Mud Girl (24 page)

“Horace is a true friend,” Abi says. “No matter what.” Ernestine nods. “Still. One doesn't want to ask too much of a friend.” When she says that, it's as if a wall of playing
blocks goes up around her. The kid in kindergarten, by herself, making herself a palace. Abi wants to knock down the blocks – send them flying!

W
hen they are not far from the elm, they see Horace, and his face lights as he moves toward them. He gathers both of them in his arms.

“Abi knows your heart, Mary. She knew you were here. Are you all right then?”

“I'm all right, Horace,” she says.

He looks at her keenly, but doesn't ask anything more. “Look – I've set out the blanket. Shall we watch the fire-works?”

They sit, Abi in the middle. It all takes so long, all this feeling our way through the dark, she thinks, and she is doubly glad for the pink and green, the gold-bursting stars, and weeping-willow-silver to the ground. Then there are the wiggling-white-and-spermy, screechy bits of fire, reminding her of a family planning video at school. She doesn't explain her giggle to Horace or Ernestine. But when Ernestine reaches for her hand, Abi gives it a little squeeze.

Eating His Soul

A
bi gets home from work on Wednesday, and there's Colm waiting for her, sitting out on the car seat. “Aye, there you are,” he says. “I've got a lemonade here for you, Aba, and I'd like to chat with you.” He hands her a large plastic bottle with a lid, which he pulls off.

Homemade lemonade, with a vague taste of tea, and globules of pulp that burst cold and tangy on her tongue. She sits on the other end of the bench. She's quite positive she's never tasted anything as delicious as Colm's lemonade. Would be good at the end of every workday.

“You're working hard?” he says, and she nods.

“Cleaning houses. With my friend Amanda.”

He nods. “Took me two hours to get that out of your Da.
I couldn't believe he didn't know where you were. I kept asking him and asking him, and finally out it comes. He didn't know Amanda's name, though.”

“This is very good lemonade – the best I've tasted.”

“That's good, that's good, but Aba,” he says, “I'm worried about him. Worried sick. I think it's time…we do something.” He's looking at her anxiously.

“Do something?”

“Aye.”

“Like what?”

“He needs help.”

I knew that
.

The ice in the lemonade hasn't melted yet, and she swirls it, listens to the cubes knocking.

“How old does a person need to be to live on their own?” she asks, still looking at the lemonade.

She looks up in time to see understanding come into the old man's eyes.

“There'll be a place for you, Aba, no worries there.”

She's not convinced, and he knows it.

“You're almost living on your own here,” he points out.

“But it's my home. Dad's here. Mum might come back.”

“She'd be able to find you, no matter.”

He probably has more to say, but she cuts him off. “Mum lived in one of those places once. A foster home. For
almost a year before her folks could have her back. You put me in one of those, and she won't come looking for me. She won't go near it. That place probably taught her how to run away…” Now Abi cuts herself off. She's said more than she's ever wanted to. Her mother only ever told her about that time once, and Abi's pretty sure Mum never meant to tell her anything about it at all. She remembers how Mum couldn't even finish telling the story, how her voice was all cracked and her words broken. How she'd said that was why Abi must know how to take care of herself; she, Mum, had not been able to take care of herself. She'd never said more.

Colm seems stunned.

“Sorry, Aba. I was just thinking. Thinking about him being somewhere safe, where he could get better.”

Abi nods. “I know.” She's shaking. “You're his friend. I know.”

“And you need to be safe too,” he says.

Abi doesn't respond to that. In a low voice, she asks, “What do you think is wrong with him?”

“I think sadness is eating his soul.”

“I think sadness already has,” she says.
Guilt finished it off
. She downs the last of the lemonade. “I'm going to be seventeen in a few months. I think somebody once told me that if you're seventeen, and you have a job, you can leave home.”

Colm sits nodding slowly, his lips pursed. “Maybe I can come around more often.”

“What about a boat? Do you have a boat? Maybe he'd go out in a boat. He used to have one.”

“Is that right?” Colm looks thoughtful. “I don't, but maybe I can do something about that.” He stands, and reaches into his pocket for a pencil. “I'll give you my number if you need to call me, all right? And think about what I said about there being a safe place for you. Just because it was bad for your mum doesn't mean it has to be for you too. Remember, young Stu, who Fiona was talking about? He lives with my neighbour. You could talk to her.” But Abi's turned away now. He writes on the card in his hand. “I'll leave this on the kitchen counter then,” he says. “And now I'll go say good night to him.”

“Where's Fiona?” It suddenly occurs to Abi that the girl's not come with her grandfather.

“Oh!” Colm gives an angry snort. “She owed me for one mischief or another. But we're done with that now. I told her to go back to shopping with her mother. Leave me to it!” The screen door slams behind him.

W
hen Abi goes in later, the
TV
is off and Dad is out back, holding onto the railings, looking out to the water.
She goes and stands beside him, and he does turn to look at her.

“Aba,” he says, as if he's all there.

“Colm came to see you,” she says. It scares her, knowing he might shut down, turn away, at any moment, at any word.

Her father nods.

“Did you play chess?”

It's an easy enough question. Still, it takes her father a full minute to drag up an answer from wherever it is he stores his few words. After a time, he shakes his head.

Abi feels a stirring of that anger she felt toward him on Sunday. “Dad, come in,” is all she says, though, and she takes his elbow and tries to steer him toward the house. To her surprise, he resists her, and grasps the railing.
Okay
.

She doesn't know how long he's out there; he is still there when she goes to bed, early so she's rested for work the next day. She lies awake longer than she'd like to, and still she doesn't hear him come in.

What was it like, all those years ago? Twenty years? No. Eighteen, it would have been. Two women and one man. Her mum and dad and Ernestine. Two Marys and one William. Bill. Will. Ernestine called him “William.” The guys at work called him Billy. Mum always called him Will. Maybe he was a different person with each of those names. What does he think of being “Dad”? Does he think about it? What did he
think about when he was filling out that form for a Big Sister? What did Ernestine think when she…
hey, how did that go?
Abi falls asleep with her mind in the maze of her own questions.

Saturday Tea

“S
o how was it, Ernestine? How was it you found me?”

It's Saturday morning, and Abi and Ernestine and Horace are on the back porch sipping tea and eating chocolate-dipped cookies that Ernestine made the day before.

“I'd applied to be a Big Sister, and I'd told them I wanted an older girl – well, not as old as you, they don't usually have girls as old as you. I was thinking a preteen, or early teen. I wasn't at all sure I could relate to a little girl. They gave me a sheaf of papers to look through. Then the coordinator pulled out your application and said, “This one's really too old.” But as she pulled it away, I caught sight of your father's name and
asked her if I could have a closer look.” Ernestine stops to finish her cookie before going on. “I saw your name, your age, where you live – I knew that your father still lived at his uncle's old place on the river.”

“When did my dad apply?” Abi asks.

Ernestine looks at her oddly. “He didn't. The signing name on the form was your mother's. The date was last August.”

What'd she do? Have a list? “Stock up on underwear and tampons. Find a Big Sister. Leave a cookbook…”
Abi can easily imagine her with such a list.

There are all the other questions, too.

“So…were you just curious?”
Or was it more? And don't make it up…

Ernestine thinks for a minute, and before she answers, she looks over to where Horace is sitting on the steps, half-turned away from them. He's got a red kerchief wrapped round his neck, and Abi can see the sweat absorbed in it. She thinks how, with a striped cap, he'd look just like a conductor. And there's something else; some sense of being at a train station, coming back to a train station, and back again, always going somewhere, never getting anywhere. That's all it is – just a sense. Funny – she's never felt that before about Horace. He's always seemed so easygoing. No,
carefree
, that's the word. Free of cares. She's never noticed a sorrow in him before. She finds herself backing up
from where she's been kneeling, at the low table of tea mugs, backing out of the sun and into the shade, closer to where Ernestine is, with her chair tucked into the far corner of the porch. Ernestine seems to be still thinking about Abi's question. Abi looks from her, back to Horace, who is sitting very still, and again to Ernestine, suddenly conscious that she is between them, just as she'd been when they watched the fireworks. The thought crosses her mind that that is how someone wants it. But who is that someone? Horace? No. Ernestine? Why?

“So?” Abi prods again.

“Well,” begins Ernestine, suddenly seeming very much like that first day that Abi met her. “Well…”

Horace has raised his head ever so slightly. He's listening.

Ernestine clears her throat. “It's like this – I had this idea that if I could see William again, I could find it in myself to…forgive him. I've needed to for a long time.”

She looks directly at Abi. “You once said I forgive too easily. You were so wrong; I don't seem to be able to forgive at all. And I never forget. I keep thinking that perhaps I can learn how to do just one of those things before I die.”

Horace stands. “The train must be stuck,” he says to no one in particular, and goes round the side of the house.

Ernestine stares after him. “Dash the man!” she mutters. “If he had any brains at all, he'd be running from me!” Her voice is quavery.

Abi watches Horace as he disappears from view. She'd like to think he wouldn't run away – she really wants to know that – but then what was it he just did?

“Okay,” she says aloud to Ernestine. “Maybe Horace only walks away and then he comes back!”

“They always run away – why should he be different?”

“Maybe just because he is. Why should he be the same?”

Ernestine looks at Abi a long time. “Maybe,” she begins, “because I'm the same. I don't seem to be able to change.”

“Is that why you ran away?”

She nods slowly. “I think. Because it scared me. I thought I'd made a horrible mistake. I'd thought that if I did the unthinkable – became friends with you, the symbol of all I'd lost – that something in me would heal. At first, it seemed easy. It seemed that the person I was hurt by and angry at all those years was gone. Then, that day I walked in, and he was there – right there – and I looked into his eyes, and I just wanted to run. I realized I hadn't forgiven anything. The pain was as raw as on my wedding day. I felt afraid.

“Now I'm not so sure it was a mistake – judging by how you and Horace believe in me. But I can't say I share your belief.”