GERALDINE MCCARTHY - THE BOND

Geraldine McCarthy lives in West Cork in the Republic of Ireland.  In a former life she was involved in tutoring, lecturing, translation and research. She has been writing short stories and flash fiction for two years now.  Her work has been published in The Fable Online, The Incubator Journal, Seven Deadly Sins: a YA Anthology (Gluttony and Wrath), Scarlet Leaf Review and Brilliant Flash Fiction. 

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THE BOND
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I studied the black and white photos lining the wall of the sitting room: Anne, throwing her hat in the air at her graduation, Anne, gliding down the aisle a few years later, then her little girl, Róisín, frowning as she made daisy chains in my back garden.  Hard to fathom that tonight was my daughter’s fortieth birthday. 
She had booked a function room at the local hotel. I hated parties, preferring to be enveloped in my duvet by 9.30, reading a PD James mystery.  I didn’t trust people when they had drink in them, just as they probably didn’t trust me, imagining I was going around with some invisible pen and notebook, recording their misdemeanours. 
I plumped up the cushions in the good room and traced my finger over the mantelpiece to check for dust I knew wasn’t there.  Anne only laughed when I had chosen a white sofa and white fluffy rug.  “Aren’t you drawing work on yourself?” she’d said.  I didn’t mind though.  I wanted a room to be proud of, and with Anne gone and no pets in the house, it wasn’t hard to keep clean.
Through the window, I saw a silver BMW with a Dublin registration pull up.  It was probably my brother, Frank. Anne had insisted on inviting him, saying it was an opportunity for bridge-building.  I squeezed a white cushion to my chest as I recognised him getting out of the car.  He was stooped, but agile, going bald on top.  I wondered how he in turn would assess me.  He always said my hair was too severe, pulled back in a bun.  Still, for seventy, I hadn’t many wrinkles, thanks to Oil of Olay, and a few good genes.  Anne had laughter lines around her eyes already – I feared she wouldn’t age well.
The ping of the doorbell brought my pondering to a halt.  My mouth went dry as I made my way down the hallway to open the door.
“Frank,” I said.  “Long time no see.”
“Long time no see, Rebecca.”
We didn’t hug. We weren’t that type of family.  I hadn’t seen Frank for nearly ten years.  He’d been on holiday in Australia when John died.
“Come in.”
For some reason I led him to the kitchen.  He sat on a hard chair.
“Will you have a drop of something?”
“Ah, it’s a bit early.” He smirked. “Didn’t think you’d keep the hard stuff in the house.”
He was annoying me already. 
“It’s there for visitors.” I sat opposite him.  “Twas good of you to come down.”
“Well, Anne pretty much wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer.” He joined his hands in prayer-like fashion.  “My position hasn’t changed, you know. I still think you’re wronging her.”
A burning sensation started up in my stomach.  “It’s none of your business. I’ve told you that before.” 
He drummed the table with his fingers, head down, seeming to study the knots in the pine.
This was worse than I had anticipated.  “Look, we’re not going to agree on this, so can’t you let it drop?”
He stood up, the chair scraping loudly on the tiles.  “It has to be said. You’re wronging her.  She has a whole other identity, another history, and you’re keeping it from her.”
My heart started to race in my chest.  I stood as well.  “It’s not as simple as that. And you have no right to come in here, telling me what to do.”
“And what about Anne’s rights?”
I sat down again abruptly.  “Look, Frank,” I said, lowering my voice, “It was a long time ago. Costello didn’t tell us much about Anne’s birth mother.  Just that she was very young, sixteen.  That’s the only information I have.”
“You could contact Costello.” Frank was still standing, towering over me.
I thought of how Anne had come to us after five long years of a silent house and an idle swing.  It was Dr Costello who had made everything possible.  He and my husband, John, had been in Rockwell College together. 
When Anne arrived some dormant part of me woke again.  I had known all along what my vocation was, and now I could live it out.  We moved from Dún Laoghaire immediately. John got a transfer to a Bank of Ireland branch in Limerick city.  Settling in the suburbs, I stayed at home to mind Anne, to smile in response to her gurgling laugh, to delight in the passing of her milestones.
Funny the bond that formed between me and Anne.  I couldn’t believe it.  As a child she clung to me, following me around the house, mimicking as I hoovered and ironed and pegged clothes to the line.  As a teenager, she barely rebelled.  Not that she didn’t have her moods and her moments, but a friendship steadily grew between us, despite the odd adolescent hiccough. 
No way was I going to destroy that.
 “It would be no good talking to Costello now,” I said, as calmly as I could muster, “He’s in the latter stages of Alzheimer’s. He—”
I heard a key turn in the front door and looked at Frank imploringly. He was stony-faced.
Footsteps down the hallway. “Hi Mam. Hi Frank, how are you? Great to see you.  I wasn’t sure whether you’d got my letter?” 
“Well, you were very persuasive,” he said.
She appeared to pick up on the vibes.  “Have I interrupted something? Mam, you’re very red.”
“I was just leaving,” Frank said.
“Ah, why don’t you stay? I’ll make tea,” Anne said, reaching for the kettle.
“No, I’ve got to get back to the hotel.” His tone became gentler. “Sure, I’ll see you at the ‘do’ tonight. We’ll talk then.”
I didn’t know if my legs would hold me up, but I needed to follow him out. “I’ll walk you to the car,” I said.
It was a balmy May day and I sucked in the fresh air.  In the driveway, I leant into the driver’s seat and whispered, “Remember this: she’s loved, she’s happy, she’s healthy. Don’t mess with that. Please.”
Frank turned the key in the ignition. “I’ll see ye later,” he said.
                I collapsed onto the garden seat by the sitting room window. My underarms were damp and the warm wood beneath me made me hotter still.  I was angry at Anne for drawing Frank on us, but needed to suppress it. It wasn’t her fault. How was she to know? A bumble bee circled, hastening my return to the house.
                Anne slouched at the kitchen table, sipping a cranberry juice from a small carton.  That was my daughter for you – she would get wound up a month before a big event, but as it drew closer, a calmness descended on her.
“Too warm for tea. Do you want one?” she said.
                “No, I’m fine,” I said, distracted.  “How come Róisín isn’t with you?”
                “She’s gone to Saoirse’s house to play. Told me this morning that she didn’t want to go, that she’d prefer to read her book.”  Anne smiled. “Getting more like you and me every day, she is.”
                Normally a remark like that would make me glow.
                Anne plucked the straw out of the carton and laid it on the table.  “Things didn’t go well between you and Frank then?”
                “Ah, typical older brother, always bossing, even when we were children.” Bitterness crept into my voice. “Frank always thinks he knows best.”
                Anne let a silence hang between us. I knew she was hoping to draw me out. That was her style. 
                “Are you all set for tonight?” I asked.
                “Yeah, I’ve phoned the hotel to confirm the booking.” Anne looked at her watch. “Sugar, I’ll have to get going to pick up Róisín.”  She pecked me on the cheek and squeezed my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Mam. It will all go off fine.”
                I barely noticed her leaving.  The thing was, Anne came into the world on 7 May 1957, but she came into our world ten days later.  We arranged to have 17 May put on her birth certificate, as well as our own names.  Costello smoothed it over.  Said he was in John’s debt, though neither of them ever elaborated. 
It was a euphoric time and the paperwork seemed like a minor detail.   I didn’t allow myself to dwell on the deception, focused instead on nurturing my child and providing a loving environment for her.  I convinced myself that as long as she was cherished, that was all that mattered. 
In Limerick, I deliberately didn’t make friends.  Oh, I swapped pleasantries with the mothers at the school gates, as you do, but I never sought entry into any of their cliques, never went for coffee with them, or walked with them in the nearby university grounds.  Anne was my best friend. Or had been up until now. 
I wished John were here. Frank wouldn’t be so Bolshie if my husband were still around. And John would know what to do. Whereas, here was I, at risk of losing everything, not having a bloody clue.
*
Although the hotel was within walking distance, I decided to drive.  I questioned my choice of outfit – a cream trouser suit and gold top.  Maybe it was too formal? I didn’t go to many parties.  The burning feeling gnawed at my stomach again, and out of the blue an old Irish saying came into my head – sceitheann fíon fírinne – with wine, the truth pours forth.  Myself and John had learnt that at a night class in the university years ago, and being teetotallers ourselves, we often quoted it.  I didn’t know whether Frank imbibed much nowadays – when I tested him this morning he had refused a drink - but when he was younger he was no stranger to the high stool.  As I pulled in to the hotel car park I had to cast these thoughts aside.
It was bang on eight o’clock when I walked into the bar.  An ABBA tribute band was setting up in the corner, all flares and platforms and high peaked collars.  In my cream suit I could have almost blended in with them.   One section, by the fireplace, was reserved, and balloons with ‘40’ on them bobbed from the walls.  Anne and her husband, Dónal, waved and I sat down with them at a low table.  A few of Anne’s colleagues from the library were nearby and I exchanged pleasantries with them while Dónal went to the bar to get me a still water. People arrived in dribs and drabs, more colleagues of Anne’s, her neighbours from Monaleen, some old school friends.  I found it difficult to concentrate on the chit chat.  Small talk was trying at the best of times, and when the music started blaring it became virtually impossible.
Frank strode in just before nine, just as baskets of sandwiches and cocktail sausages were being passed around.  He grabbed a spare stool and pulled it up beside me. Old Spice wafted in my direction.  Anne had been mingling, making sure people were eating, but came over to our table immediately.
“Frank, what will you have?” she said.
“I’ll get these. You’re the birthday girl. Name your poison.”
“Ah, I’m taking it handy, but a white wine spritzer would be nice,” Anne said.
“Rebecca?”
Pointing at my bottle of Ballygowan, I said, “I’ll be fine for a while.”
I nibbled a soggy egg sandwich, but my stomach was churning.
He came back, his hands full with the drinks. I noticed he was on whiskey and water and suspected that this might not be his first of the night. 
“How’ve you been, Frank? Still travelling the world?” Anne said.
“I might as well. Sure I’ve no ties, and that’s what retirement is for.”  He tapped a Heineken beer mat on the table.
The band struck up ‘Mamma Mia’ and I strained to hear the conversation.
“Where was your latest destination?”
“Sorrento. Went down to the Amalfi coast and out to Capri.”
“God, I’m looking forward to retiring myself. It sounds marvellous.”
Frank grinned. “I thought you loved your work.  Having everything in order.  Following the Dewey Decimal System.”
Anne took this with good humour.  “Ah, where would we be without Dewey?”
Through the corner of my eye, I spied the younger ones getting to their feet to do a routine to ‘Dancing Queen’.  It was a pity we couldn’t talk in peace.
“I suppose you got your love of reading from your mother here?” Frank said, raising his voice a notch.
Anne sipped her spritzer.  “Definitely.  There were always books in the house when I was growing up.”
“We did our best for you,” I said, glancing sideways at Frank.  If there was an explosive device on the stool next to me I couldn’t have been more nervous.
“One thing that always puzzled me though was where your brought your height from.  Neither Rebecca, nor John, God rest his soul, could have been considered tall.” He looked me in the eye. 
There he was again, picking at the scab. He wouldn’t be satisfied until there was blood.
Anne turned to me, puzzled.  “That’s a good question.  Where did I get my height from, Mam?”
I felt my face and neck flush, and hoped Anne would attribute it to the heat in the room.
A kerfuffle erupted by the kitchen door and a waitress appeared, carrying a creamy confection ablaze with candles.  Saved by the cake.  Dónal began singing ‘Happy Birthday’ and the crowd joined in. Anne stood and made her way towards the cake to blow out the candles.  Cameras flashed and toasts were made.
I leant over and hissed in Frank’s ear, “Are you just playing with me or are you going to tell her?”
“You can relax.  I’m not going to tell her. It’s not my mess, and not my job. But you have a lot of thinking to do.” 
I should have been relieved, but somehow I merely felt deflated.  I couldn’t leave early or Anne might suspect something, so I put on my biggest fake smile and went up to hug her.  That was all I could do now, hug her and hold on tightly to my secret.
*
Every hour, on the hour, I woke.  I gave in at six o’clock, went downstairs and had a bowl of Special K with a cup of instant coffee.  The kitchen was bathed in buttercup yellow.  It should have been a great morning to be alive. 
I moved into the good room, taking my coffee with me, though I feared that in my confusion and tiredness I would spill it.  The whiteness of the furnishings should have soothed me, but it only contrasted with the dark rooms of my mind which I had entered during the night.  I had visions of a sixteen-year-old girl, frightened and guilt-ridden.  I meditated on the nine months Anne had spent in her womb.  But it was the lost ten days which bothered me the most.  A bond would have formed between Anne and her birth mother in those ten days.  For the first time, I admitted to myself that our act of deception was morally dubious.  And with that admission all the happy memories became tainted.  As I gazed at Anne’s graduation picture in Edinburgh and the snap of her wedding day with Dónal, and little Róisín, it was as if the photos had become blotched with mildew.
And yet I couldn’t face telling Anne the truth. Because there were many types of bond.  And my connection with her was as real as anything else in this world.