Heap Earth Upon It, page 8
‘Why can’t I ask them?’
If I push my way to the centre of her, perhaps all that she has built up will crumble. But just as I start to bring myself close to her, and consider asking her an honest question, perhaps even confronting the real issue, I see Tom coming up the garden path.
‘Leave it there now, Jack. You know what he’ll say.’
Anna
I was never so glad to see Tom’s face at the window. Haven’t we only just had your anniversary, and Jack wants to go out meeting women? I shouldn’t have to tell him why that’s inappropriate. The old Jack is creeping out again. The way he was before you, a divil for the drink and the women and never without the boys. We all thought that the time you had Jack was the making of him. It slowed him down, grew him up. He dropped the bravado, you know? It was a relief to see him settled. These days, it seems he is unmaking himself. Regressing to the half adult he was before you matured him. I suppose he doesn’t know what to do with himself anymore.
‘Well, well!’
Tom bursts through the door, announcing himself and throwing a pound of wrapped ham down on the table. Not fish, but ham. Something about that hits me harder than I would have imagined. I was looking forward to attempting fish again, to use what Betty taught me. I suppose Tom might not think it’s worth the money to let me practise.
He starts telling us about what’s happening in town. Small, tiresome gossip that doesn’t mean anything to him, but that he pretends to be scandalised by. Nothing about Bill or Betty Nevan. I was hoping we might have been called back down to their house by now. It’s embarrassing to be waiting for an invitation that might never come. How terribly I want to be shown ways to hold the knife against the belly of a fish. How to pull it through with such poise that it appears to be art rather than slaughter. How to do anything with the grace and fearlessness of Betty Nevan. Like I said, it’s embarrassing.
Tom wipes his hands on his trouser legs and sits down at the table. Enlivened from the socialising. Inwardly, I’m sure he is imploding over the silence of Bill Nevan, who he was half counting on for a job. However, as ever, he doesn’t allow himself to become derailed.
‘Come here to me, girl.’
He calls, his arms out to Peggy. Occasionally, he decides to switch on his heart for her. Jack throws his eyes up to heaven. Maybe Tom is trying to put some truth into his lies about how close a family we are. If he was to be honest, I think the nicest thing Tom could say about Peggy is that he is indifferent to her. Perhaps it’s the shock of his attention, perhaps it’s knowing that she is too old for this, but Peggy hesitates before sitting on his knee. Jack’s face is decidedly still as she leaves his side.
And even though I know it’s contrived, my heart softens to see them like this. Tom is right to stay positive. He never lets things swallow him up. I wish I could be the same way.
‘Ah, aren’t ye lovely?’
I cannot help but say. Tom bouncing Peggy on his knee, and Peggy letting him, acting younger than she really is. He starts singing a song I don’t recognise. Something he made up himself, probably. Suddenly I realise how lucky we are to have each other in this new town. To have people we are entirely comfortable with, and a place where we can be ourselves. Right now, with the four of us together, it’s like we never left Kilmarra. It’s like nothing ever changed. Equally comforting and heartbreaking. What great, sudden love I feel. My heart liquifies, the blood rushes out of me. Out of control.
‘Sing me a song, will you?’
Tom says, softly, smiling, right in Peggy’s hair. She recoils, his breath in her ear. It seems, for now, he has decided to love her. Daddy used to sit me up on his lap when I was little. He used to bounce me up and down and treat me like I was the centre of the universe, the way Tom sometimes treats Peggy. I was so loved by my father. Nobody loves me that much anymore. Nobody tries to, and I suppose nobody could. I want to get to a place where I appreciate those things without feeling hurt. I want to be asked to sing, too.
Peggy starts, her little voice high up, bringing life to the room. ‘Weila Waile’. It makes us laugh. What a song for a little girl to sing. I pretend not to care where she learned it, because right now, we are all happy. It has been so long since we were all happy at the same time. Tom has done his job. It’s good to be here, just for now it’s really good. If you could see us. If you could just come up the garden path and knock lightly on the door. You’d be so welcome, if you would come.
And just as suddenly as my heart melted a moment ago, it has solidified again; it almost ceases to beat. It’s hard to see Tom do this to her. A sudden outpouring of the love that she is famished of, which he will take away again without thinking. It’s hard to see Peggy loved. She is the last piece of Mammy that I have. She is the reason I have no Mammy. Complicated.
Whatever was within me a second ago that was letting me enjoy myself has disappeared. I can’t help but get lonely for you when I’m supposed to be happy. It feels inescapable. If I can’t even enjoy myself in the good times, then when am I going to enjoy myself? When is the weight of all this going to go away?
The anxiety comes over me. I don’t think I’ll ever feel right again. The fear takes up every thought. It fills the spaces between my clenched teeth. I try to put it all to the back of my mind, but you’re already there. You’re everywhere.
Yes, what a song for a little girl to sing. How horribly inappropriate. I’ve lost the humour in it. Tom encourages Peggy as though he really is entertained by her. As though he is mad for her. He seems to have stepped into the perfection that he is always trying to create. Like nothing bothers him anymore. The claws of his bachelorhood don’t sink in as deep as they used to. The shame of his past doesn’t hang as heavily. It seems like he has it all sorted. I just don’t know if I believe it.
Such a pity that happiness isn’t actually contagious. Such a hard thing to be the odd one out, not feeling what everybody else feels. Not enjoying what everybody else enjoys.
It’s just January, that’s all. I’m sure. The cold and the headaches of the season. Everybody is irritable in January. It’s just that I feel disappointed we haven’t heard from the Nevans. That’s it.
Come on, Betty, knock on the door and solve me. Solve it all.
Tom
Dutifully, I wait for Bill’s word.
And each day, I act like I am not wounded by my own hopes. Outside, with Jack, I clean up the yard. Anna insists we stay busy. The Devil makes work for idle hands, and all that.
‘I’ve big plans for this place.’
I tell Jack, pushing the shovel into the earth. Pushing my positivity into him.
‘Peggy will plant sunflowers for me here, and I’ll get us a wheelbarrow and bicycles. I might get myself a little writing desk, and we’ll have a bed each. And whatever else we like.’
Jack makes no signs to say that he doubts me, but he doesn’t seem to believe me either. I want to feel he’s on my side.
‘We’ll go out for a few pints soon, just the pair of us. Scope the place out properly.’
And though he tries to stifle it, I see a smile coming to his eyes. There was a time when Jack couldn’t be kept out of the pub. Always in with the boys, after the women. The women were weak for him. Not boorish, he was charming. Able to read people and understand them. It suited him. I’ll coax that rogue back out of him. It would suit me.
‘There might be a dance on or something.’
Now we’re making progress.
‘We might meet a few women.’
As soon as this leaves me, I wonder if it was too far. If he isn’t ready to talk about women yet. But he takes the shovel from me, forcing himself to have the craic. The earth crumbles off it through the air, as he spins and dips it as though it’s a woman he’s dancing with.
‘’Tis like this, look. You were never a natural dancer, Tom.’
He tells me. As though he would ever dance with a woman like that. And what if we were to meet a pair of women? What then? I laugh with him. The sky is turning to a pale purple. Soon, the fine weather will find us. For a minute, I feel like we are boys again. Like we are young. Like any minute, Daddy will come out of the house and tell us to stop fooling and get back to work. It could be. Is he in there now, alive all this time? I feel like I am alive.
Yes, I would love to go to a dance. Oh, for the days when we were a social family. Always out, always meeting people and invited places. I bite my cheeks, unable to consider all the many reasons we dropped that. There is so much I want from this new start. More than anything, I want to hold my head up high in the town.
Just as I am beginning to consider forgetting all about Bill and his farm and moving onto other ventures, on Sunday, he asks for me after Mass. And then Monday he asks for me in town, and on Tuesday. By Friday, I have stopped waiting to be asked.
Daddy might have said I was a fool, waiting on Bill Nevan like this. That I should try to make a go of things on my own, without answering to somebody else. Even sixteen years on from his death, I still feel I need to impress him. Today, I realise that it doesn’t matter very much either way if I impress Daddy. The world goes on turning, and I need to put dinner on the table. Having somebody to answer to suits me. This job may be the bettering of me.
Anything at all to start the bettering of me, because there is so much I want from life.
I want to be everything that, currently, I am not. A well-off man. A purposeful man. More important, less imposing. Oh, to be anything but this, Tom O’Leary, broad and burdened. Let me work my way to the top. I follow Bill around his field, taking in everything that he tells me. There isn’t a terrible amount of work between the two of us, just more work than he can manage on his own. Paddy Murphy used to help him, but he’s getting too old now. He talks about work and trivial things at the same time, so I have to keenly gather every word he drops.
‘Did you ever see Sixty Five broadcast on the television? They’d a thing on last night, Heart of Thy Neighbour, all about the North.’
He knows I don’t have a television. It’s nice to be caught up on what is being shown, so I don’t feel behind on things.
‘There was a man on saying that the Protestants up there are actually afraid of the Roman Catholics! Now can you credit that?’
I know about as much as any other man does on the topic, but it doesn’t feel like enough when talking to Bill. I’m only guessing, but he seems well-educated. I don’t want to say the wrong thing, to seem ignorant.
‘They don’t seem very afraid to me.’
I offer, and he laughs. Sure I don’t know where he stands on the whole thing.
‘On the Land is what I like, ’tis a farming programme. Betty hates it.’
He goes on laughing, telling me about the presenter and the topics they cover. How it’s the best thing that Telefís Éireann broadcast, besides the news.
Isn’t he lovely to listen to? I never thought I’d be chatting to a man as clever as Bill Nevan. No, for a long time, I thought that a man is born into the life he is to live. Some men are born to go to the likes of Trinity College, and study law and politics. To occupy dignified spaces and make money, and to cultivate culture. And then there are those like myself, born to turn turf and plough fields in a never-ending loop. Sharing our grand ideas and opinions with the animals and the soil. I always thought it was the luck of the draw which side you ended up on. And I have resented my side, until I met Bill: a good man, with a good life, who wants to give me a start.
The days are starting to stretch out, making space for me and my ambition. The sea air is filling up my lungs, cleaning me. And the dark weeks of January are so close to being behind me as I push a shovel through Bill’s land. I am well on my way. I will make this work for them. For myself. Peggy will grow up here as though she never lived anywhere else. By the time she is my age, Kilmarra will be such a far-off memory that we will question whether we were ever there at all. The poor bastard child will never know what trouble she caused us.
Without people always asking us about you, Jack will find his rhythm again and get back to himself. He will lighten up and find things to keep him going. More than that, he will be happy. All the trouble will lift off Anna, and she will know such sweet, holy peace.
What a wonderful chance he has given me. Yes, I’m well on my way. What a charming family we will be. Admired by everyone, with the finest of everything. The happiest people in Ballycrea. We will shed the people we have been. Leave it to me. Our dignity reclaimed. Our trouble forgotten. Yes, watch will you, and give me all your strength while I smother the O’Leary name in glory.
The last few days have reminded me of how young I really am. I realise that it doesn’t matter that I haven’t made it yet, because I am going to make it now. It doesn’t matter if people think I’m clinging too tightly to my siblings. Let us cling to each other if we need it; what harm does it do to anybody? If it makes us feel better, then it makes us feel better. We all latch onto people now and again. Don’t pretend you never did.
Each morning at seven, I wait for Bill at his gates, and we get to work as the world turns from dark to light. It seems that he is glad of the help. I think he might be glad of a new man in the town. Bill says that I have refreshing ideas, an interesting way of seeing things. Isn’t that a fine compliment? I recite poems from memory for him, I sing songs while we work. Sometimes, if I can get away with it, I pass things off as my own. Sometimes, I will attribute something I’ve written to Yeats, and take his belief as a compliment.
‘’Tis on the stage you should be, Tom. Not working out on the fields.’
I don’t know what to do with this but nod and laugh.
In the evenings, I see Anna and Betty come to the door. Brightly, joyously, every evening Anna comes down the hill to walk me home. How lovely it is to see her lightening up. Often, she sits in with Betty for a half an hour, and they talk. It gives her a chance to be a woman.
Such a fine house, bigger than two people need. They stand in the doorway, looking out at us. Isn’t it all so quiet? So soft?
Anna
‘Have you always lived here?’
I ask Betty, from where we lean against the door frame, watching the lads in the field. The sky, gone the colour of buttercream and rose. The night will be in soon. A tiny birdsong starts, and the chickens are clucking in the coop. A yard cat passes us by, here to walk around in the last colour of the day. Briefly bewildered by the beauty of it all, I take a moment to breathe deeply. I didn’t realise how badly I needed to take a proper breath. A minute of quiet, in a perfect place. A pretty evening and somebody good by my side. I feel like I could fall asleep. I feel safe. A feeling I had forgotten.
The more time Tom spends on Bill Nevan’s farm, the more time I spend in Betty Nevan’s kitchen. This half an hour at the end of the day, drinking warm tea, watching the sky and talking quietly with Betty. Knowing that every day ends with this half an hour is knowing that life will end with peace. What peace it has brought me. I had forgotten how good it feels to have something to look forward to.
It’s a nice life. Imagine. Something has come into my grey world and settled me. This isn’t the sort of happiness that thinking of you could interrupt. How lucky I feel, here in the slow pace of Betty’s kitchen. The music on the radio and the sea asters painted on her plates. Talking to her makes me feel interesting, like I’m two pints deep, all the time.
I don’t know her age. Forty-four, I’d guess. Maybe forty-five. A very beautiful, well-looked-after forty-four or five. I’d forgotten I had even asked her a question when she answers me.
‘Not always. I was once a blow-in, too. I came here when I married Bill. But that was so long ago, it’s hard to believe I ever lived anywhere else.’
How reassuring, to know that a woman like her was once just like me. A total stranger in Ballycrea, making a new start. Look how well she has done, with her farm and her friends and her sanctuary. It makes me think that perhaps being in Ballycrea could be an opportunity, not a consequence. Isn’t it funny, how easily she has reframed things for me. Without even realising.
‘I would have thought you were always here. Just that, the town seems to really like you.’
She takes in what I’ve said. It’s good to be considered, not just answered. She unties her apron.
‘Well, I like the town. What’s left of it anyway.’
If I stay quiet, she might go on talking. If I listen to what she says, I could learn what she knows. Then I could do what she does, and live as she lives.
Even now, just leaning up against the doorframe with her, I feel closer to calm than I have in so long. Perhaps it’s being in the company of a woman. Perhaps it’s getting a break from my real life. Perhaps if I stay here for long enough, she will heal me. As long as the evening is coming down around me, as long as she will have me, I will stay here with her.
Raking her fingers through her hair, she rolls what she loses into a ball and lets it float off. A bird will use that in its nest. How nice is that?
Looking at me sideways, she realises I’m not going to say anything. She clears her throat and keeps going.
‘Well, you know the way. There’s always youngsters immigrating, there’s always shops closing. Things changing, you know? Bill is always saying I’m no good with change.’
Although she says it in a light, jovial way, there’s nothing light about the way she has seen into my head and spoken my thoughts back to me. Everything is always changing, I can’t cope with it, either.
‘Don’t get me wrong, I understand it, ’tis just sad to see so many going. Did you ever think of it? Immigrating?’
