The First Time I Said Goodbye (26 page)

I stood for a moment, trying to ground myself, my head still swimming slightly from the wine and beer. I tried to imagine my mother – just twenty – running down this street to her work. I tried to imagine her opening one of these doors and climbing the stairs to see Ray and I tried to imagine what it must have been like for her on that last night.

I couldn’t speak. I could barely think. I just stood there and allowed myself to feel for a bit.

I was conscious of Sam on one side of me and Niamh on the other and, when I had stood for a while and started shivering, we left and went home.

The party was continuing in its own way in the living room but I climbed into bed and lifted my phone. It was a cowardly way to do things, I know. But I didn’t want any drama – not any more. And, I supposed, I didn’t want to hear him reply that it was okay, he didn’t mind either.

I’m sorry,
I punched in,
but it’s over.

Chapter 22

I have to let go. Not because I want to – but because I can’t make you forgive me.

Derry, January 1960

If Ray had known that he would not see her again, that he would not kiss her again, that he would not feel her skin against his again, he would not have let her leave the flat. He would have begged her to stay. He would have risked the wrath of his superior officers and whatever they could throw at him to get just a few more minutes with the woman who had stolen his heart. But he believed, just as Stella believed, that they would be together again in a number of weeks. It was, he told himself, the only way he could bear to be parted from her. He was angry at himself, as they left Derry and began the long journey home, that he could find no joy whatsoever in returning to his native America. Not even the thought of his mother’s home cooking could comfort him as they travelled away from Derry. He felt as lost as he had ever done and he started to count down until the moment he would see her again.

* * *

Derry, February 1960

The news of Molly Davidson’s return from America came as quite a shock. It wasn’t more than months since she had left and, once word reached the factory floor that she was returning to her family, it quickly became the main topic of conversation. Stella, although curious about Molly’s return, was also a little relieved. She herself had been the main fodder for the gossips since Ray had shipped out. There were those who chose to believe that she had been jilted – that there had never been a wedding planned in the first place. There were others who, while accepting her version of events, adopted the pose of the doom-monger, telling her that out of sight meant out of mind and sure wouldn’t everything be different when he was back in America with the local women throwing themselves at him? “I don’t mean to worry you,” Meg, a stitcher, had said, “but I’ve heard it a hundred times. Sure their heads get turned as soon as they are back among their own.” Stella had just shrugged, put her hand to the brooch she wore every day and willed them to be wrong. Ray was different, she was sure of that. Theirs was not some silly romance – it was true love. It rivalled anything she had seen in the movies and what would the girls from the factory floor know anyway?

“They’re jealous and that’s an end to it,” Dolores said as they walked home from the factory. “There are people in this world who can’t bear to see others happy when they themselves are not.”

“You don’t think they might be right? That he might forget me?”

Dolores laughed. “He couldn’t if he tried. Sister, dear, you have to put these worries to one side. This is just a blip and sure you will have your big romantic reunion and this will be a story you tell your grandchildren in years to come.”

Stella hoped her sister was right but, if she was honest with herself, with every day that passed and with every moment they were apart she wondered just a little if it had been real? Had her head been turned? She willed that her paperwork would sort itself out, that the call would come from the States and that she would be able to go.

But at the same time, she dreaded it as well. That big goodbye.

Linking arms, the sisters walked back to their house where they could hear their mother setting about making the dinner while the younger boys ran in and out the front door, leaving it wide to the world.

“They’ll catch their deaths,” Kathleen muttered as she popped another potato into the pot and dried her hands off on her apron.

Stella took her coat off and hung it up, kicked off her shoes and put on her slippers. She then put on her apron and set about helping her mother lay the table for dinner. It was a small table, and really they didn’t all fit around it, especially now that the older boys were grown men, but nonetheless Kathleen Hegarty would insist they sat down together every night – all six children, herself and Ernest – and ate their evening meal together.

The Hegarty household worked well because it ran like clockwork. Then again it needed to. Ernest would have to be at the docks first thing to see if there was any work in for the day. The older boys had taken to joining him, but there wasn’t much going, especially not for the boys who were not known to the port officials. More often than not Peter and James would slink back home where they would spend their days doing odd jobs for the neighbours or trying to get a lead on whatever job they could. There wasn’t much labouring going then, either, and any decent jobs, it seemed, were sewn up. So more often than not Kathleen Hegarty would find herself with two, fed-up, grown men under her feet for the morning until the two youngest came back from school. Then she had four boys to keep in line. Despite whatever money Ernest could make at the docks, and whatever Dolores and Stella could put into the house, times were tough.

Stella noticed as she set the table how some of the crockery was looking past its best – a crack here and a chip there. She vowed to save up to buy a new set – and quickly remembered she wouldn’t be here to save up. She would be a million miles away, worrying about a new set of her own. The thought almost winded her until Dolores nudged her firmly in the ribs.

“Get a wiggle on there, Dolly Daydream. There’s work to be done. And I want to get out of here early tonight. The Corinthian waits for no woman. Why don’t you come along? Shake that sad face right off.”

Stella shook her head. “I don’t think so. It wouldn’t be right and besides I’m really not in form for it.”

“You can’t hide yourself under a rock until the call or letter comes from America, you know. You’ll be away from us all soon enough. Get out and enjoy yourself.”

Dolores was teasing. Stella knew that but still she felt herself bristle. What company would she be, out and about with a sour face on, watching courting couples on the dance floor while she nursed a cordial and missed Ray?

“Maybe you should go out, love,” Kathleen said softly. “It might do you good.”

“I’m grand, Mammy, honest. Actually I thought I might go and call on Molly later. See how she is? Must be terrible for her to have to come back from America. I wonder what happened?”

Stella watched the expression on her mother’s face change and darken slightly. “I’d say she’s tired from the journey, pet. Best give her a day or two to settle.”

Stella nodded and continued pouring a pitcher of water. Any second now the front door would rattle and Ernest would come through it and the kitchen would fill with four hungry boys all ready for whatever Kathleen had prepared for them. Tonight it was spuds and cabbage, with some bacon cooked for Ernest who had been out working all day. The girls, though they had been working too, would eat the same as the rest. That was simply the way it was and while the smell of the bacon made her mouth water, Stella never thought to question it. She knew there were nights they were lucky to have a cooked dinner on the table at all.

“So you’ve no excuse not to go to the Corinthian then,” Dolores said.

“Dolores, please! I’ll just stay in with Mammy and Daddy. Leave me be.” Stella knew she was snapping but she didn’t want to go and her sister’s pestering was starting to make her short-tempered.

“Okay,” Dolores said, backing off. “But I would have thought you’d have liked the chance to let your hair down a little. You’ve been so miserable lately.”

“You would be miserable too if you were me,” Stella replied, her temper flaring.

“Girls! Now enough or I’ll knock your heads together! Your father will be home any minute after a long, hard day and the last thing I want him coming home to is the pair of you bickering like children. Dolores, your sister says she doesn’t want to go, so leave it and that’s that. And Stella, your sister is only trying to get you to come out of yourself a little, so try to keep calm. Honest to goodness, as if I didn’t have enough on my plate with the younger boys to have to step in between the pair of you – grown women and all!”

Stella blushed and felt embarrassed. It wasn’t often she got a dressing-down from her mother and, feeling suitably chastised, she apologised immediately and offered to go and make sure the younger boys had washed up before dinner.

“You need to check on those older boys too!” Kathleen called as she left the kitchen. “They’re likely to be muckier than the wains.”

* * *

Dolores had skipped out of the house – a smile on her face, her hair curled and set and a new dress on her back. Stella had, she had to admit after all, felt a little jealous to see her run out – so carefree. But nonetheless, she had known the moment she had met Ray that things wouldn’t be the same again and if that meant, in this instance, sitting in with her parents instead of dancing the night away she was happy to do so. She put the two younger boys to bed. Michael shrunk from her grasp as she tried to hug him while Seán held on tightly and begged to sleep in her bed that night.

“Are you really going away, Smella?” he asked, his eyes bright.

“Yes, pet, I am.”

“And I’ll only have one sister then,” he said sadly, his face dropping.

“You’ll always have two sisters, Seán. You don’t get rid of me just because you can’t see me. I’m still your big sister and always will be.”

He held on extra tight and she felt herself holding him a little tighter too.

Back downstairs, her mother stoked the fire while her father snoozed in his chair. It had been a backbreaking day at the docks, he had said when he got home and he was exhausted – but not too exhausted to polish off his bacon and cabbage. But now, after a bath, he was fit for nothing but sitting with his eyes half closed while Kathleen did her knitting in the corner. Stella imagined for many twenty-year-olds this would be their idea of hell but she took it all in and tried to capture the simple images before her in her memory.

As she made them all a cup of a tea, she started when she heard a rap on the door. It wasn’t often they had visitors at this time of night and she had been planning to make for her bed as soon as she had drunk her tea. Opening the door she saw Mrs Murphy, almost fit to burst, on the doorstep.

“I had to come, pet,” she said, pushing past Stella and into the hall – her coat already half off before Stella had the chance to say hello. “I had to tell you . . .”

“Mrs Murphy,” Stella said, “do come in.”

“Is your mammy here, doll? She should hear this too? And your daddy.”

Stella turned to see Kathleen walk out of the scullery to see what the commotion was.

“Ah, Kathleen. Grand, so you are here. Is Ernest here too?”

“He’s having a wee sleep. Eileen, what on earth is this about?”

Mrs Murphy took a deep breath and nodded towards the kitchen. “If you’ve a pot of tea on I could tell you over that. And some biscuits if you have them.”

“Stella, would you put a cup out for Mrs Murphy?” Kathleen said, shooing the gossipy neighbour into the kitchen.

Stella dutifully did just as her mother asked, loading the cup with sugar just the way Mrs Murphy liked it.

“Well, you know me,” Mrs Murphy started, “not one to gossip and all – but seeing as Stella here finds herself in a similar situation I thought it was my duty to tell you.”

Stella felt her heart beat faster. Was there something wrong with Ray? No, she told herself, that couldn’t be it. Sure what would Mrs Murphy know about Ray? She mustn’t let her mind run on with itself. She sat down and lifted her own teacup, her hands shaking slightly, and sipped gingerly from her tea.

“That poor girl,” Mrs Murphy continued, a glint of something – perhaps enjoyment at having some juicy gossip to share – in her eye. “Poor Molly.”

Kathleen Hegarty bristled at the name – it was slight but enough for Stella to notice from across the table. “I don’t think we need to be worrying about Molly Davidson,” she said and Stella knew that whatever it was that Mrs Murphy was about to impart with such glee from across the table, her mother already knew.

“But of course we do,” the older woman said. “You can’t have your Stella here running off to the States not knowing what she might be landing herself into. It would be remiss of me not to tell you,” she said, turning to look at Stella directly.

“Eileen, please,” Kathleen said, but her protestations went unnoticed.

“Stella, you see these men – all stories about love and romance and how great it is going to be. Well, Molly Davidson would tell you different. There she was all the way over there and then . . .” At this Mrs Murphy blessed herself and looked up to heaven while all Stella could do was wish she would spit it out. “It was all lies. All lies.”