Chapter 15
I made my way over the grassy cliff with my latte in hand, slowing down as I got closer to the hunched figure of Sorcha.
She stared out at the slate-grey, churning waves with a blank expression.
Her black, unruly curls whipped across her face in the strong wind roaring over the cliffs.
I pulled my jacket tighter around me and plopped down beside her.
She turned to look at me, and we paused for half a second before wrapping our arms around each other.
We didn’t speak, but I felt her shoulders heaving as she cried.
The icy wind froze the tears leaking from my eyes.
After a minute, she took a deep breath and pulled back, giving me a watery smile - grey eyes dimmed, missing the normal twinkle that danced there.
“I’m sorry, Róis. Look at me blubbering into your shoulder when you’ve just lost your brother.”
“And you lost your partner, Sorcha. It’s not a competition to see which one of us is in more pain right now.
” I truly meant that, even while a part of me thought about how irrevocably my life had changed with Shea's loss. Sorcha would eventually move on. She could grieve, find someone new, settle down with a husband and kids. Build that dream house on the plot of land her Dad had kept for her like she and Shea had talked about, take yearly trips to Spain with the family; the whole shebang. And while the idea of her with anyone besides my brother made my stomach curdle, I didn’t want her to be alone.
Shea would never want that for her. He loved her more than anything and would want her to be happy.
She nodded slightly and turned her gaze back to the sea, tracking a seagull battling the ferocious wind.
“We haven’t heard anything from you since the hospital.
We were worried,” I said gently. She didn’t owe us anything by entering our bubble of misery at the house, but I knew how she felt about Shea.
Not being with us meant she was feeling this pain all on her own.
And with loneliness creeping up on me every day, I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for her.
“I’ve just needed some time to myself. Sorry I haven’t been around, I’ve been meaning to check in with your Mam, but...” She trailed off, and I just nodded understandingly.
Seeing my mother as a shell of herself was hard to bear, so I understood anyone who had the choice, avoiding the interaction at all costs.
I knew Aunty Lucy had tried to get firm with her a few times to shake her out of it, but aside from last week, there’d been no reaction.
Last week, Mam had lost it to Lucy’s prodding; threw her mug off the wall while screaming like a banshee.
She’d collapsed into Lucy’s arms, heaving dry sobs.
We’d all hoped it was a breakthrough. Until the next day, when she took her spot in the same chair in the kitchen, with an untouched mug of tea in front of her.
“Don’t worry, I get it. I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” I answered softly.
Sorcha started shaking, fresh tears tracking down her face again. I scooted closer and pulled her into another hug, but she pushed me away and turned to face me.
“I haven’t been okay, Róis,” she said, a pained expression on her face. Then, before I could respond, she continued, “There’s something Shea and I hadn’t told anyone.”
Her hand dropped to her stomach as she said it, and the world ground to a halt. The wind stopped roaring, the churning waves froze, even the seagull fluttering against the gusts seemed suspended in mid-air. She was pregnant.
It felt like a shard of ice plunged straight into my chest as hundreds of emotions battled for my attention at once.
The pain of knowing Shea left this world before he got to be a father, the sparks of excitement at the idea of a new baby - a little piece of Shea to hold onto in our lives.
I tracked my eyes from Sorcha's hand on her stomach up to her eyes, glassed over with that pained expression.
“Sorcha, I don’t know what to say. I’m so happy for you, but I’m so sorry too.” Her expression didn’t change as she watched the swirl of emotions crossing my face.
“I’m nine weeks now. We’d been keeping it a secret for weeks, but Shea was bursting to tell you. He couldn’t hold it in any longer, so we’d been planning to announce it at game night that weekend,” she said in an emotionless voice.
My heart clenched as I remembered Shea’s message about a surprise for us, this was it. That I was going to be an aunty.
I curled my arms around my chest, trying to physically hold myself together against the pain wrenching it in two. The ache at what Shea was missing replaced my ache at missing him.
“I’ve been keeping my distance because I’ve been trying to decide what to do,” Sorcha said in the same dead tone, and my head snapped up to her face as I realised what she meant. She didn’t know if she was going to keep it.
I squeezed my eyes shut, blocking out this hell for a few seconds.
Trying to regain composure and shove down the sobs clawing their way up my throat.
It was completely her choice, and given the circumstances, I understood her not wanting to go through with the pregnancy.
But the thought of my last connection with my brother disappearing felt like losing him all over again.
“Why are you telling me?” I choked out, wishing I could scrub those words out of my brain and pretend I never had this knowledge.
“Since he died, I’ve just been waiting for a miscarriage,” she said.
“You’re supposed to be healthy and stress-free when you’re pregnant, to protect the baby.
But I feel like I’m being tortured with hot knives inside my chest every day.
I’ve had my checkup, me and the baby are both doing great, apparently.
So then, I thought about taking it into my own hands.
This was supposed to be about me and Shea starting our family together.
Now it’s just me, with my life disintegrating around me. ”
I watched her speak, noting how lost she was in her own words. She seemed to have forgetten I was there, talking to herself out loud. I was scared to breathe too loudly in case she noticed and stopped, and I needed to know. Had she decided?
She shifted towards me. “But then yesterday, I started to think about what Shea's baby might look like. What if it has his light brown eyes? Or his brown wavy hair? Or his lopsided smile? And it felt like the knives in my chest hurt a little less, just for a minute. This baby is all I have left of him.” She cradled her stomach again, and I held my breath for her to go on.
When she didn’t, I asked, “So, have you made a decision?”
She looked up, a soft smile lighting her face as she met my gaze.
“You’re going to be an aunty, Róis.” I burst into tears and squeezed her so hard she squeaked I was crushing her.
It took a lot of coaxing, but Sorcha eventually agreed to come home with me.
We gathered Dad and Fionn in the kitchen with Mam’s blandly smiling face.
As Sorcha told them she was expecting, Dad burst into tears, burying his face in his hands.
Fionn pulled her out of her chair and swung her in circles till she yelled the baby was dizzy.
But my eyes stayed on Mam the whole time.
She blinked at everyone’s reactions like something had finally woken inside her again.
Then her eyes settled on Sorcha, batting Fionn's hand off her stomach.
“I’m going to be a Nana?” she asked faintly.
Sorcha beamed. “The best nana.”
Mam pushed her chair back so suddenly it crashed to the floor as she launched herself at Sorcha and sobbed into her shoulder. I heard murmurs of “You beautiful girl” and “So brave” while Sorcha patted her back with tears shining in her eyes.
Once the news settled for everyone, and Mam bustled around with tea and biscuits, I looked around the table in disbelief.
I hadn’t thought we’d ever sit here together again, laughing and smiling; and now only three weeks after losing Shea, he’d found a way to bring us back together.
For the best reason. Mam finally looked a bit like herself again, and the relief coursing through me was insurmountable.
When Sorcha left after protests from the rest of us, Dad and Fionn drifted outside to puck around with the Hurleys. I stayed with Mam at the table, watching them through the window, but that blank, waiting stare was gone.
“How are you feeling, Mam?” I asked cautiously. I wanted to check in but was terrified she’d slip back into that corpse-like state. She smiled warmly, and my scalp pricked with relief.
“This is the best gift God could have given us. A little bit of Shea to keep us going,” she said gently. I didn’t think Sorcha would ever realise she saved my Mam that day. This was the first life I’d seen in her eyes since Shea’s death. I hadn’t thought anything could bring her back.
“I’ve missed you, Mam,” I blurted without thinking, then cleared my throat as she looked at me surprised.
“I haven’t gone anywhere, my darling,” she said seriously. I stared for a few seconds, watching her face for any flicker of self-awareness, but nothing came.
I scoffed. “Okay, Mam.” I pushed away from the table, anger coursing through me. Hadn’t gone anywhere? I lost her right along with Shea last month. Now that Sorcha was pregnant, she was just going to pretend everything had been normal these past weeks?
“What I mean,” she said, putting a hand on my arm to stop me, “is that I’ve been here, trying to just breathe underneath it all.” I paused at her words and sat back down, struck by the earnest look in her eyes.
“You haven’t even looked at me, at any of us, these past weeks,” I said, voice breaking with how much it hurt to say.