felt slowly but surely that she was getting through his reserve. His grey eyes with their incredibly long, curling lashes would light up when he saw her and the shy smile that curved around his
firm, well-shaped mouth always lifted her heart and made her feel incredibly happy.

When Jim kissed her for the first time, Irene kissed him back with a passion that surprised him.

‘I love you,’ she whispered, burying her face in his neck.

‘Do you?’ he whispered back, holding her tight against him. ‘What do you love me for? Sure, you could have any man you wanted. All the fellows in the village are mad for
you.’

‘I don’t want any of the fellows in the village. I want you. I’m happy when I’m with you.’

‘I’m happy when I’m with you, too. You’re beautiful, Irene.’ Jim blushed a dull red as he said the words with bashful shyness.

Irene was over the moon with happiness. He loved her as much as she loved him; it was just that he found it hard to say the words. His kisses were passionate and hungry. The kisses of a man in
love. What more could she want?

She would have gone the whole way; it was Jim who’d drawn away and said that he didn’t want to do anything to dishonour her. He respected her too much and besides he didn’t
want her father after him with a shotgun, he’d murmured as his breathing returned to normal. Girls who went all the way were considered loose and beyond redemption but, at the time, Irene
didn’t care. She just wanted to make love and be as intimate as she possibly could with the strong, virile young man who’d taken over her mind and soul.

Jim fascinated her. She loved watching him work with his hands, his long fingers caressing a piece of wood as gently as they caressed her. He made beautiful ornaments for her and when he’d
given her an intricately carved sandalwood jewellery box with a heart in the middle of the lid, on Valentine’s Day, she’d known that she was loved, even if he had yet to say the words.
Irene waited patiently for his proposal. Eighteen months went by, and not a word, until finally, in complete frustration, she’d asked him, ‘Are we going to get married?’

‘I suppose so, if that’s what you want.’ He looked away, embarrassed.

‘Don’t be too enthusiastic,’ she snapped.

‘Don’t be like that, Irene,’ he muttered.

‘Do you love me?’ she demanded.

‘Ah, for heaven’s sake, woman, don’t be asking me questions like that.’

‘Well, do you, Jim? You’ve never said it,’ Irene said heatedly.

‘Calm down like a good girl.’ He jammed his hands in his jeans pockets and stared at her.

‘Is it so hard to say?’ She couldn’t understand his reticence. She’d tell him that she loved him twenty times a day, except that she knew that it embarrassed him.
‘Is it so hard to say, Jim?’ she repeated when he remained stubbornly silent.

‘Yes. For me it is. It’s not my way.’ He paced the floor agitatedly.

‘I need you to say it,’ she pleaded.

He remained stubbornly silent, his jaw jutting out aggressively.

‘Do you love me, Jim?’

‘I suppose I do. Now are you satisfied?’ he demanded but he took her in his arms and his kiss was tender.

She’d asked him many times during the first years of their marriage, especially in the precious moments after their lovemaking when she held him in her arms and felt that no one else but
them existed in the universe. But he always shushed her and lay silently with his head against her shoulder stroking her long, black hair. Getting him to open up emotionally, to say endearments and
to tell her that he loved her was like drawing blood from a stone.

He worked long hours at his trade and when he came in from work, tired, he’d eat the dinner that she put in front of him and then stretch out in his favourite armchair and fall asleep.
Irene would be as mad as hell. She’d be dying to talk, to tell him the news of her day. She worked as a legal secretary in Waterford and she loved meeting the clients. She’d want to ask
him about his day and who he’d worked for making kitchens or wardrobes or stairs, or bespoke furniture, but all that she would get was a low rumbling snore as he slept in the armchair. Around
nine, he’d wake up and head off to the village pub for his nightly pint. He wasn’t a heavy drinker, she never had a problem there, he’d just nurse a pint for an hour or so and
then he’d come home and be in bed by half ten, ready for an early start the following morning.

Gradually, over the years, resentment began to eat her up. Why couldn’t he make the effort, she’d ask him again and again? Why did he not take her needs and feelings into
consideration? What was the point in being married if they didn’t share and talk and do things together as a couple?

‘Oh, for God’s sake, woman! Don’t be bothering me with all this romancy stuff. Don’t we go walking on Sunday afternoons? Don’t I give you every penny I earn? What
more do you want?’ was his retort.