Jack
AS THOUGH THEY AREN’T IN the middle of a party at all, Betty sits Peggy down on her lap and takes her hairbrush from her handbag.
Ignoring everyone around them, she brushes Peggy’s hair like she is taming the waves of the sea.
This small gesture, filled with so much love.
Gutting. Unbearable. Expensive brush from an expensive bag, in her expensive hands; so much grander than my thin little comb, my calloused fingers.
All of Betty’s care and attention on my Peggy.
It makes me sick. Just her being here exposes everything that I lack.
There is something innately peaceful about Betty.
Something that Peggy needs, and that I cannot give her.
Although I’ve tried to stabilise things, Peggy has never stood on firm ground in our house.
Betty can give her that peace. But could she ever love Peggy like I do?
Normally, brushing Peggy’s hair is a fight.
Normally, an adult would ignore her. And normally, Betty would race around the room, engaging with all of the people that want so terribly to engage with her.
But they only seem to be interested in each other.
They are both happy. Relaxed. As much as I want to call her over, sit her on my lap and assert myself as her parent, I realise that it would be a lot kinder to Peggy to leave her with this woman.
‘Ah, you’re only gorgeous.’
Betty says softly, and although I wince, it’s good to know that she means every ounce of what she is saying.
Era you know, there’s an awful lot to be said for those Nevans.
Even if I’ve never really warmed up to them, I can see why the others think that they are what we need.
If somebody can breathe a bit of life back into Tom, and anchor Anna down to the ground, and be soft with my Peigín, then of course they must be good.
Why, to make sense of the messes that we are, they must be angels on earth.
It appears all Tom’s arse-kissing has paid off.
Look around the room. He has throngs of friends here.
The people really seem to like him; and by extension, they like all of us.
I’m happy for him. He got what he wanted.
It’s about time that something worked out for one of us.
I suppose there’s a lot here that could work out for me, if I got out of my own way.
Did you ever notice that Tom never stands in his own way?
There is something in this room that could work out for me, if I let it.
Teresa. The last thing I expected from Ballycrea was Teresa. It’s complicated to be this fond of anybody, when I am still so fond of you.
A part of me knows that it would be kindest to let her be, so that she can find somebody who is ready for her.
With a fresh head and without a big, dirty past. I wonder would I get away with keeping all her love for myself, at arm’s length?
Could I let her heal the parts of me that I’m willing to share, while holding back all the parts that I want to keep for you?
And how do I find out without hurting her, whether she would be satisfied with only glimmers of me?
She comes towards me. Since kissing her, I have felt adrift.
Unable to steady or situate myself without her shore.
The way that she walks towards me now – new dress, glass in her hand – glaring eyes, it all evokes something carnal in me.
Whenever you moved towards me, I wanted to be a gentleman. Now, I just want to be a man.
‘Nice crowd.’
She says to me, and I realise that neither of us will get what we want if a part of me still wants you.
She puts her glass into my hand, and I let her. Her fingers overlapping mine, the condensation slipping against my palm and her pulse beating against my nails. I think what I need is her compassion, but she presents me with the beat of her pulse instead. What am I to do?
A single man, with a beautiful woman handing him a drink. Smiling. The most beautiful woman in the room. Her hand on mine, in front of everybody. What’s the problem? Why can’t I settle?
‘Yeah, really nice.’
Freckled face. Fox-tone hair. Terracotta. Kerr’s Pink. Rusted gate. I could love her. With enough patience, I really could.
Teresa is like a Sunday afternoon, you know? I look forward to her all the time, and then when she comes I don’t know what to do with her. If anything, the freedom and the loveliness of her are a burden. I suppose it’s the effort making, the getting to know someone. Starting again.
Oh, but Sunday afternoons with you. Listening as you hummed along with the radio.
Leaning up against the fence with you, as you reached over to stroke the sleeping pigs.
I can hear you sucking on a piece of clove rock.
I can hear the pig grunting, and you jumping back, laughing.
Settling into me. I feel the pulse of your throat under my thumb, still. How do I tell these pulses apart?
The last time Teresa was this close to me, I kissed her.
I could take her waist in my hands now and do it again, I don’t know if the locals would care much.
What would Peggy think if she saw us? I could take Teresa somewhere quiet, away from everybody else.
Where I could touch her in the way that I have often wanted to touch her.
Somehow, even with you on my mind, I still want to touch her.
Brimming, glistening eyes, looking right into mine. Just close enough to see into the pool of my thoughts, and what lurks within them. Something in her gaze changes. It falters. And I feel sure that when looking in my eyes, she saw you. I take the drink off her.
‘You’re very good. Did Mary manage to come?’
I say, pulling my hand away from hers, putting her glass to my mouth and swallowing her drink. The cold hardness of it fills me up with regret. I should have taken the chance and kissed her. A glass filling the space where her lips should be.
‘No, she’s wrecked now with the baby due. I’ll be lost without her when it’s born. We used be joined at the hip before she got married. Now she’s always with himself.’
By her face I know that I have hurt her, but she keeps chatting.
As though she isn’t allowed to be hurt by me.
I’m sure that if I smile in just the right way, she will let me away with it.
She lets me away with everything, this girl in love.
I think that she sees the sadness in me and likes it.
She is one of those women who wants a complicated, dark-souled man, I think.
If I could only have an honest conversation with her.
To let her know that I do want her, and that the many reasons I have held myself back are beginning to thin.
To let her know that my life has been a deep and endless ache, to see if that would turn her on or off.
To ask whether she would hold my hand while I get myself over you, so that we could have a proper start together. Maybe I should say something.