everyones here. come out. its not that cold.

Summer 2016

Concord 34 JP always thought I needed to get out more. I thought it was likely that Val had given
him specific instructions on this point: Make sure she gets out of the house. Another
Sally Rooney text arrived, but it was not from JP. It was from my sister.

I see you’ve deleted your Facebook. Tried email but no reply. All ok?

I was lying face-down on the sofa with my arms tucked up underneath my body when I The detectives put the pianist’s mother in handcuffs. I held down the power button on
heard the first text notification. I had my neck turned just marginally toward the TV so I my phone until the display turned black. The phone felt heavier, as though it became a
could keep an eye on the film, and I knew it was only JP texting from the beach physical object only when switched off. Its weight impressed me.
anyway. When I finally sat up to check my phone, it read:

I had moved home from Dublin in May. The day I arrived, my mother lifted a lock of
playing fuck marry kill. libby says kill rob. robs not happy! my hair and shook her head. That’s in terrible condition, she said. Look at that. She
asked if Val was bringing the rest of my things in the car, but one wheelie suitcase was
all I had. No, this is it, I said. All my earthly possessions. She didn’t laugh.

Onscreen, the detectives were interviewing a suspect who looked like a twelve-year- My mother was still working full-time that summer, so in the mornings I had the house
old. He was the piano genius character from earlier. I tried to text back using only one to myself. I regularly slept for periods of over twelve hours, and when I woke up I liked
hand but eventually removed the other from beneath my body too. I typed out: to put on my cotton dressing-gown and pad around in my bare feet. I sat on the floor
with my back against a portable radiator until it started to burn me. The house wasn’t
cold, I just liked the sensation.
Are you still on the beach? Must be freezing.
A week after I got back, JP and Rob knocked on the living-room window and waved at
me. I came out to the front door to ask what they wanted, crossing my arms over my
chest.
All the lights in the house were off except for the TV. I was alone because my mother
was at a staff birthday party. You never told us you were around, JP said.
 Were you sick or what? said Rob. You look like shit. amongst themselves, while a cloud of insects moved over the dune grass and I closed
my eyes. It wasn’t late but I was tired already. I was always getting tired then.
Few cans on the beach? said JP.

It was after sunset and the sky was ice blue, the colour of science fiction. There were
some other people down on the dunes too, people I knew from school. I had no reason JP and Rob called over to the house to see me most days after that. So as to avoid
to be there and no reason not to be there. JP and Rob were telling me what everyone letting them into the house, which I feared would bring them into contact with my
had been doing while I was away, sometimes pointing at the person in question while private psychological space, I brought magazines down to the beach and pretended not
they spoke. JP gestured at a group sitting a few feet away and said: There’s Evan, he’s to listen while they told anecdotes about all the memorable things Val had done in
finished the Leaving now. school. It was clear to me that JP and Rob thought I was weird, but their loyalty to Val
prevented them from ever admitting this, probably even to each other. As a result they
Your cousin? I said.
struggled gamely to interest me in their discussions, as if convinced that the right

He’s like you, Miriam, Rob said. A social justice warrior. Can’t even make jokes conversational gambit would eventually lead me to reveal myself as a normal person
about the fucking Polish in front of that guy. after all. In the evenings Val often called me on the phone and asked how I was getting
along with them, like we were new colleagues and he was our Project Manager. His
I bundled my jacket up into a ball and lay my head down onto it. The sea sounded parents had sold their house and moved to Spain when they retired, and he had no
noisy like human breath. brothers or sisters in town. I was the only real reason for him to visit, and for a long
time that summer he didn’t. At the time I thought he sensed my reluctance to see him,
I remember him pre-pubescent, I said. Possibly without front teeth.
though now I wonder if he was just reluctant to see me.
JP called him over: Evan! Come here! To me, Rob added: He’s got his front teeth
When they tired of me, JP and Rob mostly liked to bully Evan. If he was at the beach it
back, look.
was just a matter of emptying a bucket of seawater onto his head; otherwise we all had
He came over then, a tall guy with very clear skin. I thought I probably didn’t to troop up to the video rental shop where he worked so they could tell him he was a
remember him after all, maybe I had been thinking of someone else, but he virgin while he was trying to deal with customers. Evan acted aloof and sarcastic, but it
remembered me. He knew my name was Miriam and that I lived in the yellow house. I was clear he didn’t have any real friends. For this reason he seemed to appreciate my
offered him one of JP’s cans of lager, but JP said Evan didn’t drink. addition to the squad. When I arrived at the beach one night, before he noticed I was
there, I heard him asking Rob: Do you think Miriam is coming out? I enjoyed watching
He’s a good boy, Rob said. He does what mammy tells him. him get bullied. His embarrassment was touching, and he often flicked glances toward
me, hoping that I hadn’t noticed what the others were saying about him, or else hoping
Tell Miriam how much you love Karl Marx, said JP.
that I tacitly took his side. He didn’t know Val, and couldn’t remember ever meeting
Evan held his hands out as if to say: These people, right? I admired that in a teenager, him, even when JP said: Of course you’ve fucking met him. Val? Val Dolan. JP
now that I was twenty-five and extremely bored of myself. The guys started to talk appeared to see Val as a sort of international celebrity, rather than a man who had been
very popular in school once and was now nearly thirty.
We spent some evenings that summer in the caravan park, where Evan’s parents owned Rob cracked up again then, but I just said: No, that’s it. The black one. Do you want me
a mobile home. It had three tiny bedrooms and a rain-faded plastic plate beside the to get you another glass of Coke?
front door reading ‘Concord 34’. On the patch of concrete outside they had a small
barbecue, which we used often. When it rained, we bought chips from the van outside
the caravan park instead and sat inside to eat them and drink lukewarm beer. Val and I had been in school together, but he was older. When we started seeing each
other I was sixteen and he was twenty, and he would come home from university at
One night we were sitting outside on the plastic lawn chairs, which left faint pink criss-
weekends and drive me around in his car. It made me feel special, like the girlfriend of
crosses on my thighs. Something I said made Evan laugh so much that he spilled own-
a mob boss. Val had been immensely popular in school, and I assumed that he was
brand cola on his T-shirt and said ‘fuck’ under his breath. When he went inside to
popular everywhere and women fell for him constantly. It didn’t occur to me to wonder
change, Rob said to JP: Your little cousin wants to ride Miriam, you know. Rob liked to
why he spent his college weekends at home in the company of a sixteen-year-old. He
scandalize JP by making remarks like this.
was always complimenting my intelligence and then telling me to be careful not to
Fuck off out of it, said JP. show off about it. He said women in college were full of themselves and always
showing off, and men hated that. Years later I realized he had failed to make any friends
I’m not being funny, mate, Rob said. He has fantasies about it, I can tell. He’s in
in university at all, that he longed to be back in school, and that he had never had a
there now thinking about that little black swimsuit she wears.
relationship with an adult woman. By then enough time had passed that I felt sorry for

For some reason I laughed then. There was nothing whatsoever seductive about my him, and even a little guilty, like I had discovered a secret he had been trying to
black swimsuit. Actually it was ugly and one of the shoulder straps was frayed. conceal.

You’re mentally unwell coming out with that stuff, JP said. By the time I finished my Master’s, we’d been together nearly eight years. For a while
after I graduated, I lived in his apartment in Dublin, which he shared with a friend of
Rob and I both kept laughing, until JP went away down the path in a sulk and we his called Derek. I didn’t have a job, so I washed the dishes every morning after they
stopped. JP had been Val’s best friend in school. Before I came on the scene he even got left for work, and every evening after we ate dinner. During that period I washed dishes
to ride in the passenger seat of Val’s car at lunchtimes, I remembered that. Together so often that I became minutely attuned to the idiosyncracies of each individual fork
Rob and I watched JP down at the end of the road, lighting a cigarette. I’ll tell you that and cup, and developed a robust and internally complex system for washing and
guy’s problem, Rob said. He’s a sidekick with no fucking superhero. stacking in particular orders. That was all very well while things were good, but if I
went away for even one evening, dirty crockery would pile up to the extent that the
Evan came back outside then in a different T-shirt. I thought he did look a little flushed.
system became unworkable. I would have to settle for stacking saucepans on top of
Here he is, Rob said. Tell us, Evan, what colour is Miriam’s swimsuit? glasses and things like that. Often I was so exhausted and frustrated by their failure to
wash up in my absence that I cried to myself, with the kitchen door wedged shut and
Evan glanced at me, perhaps to check that he had permission to answer. Then he my tears running hot like dishwater. Housework, its impermanence and repetition, its
looked out, away, as if the question belonged somewhere with the landscape. continual undoing by others every day, became the concrete representation of every
unhappiness in my life. Nothing I did stayed done.
The one I’m thinking of is black, he said. But you might have more than one.
In April I found out I was pregnant. My sister Clare lived in London and I went over to None of your fucking business if they are, is it? said JP.
visit her for a weekend. Clare had a pull-out sofa and she let me sit in the bath as long
How long are you together? Rob said. Six years or something.
as I wanted. The procedure didn’t hurt very much but afterwards I felt wrong. Clare
told me my feelings were normal and not to blame myself for absorbing negative Nine years, I said.
cultural messaging about female reproductive autonomy. On the plane back to Dublin I
had a dream that my body was made of cells, and when I told Val about the dream he Rob whistled and JP rolled his eyes. I swallowed a mouthful of wine, which tasted
said: Miriam, your body is made of cells. What do you think it’s made of? I was flat and tinny, and looked up through the skylight at the darkening sky.
standing in the kitchen, at the sink, and Val was in the doorway. You’re acting weird, he
You could have an eight-year-old by now, Rob said. Do you ever think about that?
said. That was when I decided to move home.
A little eight-year-old just giving you lip all the time.

I say we take a look at this pool, said JP.

Not long after the night when Rob joked about my swimsuit – it was probably July by
The pool was lit from underneath. There was a row of potted plants on one side of the
then – we got invited to a house party outside town. A girl Evan knew from school was
room and two ladders down into the water. Some of Libby’s friends were already in the
throwing the party, a sixteen-year-old called Libby. I had met her once in Milligan’s
water, splashing each other or linking arms and whispering. I changed into my
and she told me that she liked my jacket. Rob said her family was ‘Celtic Tiger rich’
swimsuit in the downstairs bathroom and then sat at the side of the pool drinking wine
and their house had a heated pool in the basement. My mother let me take the car so I
and watching Rob and JP pretend to drown each other. They said things like: Drown,
could drive back the next morning. When we picked Evan up he was wearing an
motherfucker! Everything echoed very hard. I felt drunk then and I kept laughing. I
Oxford shirt and navy-blue chinos, which Rob and JP made fun of for the whole
said: I actually hope you both drown. But no one could hear me.
journey. You look like the CEO of a fucking start-up, Rob said. You look like you want
to optimize the house party’s share performance. I thought about the other night, when After some time Evan and Libby came down to the pool. Libby was wearing a red
he spilled the soft drink on his T-shirt. I think he looks nice, I said. And our eyes met in bikini and smiling. Before I could meet Evan’s eye, I decided to submerge my entire
the rearview before I looked back at the road. body in the water. It was warm and broke into my ear. When I surfaced again, he was in
the pool already. My hair was dripping water down into my face. I was drunk. I’m
It was still light out when I parked up outside the party. Libby came out to the front step
drunk, I said, but Evan couldn’t hear me. He came closer and said: You’re what? I
to see who it was, looking very skinny, like a piece of paper that could blow away. She
could see Libby sitting with her friends at the side of the water.
waved at Evan and said: I didn’t know if you were coming! He glanced at me and then
looked back and waved at her. JP, Rob and I went inside and left Evan and Libby She likes you, I said.
talking.
He didn’t look back at her, but he knew what I was talking about.
Rob found a corkscrew for my bottle of wine. We sat at the kitchen table drinking and
peeling the labels off things. Yeah, I know, he said.

Are yourself and Val going to get married, or what? Rob said.
 We were looking into each other’s eyes a lot and the water felt closer and stranger. I For the next few days Evan and I didn’t talk about what had happened in the pool.
had my back against the wall of the pool and over Evan’s shoulder I could see Rob and Instead he just looked at me a lot, like he was waiting for me to do something wild
JP looking at me. again. Whenever I came down to the beach with the others I could feel his attention
move toward me like the tightening of a string that no one else knew about.
They’re watching us, I said.
One night he had a barbecue outside the trailer and some of the people from his school
He looked over and we both waved at them. They waved back. I touched my nose,
came along. He sent me a text to ask if I was coming and I said yes. After exactly ten
which was wet, and Evan looked into my eyes again in a slightly telepathic way.
minutes he sent another text saying: Oh cool, see you then. When I arrived I noticed he
Rob thinks you have a crush on me, I said. was wearing a shirt again, which he smoothed down with his left hand when I said
hello. JP and Rob and I smoked cigarettes together at the grill and talked about how
Oh. Does he, okay. Did he tell you that? young everyone was. Libby was there in a polka-dotted dress, and she kept touching
Evan’s arm and laughing. I wondered if Libby ever felt cold from being so thin. Then I
You can’t trust him. He tells me everything.
looked at Evan and sucked on my lower lip until Libby noticed he wasn’t listening
Evan was looking right at me but he didn’t seem to hear what I said. After a second he anymore.
said: What? I laughed and splashed one of my hands in the water. Did you get
After his schoolfriends left, we went into the trailer to finish our drinks. It wasn’t late.
distracted? I asked. He looked at me for a few seconds longer with a shy kind of smile
Rob was planning a house party the following evening so none of us had been drinking
on his face and said: No. Wait. What?
very much anyway. The interior of the trailer was plasticky and there was an ancient
Then someone turned all the lights out, so the pool went black. We couldn’t see where television set that crackled when Rob switched it off. The lampshades were the colour
anyone was anymore, and the girls were screaming these high-pitched screams which of butter, and moths crawled up the outside of the windows. Evan was washing glasses
sounded artificial. I touched Evan’s arm with my hand. Everyone else was shouting to in the sink and we were sitting on the sofas feeling lightheaded.
put the lights back on. Evan’s face was very close to mine and I could feel him breathe.
You should go for it, Evan, really, Rob said.
His aftershave smelled slightly bitter along with the chlorine. At first we let our lips
touch sort of innocently and then we kissed. I felt weak and even a little faint. I could Evan didn’t look up from the sink, he was just pretending not to listen.
hear myself sighing pleasurably.
Is this the thing with Libby? I said.
I got back out of the pool just as the lights came on. I found a damp towel hanging up
on a hook and started to wring out my hair. Evan was still standing there in the water She was getting very handsy earlier, said Rob.
looking up at me and I laughed and said: What? He shook his head and said: Nothing,
Do you really want to go to college and still be a virgin? JP said.
what do you mean? That was good, I was glad he said that. Once my hair was dry I
went upstairs to someone’s bedroom and fell asleep until the morning. Give him some life advice, Miriam, said Rob.

I slipped out of the shoes I was wearing and pulled my feet up onto the sofa, with my
arms wrapped around my knees.
 Maybe he’s saving himself for someone he really loves, I said. I gave an amused, condescending type of laugh. It sounded very uncharacteristic but I
didn’t think Rob or JP would notice.
He coughed at that, though he didn’t look up from the sink.
Worried for my safety? I said.
I’ll fuck her if you don’t, Rob said.
Worried for his, said Rob. You’d make mincemeat out of him. Come on to fuck.
You do realize she’s sixteen, said Evan.
I sat up and slipped my shoes back on. We said goodbye to Evan and he thanked us
And you realize Miriam has a boyfriend, do you? Rob said. You’re not getting out
for coming. Outside the night was cool and humid and smelled of iodine. Our footsteps
of the friendzone on that one, trust me.
echoed off the trailer sidings, and JP lit a cigarette.
Evan and I finally looked at one another then. He was drying his hands on a tea-towel.
He does fancy you, Rob said.
Are you really a virgin? I said.
JP exhaled and then waved a hand through the cloud of smoke to disperse it, like it
He is, said Rob. was distracting him. I watched this process coldly.

But we didn’t look at Rob, we just looked at each other. Evan started to smile this He’ll get over it, I said. I wouldn’t worry.
bashful smile, like I was telling a joke at his expense but he still found it humorous.
I wouldn’t mind but he knows you’ve a boyfriend, JP said.
Why, are you into that? Evan said.
I sighed and took my phone from my pocket to indicate that the discussion was boring
JP swore loudly at this remark, while Rob started to laugh and slap his thigh. I put my me. Idly I found myself scrolling to Evan’s name and selecting Compose Text.

index finger in my mouth and sucked on it consolingly. JP wanted Evan to apologize. I

He gets hung up on these older girls, Rob said. Who couldn’t give a fuck if he lived
lay back on the sofa then and said I felt sleepy.
or died, usually.
Are you not coming to Milligan’s? said JP.
On my phone I tapped out the message: Are you still in the trailer or did you head
I’m too tired, I said. home?

How are you getting home so? he asked. Yeah, he has a type alright, said JP. Fuck me.

I’ll walk. Evan responded: I’m still here. As we walked along the seafront, near the street where
I would take a right turn and head back home, I closed my eyes briefly. My feet
Rob got up and put his jacket on. I closed my eyes and turned my face into the sofa sounded very sturdy and I heard the tide licking the sea wall. When I opened my eyes
cushions. again the darkness felt fuller and more physical. A satellite blinked green above the
lighthouse. I typed out: I’ll be back in two minutes. Then I hit send.
Come on then if you’re walking, JP said. We’re not leaving you here with Romeo.
I said goodbye to the others and turned to walk up the road to my house. I could even and not the same one that I had always been before. Afterwards we kissed and kissed
see the house appear in the distance, yellow like a false promise. Then I hopped over until we had to stop to breathe. Then I put my dress back on. Evan said thank you
the unpainted fencing and ran down the sand dune into the caravan park. My blood was before I left. I paused at the door and thought: I’ll pretend I didn’t hear him, and then
racing very quickly around my limbs, since usually I never hopped or ran or used my he’ll have to say it again. I waited for a second to see if I would really do it, but in the
body to accomplish tasks of any kind. All the trailers looked the same, the same boxy end I just left instead.
shape and toothless front-facing stare, but some were newer and had double glazing.
On my way home I felt the cold air wrap itself around me like a sheet. When I got back
Evan’s was one of the old ones.
my mother was still awake, she was in the kitchen.
I knocked on the mottled glass and saw his shape blooming behind it. He opened the
Were you swimming? she said. Cold night for it.
door and I went in. His skin was fair and slightly flushed. He said: Did you forget
something? I tried not to grin or do anything too insane. I just worked on taking off my No, I wasn’t.
scarf and saying: No, I didn’t. Then Evan swallowed, although I knew he didn’t mean
to. Oh? Your dress is inside out.

Are you really saving yourself for someone special? I said. I looked at the tag. The lights in the kitchen felt dizzyingly white and hygienic and I
wasn’t sure if my legs were shaking or not.
He looked at the carpeting intently, with a studious expression.
That’s, like, a stylish thing now, I said.
Not as such, I don’t think, he said.
She laughed. She was making herself a cup of tea.
Because I’ll take your virginity, if you want.
Clare was asking for you, she said.
He didn’t say anything at first and then eventually he looked at me. We stared at one
another for so long that I felt like he could crawl inside my eyes, into my head, as Tell her I said hi.
though it were a hollow tree.
She wanted to know how you were feeling. You could call her.
Yeah, he said. That sounds good.
I said: Sure thing, I’ll call her. But I didn’t. I went to bed and slept until noon.
There was one double bed in the trailer. The sheets were damp and gritty with sand. I
could tell Evan was nervous because he kept apologizing for irrelevant things. When he
put his hand under my dress I heard my own throat make this kind of sighing noise, as In London, Clare and I had bought tickets to go see a musical with some of her friends
if I wanted to swallow his entire body. I moved my mouth beside his ear and said: I from work. When it came time to leave the apartment I was still being sick in her
really want you. And he just said: Oh God, okay. bathroom. She said she thought it would be good for me to get some fresh air. Go meet
your friends, I said. Then I ran my second bath of the day and climbed inside. I felt
The sex actually didn’t last very long, but that was alright. When he was inside me I
felt so good that I pledged to be a different person for the rest of my life, a good person,
tired like a dead person might be tired, after living an entire life all the way through and my control. At one point JP made his way over to me, pressed a can into my hand and
finally getting to be dead. said something I couldn’t hear. Then he clapped me on the shoulder and left again.
When I could get away, I went out to the back garden and lit a cigarette. It was cool
Everyone knew I had been sick. Even Rob knew. He said it he’d heard it from
outside and I was alone.
someone, which meant he’d heard it from Val. Rob and I were alone on the beach when
he mentioned this, while JP and the others were in the water. About halfway through my cigarette the kitchen door opened and Evan came out. He
had already closed the door before he saw me, and then he seemed to hesitate. Oh, he
Isn’t that why you moved home? Rob said.
said. I didn’t know you were out here. He glanced back at the door. My body felt
Because I was sick? wound up very tightly. I wasn’t following you or anything, he said.

Yeah, you had one of these nervous breakdowns or something. Anyway, I won’t I didn’t think so, I said.

ask.
He nodded. The light from the kitchen door was mottled yellow and not terribly

Okay, don’t, I said. bright. Evan put his hands in his pockets and I dragged on my cigarette. Were you
leaving? I said.
He seemed a little cowed by this remark. He toyed with the drawstring of his
swimming shorts contemplatively and then sighed. Rob struck me as someone attuned I was going to, he said. He coughed and added: Are we okay?
to his own limitations, and fundamentally maybe even a decent person. JP was
I smiled, what I hoped was a brilliant smile. The idea of Evan trying to let me down
squeamish and shocked by everything. He left the room at any mention of my illness,
gently was amusing to me, maybe because it was really so painful that I had to repress
of the notion of mortality, or of blood or any other bodily fluids,.
the pain to even think about it. I think so, I said.

It’s a hard old life I suppose, Rob said.

He touched the back of his neck then like it hurt. He wasn’t looking at me. I realize I

Just don’t. probably did everything wrong last night, he said. I think I was nervous. But I hope I
didn’t do anything that hurt you, or whatever. Finally he looked up at me. His back was
No, I wasn’t. I won’t. to the door and I could only make out the dim shape of his face, two glints that took the
place of his eyes. My heart throbbed hard in my throat.

Oh no, I said. You didn’t do anything wrong. I had a nice time.

After what happened with Evan in the trailer, I had no plan. I didn’t hear from him the
next day and I knew Rob and JP would hassle me if I didn’t go out, so I went over to He looked at me and then, seeing that I was sincere, he started to smile. I could see his
Rob’s. He had a free house, it was noisy and very hot. I saw a lot of people I knew from teeth bluish-white. He looked away again.
school, and they all wanted to know what I was doing. I learned to say the word
‘nothing’ in a number of different voices. I felt like a stranger to myself, like I was no That’s a relief, he said. I thought I must have done something bad. Maybe I should have
longer living my life but instead being propelled through it by interesting forces beyond texted you afterwards or something? I didn’t really know what to do.
I laughed then, with a nervous energy. Are you asking me for relationship advice? I He let go of me to take his phone from his pocket. He had a bashful expression then,
said. but he was still smiling. With you I honestly don’t know what to expect, he said.

Kind of, he said. You know everything, so you’re the person to ask. After that we started to see each other almost every night. He told the others he was
seeing someone in Ballina, so they thought he was out of town when really we were
I glanced at the door but there was no one watching. Quickly I reached to touch his
sleeping in his parents’ trailer. Sometimes we watched films together in bed, or
hand and he felt for my wrist with his fingertips. A strange weakness came over me.
discussed what we thought was the worst feature of JP’s personality. Evan thought it
You know I have a boyfriend, I said. was the high sensitivity to perceived slights, but I said it was moral cowardice.
Eventually Evan agreed. He tended to think I was right about everything. Sometimes he
Yeah, I know, said Evan. But that’s not really my business, I don’t think. I mean, I called me during the day to ask my views on various issues.
trust you to make your own decisions and all that.
In bed Evan was very devoted and unselfish. After he made me come he liked to look
That’s very thoughtful. up at me with an inquiring expression as if to say, Was that okay? To me his body felt
impossibly lean and compact, like a tuned instrument. I wanted to know how badly he
Well, not to brag, but I do think about things a lot.
wanted me. I even asked him to tell me once, and he kind of shrugged and acted
I smiled. He was still touching my wrist, and he watched me as if to study what effect embarrassed for a while and then said he couldn’t look at my mouth when we were
his touch was having. around other people because he liked it too much. Looking at my mouth makes you
hard? I said. He covered his face and said: Yeah, a little bit. I don’t know. I bit his arm
Will you be around later? I said. and then said: That’s good. Now say it again.

Yeah. Why, do you want to meet up? I felt differently about myself when I was with Evan. In bed Val liked to pinch the
spongiest parts of my torso and say, What about that gym membership? He claimed he
Will there be anyone in the trailer?
was joking but I knew he wasn’t. It made me defensive. In return I told outlandish lies
He looked down at my wrist, silvery-white in the darkness. No, he said. Except for like: The doctor says I’m actually underweight. With Evan I didn’t need to defend
you and me, obviously. That made me laugh. He smiled then, pleased that I was myself. I told him that I sometimes cried over the weird shape of my body, and he
laughing. nodded and frowned at the time and then the next morning wrote me four long
successive text messages about how pretty I was. He was like that.
I’ll come over after this, I said. I guess we should avoid leaving together.
Once I asked him: Do you like me? The question just came out. It didn’t even sound
Yeah. And I should probably change your name in my phone, should I? In case sarcastic. I was stunned by the sound of my own voice saying it. We were lying in bed
anyone sees it, you know. in the trailer, with the damp green curtains pulled shut although it was daylight outside,
and I could feel Evan’s breath on my lips. Yes, he said. I turned over onto my back and
What kind of messages are you expecting?
looked up at the frill of light on the plastic ceiling board.
 Everyone already knows that anyway, I said. Then Val swallowed.

Yeah. But I like you more than they think I do. He has a little crush on you, does he Miriam? said Val.

Our hands touched under the blanket. I thought of him as a creature then, a sweet little I don’t think so, I said.
antelope, and I pictured him gambolling off far away from me. In a moment of
Evan turned and saw us then. I looked out of a window and felt my shoulders contract
wildness I lifted his hand out from under the blanket and kissed it very hard, thinking:
while Rob waved him over and slapped an empty seat. Sit yourself down, son, Rob
Don’t go, don’t go, don’t go.
said. Evan sat down and no one else spoke for a moment. I almost had to shut my eyes
to avoid looking at him. Then JP said: You know Val, don’t you?

Val finally came down to visit for a weekend in August. We went for drinks together in No, Evan said. I don’t think we’ve met.
Milligan’s, and JP was beaming and laughing at everything Val said. I sipped a gin and
I felt myself starting to freeze up. Rob grinned and shook his head.
tonic through a straw and then fished out the piece of lime to chew on it. I thought I
probably had some vitamin deficiencies, since I got these blisters inside my mouth all Val Dolan, Rob said. Val, this is JP’s cousin Evan.
the time and my muscles were very weak. Eventually Val told me it was ‘sick’ to chew
on a lime so I put it back in my drink, and JP laughed as if it was Christmas and Yeah, I’ve heard of you, said Val.
everyone was happy.
Oh really? Evan said.
Then Rob pointed at the bar and said: There’s your little spaniel, Miriam. It was Evan.
Val looked at JP and JP returned an apologetic grimace. Val took another drink and
He was wearing a denim jacket and tennis shoes. I felt a prickle of sweat under my
then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He was smiling.
arms.
Yeah, he said. I heard you have a little crush on my girlfriend here. Is that true?
Who? said Val.
I looked at the piece of lime in my glass. It had teeth marks on it.
My cousin Evan, said JP. He’s just finished the Leaving.
Oh, are you Miriam’s boyfriend? Evan said. No, I don’t really get crushes.
But what was that about him being a spaniel? Val said.
You don’t like her? Val said.
Oh, he just likes to follow Miriam around making sad eyes, said Rob. You know.
Dog stuff. He’s in love with her. I like her, we’re friends, said Evan.

Not really, I said. Why, you don’t think she’s attractive? Val said.

Val took a mouthful from his pint and observed Evan from across the room. I followed Val was grinning with barely-suppressed laughter, like his own joke was the funniest
his eyes. The inside of Evan’s mouth haunted me, like the prospect of material wealth. thing he had ever heard. I breathed very deeply into my chest then. I had read
somewhere that if you breathed the right way, your ribs weren’t supposed to move at The house was dark and empty. I walked around the kitchen touching things: items of
all, and only your stomach would swell out, like a balloon. I tried to achieve this effect furniture, the knife block, a fridge magnet saying ‘Beautiful Lisbon’. I touched the soft,
while Evan and Val looked at each other. greasy plastic of the phone keypad and watched a car go by outside like a ghost. It’s not
supposed to hurt, I thought. It was never supposed to hurt.
Well, she has a boyfriend, Evan said. And everything. Obviously.

Val laughed at that. He laughed and nodded like, okay. He picked up his glass and
Evan tried unsuccessfully to make eye contact with every other person at the table in After Val left on Sunday, I went to meet Evan in the caravan. It was still light outside
turn. I felt his gaze moving around like hot light which I had to avoid or I would die. but getting darker, and I felt a mild fever, as if I was coming down with something.
Then I got up to go to the bathroom. Evan sat on the edge of the bed while I looked into the mirror and unbuttoned my
blouse. I could see his eyes behind me, large and innocent like fish.
There was no one else in the ladies’ so I ran the tap and splashed cold water under my
arms. I knew that Evan had just finished school and I was a grown woman with a So I have to ask someone to go to this Debs thing with me, he said.
Master’s degree in Classical Civilisations. I was old enough to be Evan’s teacher. In
I didn’t say anything. I ran my thumb over the next button of my blouse, a small flat
only slightly different circumstances they would put low-resolution photographs of me
mother-of-pearl button that felt rough to my skin. I’d forgotten that he would have to go
on the news and people would call me depraved.
to the Debs. He’d never mentioned it, he’d never mentioned looking for a suit or
When I got back upstairs, Evan was gone and JP had his hands in his lap like he was anything.
saying penance or sending an invisible text message. Finally Val swallowed the last of
And I guess I’ll ask Libby, he said. Because I don’t know that many girls, and I
his pint and said: Let’s call it a night, shall we?
know she wants to come. Is that okay?
Val was staying in my house for the weekend. When we went to bed that night he rolled
Why shouldn’t it be?
over on top of me and said: You’ve been very quiet. He was resting his weight on his
left elbow, which was tugging hard on a lock of my hair, although I didn’t mention that. He shrugged and placed the edge of a thumbnail into his mouth. He was still watching
I said: Have I? His breath smelled yeasty and alcoholic. I had largely stopped drinking me. I slipped the blouse off my shoulders.
alcohol by then and found the scent sickly. Also his body felt too heavy for me.
Are you going to fuck her? I said.
After we had sex he told me I needed to relax. He sounded exasperated. In fact I was in
some pain, so I just lay there trying to locate the exact source of the pain inside my What? Jesus Christ. No. Why would you ask that?
body while he talked. He said I was ‘really tense’ and I apologized. There was some
I could see peripherally that his expression was both hurt and accusatory, but I was
silence then, and though it was obvious that he was irritated, I did nothing further to
looking at the bra strap on my right shoulder.
soothe his irritation, which usually I would have. I said I was going to the bathroom,
and I put my dressing-gown on and padded downstairs. You can if you want to, I said.

I think it would be illegal. But I also don’t think of her in that way, at all.
 I didn’t answer. I reached my hands behind my neck and drew apart the clasp of my Are you in love with me? I said.
necklace. In the mirror I could see my own face round and cold like a letter in an
For a moment longer we continued to look at one another and then I thought: No, I
alphabet.
can’t. I started glancing hysterically around the room instead, and then down at my own
I won’t ask her if you don’t want me to, okay? he said. I won’t even go, I don’t hands, where the necklace lay in my palm like a dead thing.
really want to anyway.
I don’t know, he said.
I don’t care what you do, Evan.
He pronounced this sentence as if it had a question mark at the end, as if what he was
Well, alright. But I kind of want you to care. really doing was guessing what I wanted him to say.

With the necklace loose in my hand, I turned around and looked down at him. I was It’s a stupid question, I said. Forget I asked it.
near enough to the end of the bed that he could reach forward and touch me, but he
I felt cold then, and shivered. I picked my blouse up from the back of the chair and
didn’t. We just looked at one another.
started to put my hands through the sleeves, holding the necklace so tightly in my fist
You know in April this year I found out I was pregnant, I said. that it hurt me. I felt very ashamed.

He stared up at me and said nothing. He had a canine kind of expression, like a desire Are you going? he said.
to trust, but also an uncertainty, as if maybe I was testing him.
I think I should.
I never told Val about it, I said. I told him I was going to visit my sister in London.
Oh, okay, he said. And he swallowed.
Evan nodded, a slow and very small nod.
It’s just that sometimes you’re not that nice to me, he said.
Do you think that makes me a bad person? I said.
I finished getting dressed and then slammed the door shut on my way out.
Obviously not. You know about my views on this.
Outside the air smelled of salt and wet dune grass. I closed the trailer door behind me
I mean the fact that I didn’t tell him. and walked down the steps with my legs trembling. Then I put my forehead against the
cool corrugated plastic of the trailer wall and felt my breath returning against my lips. I
I could see Evan’s gaze moving from my right eye to my left, as if he was trying to
breathed in and out like that again and again, absorbing everything back into myself
find something hidden inside me that would answer this question.
until I felt dizzy and my face was streaming wet.
Why did you decide not to tell him? he said.
Back in April, Clare had driven me to the airport herself, in her own car. It rained and
I don’t know. we were stuck in traffic. I told her I felt empty and she said that since childhood I had
always looked for external factors to validate my pre-existing feelings of emptiness.
Well, I think you had good reasons, even if you don’t know exactly what they are. But it’s okay to feel empty, she told me. I guess I would have been the the world’s
worst mother anyway, I said. And Clare looked out the windscreen and switched the
wipers on and said: What you’re feeling is okay.

To read the rest of Dublin Review 63, you may purchase the issue here.