Always You (25 page)

‘Oh it’s all right, Mum. I’m used to him behaving like an arse.’

Bridget gasped and Malachy glowered.

Cahal sat down on the sofa beside his brother, crossed his legs and stared coolly at his father. ‘You’ve never said a civil word to me my entire life. No point in breaking the habit of a lifetime.’

‘Tea?’ said Bridget in a voice so high it might have broken glass.

‘Yer all right, Ma,’ said Sean, lifting the mug off the arm of the sofa and bringing it to his lips.

‘No thanks,’ said Cahal.

‘So what brings you here, son?’ said Bridget perching on the arm of the sofa, the duster in constant motion, held by hands that could not be still. ‘Did you bring those photos of the kids from when you were over?’

‘Sorry, Mum, I forgot. I’ll bring them next time.’

‘You’ll be going home soon,’ she said quietly, looking at her hands.

A wave of panic made him tense. Time was running out and he hated to be reminded of it.

‘I hear you’ve been sniffing round that Walker woman,’ said his father. He took a puff on the cigarette between his yellow-brown finger and thumb. ‘I thought you’d have more sense.’

Beside him, his mother’s hands stilled. And something in the atmosphere shifted.

Cahal leaned forward, his hands resting on his knees, and he said, ‘What were you in prison for?’

Malachy’s eyes darted to the left, then at Bridget and finally came back to rest on Cahal. ‘This and that. Sure, I was a head case when I was young.’ He tapped ash into the glass ashtray on the arm of the sofa and took a last, long haul on the cigarette. ‘I did a bit of time for theft and breach of the peace. Not that it’s any of your business.’

‘Breach of the peace?’

‘That’s right. Man picks a fight with me in a pub, he’s not going to get away with it.’ He pressed the spent cigarette into the ashtray, twisting and squeezing till it was a pulp.

‘Theft and breach of the peace. And you expect me to believe that they gave you five years for that?’

‘Who told you he got five years?’ said Bridget sharply.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ he said, and sensing he was onto something, he pressed on, keeping his eyes on his father. ‘You don’t get five years for petty crimes like that.’ He inched even further forward on the sofa, his heart pounding. ‘What did you really do?’

‘I fecking told you,’ said Malachy and he threw the newspaper on his lap across the room. ‘Are you fecking deaf?’

Malachy was lying, he knew it.

‘Do you know, Sean?’ said Cahal without taking his eyes off his father.

‘Nah. Why are you asking?’

‘Because,’ said Cahal, staring at his father’s red and furious face, ‘I think he did something he doesn’t want us to know about.’

Bridget jumped to her feet all of a sudden and screamed, ‘How dare you come into this house and start accusing your father of … of lying.’

Everyone stared at her in stunned silence. She waved the duster in the air. ‘Didn’t he tell you it was for theft and fightin’? You’ve no right coming in here, throwing lies around and digging things up from the past.’ And then just as suddenly all the fire went out of her and she sat down.

‘Do you hear your mother?’ Malachy roared. ‘Get out of here, Cahal. And don’t be bringing your filthy mouth back here again.’

Down on the street Cahal found his car untouched. The rain had stopped and the sun, peeking between grey, bubbling clouds, sent up hot steam from the black tarmac. A group of teenagers loitered at the end of the street, their winter hoodies exchanged for singlets and tattoos on red, sunburnt arms and necks. He raised a hand and one of them returned the gesture.

‘Cahal!’ said Sean’s gravelly voice. The door to the building slammed shut and Sean came down the steps.

Cahal opened the car door and put his arms on the roof of the car. ‘What did you think of that then? There’s something he’s not telling us, isn’t there? And I’m going to find out what it is.’

Sean glanced up at the windows of the flat, then grabbed Cahal by the forearm. His grip was firm and his eyes pooled with tears.

Alarmed, Cahal said, ‘What is it?’

‘You did the right thing getting out of Ballyfergus, Cahal, boy. I’m proud of you, my wee brother.’ He smiled. ‘You’re the only one of us that did good, Cahal.’ His grip tightened. The back of Cahal’s throat felt like it was closing over. ‘Go back to Australia,’ went on Sean, ‘and live the life the rest of us dream about. Live it for me. Forget about them.’ He looked again at the top-floor flat. ‘There’s nothing for you here.’

Cahal stared into his brother’s face but he saw not a haggard, broken man but a thirteen-year-old boy with blond hair and an angry, pure heart. A boy who had stood up to his father to protect Grainne, when she’d accidentally smashed the TV screen with a wooden sword, only to take the beating himself. A boy who’d started smoking at ten and drinking at twelve, all his promise withered by the age of eighteen.

Tears flowed freely down Cahal’s face but he did not wipe them away. He pulled a wad of notes from his jacket pocket and pressed them into Sean’s hand. ‘See that Ma gets what she needs,’ he said, his voice small and reedy. ‘And you too.’ Sean let go of his arm and stared at the money.

‘I’m sorry, Sean,’ said Cahal, his voice choked with years of regret and guilt. Then he got in the car and drove off.

Sarah opened her front door on a balmy Saturday night and Cahal immediately scooped her up in his arms and kissed her like she’d been gone a month instead of a week. She clung to him, her face pressed into his warm neck, his scent filling her nostrils and fuelling her desire. Inside her head she battled the fickle demons that whispered
you are going to lose him again
.

‘I missed you, gorgeous!’ said Cahal, when he eventually pulled away. Plastic bags rustled at his feet and he wore a short-sleeved blue shirt and tan jeans.

She brushed a curl off his forehead, his healthy tan partially restored over the summer by the Irish sun. She disliked her pale skin but Cahal loved it. He called her his alabaster queen. When they lay together, limbs entwined, they looked like lovers of different race. ‘I missed you too. Dreadfully,’ she sighed. ‘I wish you could’ve come with us.’

She’d taken a farm cottage in Donegal for the week for herself and the children, and Dad and Aunt Vi had come too. It had been booked long before Cahal came on the scene. She had hoped that the holiday would be a chance for her to reconcile with her aunt. Unfortunately, it had turned out exactly the opposite.

'
What’s that ring on your finger?’ Aunt Vi said when they were alone in the kitchen doing the dishes together on the first night.

Sarah lifted her hands out of the basin and wiped the suds off the ring. It glinted, wet and shiny in the evening sun coming through the window. ‘A Claddagh ring. Cahal gave it to me.’ She smiled. ‘Pretty, isn’t it? It’s an Irish marriage ring.’

At once, the plate she was holding slid out of Aunt Vi’s hands and smashed to pieces on the stone floor
.

‘Oh,’ cried Sarah and she jumped away from the sink, her hands dripping suds onto the floor. ‘Are you all right, Aunt Vi?’

Aunt Vi held on to the counter and stared at Sarah, seemingly oblivious to the shards of china at her feet. Her face was pale as a ghost. ‘You … you married him?’

‘No,’ she said irritably. ‘It’s only a wedding ring when it’s on your left hand.’

Aunt Vi held on to the counter with both hands and bent her head. ‘Oh, thank God.’

Sarah’s stomach tightened into a hard, cold knot.

Aunt Vi lifted her head and stared at Sarah, her voice little more than a whisper. ‘Promise me you’ll stop seeing him. I beg you, Sarah. Please.’

*

Cahal picked up the bags at his feet and Sarah led him into the kitchen. ‘I got enough Chinese takeaway for the kids too. They like lemon chicken, don’t they?’

‘Oh, that was thoughtful of you.’ Sarah picked cutlery out of a drawer and tried to inject some enthusiasm into her voice. ‘They’re over at Becky’s just now. But maybe they can have some for their supper.’ Even though they were barely on speaking terms, Becky still acted as though nothing was wrong around the kids. The situation between them was awful but how could Sarah resolve it without telling the truth? Even though she had Cahal, she’d never felt so alone. Or so sad.

Glancing out the window, she noticed the evening sun had already fallen behind the garden shed. It was nearly the end of August, September loomed ever nearer and with it a mounting sense of dread. Maybe she shouldn’t have introduced Cahal to the kids after all. They liked him but when he went away they would be left confused and she would have to carry on. But how could she, without him?

‘These don’t feel so hot,’ said Cahal, setting the containers on the granite worksurface.

‘Let’s pop them in the oven for a bit. It’s a little too early to eat anyhow.’ She switched the oven on and got plates out while Cahal opened a bottle of wine. She was busy filling a jug with water at the sink when Cahal came up and wrapped his arms around her from behind. ‘Leave that a minute.’ She turned off the tap, set the jug down and swivelled round. He nuzzled her neck. ‘Tell me all about the holiday? Did you have a nice time?’

‘Yeah, it was fine. The kids loved it. The farmer let them collect eggs every day and took them for rides on his pony.’

‘I bet Lewis loved that. And what about you?’ he said pulling back a little to look at her face. ‘Did you enjoy it?’

With her hands behind her back she held on to the kitchen counter and looked at the floor. ‘It was okay.’

‘Did Becky come in the end?’

‘Yeah, she came for one night.’ And though Becky had avoided her as much as possible, she was still glad to see her. ‘A week in a cottage with just Dad and Aunt Vi is a long time,’ she joked, making light of what had, in fact, been a difficult week.

‘Well, that’ll be because I wasn’t there,’ he teased and she looked into his eyes and tried to smile.

His smile faded and he hooked a lock of stray hair behind her ear. ‘What is it, love?’

She looked away. ‘I … I couldn’t relax properly. I was worried Evelyn would pass away while we were on holiday. We were in constant contact with Ian, which kind of spoiled it a bit for me.’

‘But she didn’t.’

‘No, not yet. But it’s going to be any day now.’ She put her hands to her face and though she tried to hold the tears back, they came anyway.

He squeezed her upper arms. ‘I’m sorry. I know you’re very fond of her.’

She sniffed. ‘I’m not crying just for Evelyn. I’m crying for us too. What are we going to do, Cahal?’

‘Oh, Sarah,’ he said and held her tight while all the sorrow seeped out of her. ‘I don’t know, darling.’

She pulled away and looked up into his sad, dark eyes. ‘But you’re going back to Melbourne in three weeks and I can’t see where we go from there.’

His chest rose and fell. ‘There’s always hope, Sarah.’

She folded her arms. ‘You keep saying that, but what’s going to change, Cahal? We’ll both still be parents with all the commitment that entails.’

‘Look,’ he said, holding her by the elbows, though her arms were still stubbornly crossed, ‘why don’t you bring the kids out to Melbourne at Christmas? I promise you, they’ll love it.’

She sighed. ‘What for? To show us what we can’t have?’

His hands dropped to his sides. ‘Please, Sarah. Don’t make this any harder than it already is.’

‘I’m sorry.’ She put her arms around his neck and leaned against him. He wrapped his arms around her waist and they stood like that for a long time just holding each other.

She loved him so much she would give up her house and her job and all that was familiar. But even being prepared to give up all this was not enough. Because she would never leave her children. And she would never ask Cahal to leave his. It would destroy him and, in the end, it would destroy them.

The back door clicked open. Sarah fixed a neutral expression on her face, expecting it to be one of the kids. But when she looked across the room, it wasn’t Molly or Lewis, it was Aunt Vi.

‘Your Dad’s waiting outside –’ began Aunt Vi but, as soon as she saw them, the cheerful words died on her lips.

Cahal and Sarah sprang apart. Aunt Vi stood stock still in the doorway, a metal loaf tin, partially wrapped up in a tea towel, in her right hand. The evening breeze carried the smell of warm gingerbread, fresh from the oven, across the room.

‘Hello, Vi,’ said Sarah, trying not to show she was unnerved by her aunt’s unexpected presence. She glanced nervously at Cahal. Unlike Sarah, he appeared completely calm, and even gave her a small reassuring smile. Taking courage from this, she said, rather stating the obvious, ‘You haven’t met Cahal, have you?’

Aunt Vi stepped inside and shut the door. ‘I thought your father asked you to stop seeing him only this week.’

Sarah glanced at Cahal. His brow furrowed.

‘And you told him you would,’ went on her aunt.

At this Cahal flinched, then turned his shocked and wounded gaze on Sarah.

‘That’s not true,’ she blurted out. ‘I said I would think about what he said. That was all.’ To reinforce the truth of this, she went over to Cahal and put her arm around his waist.

This action seemed to incense Aunt Vi who shrieked, ‘Are you going to defy your father?’

Sarah hesitated, momentarily surprised by this outburst from her normally mild-mannered aunt. ‘For heaven’s sake. Stop talking to me as if I’m a child.’

Cahal put his arm around Sarah’s shoulder and pressed his fingers into the top of her arm. At this, Aunt Vi’s eyes narrowed meanly, and her upper lip curled. ‘Your father didn’t raise you in a good Christian home to consort with low-class people like this, Sarah. You’re breaking his heart. Can’t you see that?’

Sarah slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand. ‘I’m sick of you and Dad loading all this emotional blackmail on me. I’m not breaking Dad’s heart. He’s breaking his own heart with his pig-headed narrow-mindedness and prejudice.’ She spat the words across the room. ‘I’m not responsible for how he chooses to react to Cahal.’

Aunt Vi’s lips pursed momentarily and then she turned her attention to Cahal whom, up until now, she had not looked at, nor acknowledged, in any way. She glared at him and hissed, ‘They’re all evil criminals, the Mulvennas. Men of violence. And this one will turn out to be just the same.’

Sarah put a hand to her throat, horrified both by her aunt’s outrageous words and the hateful manner of their delivery. Beside her, Cahal tensed.

‘If you’ve something to say about me,’ he said, maintaining admirable calm in the face of her aunt’s spite, ‘say it to me. Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here.’

‘Aunt Vi, please,’ said Sarah disentangling herself from Cahal and taking a few steps towards her aunt. ‘What has Cahal done to make you hate him so much?’

Vi’s eyes bulged behind her glasses and the tendons on her neck stood out like wires. ‘You mark my words,’ she said pointing an accusative finger at him, the loaf tin still balanced in her right hand. ‘You’re just like your father. From the way you look to the way you talk. And inside you’re the same too.’

Cahal gave Sarah a perplexed glance then addressed Aunt Vi. ‘Does this all come down to my father? Is that why you hate me so much? This is madness,’ he said with a shake of his head and an exasperated glance at Sarah. ‘Look, I know he’s no angel,’ he went on reasonably, ‘but I don’t see how what he did has got anything to do with me. Anyway, he paid for the things he did wrong.’

Aunt Vi’s nostrils flared and she pulled herself up to her full height. ‘No he didn’t. That sentence never even came close to being enough for what he did,’ she said in a voice so low it scared Sarah. And then her voice rose. ‘I hope God can forgive him for the … the violence he committed, for I can’t. I hope he burns in hell for all eternity!’

‘Aunt Vi!’ cried Sarah. What had transformed her placid aunt into this ranting madwoman? ‘Stop!’

Cahal raised his hand against the onslaught of her aunt’s vicious words. Both women fell silent. How he kept his temper, Sarah didn’t know. Every fibre in her body was on fire, blood pumping so fast inside her head, she thought it might burst.

‘Okay,’ said Cahal and, though his voice was calm, the muscles in his right cheek twitched and his eyes were hard and cold. ‘He has a bit of a temper on him – I’m not denying that – but only when provoked.’

‘Only when provoked!’ screamed Aunt Vi, as the last semblance of self-control fell away. There was a terrible pause. She raised her right hand, the loaf tin balanced precariously on her palm. ‘Your father is evil. Satan incarnate.’

And then the tin was in the air, moving so fast that neither Sarah nor Cahal had time to react. It sailed past Sarah, there was a dull thud, and when she spun round, Cahal was bent over, leaning against the sink, with his hand pressed to his left temple. The tin skidded to a halt by the skirting board. The gingerbread, split in two, lay on the tiled floor at Cahal’s feet.

‘Cahal!’ she cried and dashed to his side. She put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Are you badly hurt? Let me see?’

‘It’s … nothing,’ said Cahal, straightening up, but when he removed his hand, blood seeped from a gash just below the hairline. Fear filled her head and anger filled her heart.

‘You stupid woman. You could’ve really hurt him!’ She kicked the gingerbread out of the way and grabbed a tea towel off a hook. ‘Here, use this.’

He pressed the towel to his head. ‘I’m okay, really.’ He removed the towel and frowned at the blood on the cloth. ‘It’s not serious. Bloody hurts though,’ he grimaced.

‘Oh, darling,’ said Sarah, examining the wound. It was an inch long, but not deep. Satisfied that he was not seriously hurt, she turned to face her aunt. ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’

Aunt Vi’s face was livid, her expression unrepentant. ‘I won’t let you destroy her life. Not the way he destroyed mine!’

Cold dread stilled the fire in Sarah’s breast. She paused, took a deep breath and said, ‘What did you say?’

But her aunt didn’t seem to hear. She glared at Cahal for a few, short seconds. Then, without any warning, she took three nimble steps over to the island unit, and grabbed a boning knife, long and slim, from the knife block.

Sarah screamed. Cahal grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back. Aunt Vi raised the knife in the air, every muscle in her puce face contorted. Cahal pushed Sarah behind him and growled, ‘Don’t you touch her.’

‘For God’s sake, Aunt Vi. Put it down!’ sobbed Sarah, clawing at Cahal’s back.

‘That’s enough!’ said a voice from the doorway.

Everyone froze. It was Dad. Before anyone had time to think or move, he walked over to Vi, took the knife out of her hand and said, ‘That’s enough, Vi.’

The fight went out of her instantly and the madwoman was suddenly gone, replaced by a harmless, confused-looking old woman. Dad put his arm around her shoulders and she began to cry, holding on to the back of a chair. ‘There, there, now,’ he said, gently.

Sarah came out from behind Cahal’s back and stared in numb astonishment at the scene before her. Her aunt rarely cried and never like this. Her whole body heaved with sobs and the sound that came out was a pitiful sort of wailing. In the face of her obvious distress, Sarah couldn’t help but feel sorry for her, but she was furious too.

‘Dad, did you see what she did? She came in here and just went completely bonkers and threatened us with a knife.’