Born & Bred (40 page)

“There’s more to it than just that. You see, a part of my job is to manage the resources of the diocese. That way, when I see a fine young man, such as yourself, who has labored away without thought for himself—well it allows me to reward such devotion. You’re overdue a spell in Rome. I firmly believe that we can find the best of ourselves there but I don’t want you to feel like I am pressuring you. Just think about it and if you ever feel like giving it a whirl—then we can talk.”

“That’s very generous, Your Grace,” Patrick agreed as he absorbed the Bishop’s real message. He was just being given the time to accept it. “Will that be all? I don’t mean to be rude but I have a funeral this afternoon.”

As he left, he turned in the doorway to ask: “What was the other thing you were going to talk to me about?”

“Ah, it was nothing important.”

The Bishop poured himself another little dash of whiskey and leaned back in his chair. He raised his glass to all the old times, to the memory of Bart and Nora and all that they held dear, and to Danny, the prodigal son now deep in the Canadian woods where he might yet make a man out of himself.

*

After all the fuss died down, Jacinta found time to get over to the church. She’d been putting it off but she had to talk with Nora again. They hadn’t spoken since the night of the wedding—when Danny went outside.

Perhaps Nora was still mad at her about that, but she still had to talk with her. She had to tell her what it was like to watch her only child get on a plane and emigrate.

Only it was worse. Danny was a kind of a refugee, fleeing from his homeland—from things his mother hadn’t been able to protect him from. Part of it was Jerry’s fault but she didn’t want to be thinking about that when she knelt down to say her few prayers by the side altar.

She wanted to pray for Danny—that he’d come to no harm in Canada. She knew Martin would look out for him but she wanted to get as much help as she could.

She was into her second rosary, the beads slipping through her fingers only to come back around again. Nora was giving her the wait but she didn’t mind. It was so nice and quiet with only one other woman, off in the corner, deep in her prayers, kissing the cross on her beads every now and then.

I’m here now but I can’t stay
, Nora interrupted.
Bart’s waiting for me outside. He never was a great man for churches but who could blame him for that
?

She asked after every detail of Danny’s leaving, every word that was said and how long they cried. She said she missed that.

“Do you know what Danny said to me, just before he got on the plane,” Jacinta whispered through her fingers. “He was talking about when they had him locked up in the boot. He said that even there, with bullets flying all around, he was thinking of something you used to tell him when he was a little boy. Do you know what that was?

“He said that he remembered you telling him that his guardian angel would always be there for him. He said that after he thought that—he wasn’t afraid anymore.”

She thought she heard Nora sniffle a little. But that was all.

Then she was gone again, leaving Jacinta alone in the near silent church. Only the slipping beads and whispered prayers of the woman in the corner. And the rustle every time she raised her cross to kiss it. Jacinta looked over and nearly left when she saw who it was—Mrs. Flanagan praying another afternoon away. But Jacinta didn’t leave. She thought that Nora would prefer if she stayed—for a while anyway. She had nothing to rush home for.

Mrs. Flanagan never looked over but Jacinta didn’t expect her to. She’d give her some time and then one day, when it felt right, she would go over and kneel down beside her and say a few prayers together, for both their sons.

*

Danny called home on Saturday afternoon—just as he said he would. He called around three so Deirdre was able to drop by—just as they had planned, without her father knowing.

“It’s got to be about minus twenty,” he told her when his mother finally put her on. He was proud of himself—being able to bear it. At home, they’d be clutched around the fire and nobody would go out.

“Ah, ya get used to it.” He hadn’t yet, but Martin assured him he would, after he learned to dress for it.

He sat by the window, looking down on the length of Balliol Street, a narrow gorge between towers. It was snowing again and he watched the cars struggle to get up the hill. “No. Everything goes on as usual. They’re used to it.”

One car got stuck and had to be pushed, its rear tires spinning uselessly.

“I haven’t got any gigs yet. I’m still finding my way around, but Martin has told me about all the best places. I’m just waiting to make a few connections, ya know?”

The car finally made it up the hill, leaving long, scuttery brown trails. But it was still snowing and they’d soon be covered with fresh white snow.

“I miss you. I don’t miss the rest of it,” he lied. He was homesick but he couldn’t tell her that. It would have sounded ungrateful and he knew stuff like that was important to her. He had told her about his epiphany—the night in the cell—and he didn’t want her to think that he was backsliding. He wasn’t. It was just that then, he’d been scared. Now that the crisis was over, and the heat was off, he looked at it differently. He had never asked to be what he became. He was just a product of his times.

“I am happy. It’s just there’s a lot to get used to, ya know?” There was. His slate had been wiped clean and he had been given a fresh new life. Only old habits would be hard to break.

“No. I’m staying away from all that for a while.” It wasn’t totally true. He had shared a few joints with Martin, but it was different. He was different. Everything over here was different. Here it was more like a normal thing to do.

“There’s a few, but none of them are as pretty as you.” The snow fluttered down on the balcony outside, soft and fresh. “Or as nice.”

“No, I mean it. Knowing that you believed in me made all the difference.”

It had. Since the day in the Dandelion, despite all the shite that followed, she had given him another chance. That was all he needed. Everyone else was always going on about God and Love but she was the only one who really showed him any.

“I couldn’t have made it without you.” He almost started to cry. Loneliness, gratitude, forgiveness, they all fluttered through his heart. Only Deirdre had ever been able to make him feel like that. Only Deirdre could really see who he was behind all the masks he wore. Only Deirdre could love him.

“I love you, Deirdre Fallon,” he blurted out when they had wandered into a pregnant pause. “And I want you to think about coming over so we can be together.”

Daniel Bartholomew Boyle had come through Hell and high water. But he had left all of that behind. None of it mattered in Canada, where everything was still new, even the old. He was ready now to begin again. He was ready to leave his footprints on the fresh snow and he would become what he never had allowed himself to become before.

“You might? Well that gives me something to look forward to.”

Sin a bhfuil

Sin a bhfuil
, as the Irish say: that’s it. That’s the beginning of
Life & Times
, the beginning of the story of Daniel Bartholomew Boyle and I hope you liked it. And before you ask —no! It’s not about me, it’s about the times I lived through and some of the things that happened around me.

I had the same question from people who read
Lagan Love
and I wasn’t in that either. I had a small part in an early draft but I ended up leaving myself on the “cutting-room floor.”

I did include myself in one scene in this book —a tiny part —and if you can figure it out, contact me and I’ll send you a signed copy.

But back to Danny, the poor little lad who grew from his grandmother’s knee to the prodigal returned. What’s next for him? How will he fare in Canada? Will Deirdre join him? Will they get to live happily-ever-after?

What of his parents, Jacinta and Jerry, how will they fare?

And Patrick Reilly? Will he go to Rome?

Will Miriam and her American hook up?

I will tell you, but not here. It’s all in the next book,
Wandering in Exile
. It’ll be out soon and we can have another little chat after you’ve read it. In the meantime, let me know what you think at:

https://www.facebook.com/AuthorPeterDamienMurphy

Drop by and we can “chat” some more.

– Peter.

A Preview of LAGAN LOVE

If you know something about passion, and desire, and giving everything to live your dreams then leave your world behind for a while. Come with Janice to Dublin, in the mid nineteen-eighties when a better future beckoned and the past was restless, whispering in the shadows for the Old Ways.

Janice has grown tired of her sheltered existence in Toronto and when Aidan leads her through the veils of the Celtic Twilight, she doesn’t hesitate. In their love, Aidan, Dublin’s rising poet, sees a chance for redemption and Janice sees a chance for recognition.

Sinead tells her that it is all nonsense as she keeps her head down and her eyes fixed on her own prize – a place in Ireland’s prospering future. She used to go out with Aidan, before he met Janice, so there is little she can say. And besides, she has enough to do as her parents are torn apart by the rumours of church scandals.

But after a few nights in Grogan’s, where Dublin’s bohemians gather, or a day in Clonmacnoise among the ruins of Celtic Crosses, it won’t matter as the ghosts of Aidan’s mythologies take form and prey on the friends until everything is at risk.

Lagan Love
is a sensuous story of Love, Lust and Loss that will bring into question the cost we pay for our dreams.

Here’s an excerpt from
Lagan Love
:

***

He had left a note to meet him in Grogan’s. She understood the significance: ‘Grogan’s is where I grew up. It’s the closest thing I’ve had to a real home, at least since my mother died.’

So this is it, I get to meet the family. I must make a good impression. What would complement my Just-had-good-sex-but-I’m-still-horny smile? Perhaps something in red, with black pants – no, a short black skirt.
She wanted to leave an impression on his soul, as well as his body.

For a while, she would become a fixture on his arm, and in time, the world would know her for her own work. After that, Fate would decide if she stayed or went, but first, she had to look the part.

She paraded back and forth in front of the long mirror that leaned against the wall. It offered that nice perspective, sloping away. She could turn and see most of her back, right down to her long slender calves.
Was it really fair to Sinead?
She said it was okay, but her reflection wasn’t listening. She was posing in her black underwear.
And what was it you were saying about clichés? We could try the red set.

It was perfection. Her skin looked like alabaster, her lips like wine and her hair like storm-clouds. She shimmed into her short skirt and, corseted in her red shirt, checked herself one more time.
Dark and dangerous, like a child of the night,
she offered her passing reflection as she left.

Be careful, you don’t know what else wanders in these nights, in this ancient city, in this strange land,
her likeness tried to warn her but she had closed the door and was walking the moonlit street. Her heels clattered quickly past the shaded bench where a shadow flitted and was gone.

By the time she arrived in Grogan’s, he was standing by the bar. Her shirt was tight and her skirt was, perhaps, a bit short, but what the hell. She opened her leather jacket slowly. Her top three buttons were undone. She wanted to push her breasts forward, but she was losing her nerve. Most of the men in the bar had turned. They almost formed a circle around her but kept their distance and opened like a path before her.

She grew a little shy as they eddied back to their smoking and swearing as she passed. She smiled with as much assurance as she could muster and reached forward and kissed his lips as he ordered drinks and steered them to a small table in the corner. As Janice sat, she was careful to let her skirt ride up a little. His eyes followed her hips and she felt warm in his gaze. She reached out across the table; she wanted to be close to him again.

He leaned back and looked at her for a moment with that glazed look men get, but he was calm. “I was thinkin’ about you all day, an’ I was thinkin’ that maybe I’d write a poem about you or somethin’.”

The ‘something’ sounded appealing but, after her lust was sated, love poems would make the whole thing perfect. She would paint him of course; it would be a part of her Dublin period, a blue period when the seeds were sown. He’d be world renowned by then, too. It was all so good that she almost shivered.

“Are you cold?”

“No, of course not,” but she did lean forward and push her breasts together.

“Maybe,” he smiled at her adjustment, “we could collaborate, ya know? I could talk with some people I know, and we could do one of those fancy books with paintin’s and poems together. I think that would be fuckin’ brilliant, don’t you? I mean it wouldn’t be hard now that everybody is talkin’ about my poems already.”