The rain quietens, and stops abruptly, like it was one big mistake and it has moved on to the place it was meant to attack all along. A moment of silence hangs over me, the silence that comes with snow. I stand tall, one hand splayed against the wall. I close my eyes so I can let it surround me. Breathing in its calm. Letting it slip down into my jittering bones and fidgeting muscles. It irons me out and I become still. Ahead of me in the street, voices trickle out from other drinking holes. Goodnights are called and engines start. The town comes alive again after its scourging; waking up to the divilment of a Saturday night. Car horns blare and arms wave into the balmy night.
There you have it now – my work here is done. My life boxed away, neatly wrapped, sorted and labelled. My night of celebration is complete. Feck me though, when I set my mind to something, there’s no stopping me.
The band is giving it all they’ve got down the corridor. I can hear their muffled efforts even from here. The tunes mean nothing to me, but I hum along anyway to notes and words I make up in my head: Eleven o’clock and all is well. Time to go, so much to tell. I smile at my talent. Then doors open and out they come: the weaklings who ran from a drop of rain. I move upstream, weaving my way through them, back inside. Reaching reception, I stop for a minute, hands in pockets, eyeing the door to my left to the rooms that I must go through.
‘Ah, I find you, Mr Hannigan,’ Svetlana calls, coming up alongside me, taking me by surprise. ‘I thought you leave. I look everywhere. You forget this.’
I look at the bottle of Jefferson’s she holds in her hands.
‘Well, aren’t you the clever girl.’
‘I not want Emily to see. I don’t want to get sack. Not for you, anyway.’
I laugh and take the bottle.
‘Where you go now, the dance?’ she asks, with a cheeky smile.
‘No, that’s me done. Me and this boy here have a date with destiny,’ I say, looking at the bottle.
‘You right. The band,’ she says, coming close to me now and leaning to my ear, ‘they called the “Rhythm Kings”. I don’t know why? They have no rhythm. They play only hilly-billy music. I hate hilly-billy music.’
The back of her throat has a way of dealing with h’s, taking its time over them then spitting them out, that tickles my ear. I laugh one last time for her and move on, but before I push open the door, I call back:
‘Svetlana. Thank you.’ I raise the bottle.
She smiles: ‘Next time just Guinness, by the neck, yes?’
‘By the neck. Now you have it,’ I say, pushing my shoulder against the door. At the other side, I stop and listen to it swing shut. And then turn to look back through the glass to watch her disappear into the bar.
I don’t use lifts so I find my way to the stairs and begin the climb.
‘You and lifts,’ Sadie used to say to me, dismissing my distrust.
‘Before you start, it’s nothing to do with The Towering Inferno,’ I’d reply, looking at her lips puckering away, ‘it hasn’t, woman. There was a man in Mulhuddart—’
‘Ah, the man from Mulhuddart,’ she’d say, pressing the button like she was playing some game in an arcade.
‘Yes! A man in Mulhuddart who suffered untold and lifelong damage to his legs because of one of those yokes falling and him in it,’ I’d protest to her profile that refused to acknowledge me or the poor man from Mulhuddart. ‘And pressing the hell out of it doesn’t make it come any quicker,’ I’d say, my voice raised so she’d be sure to hear me as I began my ascent, step by step, muttering at the injustice with every lift of my foot.
The man from fucking Mulhuddart!
How many times did we argue about a man we never knew? You know, I miss those stupid arguments as much as anything.
My legs feel heavy with my rain-soaked clothes. Slower than I’d hoped, I keep going. So near, and yet, so bloody far. I lean against the top of the bannisters after I’ve scaled each flight and consider falling asleep right there, standing up. But my brain taps its knobbly internal finger at my skull.
‘Not yet,’ it says. ‘Not yet.’
Chapter Seven
11.05 p.m.
Honeymoon Suite
Rainsford House Hotel
Tonight I will die. There. I’ve said it. Now you know. But I don’t like to hear the words, let alone think them. Not because I don’t want to do it but because I feel the guilt for those I leave behind. For you, Kevin. You, who have deserved so much more from me.
I stand outside the bedroom and take in the door. It’s grand and deserving of the attention. When I say grand, it’s in the magnificent sense of the word, not the Irish one that’s robbed it of its majesty. Mahogany. Wide and solid. My hand runs along its smooth varnish and I pat it with respect. The key too, that has knocked against my father’s pipe the whole night, is large and important. None of those card jobs. You’d never lose this beauty, I can tell you.
I turn it and open the door to catch the smell of freshly cleaned sheets. I close my eyes and concentrate, stuck half in, half out, wanting to hold on to it for as long as I can, knowing it will fade in a matter of seconds. And when it does, I step in fully and look around at this room’s perfection.
White linens, not a crease in sight, on a four-poster bed. Curtains hang around it matching those of the window: deep purple folds that fall to the floor with the weight of the money they must have cost. Cream pillows, with purple flowers, sit three rows deep. A mahogany wardrobe stands at the end of the bed. To its left near the window is a writing desk with a bottle of water and a glass. When I switch on the lamplight I can see the furniture is old but cared for, polished to a shine. A chair with its back to me is pushed in under the arch of the desk, its green leather secured to the frame with brass tacks. And an armchair, to the right, with a high back and generous armrests, sits in the corner like it’s been waiting for me all this time – eighty-four years.
My hand bangs the whiskey bottle down on the bedside locker. I didn’t mean to do it. I misjudged the distance and I jump at the sound.
‘Ssh,’ I say, ‘they could be coming. Robert might be running up the stairs right now to save the day and wrestle you from me. Quiet now.’
I take off my sopping jacket and throw it on the bed. I look around and try to locate my faded memories, the shadows of your wedding night. Can you remember it like it was yesterday or is it half rubbed out in your head too? Was the room as mighty, as plush and posh as this? I walk around the bed, over to the window, feeling my feet sink into the deep carpet. Not the easiest of dance surfaces, but nevertheless, I take my stance and waltz her. Feeling her back arch under my guidance as I move us through the steps.
‘Goodnight, Sadie. Goodnight, Sadie, I’ll see you in my dreams,’ my tired voice sings.
‘Irene,’ I imagine her protests, ‘it’s Irene, not Sadie.’
But I don’t listen and off we go again, waltzing through our lives. Humming my way through my one, two, threes, when the words escape me. Dancing her through our highs and lows and all of those bits in the middle that’ve made up this life of ours. Grinning like the happy fool I am. Faster and faster I spin, brushing by curtains, dicing with corners, colliding with chairs, racing through those moments on my memory reel. Swirling, swirling, until at last I land on the soft down of the bedcovers. Panting, exhausted, the ceiling spinning above me. My eyes shut tight against it all. The soft silkiness of the covers holds me, refusing to let go. Its folds are far too tempting and soon I feel myself drift away.