He likes to listen to him now, though, whenever he’s on. I think he reminds him of a precious time spent with Mum, as though when we all hear Gay Byrne’s voice, he hears Mum’s instead. When she died, he surrounded himself with all the things she adored. He put Gay on the radio every morning, watched Mum’s television shows, bought her favourite biscuits in his weekly shopping trip even though he never ate them. He liked to see them on the shelf when he opened the cupboard, liked to see her magazines beside his newspaper. He liked her slippers staying beside her armchair by the fire. He liked to remind himself that his entire world hadn’t fallen apart. Sometimes we need all the glue we can get, just to hold ourselves together.
At sixty-five years old, he was too young to lose his wife. At twenty-three I was too young to lose my mother. At fifty-five she shouldn’t have lost her life, but cancer, the thief of seconds, undetected until far too late, stole it from her and us all. Dad married late in life for that time, and didn’t have me until he was forty-two years old. I think that there was somebody that broke his heart back then that he has never spoken of and that I’ve never asked about, but what he does say about that period is that he spent more days of his life waiting for Mum than actually being with her, but that every second spent looking for her and, eventually, remembering her, was worth it for all the moments in between.
Mum never met Conor but I don’t know whether she would have liked him, though she was too polite ever to have shown it. Mum loved all kinds of people but particularly those with high spirit and energy, people that lived and exuded that life. Conor is pleasant. Always just pleasant. Never overexcited. Never, in fact, excited at all. Just pleasant, which is just another word for nice. Marrying a nice man gives you a nice marriage but never anything more. And nice is OK when it’s among other things but never when it stands alone.
Dad would talk to anyone anywhere and not have a feeling about them one way or another. The only negative thing he ever said about Conor was, ‘Sure, what kind of man likes tennis?’ A GAA and soccer man, Dad had spat the word out as though just saying it had dirtied his mouth.
Our failure to produce a child didn’t do much to sway Dad’s opinion. He blamed it on the tennis but particularly on the little white shorts Conor sometimes wore, whenever pregnancy test after pregnancy test failed to show blue. I know he said it all to put a smile on my face; sometimes it worked, other times it didn’t, but it was a safe joke because we all knew it wasn’t the tennis shorts or the man wearing them that was the problem.
I sit down on the duvet cover bought by Mum, not wanting to crease it. A two-pillow and duvet cover set from Dunnes with a matching candle for the windowsill, which has never been lit and has lost its scent. Dust gathers on the top, incriminating evidence that Dad is not keeping up with his duties, as if at seventy-five years old the removal of dust from anywhere but his memory shelf should be a priority. But the dust has settled and so let it stay.
I turn on my mobile, which has been switched off for days, and it begins to beep as a dozen messages filter through. I have already made my calls to those near, dear and nosy. Like pulling off a Band-Aid; don’t think about it, move quickly and it’s almost painless. Flip open the phonebook and bam, bam, bam: three minutes each. Quick snappy phone calls made by a strangely upbeat woman who’d momentarily inhabited my body. An incredible woman, in fact, positive and perky, yet emotional and wise at all the right times. Her timing impeccable, her sentiments so poignant I almost wanted to write them down. She even attempted a bit of humour, which some members of the near, dear and nosy coped well with while others seemed almost insulted – not that she cared, for it was her party and she was crying if she wanted to. I’ve met her before, of course; she whizzes around to me for the occasional trauma, steps into my shoes and takes over the hard parts. She’ll be back again, no doubt.
No, it will be a long time before I can speak in my own voice to people other than the woman I am calling now.
Kate picks up on the fourth ring.
‘Hello,’ she shouts and I jump. There are manic noises in the background, as though a mini-war has broken out.
‘Joyce!’ she yells and I realise I’m on speakerphone. ‘I’ve been calling you and calling you. Derek, SIT DOWN. MUMMY IS NOT HAPPY! Sorry, I’m just doing the school run. I’ve to bring six kids home, then a quick snack before I bring Eric to basketball and Jayda to swimming. Want to meet me there at seven? Jayda is getting her ten-metre badge today.’
Jayda howls in the background about hating ten-metre badges.
‘How can you hate it when you’ve never had one?’ Kate snaps. Jayda howls even louder and I have to move the phone from my ear. ‘JAYDA! GIVE MUMMY A BREAK! DEREK, PUT YOUR SEATBELT ON! If I have to brake suddenly, you will go FLYING through the windscreen and SMASH YOUR FACE IN. Hold on, Joyce.’
There is silence while I wait.
‘Gracie!’ Dad yells. I run to the top of the stairs in panic, not used to hearing him shout like that since I was a child.
‘Yes? Dad! Are you OK?’
‘I got seven letters,’ he shouts.
‘You got what?’
‘Seven letters!’
‘What does that mean?’
‘In Countdown!’
I stop panicking and sit on the top stair in frustration. Suddenly Kate’s voice is back and it sounds as though calm has been restored.
‘OK, you’re off speakerphone. I’ll probably be arrested for holding the phone, not to mention cast off the car-pool list, like I give a flying fuck about that.’
‘I’m telling my mammy you said the f word,’ I hear a little voice.
‘Good. I’ve been wanting to tell her that for years,’ Kate murmurs to me and I laugh.
‘FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK,’ I hear a crowd of kids chanting.
‘Jesus, Joyce, I better go. See you at the leisure centre at seven? It’s my only break. Or else I have tomorrow. Tennis at three or gymnastics at six? I can see if Frankie is free to meet up too.’
Frankie. Christened Francesca but refuses to answer to it. Dad was wrong about Kate. She may have sourced the poteen but technically it was Frankie that held my mouth open and poured it down my throat. As a result of this version of the story never being told, he thinks Frankie’s a saint, very much to Kate’s annoyance.
‘I’ll take gymnastics tomorrow,’ I smile as the children’s chanting gets louder. Kate’s gone and there’s silence.
‘GRACIE!’ Dad calls again.
‘It’s Joyce, Dad.’
‘I got the conundrum!’
I make my way back to my bed and cover my head with a pillow.
A few minutes later Dad arrives at the door, scaring the life out of me.
‘I was the only one that got the conundrum. The contestants hadn’t a clue. Simon won anyway, goes through to tomorrow’s show. He’s been the winner for three days now and I’m half bored lookin’ at him. He has a funny-looking face; you’d have a right laugh if you saw it. Don’t think Carol likes him much either and she’s after losin’ loads of weight again. Do you want a HobNob? I’m going to make another cuppa.’
‘No, thanks.’ I put the pillow back over my head. He uses so many words.
‘Well, I’m having one. I have to eat with my pills. Supposed to take it at lunch but I forgot.’
‘You took a pill at lunch,