All That I Leave Behind (18 page)

He smiles briefly, the lines at the corners of his eyes crinkling. ‘I know you didn’t,’ he says, bouncing Mary-Pat gently on his knee. ‘It’s a mother’s instinct, isn’t it? Not to want to let her child out of her sight. It’s nature’s way to bond us to them, so we can’t wander away from the nest and leave them motherless.’

‘I suppose it is,’ I say weakly. I feel a little uncomfortable at this Biblical turn of events. It seems to me that Sean O’Reilly has a very definite way of looking at the world, where things are either right or wrong, not a mixture of both. I wonder what he makes of me, the hippy in John Dermot’s place, with my daft ideas?

‘I suppose I’d better be getting back. My husband will be wondering where I am by now.’

‘Oh, of course.’ He looks embarrassed for a moment, before getting up, Mary-Pat tucked under his arm. ‘Will you listen to me,
ráiméis-ing
on, old bore that I am.’

‘You’re not.’ I giggle.

‘What? Old or a bore?’ He grins, as I try to get up from the chair and find myself pinned there by my bump. ‘Here, let me help,’ and he pulls me gently to a standing position, his arm solid under mine. ‘You have a lot on your plate,’ he says gently.

‘I do, but my husband does his share,’ I say stoutly. ‘He’s great with the baby and he helps me in the garden …’ I feel the need to defend him, because I know that there’s ‘chat’, as Bridie puts it, about the amount of time John-Joe spends in Prendergast’s.

‘Well, then you’re a lucky woman,’ he replies. And then, as if the subject is closed, ‘Let’s lead the way to the hens, little lady, shall we?’ And off he marches to the squawking barn, opening the large wooden door, whereupon a tiny little black hen darts out underneath his legs. Deftly, he leans down, Mary-Pat still in his arms, and plucks the hen up with one hand. ‘Making a bid for freedom, eh, Bessie?’ and the little hen turns her head to the side, as if she’s listening. Then Mary-Pat reaches out a little hand and pats her gently on the head. ‘Oh, she’s been chosen, so,’ he says. ‘And now, let’s see what other little ladies we can find inside, shall we?’ and he goes into the barn, talking softly to Mary-Pat as she gurgles and coos. And I have that sudden thought again, that picture of myself here, in another place, in another life. I have to shake my head to dislodge it from my brain.

Only when we’ve selected our little menagerie, and he’s pushing them gently into the crate I’ve brought, balancing on the wheels of the pram, does he say, ‘Well, I suppose the cottage will be getting a bit small for you, once the baby comes along.’

‘I suppose it will,’ I agree, fighting a sense of weariness at the thought of four of us crammed into that tiny place.

‘Why don’t we take a look at my brother’s place?’

I shake my head for a second. ‘Why?’

He’s taken aback. ‘Well, because … it’s habitable anyway and it’s got a nice patch of land, and I’ve been looking for a tenant for a while, truth to tell.’ He runs a hand through his black thatch, which now stands upright on his head. He looks a bit lost and I feel sad that I’ve offended him in this way, when he’s clearly doing me a favour. I’m sure he probably doesn’t need a tenant for his brother’s house.

‘I’d love to see it, Sean. Thanks,’ I say and he beams and says, ‘We’ll lead the way again, little lady, shall we?’ He hasn’t relinquished Mary-Pat and she’s growing sleepy in his arms, her tiny thumb in her mouth, eyelids drooping. ‘Here, let me take her,’ I say and put her gently in the pram. She hardly protests before turning onto her side, the way she always does when she’s going to sleep. Sean looks disappointed and sticks his head under the hood of the pram. ‘Night, night, sleep tight,’ he says and when he stands up again he blushes, as if it’s not right for a man to fuss over a baby like that. But I think it’s very endearing. He’ll make a good father, I’m sure.

We chat about growing vegetables and what works best in the soil here, and about the finer points of hens, about which I confess I know nothing. ‘You just have to handle them gently,’ he says, ‘and talk to them a bit, they like that.’

‘I’ll remember that.’ I smile, as we walk up towards a rusting gate, over which a thick green arch of privet grows. The house is a plain two-storey farmhouse painted pale yellow, and it’s regular in build, like the kind of shapes I used to draw as a child: a neat rectangle with a row of smaller rectangles inside for the windows and a larger one for the door, which is a faded, peeling red. It looks a little tired, as if someone hasn’t loved it for a long time, and the garden is a neat lawn of green, devoid of any embellishment. ‘I just keep it tidy for him. It needs a lick of paint, mind you, and the guttering needs to be fixed.’

‘It’s perfect,’ I say. And I want to run all the way home to tell John-Joe, to look at his face when I tell him that I’ve found it now. My home. Our home.

P
ius
was in the cabbage-and-wax-smelling hallway of the parish house. He must be one of the few in Monasterard who’d never been in it. The thought made him smile for a second. He wondered what Mammy and Daddy would have made of it.

He and Rosie were ushered into Father Naul’s office by Bridie O’Reilly, now bent almost double over a walking stick, a thick cardigan buttoned tightly over a blue floral dress, even though the heat in the house was sweltering. They must have the heating on, even in summer. Bridie must be in her nineties, Pius thought, following her through the door into a surprisingly modern room with a cream carpet and a new leather sofa and very little in the way of religious iconography. She’d always made a big deal about being the priest’s housekeeper, bustling around the main street, a self-important look on her face,
announcing to all and sundry that she was ‘doing messages for Father Fathom’. Pius wondered what she made of Father Naul.

As if answering his question, she muttered, ‘Ye’ll have tea,’ shooting the priest a disapproving look. Clearly, she wasn’t his number-one fan.

‘Indeed we will, Bridie, and thanks,’ Father Naul replied, jollying her along. The old bat.

She turned to go out the door, but then stopped and, as if she’d remembered something, turned back again and shot Pius a look. ‘Whose are you?’

‘Whose what?’

‘Who’s kin?’

Jesus, you have a way of asking, Pius thought as he cleared his throat. ‘John-Joe O’Connor, and my mother was—’

‘I knew your mother,’ Bridie interrupted, beaming. ‘A fine woman she was. We were great friends, so we were.’ She shook her head, and muttered, ‘That fellow …’

There was a long silence. That fellow indeed, Pi thought.

‘And you’re the baby, I suppose,’ she said, darting a look at Rosie. It was funny, Pius thought, for a second the old lady looked as if she were afraid.

‘Yes, that’s right,’ Rosie began, before Father Naul interrupted. ‘That tea would be just lovely, Bridie, and biscuits if Father Fathom hasn’t eaten them all.’

‘Tea and biscuits,’ she repeated, as if he’d asked for champagne and caviar, and then she was gone, the door banging behind her.

‘You’ll have to excuse Bridie. She has her ways,’ Father Naul explained. ‘Anyhow, I hear you’re a great man for the fishing, Pius. I like to fish for trout myself, although of course it isn’t the place for it. So I’ve been trying to perfect my roach-catching techniques to compensate.’ He smiled, and the lines which were etched into his skin suddenly smoothed out, his steel-grey hair waving around his tanned face. He really did look like Sam Shepard. Pius could see why all the ladies at the wedding had been flirting with him.

‘You need to know the canal better for roach,’ Pius found himself saying. ‘All the best spots are the ones only the locals know about.’

‘Well, maybe you could show me a few of them some time.’ Father Naul beamed.

Pius nodded and said of course he would, wondering what Daddy would have made of it, going out on a little jaunt with the parish priest. ‘Religion is the opium of the masses’ had been one of his favourite sayings, and every time he’d said it, it had been in the same self-congratulatory way, as if he’d been the very first person to think of it, not Karl Marx or whoever it was. Daddy, the little shit.

Father Naul was perching now on the edge of his desk, sleeves rolled up to reveal hairy, muscular forearms. He clearly wasn’t a man for sitting behind a desk. Of course not, Pius thought. Sam Shepard didn’t either. He was always on the back of a horse, and Pius could see Father Naul on one too, a battered cowboy hat on his head. He looked out of place in this sterile lunchbox of an office.

‘So, Rosie, I’ve dug out the parish records that you asked for – 1981, I think, is that right?’ and he leaned over and picked up a large red volume from his desk, opening it and scanning the contents, a frown of concentration on his face. ‘Now, I just need to find the entry … ah, here it is,’ and he turned the book around to show them both, his index finger on the second column down, which had been filled in with an immaculate hand.

‘See? Rose Michelle, daughter of Michelle Spencer and John-Joe O’Connor. And there’s Pius, the godfather.’

Rosie looked at him with a puzzled expression on her face and then back at the register and finally back at him again.

Pius managed a smile. ‘Believe it or not. Not sure how well I executed my pastoral duties at eight years of age. Or later, for that matter.’ Especially as he could hardly be a spiritual guardian, what with him not being a Catholic. He never had understood why Rosie was the only one of them to be baptised – it was hardly as if Mammy and Daddy had found religion, now, was it?

‘Oh, Pi.’ She reached over and squeezed his hand, giving him a watery smile. She looked down at her shoes then and there was a little sniff.

Oh, Lord. ‘C’mon, it’s OK, Doodlebug. It’ll be OK,’ Pius said, and he looked meaningfully at Father Naul. ‘It’s all been a bit emotional …’

Father Naul nodded but said nothing further and Pius admired him for it, that, in spite of having officiated at a wedding which was now the talk of Monasterard, he was able to keep his mouth shut when needed. That he didn’t feel the need to witter on about it being the Lord’s will and all that nonsense, when the Lord had shag all to do with it.

She seemed to rally then, lifting her head and asking Father Naul, ‘Who’s the godmother?’

‘Well, let’s have a look … someone called Jasmine … I think,’ he said. ‘Hang on, I need my reading glasses.’ And he rummaged around in his shirt pocket, producing a pair of battered-looking spectacles, which he perched on the end of his nose, looking down through them at the book. ‘No … Frances. Frances O’Brien. Mean anything?’

Rosie shook her head. ‘Never heard of her. Pi, you must remember,’ and she looked at him hopefully.

God, Pius thought. Frances O’Brien. He hadn’t thought about her in years. Who’d have thought that the woman who was now the life and soul of the parish council would have been an old hippy once – she’d been friends with Mammy and Daddy at that stage. He’d had a bit of a crush on her, if he remembered right. He used to like her because she smoked weed and didn’t wear a bra. He’d spend hours watching her breasts move under whatever tiny top she was wearing, mesmerised by them, by the way they were soft and the nipples hard at the same time. It had kept him amused for that whole summer. But she smelled, too. He hadn’t been so keen on that. And when she’d moved in with them that time – he’d been even less keen because he’d had to give her his bedroom and sleep on the sofa for two months. He’d had to box up his collection of stag beetles too, because she’d found them ‘creepy’. He’d been delighted when he’d woken up one morning to find that she’d vanished.

‘She was someone Mammy and Daddy knew at the time. She’s still around, I think. Lives up the way.’ He didn’t see the need to explain any of the details. It didn’t merit digging up after all this time.

‘Oh.’

‘Well, there you are, Rosie, mystery solved.’ Father Naul smiled, a flash of white, even teeth. ‘Does this put your mind at rest?’

Rosie nodded, thoughtful, before agreeing. ‘Yes, thanks, Father Naul. I really appreciate your help.’ But she seemed dazed, Pius thought, dazed and confused.

‘C’mon, Doodlebug, let’s go home.’ Pius took control, shaking Father Naul firmly by the hand, promising to drop by to take him fishing some night and leading Rosie out of the parish centre and into his car, not saying anything until they reached the house, when he turned to say the words that he’d been composing in his mind all the way back from Monasterard. But she was fast asleep, slumped against the window of the car, her head propped up against her elbow.

He hesitated for a bit before deciding that he couldn’t leave her in the car, and so he got out as quietly as he could and went around to the passenger side, opening the door gently so she didn’t fall out and lifting her as carefully as he could. She weighed nothing in his arms, a little bird, and she didn’t even wake, head nodding back on his elbow as he carried her through the front door and into the living room, where he nudged aside Sunday’s paper with his foot and placed her gently down on the sofa. That should have been your husband, he thought, as he dragged Jessie’s blanket out from under her feet. That should have been him, carrying you across the threshold. He felt a huge sadness for her then, sleeping on his sofa like a young child, sadness and irritation that she was like a boil on his skin that he just wanted to lance, to cut it away from his flesh, so that he was clean again. Clean and free.

He made himself lunch – packet tomato soup and a hunk of stale bread because Rosie wasn’t around to lecture him about it – and sat at the kitchen table to read the newspaper. He looked forward to having a few moments’ peace, but the second he sat down, he felt his eyelids begin to droop, resting his head on the table. When he woke up, sweaty and disorientated, a feeling of panic rose in his chest as the doorbell buzzed, a long, insistent ring.

He opened the door and stood stock still for a moment.

The Mermaid was standing there, holding the hand of a little boy in a pair of faded blue shorts, a red T-shirt with ‘Ban the Bomb’ on it and a pair of bright green Crocs. Her red hair was crammed into a horrible woolly hat with a Euro 2012 logo on it and she was wearing mismatched tracksuit bottoms and a top.