‘J, wait,’ Ali calls after her as Jamie walks into the kitchen. ‘I’d better go after her, check if she’s OK.’ She gets down from the trampoline, yanking her dress down her thighs. I turn to Maggie, reaching my hands out to her instead, but she points at my chest. I look down, and the top of my dress has fallen out of place, exposing my boobs. I laugh, expecting her to join in, but she’s staring at Eli. She picks up her red cup on her way back into the kitchen and throws whatever is left in it down her throat, ignoring Eli’s protests that he ‘wasn’t looking, not really’.
Was Eli looking? (I want him to have been looking.)
I lie on the trampoline, staring up at the sky. I visited my aunt Beth in London last summer, and at night-time we sat in the tiny honeysuckled garden of her Hammersmith townhouse, eating salads that she had picked up at Whole Foods Market, drinking glasses of Pimms, and all I could think about was that you couldn’t see the stars, blurred behind smog clouds and the glare of city lights.
You can have all of this
, Beth told me.
It’ll be easy for you, with the way you look. And you can hold a conversation too, which always helps. The world is your oyster, Emmie. But you need to leave Ballinatoom, you need to get out of there like I did. Is that really all you want for your life?
London. The echoing bang-bang as her neighbours stomped up their wooden staircases, the heat rising from the concrete, the sweat-stained armpits on the tube, the grubby beggar who touched my feet and asked for spare change, the constant requests to repeat myself because my accent was too thick, the eyes that skimmed over my skinny jeans and ballet pumps. ‘How did you get on?’ Ali asked me when I got home. ‘Was it amazing?’ Maggie said. And I told them about Beth’s shabby-chic home, the forest-green wallpaper and velvet couch, the Union Jack cushions, and her Proenza Schouler bag, her daily Bikram yoga classes, and her office with a view of Big Ben, and the shopping spree she treated me to at Topshop. I told them I loved it. I told them it was the best week of my life.
Is it possible to want everything to change and nothing to change, all at the same time?
I close my eyes, the wobbles undulating in waves through me, swirling in my throat and filling my eyes and my brain, making everything go soft. I can hear the patio door swish open, then close again, the sound of footsteps, an exhaled breath as someone drags their body on to the trampoline, the material sagging as they lie down next to me.
‘Are you asleep?’
It’s Conor.
I wait for a few moments before answering. ‘No.’ I open one eye, and he’s on his side, watching me.
‘I need another drink,’ I say, trying to sit up, but he stops me, placing one hand on my shoulder.
‘Wait. That shit is strong, Emmie. Just give it some time before your next one. Unless you want a repeat of what happened at Dylan’s.’
‘Shut up.’
‘You were such a mess.’ He shakes his head.
‘Sound out for bringing me home.’
I never thanked him properly.
‘No problem. Of course it took longer than I had expected, what with you refusing to get off the footpath on to the road because it wasn’t a road, it was a black lagoon.’
‘Stop it.’
‘A black lagoon with sharks in it.’
‘Those trips were strong,’ I protest, but I lie back down.
I had woken up the next day in his single bed, Conor asleep on the ground next to me. I looked around his neat, clean bedroom for something I couldn’t even name. A photograph of the two of us from when we were kids, maybe? Whatever it was I was searching for, it wasn’t there. I pushed back the duvet cover as quietly as I could and tiptoed out of his room without saying goodbye.
We lie in silence for a few moments. I curl my legs into my stomach, running my hands down the smooth skin of my shins, and he reaches out, and very, very gently touches my little finger with his, his arm pressing against mine. He drops his hand slowly, barely touching the side of my waist, and for some reason I don’t move away. I turn my head towards him, and he does the same. His eyes darken, his fingers pressing into my skin as he starts to make circles at my waist, agonizingly slow. I wonder, just for a second, what it would be like to pull that T-shirt over his head and to kiss him, to see what that would do to him. His fingers drop a little lower, they’re on my hip bone now and my breath turns jagged.
‘I must get another drink.’ I clamber off the trampoline and walk away without looking back.
*
‘Would you mind bringing us to the front door?’ Ali asks as Fitzy stops the car at the bottom of the drive up to the Caseys’ farmhouse.
‘Sorry, Ali,’ he exhales, the breath coming out of his nose, halfway between a snort and a sigh. ‘But I’d never get out of that mess.’ He points at the haphazard queue of cars.
The windows of the house are rattling, as if the music is beating against the glass. There is a group of people outside the front door, red pinpricks of cigarette ends burning in the dark. The air is heavy with the smell of cow shit. Ali and I struggle to walk over the cattle grid, our heels getting stuck in the gaps between the metal bars, Maggie and Jamie looking on and laughing with the boys. Conor is the only one who comes back to help, wrapping his arm around my waist and lifting me on to the concrete at the other side.
‘Thanks,’ I say as he places me down. He turns back to help Ali, but she’s managed to make it across.
‘Oh, Ali,’ I say, pointing at her feet. ‘Your shoes.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Ali says, bending down to wipe the dirt off them.
They probably cost five hundred euros, and it doesn’t matter that they’re ruined after one wear. I smile tightly at her.
Outside the back door there’s a small outhouse, overalls hanging off hooks on the concrete wall, a row of mucky wellies lined up underneath. We open the back door and walk into a poky kitchen. The door to the living room is closed, as is the window, and the small room is foggy with sweet-smelling smoke.
‘Shit.’ Maggie coughs, waving her hand in front of her face as she drags Eli into the living room, the others following.
‘For fuck’s sake.’ A pallid-faced guy whose name I can never remember steps in front of me to shut the door behind them.
‘Blowback?’ He (Oisin? Eddie?) asks, waving a joint at me.
I nod and he turns the joint around in his mouth and carefully places it between his lips, waiting until I come closer, opening my mouth to suck in the smoke. I hold it in for a few seconds, then breathe it out, clouds rushing through my brain as I try not to cough.
In the living room, the main lights are switched off, a couple of small lamps on, some boys gathered around an iPod docking station hooked up to a boom box. They seem to be arguing with a stumbling girl, their mouths moving, but I can’t hear them over the music. All the furniture has been pushed out to the edges of the room, and there are couples on the chairs and a large three-seater sofa, grinding up on each other. Three girls in tight bandage dresses are in the empty space in the middle, their arms flailing as they dance. Fitzy, Ali, Jamie, Maggie and Eli are standing by a table covered in a hand-crocheted tablecloth, now destroyed with beer stains and fag burns. Maggie is pouring what’s left in the 7 Up bottle into chipped enamel mugs, Eli passing cans of beer to Fitzy and Conor.
‘Emmie, do you want a—’ Conor starts, but the door to the hall crashes open, hitting him on the back.
‘Shit, sorry, man,’ Dylan says, giving him a punch on the shoulder. ‘I didn’t know you were there.’ Then he sees her and his face lights up. ‘Hey, Jamie, how are you?’ He sidles up to her. Her fingers tighten around the enamel mug and she gulps her drink back, staring away from him.
‘Jamie,’ he tries again. ‘Did you hear me? How are things?’
‘Dylan.’ It’s Julie Clancy, Sarah Swallows hovering behind her. She’s wearing heavy eyeliner, multiple piercings in her ears, nose and eyebrow. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Nothing,’ he replies, stepping away from Jamie. ‘Just talking.’
‘To that slut?’ Julie squares up to her, prodding Jamie’s collarbone with her finger. ‘What is your problem? It’s not enough that you fucked my boyfriend once – now you want to do it again?’
‘Jules,’ Dylan warns her. ‘Come on, be cool. I said—’
‘As if I would sleep with him.
As if
,’ Jamie says.
‘Oh, please.’ Dylan narrows his eyes at her. ‘You loved it.’
Eli laughs, shutting up when Maggie glares at him. Julie swallows a sob and rushes across the room, falling to her knees to search under an armchair, ignoring the yelps of protest from the couple she’s disturbing. Unearthing her bag and coat, she runs through the door to the kitchen, Sarah Swallows calling after her, the two of them engulfed by smoke before the door closes again.
‘Dylan, come on,’ Conor says. ‘How is she going to get home?’
‘She has her car.’
‘She can’t drive – you saw the state she was in.’
Dylan looks like he might go after her, then he just shrugs. ‘Whatever. It’s not my problem.’
Ali wraps an arm around Jamie’s waist, squeezing it, whispering into her ear. (I need to get away from this. From her.)
In the hall there is a small wooden table and chair, a plug-in house phone, notepad and pen, and the pieces of a broken vase on top. To the left a staircase goes upstairs, the front door leading to the garden is on the right, and a short narrow corridor straight ahead, with two doors on either side, photos and ugly oil paintings in gilt frames hanging on the walls.
‘There you are.’ Sean emerges from the TV room opposite the bathroom.
‘Hey, you,’ I say, as if he was the very person I’d been looking for. ‘Did you know there’s a broken vase in your hall?’
He groans. ‘Mam is going to kill me. I told Laura to—’
‘Laura’s here?’
He slouches against the wall next to a photograph of him and Jen in the bath together. I press my lips together to stop myself from smiling, but he follows my gaze, his face turning red when he sees what I’m looking at. ‘I told her she could stay for the party if she kept her mouth shut and didn’t tell the parents about it,’ he says, moving to block the photo, ‘and then she invited some of her friends . . .’ He pushes himself off the wall. ‘Sorry. I know it’s not cool, having your fifteen-year-old sister at a party, but—’
‘Casey.’ Matt Reynolds falls out of the TV room. He’s covered in a film of sweat, a few whiskers of hair glistening on his upper lip. I peer past him to see if Jack Dineen is in there, but all I can see are the backs of three boys, none of them Jack, watching another two lads playing Grand Theft Auto. Where is he? It’s going to be such a waste of this outfit if he doesn’t show; I won’t be able to wear it again for ages because everyone here will have seen it. Matt pulls up his top to wipe his face, and I almost heave when I see his doughy tummy.
‘Are you apologizing for your sister?’ Matt shakes his head. ‘Don’t apologize. She’s fucking hot. And her friend . . .’ He tries to focus his eyes. ‘Not the fat one, the other one, the little one.’ He holds his hand out to about three feet tall.
‘Mia,’ Sean supplies.
‘Mia!’ Matt starts chanting, ‘Mia, Mia, Mia
. . .
’ breaking away from Sean to throw his hands in the air. ‘She’s a fucking ride.’ Sean looks at me, and I don’t want to seem boring so I smile to show that I’m cool.
‘Anyway,’ I say, once Matt has staggered off into the kitchen to get another drink, ‘who else from the football team is here tonight?’
‘I don’t know.’ Sean pulls me towards him. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Sorry, Sean.’ I gently push him away. ‘I have to go find the girls.’
‘Where have you been?’ Maggie leans back to grab a beer from the case behind her and hands it to me. She’s still perched on the edge of the table, her legs wrapped around Eli, who is standing with his back to her. Fitzy, Jamie and Ali are dancing in the middle of the room.
‘Shit, J is wasted,’ I say as I watch her fall down, clutching at Fitzy, who drags her back up to standing. I haven’t seen her this drunk since . . . Well, it’s been a long time.
‘Hey,’ I say. Maggie is resting her head on Eli’s shoulder, one arm wrapped around his chest as he runs his fingers up and down her forearm. ‘Where’s Conor?’
‘He’s chatting up Mia Deasy.’ Maggie points to where the iPod station is and I have to squint to see in the darkness. Laura Casey, Jen and Sean’s youngest sister, is talking to a chubby girl with frizzy red hair, the two of them sipping their beers self-consciously. Conor has to lean down to talk to Mia, tiny even in high heels, her oversized eyelashes and round eyes making her look like a human Bratz doll.
Conor throws his head back as if she’s said something really funny, and my stomach clenches. I reach behind Maggie and grab another can of beer. ‘I’m going to give this to Conor. I think he’s all out.
‘Hey,’ I say, resting my hand on the small of Conor’s back and handing him the can. ‘I thought you might need a top-up.
‘Mia.’ I brush against Conor’s chest as I lean over to give her a kiss on the cheek. ‘How are you? I’ve been meaning to talk to you for ages. How’s first year going? Are you settling in to the convent?’
‘I’m in third year,’ Mia says quickly when Conor almost spits out his beer in shock. ‘I’m in the same year as Laura. I’m nearly sixteen.’
‘Sorry. It’s because you’re so tiny, I guess. It’s adorable. You’re like a child.’ I try not to smile as Conor shifts away from her. ‘I’m jealous.’
‘Oh my God, why would you be jealous of me?’ Mia’s eyes widen. ‘You’re gorgeous. And I love your outfit.’
‘Oh, thanks,’ I say. ‘I wasn’t sure of it earlier. Come on, Conor, your honest opinion – what do you think of this dress?’
‘Dress? Is that what they’re calling T-shirts these days?’
‘Stop it!’ I swat him on the arm. ‘You sound like Bryan. He told me it looked slutty.’
‘Your brother Bryan?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Bryan has never met an FHM poster he didn’t like.’
‘Exactly!’ I say. I move in front of Mia and hold his gaze. ‘See, I knew you would get it. Do you remember when Mam found all that porn on his computer and wanted to know what BBW stood for?’