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Back Before My Actual Heart Breaks Save as PDF
Chapters (48)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. 2007
  6. 1
  7. 2
  8. 1973
  9. 3
  10. 4
  11. 5
  12. 6
  13. 1982
  14. 7
  15. 8
  16. 9
  17. 10
  18. 11
  19. 12
  20. 13
  21. 14
  22. 15
  23. 16
  24. 17
  25. 18
  26. 19
  27. 20
  28. 21
  29. 22
  30. 23
  31. 24
  32. 1998
  33. 25
  34. 26
  35. 27
  36. 2004
  37. 28
  38. 29
  39. 30
  40. 31
  41. 32
  42. 33
  43. 2007
  44. 34
  45. 35
  46. 36
  47. Acknowledgements
  48. THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING

–  Well … I stand at the sink … and I start with my hands and wash down as far as possible then I wash my feet and wash up as far as possible … and then when I’m done, I wash the possible.

–  The poss—

–  That’s right … with a flannel, so don’t you go getting sniffy with me! I’m clean because I make sure I’m clean inside and out! Which is more than can be said about you, Yes Siree Bob!

35

Disquieting days bring strange nights. I lay for hours in the pitch-dark, knowing that the eaves were above me but not able to make out their shape. I had his postcard under my pillow. Mary, I may call that way at some point. John. No frills, no dates, no times, no hope. I knew he’d get sick of wandering about eventually. The place is part of him: he loves it like I love it, with all of his heart. I will the words under my head to rearrange themselves and say something different. They might speak at any moment so I wait and wait but they still don’t tell me what I want to hear. He is coming back for his land, his fields, his trees and ditches, the bone-chilling Cloon waters. And nothing else.

The sun rose at five-thirty and I rose with it, aching and tired. Mammy calls around midday and I walk up, get the Deep Heat on and get out. The big white wall of the orchard welcomes me home. I cross the floor to the range and put the kettle on to boil. The silence soon drives me back out to the front stoop. I can breathe easier outside my empty house than in.

Inside smells like him, my errant husband, it’s like choking on nectar. And I can sit against the ancient granite wall, warmed by the heat of the day, and be able to feel for five minutes that nothing can harm me when I have solid rock at my back. I watch the river field, jumping with heavy cream meadowsweet, the lilac of cuckooflowers, the yellow dots of buttercups and the ball dance of midges.

For decades it had seemed to me that my life was a truck that roared past showering me with muck, then I realised that I was driving the bloody truck! It’s because I’m a different girl now; I grew up about a year ago! Whoosh! Bam! The scales flew clean off my eyeballs and I could see that I had my hands on the wheel all along! What a fool! Soon I would be a fool without a home because he’s coming back, coming back to winkle me out.