When his father’s laughter receded, he cleared his throat and cut his gaze to a nearby window. “Sure I’m sorry, I said so yesterday.”

Aiden shook his head. “You admitted to being a sorry sod and I didn’t disagree. But are you sorry for what you did? How you left?”

Liam crossed his beefy arms across his chest and stared his son down with cold blue eyes. “What good’s sorry when yer as old as ye are? Hell, boyo, t’was a lifetime ago. Yer mam told me if I didn’t stick to land and stop me drinking, she’d put me out. I didn’t and so she did. Simple as y’like. Judging by the looks of it, y’turned out alright, yeah?” he asked with a smirk. “Ya hardly sound like a boy from Limerick. Ya sound a bit lace-curtain nowadays.”

He stared back at his father, searching for the remorse in his eyes. When he couldn’t find it, he fell back on the emotion he knew best: Anger. “Limerick was hard in the ’90s. That flat above the washers on William Street was just a small piece of how shitty ‘Stab City’ was. And you left us for the fish?” Aiden asked, setting down his cup, fearing he’d fling it at a wall. “While Mam taught, she cleaned the hospital. She came home late, feet hurting and hands raw from chemicals, and sat down to write lessons when she should have been sleeping. She fed us every day with no fish and no coin from you, Liam. We begged her to let us get jobs and she wouldn’t let us. It tore Junior up to not go work in some factory, but she made him stay in school. He’s got two boys of his own, you know that?”

Liam didn’t answer.

“Works at a bank in Dublin too. Sean and Ryan run their own businesses and they’re happy and you’ve got grandchildren. That’s what’s happened while you were off fishing.”

“Good on ’em,” Liam said, shifting in his seat. “And what of you, boyo?”

Aiden exhaled through his nose. “I’m a university professor in Galway.”

Liam finally took a sip of his own tea. “Don’t surprise me none that ye went to teaching. Always took after yer mam.”

Aiden let out a harsh laugh. “And I got my aimlessness from you. Every time I look out over the ocean, I feel something I want to bury,” He ducked his head and ran his hand down his face. When he looked up and met his father’s gaze, the fight was gone and replaced with sadness. “It was so much easier when I thought you were dead, Liam.”

“That’s fair,” Liam said. His pale blue eyes stared at his son’s sweater, his teacup, the window behind him... But never directly into Aiden’s eyes. He cleared his throat and nodded before taking another swallow of tea.

An uncomfortable silence settled over the table as Aiden ran his fingertips over the rim of his cup. He was starting to see the futility of this meeting. The only thing that had changed about Liam was his age.