Sowing The Seeds Of Love Part 17

'Rose,' said Emily. 'Mammy, you have the wrong end of the stick.'

Bridget looked up at her daughter in confusion. 'What do you mean?'

Aoife watched Emily draw herself up to her full height. 'She's mine.'

Understanding and denial fought for dominance on Mrs Harte's face. 'What are you talking about?'

'The baby. She's mine.'

Aoife was sure the clock hadn't been ticking as loudly in the seconds beforehand. But now it was all she could hear, as if it signalled the imminent detonation of a bomb.

She and Emily watched as Bridget's complexion turned from cream to pink to puce.

'Mammy, are you all right?'

Bridget was holding on to the side of a dresser as if to support herself. Wordlessly, Aoife got up, took her free arm, walked her to a chair and sat her down. Then she searched for a kettle and switched it on.

'Mammy, say something.'

Bridget was gripping the side of the table. The table that had been scarred by a thousand coffee cups. She appeared to be whispering something to herself.

'What did you say?'

'I don't understand.' Bridget turned to her daughter, her face now a somewhat normal colour. 'How could you possibly have a baby?'

'Well, I did it the old-fashioned way. It wasn't a virgin birth, if that's what you mean.' Emily's words were defiant, but Aoife noticed that she kept her eyes lowered.

'No. I mean she's eight months old. Where has she been all this time?'

Emily sighed and sat down heavily in the chair beside her mother. 'She was in a foster-home. I was going to have her adopted but I couldn't go through with it.'

'But your pregnancy...' Bridget was shaking her head slowly.

'I was small. I wore baggy clothes. And then when I was heavily pregnant I just didn't come home. Remember last summer when you were put out that I wasn't here for the weekends?'

Bridget nodded as if in a trance. Then, all of a sudden, she seemed to come to. 'Who's the father?'

'A boy in college. He's not important. He didn't want to know.'

'So you had the baby you had Rose. In hospital?'

'I had her in hospital, yes.'

'Who was with you?'

'No one.'

The words reverberated around the kitchen as their impact resonated with all three women. Bridget's face crumpled. 'Why didn't you tell me?'

'I didn't think you'd understand.'

As both women began to cry, Aoife slipped out of the kitchen and closed the door quietly behind her. She found herself in a long hallway with a porch at the end. There, a boy around eight or nine was in the process of kicking off a pair of mucky shoes and simultaneously shrugging a schoolbag off his back.

'h.e.l.lo,' said Aoife, walking towards him.

'Well.'

She a.s.sumed that 'well' pa.s.sed for 'h.e.l.lo' in these parts. 'I take it you're Emily's brother.'

He nodded briefly. 'Who are you?'

'I'm Aoife, a friend of Emily's.'

He nodded, apparently uninterested, and walked past her towards the kitchen door.

'I wouldn't go in there if I were you.'

'Why not?'

'Because Emily and your mother need some privacy.'

'But I came home for me dinner.'

'Just give them five minutes. Go and watch some cartoons or something.'

The boy eyed her resentfully. 'What are you doing here anyway?'

'Actually, I was looking for a toilet.'

27.

They didn't see Emily for the rest of the summer. She was on maternity leave. At first it was strange without her. But the others grew to fill in the gap. There were reminders of her everywhere, in the purple spikes of lavender French, not English and when a breeze or a childish hand jangled the wind chimes. In the evenings Aoife would sit beside Emily's night-scented stock like a woman intoxicated. Sometimes Seth would be with her and they would talk until late, the children playing around them, well past their bedtime. It was only a matter of time before they asked the questions that remained an unspoken barrier between them.

Aoife went first. She had faced more in life and was less fearful. It was like a confession box, that clump of night-scented stock. 'Do you see much of your wife, Seth?'

'Every time I pick Kathy up or drop her off.'

'Of course. What's that like?'

'All right. It was weird at first but we're used to it now.'

'Is she in another relationship?'

'Yes.'

'That must be strange. Knowing that Kathy has another father figure in her life.'

'Mother figure.'

'Pardon?'

Seth turned so that he was looking at her. She could see his eyes clearly now. Hazel flecked with blue and green.

'She has another mother figure. Megan left me for a woman.'

Several heartbeats were missed. 'Really?'

'Yes, really.'

'That must have been tough.'

He shrugged and looked down at his feet.

'Did you feel I don't know emasculated or something?'

'If you mean did I feel like she'd cut off my b.a.l.l.s then the answer is yes.'

'Ouch.'

'Ouch is right. It didn't help that she was so open about it. She still lives in the same neighbourhood and doesn't try to hide it. I'm not saying she should or anything but it would be easier for me if everyone didn't know. Can you imagine the lads down the pub? It doesn't really go with my macho image.'

'No, I don't suppose it does.'

They were both quiet for a while.

'Have they grown back, then?'

'What?'

'Your b.a.l.l.s.'

He laughed she liked making him laugh. 'I almost have a full set.' He looked at her. 'Your turn.'

'What?'

'You know. You got my sordid details. Now you tell me yours.'

He was smiling but his eyes were serious. Had he been as curious about her as she had been about him? It took her a while to speak.

'My husband died,' she said eventually. 'A little over two years ago.'

'I'm sorry.'

'Did you already know?'

'How would I?'

'I told Emily a while back. I wasn't sure if she'd said anything to anyone.'

'Not to me she didn't. Although I did wonder why Liam didn't seem to have anything to do with his father.'

She nodded.

'How did he die?'

'Car accident.'

'Jesus. That must have been terrible. For you and for Liam.'

They watched Liam and Kathy race his extensive collection of tractors up and down the path, their commentary enthusiastic and bizarre.

'I sent him out.'

'How do you mean?'

She breathed deeply. 'We had a little girl too. Katie. She was one. She couldn't get to sleep that night so I suggested he bring her out for a drive.'

Aoife felt Seth's hand enclosing hers, his skin rough.

For a long time, neither of them said anything. Then: 'What was she like? Katie.'

Aoife smiled, her eyes filling with tears. 'Oh, you know. She was a one-year-old girl. She was gorgeous. Always smiling. Ma.s.sive blue eyes, reddish-gold hair her daddy was a redhead. Chubby little arms and legs. You just wanted to eat her. She'd just learned to walk. She was delighted with herself, toddling around, pulling the house apart. She was just brilliant.'

'I'm so, so sorry, Aoife.'

She nodded in acknowledgement and they sat there for ages, watching the children, laughing intermittently at their antics, Aoife's hand in Seth's.

'Almost the worst thing has been the guilt,' said Aoife at last, staring straight ahead.

'It wasn't your fault when I think of the amount of times I drove Kathy around when she was a baby, trying to get her to sleep.'

'It's not just that.'

'What is it, then?'

Aoife didn't know why she was telling him this. She was just struck by the urge to be absolutely honest. 'I was having a a kind of an affair when they died.'

'Oh.'

'It was stupid. I thought it was serious but it wasn't. Michael had to die to make me realize how little it meant.' She looked at Seth to gauge his reaction, but he was consulting his shoes. She thought she sensed a withdrawal of sympathy, but perhaps that was her guilty conscience. 'The one good thing was that he never found out about it.'

'That you know of.'