After the death of her son, Julie sees her life falling apart, and her marriage crumbling. She decides to go away on a retreat to reflect, and come to terms with her grief.
People were staring, she realised. From the next compartment a little boy, tugging at his mother’s sleeve with one hand and pointing at Julie with the other, had brought attention to her. The boy giggled; the mother smiled, though there was no trace of malice in the gently curved mouth. Julie gave the mother a watery smile in return then fumbled in her pocket for a tissue to wipe her wet face.
The man in the seat opposite, as in all the best movies, handed her a large, white handkerchief. Keep it, he told her. I have plenty more.
She felt the colour rise to her cheeks. How could she have made such a spectacle of herself? She wiped her face with the hanky, then again like in all the best movies, she blew her nose loudly. Thank you, she said to the man opposite. Thank you.
The train rattled along. She leaned her elbow on the window ledge, rested her head on her hand. Her breath was still coming in uneven gasps, and she could feel her eyes burning, and she just knew her nose was like a bright red tomato.
She wasn’t even sure why she cried any more. It had become as natural to her as breathing, or eating. Throughout the day, at unexpected moments, when she was sitting still, the tears would come. Silently at first they trickled down her face, then, as they gathered momentum, her breathing would become uneven, and a sob would escape her. Before long her shoulders would heave and panic would set in. Would it ever end, this grief?
And now the ultimate shame – she had cried in public. On a train to be exact. With a little boy pointing and giggling while his mother looked on sympathetically. And a man, an unknown stranger had given her his crisp, cotton handkerchief.
The train rattled further its rhythm soothing like the rocking of a baby’s cradle. Her breathing steadied; the urge to gulp dissipated. She was able to drag herself back into reality, and thoughts of what lay ahead. She leaned her elbow on the small, silver ashtray next to the window, rested her chin in her hand, the side of her head pressed against the glass. The countryside, with a bright, September sun shining down upon it a green so sharp it hurt the eyes, darted past.
The little boy who had watched her so intently, and pointed when her sobbing had become too extreme, soon lost interest and began to groan in boredom at his mother, and to tug at her sleeve and whinge about not having anything to do. Julie smiled as she heard the mother say in a pinched, tight voice: we’re nearly there, darling. Just be patient. Oh, the lie. They had at least another hour to go. Julie expected that the mother secretly longed to give the little sod a clip or at least yell at him at the top of her lungs. That’s what mothers did when no one was around to catch them. Only in public did they talk in that awful, frustrated voice and pretend they were infinitely gentle. Julie could sigh in relief that she had left her two at home. She was free to close her eyes and speed up the journey by taking a nap. The luxury of it.
When she stepped off the train in Galway, she saw the woman with the name board waiting for her. This then was Madeline. This long, thin woman dressed in a grey and beige fairisle sweater, jeans that crept up her legs, past her ankles to reveal thick grey socks and brown mountain boots laced with bright red laces. Julie looked upwards to her face which was haloed by a shock of fair, unkempt curls, smiled and waved as she approached her.
Madeline smiled in return, her eyes lighting up as she did so. You must be Julie, she said and held out her hand.
Julie shook it and nodded. The hand felt small, soft and delicate in her own. The fingers were short, the palm well padded. There was a warmth radiating from that hand into her own, streaming through her skin. She squeezed more firmly, comfortable with this prolonged contact with a virtual stranger. She thought about how cold her own hands were of late, how it was almost impossible to thaw them out. And now this, someone with her own, internal central heating. It was amazing. And Madeline let Julie hold her hand, as though she was accustomed to the effect the feel of her hands had on people, and during the course of the weekend Julie would discover just how useful and talented Madeline’s hands really were.
You’re the last to arrive, Madeline said, finally removing her hand from the larger, cruder hand that belonged to Julie.
Julie looked at her hand, remembered how the father forgave her her clumsy size because of her hands and their long, agile fingers. When her fingers glided along the piano keys, she could almost pretend that her entire body was worthy. When she had chosen not to play any more, carrying that body had been such a challenge, such a burden. But she was steadfast in her resolve not to forget about her body, just because her hands were talented.
Madeline had put an arm about her shoulder, and the soft, small, delicate hand, emanated its warmth into Julie’s body. It was remarkable that such a small extremity could have so much influence. Madeline led her out to the car. Have you ever been in the heart of Connemara before? She asked.
Julie shook her head. Only to Clifden, but then everybody has been to Clifden.
You’ll love our farm. Utterly isolated, but with the advantage of electricity, and good sanitation. We grow our own vegetables, of course, and never eat meat. Bread we bake, though we do buy the flour from the health food store in town.
And Julie did love it. She loved the smell of the peat and the dew in the early morning, fresh and vitalising. She loved the sight of the mauve mist over the black velvet mountains. She loved the feel of the damp, cold grass beneath her naked feet. And when she listened carefully she could hear the bleating sheep on a distant valley and the trickle of the mountain stream. Peace at last.
She helped in the vegetable garden, plucking the weeds from between the onion shoots. She hoed the thick, compacted soil loose so new crops could be planted. She harvested the beans and carrots, the food they would eat in the evenings.
She thought of her own garden, back home. Hers and only hers. The only gardening Dick did was mowing the lawn and then only on the sunniest of days. And because the mowing was his task he had purchased a motor mower for himself. He had wanted to buy one that he could sit on, and steer, so that all he had to do was take care that he drove in a straight line, and gulp beer from a can.
He didn’t. He feared he might look a fool for the neighbours who still pushed their hand mowers and raked the grass into neat piles afterwards. Instead he bought a Flymo, with a grass collector, and generally took no longer than fifteen minutes to trim their suburban patch of grass. When he was finished he lounged under the parasol in his cushioned recliner and read the paper while drops of perspiration dribbled down his neck and under his white cotton shirt.
And while Dick recovered from his exertion, Julie weeded and thinned and fertilised her vegetable patch at the back of the garden where the sun shone its finest and the hedgerows gave protection from the west wind. She planned to replace the hedgerows next season with some gooseberry bushes that would serve the same purpose but be much more practical. She fancied cultivating a strawberry patch too, and eventually a small vine to creep along the fence that separated her garden from the one next door, on the sunny side of course.
A shadow fell over her. Julie looked up to see Madeline blocking out the sun. She smiled. You seem to know what you’re doing, Madeline remarked. I learned it from my mother, Julie said. It’s still a hobby of mine.
The garden, its produce, her grubby hands and nails blackened with soil, all transported her back to when the mother lived, and the mother chattered and tended her vegetables. Past mingled with present. The mother returned to Julie’s mind and heart.
*
The sun beat down on her back, and sweat dripped from her forehead. Her dark curls stuck to her face. She looked at the mother, saw that she too glowed from the heat of the day.
Want to stop for a lemonade? The mother asked and put down her shovel. Come on, let’s take a break. We’ve earned it don’t you think?
They had indeed earned it. From early morning they had dug and weeded and hoed and tidied in the vegetable garden that was her mother’s pride and joy. This was Julie’s favourite time. Time to be with the mother without Tommy. Time to be with the mother without the father. Neither of the men of the house took any interest in the vegetable garden. It had always been the mother’s, and she tended to it as though it were her third child. For years she had grown easy crops, like carrots and onions and potatoes, which hardly took any care at all. Of late she had ventured out, and with any luck they would soon be enjoying runner beans, French beans, and hopefully lettuce.
The mother, returning from the kitchen with two large glasses of bubbling lemonade, sat down next to Julie and handed her one, already opaque from condensation. They did not have proper garden furniture. Mr. Randall did. He had four wicker chairs with thick, plush, floral cushions and a table and parasol to match. So they sat on white, plastic kitchen chairs and held their lemonade in their hands. Julie didn't mind. She didn't mind that her legs would stick to the seat and that it would hurt when she stood up. She didn't mind anything as long as she saw the returned warmth in the mother's eyes.
I think I might build a small green house next year. I quite fancy trying my hand at cucumber and tomatoes. Might even plant a couple of pepper plants too. After all, I’ll need them if I’m going to try my hand at some of those Italian recipes your dad is so crazy about.
Mr. Randall grew peppers, she wanted to say, but didn’t. They didn’t mention Mr. Randall any more. The mother’s disapproval had taken months to fade. The coldness in the eyes, the rejection in the voice, the subtle yet clear evasion of contract, Julie suffered it all. So often Julie had wanted to talk about it, about him, but she didn’t dare. The mother had frightened her by standing at the father’s side, uniting with him in his rejection of Julie. Part of Julie’s soul had shrivelled then, and her soul had waited, in hope, and with an overpowering need to be loved, so that it could thrive again.
In the garden, without Tommy and the father, she felt replenished. She would never risk losing it again just so that she could talk about Mr. Randall. She could never tell anyone how she missed him, how she longed for his affections, how she hungered for his knowledge. Sometimes, in the night, if she concentrated, she could recall the scent of whiskey, feel the heat of his breath on her cheek, and the roughness of his wrinkly, old man’s hands on her child’s flesh. She liked to remember their conversations, liked to remember the warmth she felt on the inside when he smiled at her.
The mother suffered. Her breathing sounded like grinding sandpaper, and sweat dripped from her forehead onto her yellow sundress. The grubby nails of her fingers dug into the palms of her hands and her mouth was shut tight. Julie watched, waited for the worst of the attack to pass, slowly sipping her lemonade.
Julie watched as the mother raised her face to the sun and sighed. You all right, Mum? She asked as she had done hundreds of times before.
And as she had done hundreds of times before, the mother bit hard onto her bottom lip and nodded, while her face yelled out its own story of agony.
Julie touched the mother’s hand, squeezed it tight, as though that would distract the mother from the vice that clamped itself around her heart. The hand was cold, clammy like a dead fish, but the skin was rough and callused from the extensive grovelling in the mud.
Strange, unfamiliar thoughts passed through Julie’s mind as she dutifully held onto the hand. And visions, visions of the mother, still, prostrate, struggling to catch her breath, and Julie standing above her, doing nothing, just watching. Julie watching while the life seeped out of the mother and doing nothing to prevent it. Guilt crushed her heart. Bad girl, the voice in her head said. Bad. Julie groaned, shook her head to erase the secret thoughts, looked up and told God that she didn’t mean it, and that she would always, always protect the mother.
In the real world Julie clasped the cold hand even tighter, willed some of her own vitality to pour out and into the mother, whose body was failing her more each day.
Thank God that's passed, the mother said then she downed the rest of her lemonade in one go and stood up. Hurry up, Julie, she urged. We've still plenty to do before the men come home.
Julie raised herself carefully from the chair, feeling the skin separate itself from the plastic inch by inch.
It wasn’t always like this, she thought. Times gone by, before she let Mr. Randall touch her and treat her like a renaissance lover, before the mother got sick, then the afternoons in the garden were afternoons filled with joy. Then the pause for lemonade did not cause Julie to hold her breath in anticipation, or the mother to bite on her lip to suppress the cry of pain. Then they sat, Julie and the mother, and chattered about school, or about the father. Back then, before Mr. Randall, the mother stood firmly on Julie’s side. The mother understood Julie’s fear, could even ease the confusion by explaining the father’s motivations to her.
When I married your father, she said, I knew I needed a book of instructions. I didn’t get one. I knew he was a difficult man, but I knew how to avoid too many confrontations. I loved him, and that made up for a lot. You, on the other hand, she continued. You could not possibly keep up with all his unpredictable mood swings. You could never know when the next blow might come. That’s why you have me. To anticipate for you, or to at least pacify him.
But that was before she got sick, before she decided to take the easy way out. But never had Julie expected the mother to side with the father. Never. And yet she had. Now Julie had to do her best, had to preserve her position in the mother’s heart. It was that, or have no one.
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