If You Could See Me Now (9 page)

She glanced quickly at Luke. He sat buckled up in the back, arm out the window, humming the same song he had been singing all weekend. He looked happy. She hoped he wouldn’t keep his playacting up for much longer, at least while he was at his granddad’s. She could see her father at the gate waiting. A familiar sight. A familiar action. Waiting was his forte.

He wore the same brown cords Elizabeth could have sworn he had been wearing since she was a child. They were tucked into muddy green Wellington boots that he walked in all around the house. His gray cotton jumper was stitched with a faded green-and-blue diamond pattern; there was a hole in the center, and underneath the green of his polo shirt peeked through. A tweed cap sat
firmly on his head, a blackthorn cane in his right hand kept him steady, and silver-gray stubble decorated his face and chin. His eyebrows were gray and wild and when he frowned they seemed to cover his gray eyes completely. His nose commanded his face with large nostrils
filled with gray hairs. Deep wrinkles cracked his face, his hands were as big as shovels, shoulders as wide as the Gap of Dunloe. He dwarfed the bungalow that stood behind him.

Luke stopped humming as soon as he saw his grandfather and brought his arm back into the car. Elizabeth pulled the car up and as soon as the engine was off she jumped out of the car. She had a plan. As soon as Luke climbed out of the car she shut the car door and locked it quickly before he had a chance to hold the seat forward and make way for Ivan. Luke’s face crumpled again as he looked from Elizabeth back to the car.

The gate outside the bungalow creaked.

Elizabeth’s stomach churned.

“Morning,” a deep voice boomed. It wasn’t a greeting. It was a statement.

Luke’s lower lip trembled and he pressed his face and hands up against the glass of the backseat of the car. Elizabeth hoped he wouldn’t throw a tantrum now.

“Aren’t you going to say good morning to your granddad, Luke?” Elizabeth asked sternly, fully aware that she herself had yet to acknowledge him.

“Hi, Granddad.” Luke’s voice wobbled. His face remained pressed against the glass.

Elizabeth contemplated opening the car door for him, just to avoid a scene, but thought better of it. He needed to get over this phase.

“Where’s th’other one?” Brendan’s voice boomed.

“The other what?” She took Luke’s hand and tried to turn him away from the car. His blue eyes looked pleadingly into hers. Her heart sank. He knew better than to cause a scene.

“The young lad who knew about them foreign veg.”

“Ivan,” Luke said sadly, his blue eyes welling up.

Elizabeth jumped in. “Ivan couldn’t come today, isn’t that right, Luke? Maybe another day,” she said quickly and before it could be discussed any further. “Right, I better go to work or I’ll be late. Luke, have a good day with your granddad, OK?”

Luke looked at her uncertainly and nodded.

Elizabeth hated herself, but she knew she was right in controlling this ludicrous behavior.

“Off you go so.” Brendan swung his blackthorn cane at her as if to dismiss her and he turned his back to face the bungalow. The last thing she heard was the gate creaking before she slammed her car door shut. She had to reverse twice down the road in order to let two tractors pass. From her mirror, she could see Luke and her father in the front garden, her father towering over him. She couldn’t get away from the house fast enough; it was as though the
flow of traffic
kept pulling her back to it, like the tide.

Elizabeth remembered the moment when she was eighteen when she thrived on the freedom of such a view. For the
first
time in her life, she was leaving the bungalow with her bags packed and with the intention of not coming back until Christmas. She was going to Cork University, after winning the battle with her father, but in turn losing all respect he ever had for her. Instead of sharing in her excitement, he had refused to see her off on her big day. The only
figure standing outside the bungalow Elizabeth could see that bright August morning as they drove away was that of six-year-old Saoirse, her red hair in messy pigtails, her smile toothless in places yet broad and wide, with her arm waving frantically good-bye, full of pride for her big sister.

Instead of the relief and excitement she had always dreamed of feeling when the taxi
finally pulled away from her home, breaking the umbilical cord that held her there, she felt dread and worry. Not for what lay ahead, but for what she was leaving behind. Elizabeth couldn’t mother Saoirse forever, she was a young woman who needed to be set free, who needed to
find her own place in the world. Her father needed to step into his rightful place of fatherhood now, a title he had discarded many years ago and refused to recognize. She only hoped now that as the two of them were alone, he would realize his duties and show as much love as he could for what he had left.

But what if he didn’t? She continued watching her sister out the back window, feeling as though she were never going to see her again, waving as fast and as furiously as she could as tears
filled her eyes for the little life and bundle of energy she was leaving behind. The red hair jumping up and down was visible from a mile away and so they both kept on waving. What would her little sister do now that the fun of waving had worn off and the realization set in that she was alone with the man who never spoke, never helped, and never loved? Elizabeth almost told the driver to stop the car right there and then, but quickly told herself to cop on. She needed to live.

You do the same as me someday, little Saoirse, her eyes kept telling the small
figure as they drove away. Promise me you’ll do the same.
Fly
away from there.

With eyes full with tears, Elizabeth watched as the bungalow got smaller and smaller in her mirror until
finally it disappeared when she reached the

end of the mile-long road. At once her shoulders relaxed and she realized she had been holding her breath the entire time.

“Right, Ivan,” she said, looking in the mirror at the empty backseat, “I guess you’re coming to work with me so.” She sighed. Then she did a funny thing.

She giggled childishly.

Chapter Seven

The town was stirring as
Elizabeth
drove over the gray-stoned bridge that served as the entrance to the village. Two huge coaches full of tourists were currently trying to inch past each other on the narrow street. Inside, Elizabeth could see faces pressed up against the windows, oohing and aahing, smiling and pointing, cameras being held up to the glass to snap the storybook village on
film. The coach driver facing Elizabeth licked his lips in concentration and she could see the sweat glistening on his brow as he slowly maneuvered the oversized vehicle along the narrow road originally designed for horses and carts. The sides of the coaches were so close they were almost touching. Beside him, the tour guide with microphone in hand did his best to entertain his one-hundred-strong audience so early in the morning.

Elizabeth lifted the hand brake and sighed loudly. This wasn’t a rare occurrence in the town and she knew it could take a while. She doubted the coaches would stop. They rarely did unless it was for a toilet break. Traffic
always seemed to be moving through Baile na gCroíthe, but never stopping. She didn’t blame them; it was a great place to help you get to where you were going but not one for sticking around in. Traffic
would slow down and take a good look all right, but then they would put the foot down and accelerate off out the other end.

It’s not that Baile na gCroíthe wasn’t beautiful; it was. Its proudest moment was winning the Tidy Town competition for the third year running

57

and as you entered the village, over the bridge, a display of bright blooming
flowers spelled out your welcome. The
flower display continued through the town. Window boxes adorned the shop fronts, hanging baskets hung from patent black lampposts, trees grew tall in the main street. Each building was painted a different refreshing color and the main street, the only street, was a rainbow of mint greens, salmon pinks, lilacs, lemons, and blues. The pavements were litter free and gleaming and as soon as you averted your gaze above the gray slate roofs you found yourself surrounded by majestic green mountains. It was as though Baile na gCroíthe was cocooned, safely nestled in the bosom of Mother Nature.

Cozy or suffocating.

Elizabeth’s office was located beside a green post office and a yellow supermarket. Her building was a pale blue and sat above Mrs. Bracken’s curtain, fabric, and upholstery shop. The shop had previously been a hardware shop run by Mr. Bracken, but when he had died ten years ago, Gwen had decided to turn it into her own store. Gwen seemed to make decisions purely based on what her deceased husband would think. She opened the shop of her own, “Because it’s what Mr. Bracken would have wanted”; however, Gwen refused to go out at the weekends or involve herself in any social outings as, “It’s not what Mr. Bracken would have wanted.” As far as Elizabeth could see, what made Mr. Bracken happy or unhappy seemed to tie in nicely with Gwen’s philosophy on life.

The coaches slowly moved passed each other inch by inch and Elizabeth sighed loudly. Baile na gCroíthe at rush hour; the result of two oversized buses trying to share the narrow road. Finally, they were successful in their passing and Elizabeth looked on, unamused, as the tour guide jumped from his seat in excitement, microphone in hand, succeeding in turning what was essentially a boring halt into an eventful bus journey in Ireland’s country roads. Cue clapping and cheering on board the bus. A nation in celebration. The occupants of both buses waved good-bye to each other after sharing the morning’s excitement.

Elizabeth drove on, looked in her rearview mirror to see the celebrating coach excitement die down as the bus that had faced her confronted yet another on the small bridge that led out of the town. Arms slowly dropped as they settled down for another lengthy struggle to get out of the town.

The town had a tendency to trap people this way. It was almost as if it did it purposely. It welcomed you into its heart with open arms and showed you all it had to offer with its gleaming multicolored
florally decorated shop fronts. It was like being a child in a sweet shop, shown the shelves and shelves of luminous sugar-coated mouth-watering delights. And then while you stood there looking around with wide eyes and a racing pulse, the lids were put back on the jars and sealed tightly. Once the beauty of Baile na gCroíthe was realized, so was the fact that it had nothing else to offer.

Entrance into the village was smooth compared to the exit. The bridge curved in an odd way that made the leaving so difficult. Getting in was easy. It disturbed Elizabeth. It was just like the road leading from Elizabeth’s childhood home; she found it impossible to leave either place in a hurry. But something about the town kept dragging her back and she had spent years trying to
fight it. She had successfully moved to New York at one time. She had followed her boyfriend, and the opportunity to design a nightclub, over. She had loved it there. Loved that no one knew her name, her face, or her family history. She could buy a coffee, a thousand different types of coffee, and not receive a look of sympathy for whatever recent family drama had occurred. Nobody knew that her mother had left her when she was a child, that her sister was wildly out of control, and that her father barely spoke to her. She had loved being in love there. In New York, she could be whomever she wanted to be. In Baile na gCroíthe, she couldn’t hide from who she was.

She realized she had been humming to herself this entire time, that silly song that Luke was trying to convince her that “Ivan” had made up. Luke called it the humming song and it was annoyingly catchy, chirpy, and repetitive. She stopped herself singing and spun her car into the empty space along the road. She pushed back the driver’s seat and reached in to grab her briefcase from the backseat of the car.
First things
first, coffee. Baile na gCroíthe had yet to be educated in the wonders of Starbucks. In fact, it was only last month “Joe’s” had
finally allowed Elizabeth to take away her coffee, but the owner was growing increasingly tired of having to ask for his mugs back.

Sometimes Elizabeth thought that the entire town needed an injection of caffeine; some winter days in particular the village seemed to be sleepwalking, it needed a good shake. But summer days like today were busy, with people passing through. She entered the purple painted “Joe’s,” which was empty all the same. The concept of eating breakfast outside their own homes had yet to be grasped by the townspeople.