Chapter 26
During my driving lesson on Friday night I was remembering what Jennifer had said earlier in the day about friends knowing us better than our family; it felt even more true with Dad in the passenger seat as I drove round and round St Matthew’s car park.
‘I’m getting dizzy,’ he said. ‘Where’s your focus? Must have been a busy week.’
‘Busy week, yeah,’ was all I said.
Maybe some other dads would ask all about it, maybe some other sons would tell, but we said little else for the whole lesson apart from him giving me instructions and me answering the odd theory question when he sprang it on me.
We acted like it was normal, which, for us, it was.
It had been the same with Mum after Granny died when she hardly spoke to me at all, but she was getting back to herself again, asking how I was in her own awkward way and showing an interest in Ronan and me.
She was even getting up early and going for walks on her days off and had started reading her novels again.
Soon things would be back to the way they had been; living in a house with the two people who knew me the longest and knew me the least.
The other thing Jennifer made me realise was that I needed to talk to Mr and Mrs McCoy about Buddy Time; Ronan needed me as his friend, not his teacher. I’d have to try to explain it without them feeling like I was telling them that I knew their son better than them – even if I felt like I did.
Jennifer’s words were still with me on Saturday morning in Feeney’s yard as I was cleaning all the vehicles, not just her words but the way she said them, how she looked when she spoke, the way she moved when she was confident in herself and how she shifted when Leanne gave us the flyers for the formal.
‘How’s the driving comin’ along, young Brendan?’ said Mr Feeney, jolting me out of another daydream I hadn’t realised I was in. I was standing in a puddle with the hose pointing down to the ground. I twisted the nozzle off and turned to Mr Feeney.
‘Ah yeah, not too bad, Mr Feeney. I’m not a natural, but my dad’s determined for me to sit my test on my birthday in July so there’s time yet.’
‘Ah you’ve buckets’a’time and then maybe we’ll get you out drivin’ a few of these motors, get you out on a funeral or two?’
‘You might be overestimating my driving skills there, Mr Feeney.’
‘Not a-tall, not a-tall; driving skills come second to manner in this line of work, as long as you don’t go ploughing down any of the mourners during a funeral and get accused of makin’ more business for me a’course,’ he chuckled.
‘No but she’s not a complicated beast is the aowl hearse, you’ll not be breaking any speed limits for a start.
The thing with this line of work is, if you’re only a half-decent driver but your manner is right, then you’re set.
Take it from me, I’ve had many an experienced driver with completely the wrong manner and they don’t last because I don’t let them.
But you, Brendan, have the right manner for the business, you do indeed. ’
I felt embarrassed by the compliment. I wasn’t used to them.
‘Have you thought much about the future, Brendan? A future maybe in this line of work? Outside of cleanin’ the vehicles I mean?’
‘That’s what everyone’s asking me about, Mr Feeney. To be honest, I haven’t a clue about the future. I’m maybe choosing English A level and maybe a computer course but I’m not really sure what they’re useful for.’
‘Aye well those subjects are useful for anythin’ I suppose.’
‘Yeah, that’s what my careers adviser said: good subjects for people like me who don’t know what they want to do with their life.’ It wasn’t a direct quote but it’s what I took from the ‘advice’.
‘Well all I’m sayin’ is there’d be a future for you here if you did feel the calling for it. And it definitely is something you need the calling for, an instinct. So if you did feel something along those lines then rest assured I’d be the one to get you trained up.’
‘Do you not need qualifications or what, Mr Feeney?’
‘Not a-tall, not a-tall, that’s the English way of doin’ it, and the less said about them the better.
You can’t go to university to learn the way we do it here in Nor’n Ireland; it’s a personal thing here, part of the family, in the blood or, like you, in your heart.
In your manner.’ Mr Feeney took a step closer to me.
‘Sure I remember at your granny’s funeral around this time last year, it took some amount of strength for you to do all the preparation for the hearse knowing she would be in it the next day and knowing I’d be the one looking after her.
Even in your grief you had a level of decorum and maturity in how you conducted yourself during the whole funeral.
It impressed me, and I’m sorry if I haven’t told you that before now, but I was just thinkin’ about you over the Christmas period there and thinkin’ of the anniversary of your granny and I thought I’d say it to you. ’
I nodded, feeling my lower lip go behind my front teeth.
‘Right,’ he said, backing off towards the house, ‘I’ll let you get on with it, you’re in early enough the-mara mornin’, aren’t ya?’
‘Yes, to be red up by lunchtime if that’s alright?’
‘’Course it is, give me a shout when you’re done this afternoon and if I’m away I’ll see you the-mara.’
‘See you the-mara.’
I turned back to pick up where I’d left off but stopped and called Mr Feeney back again.
‘Yes, Brendan?’
‘Mr Feeney. If there’s a girl at school that maybe you’re feeling something more for than, say, friendship, like, how do you let her know?’
‘Ah. OK. Now you’re talkin’ to the wrong fella on those matters, son, I may be a married man but herself would be the first to tell you I’m no romantic.’
‘Ah right, no bother, sure I’ll work it out.’ I felt stupid for asking.
‘Aye well, as I say, I’m not one to be a prophet on those things but if I know one thing it’s that life’s too short for regrets, I can tell you that.
So, if you weigh it all up and you picture yourself at the end of your life, on your deathbed, and you ask yourself the question, would I regret it?
Really picture yourself lyin’ there takin’ your final breaths – would I regret it?
If you do that with anythin’ in life it’ll put it in perspective and give you the answer you need. Life,’ he said, ‘too short.’
He seemed to stare down into the suddy puddle on the ground and then looked quickly back up to me again.
‘But sure your da is more the man for this kinda talk rather than me, is he not?’
I smiled, thinking of driving round St Matthew’s car park the night before, knowing I could never talk to Dad about these kinds of things.
‘Aye sure, I’ll maybe ask him too. But that helps, Mr Feeney, thanks.’
‘Not a bother.’
As he strolled off, I turned back to the hearse, seeing my whole body reflected in the side of it, and then started hosing it down again.
I was a few feet away so the expression on my face was hard to read in the reflection on the black door; it was a dark mask that rippled and morphed as the water ran down.
When the trickles ran dry and my reflection settled steady, I looked closer.
I could feel myself smiling but in the reflection I couldn’t see it.