Forbidden Fruit (42 page)

He feared meeting Peter and having his heart broken again. By then, Peter was adorable and speaking really well, so Eamonn’s
fears were justified.

I used to go to newsstands and thumb through the Irish press for word of him. In the late summer, I opened up a paper and
there was his lovely face. How, I thought, can he look so young and happy? He had been appointed Bishop of Galway. A long
article spoke of him as the most dynamic and charismatic bishop in Ireland. It was strange reading an outsider’s view of the
man I knew so intimately. The writer told how the Kerry people admired his warmth and good humor and were sorry to see him
go. It detailed his fund-raising ventures and arduous trips to the Third World. He was fulfilling his ambition to be the Pope
of the Poor.

The article included extracts from Eamonn’s latest pastoral letter to the faithful in which he encouraged a more Christian
attitude toward unmarried mothers. He appealed to parents to help any daughter who wished to keep her child. He said:

We once allowed our justifiable attitude of disappointment and disapproval towards the circumstances in which new life was
conceived to affect our attitude towards the mother and child, sometimes to the point of rejection…. Because of our natural
concern for the right moral standards, we often have not cherished these children, and in so far as we did not we were wrong
.

One day, Peter was playing with a little girl who accidentally pushed him against a wall. He suffered a bad cut between his
eyes. He had never been injured before and, seeing all the blood, I thought at first he had lost an eye. The hospital put
in four stitches. There was no permanent damage, they said. A couple of weeks later, however, he lost his sense of balance
and started falling. A neurologist tested him for a blood clot, and before the results came through, I called Eamonn at Inch.

“The facilities in London,” he assured me, “are the best in the world.”

I thought he might offer to come and see his son, but he didn’t. Was he serious about cherishing children born out of wedlock?

Two weeks passed and he still did not call to ask about his son’s health. With Eamonn, words were still only words.

I knew from the newspaper article that he was busy with preparations for his Enthronement on September 19, 1976, as Bishop
of Galway. His acceptance of a new diocese and his disinterest in Peter were final proof that he had cut himself off from
us forever.

I was tempted to take Peter with his bandaged head to Galway and introduce him to the crowds who had come to witness their
bishop’s investiture. I was in a black mood when, at about eight, the night before his Enthronement, from the house of Bridget’s
mother, Mrs. Randall, I telephoned the
Irish Times
in Dublin.

My call was taken by the night desk.

“Can I help you, ma’am?”

“No, but you might be able to help the people of Galway.”

“In what way, please?” He sounded young and earnest.

“I would like to wish Bishop Casey all the best for his Enthronement in Galway. His two-year-old son also sends his best wishes.”

“Thank you,” the reporter said, in a tired voice.

“And here is Peter himself.”

I put the mouthpiece to his lips. “Hi, hi,” Peter said.

For some reason, the child’s voice shocked the reporter into the realization that he might have chanced upon the story of
a lifetime. Maybe the paper had heard rumors about Eamonn and me, or he simply thought that if there was one bishop in Ireland
capable of fathering a child, it was Eamonn.

I heard what sounded like a chair being shoved backward and bouncing off the wall. “Wait there,” he said. “Please, ma’am.”

“Hi, hi,” Peter said again.

“Where are you? I’ll come. If need be, I’ll send a car.”

“I’m not in Ireland.”

“I’ll book you a seat on a plane. All you have to do is convince me you’re telling the truth.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I need some sort of proof.”

“Oh, I can provide it.”

At this point, Mrs. Randall was laughing loudly on the bed and saying, “You can’t do that, Annie, it’s not right.”

Bridget ripped the phone out of my hand. The last thing I heard before she cut me off was the reporter pleading, “If you could
just give me your number. Your —”

Bridget shrieked, “Murphy, you could get us all killed.” For her, the Catholic Church was like the Mafia. It would protect
its own, especially its bosses, at any price, and she feared for her children’s safety. Not for the first time, Bridget saved
Eamonn’s skin.

If Bridget had not cut me off, what would I have said? I do not know. But from then on I made a firm resolve to be silent.
The height of compassion is to conceal another’s shame. I had made my decision to keep Peter; I would have to bear my own
disgrace and was prepared to do so willingly. But that was no reason to shame Eamonn. It was time for me to leave London.

Three days later, after reading of the magnificent ceremony in Galway Cathedral, I returned to America.

With my dreams dead, I settled down to the life of a single mother. It was tougher than I had anticipated. As before, I relied
on my parents to look after Peter at night and put him by day in a play group so he could have companions of his own age.

My job at this time was quite demanding. I was working as a receptionist in a New York hospital near where we lived, still
for $150 a week. But I felt that my son had the right to a mother with a lively brain. That was one reason why I took writing
courses and deepened my appreciation of literature by reading the classics, including Chaucer and Shakespeare.

My life at this time was so centered on my buoyant, beautiful son that my social life was practically nonexistent. But, to
tell the truth, I was not interested in men. Whenever I was asked out to dinner or a show, I saw again Eamonn’s shining eyes
and friendly face, felt the touch of his hand on my cheek. “No, thank you,” I would say, as graciously as I could.

Sometimes I was bitter and resentful. Hearing a friend speak of her husband or seeing a couple embracing in the subway, I
wondered if Eamonn was initiating another young woman in the intricate discipline of loving a bishop. Was he healing another
wounded soul? Was he knocking on another’s door in the early hours of the morning?

To ease my heart, I used to take Peter for walks under the big maples in the park, and listened to him chatting away. His
chief interest at the time was in superheroes—Batman, Spiderman, the Incredible Hulk. In his games, he was always one of
these. I thought it might be his way of compensating for the lack of a father.

He was having a routine checkup at New York Hospital when the doctor noticed the large coffee-stain birthmark on his knee
and feared it might be cancerous tissue. He called Daddy, who confirmed Peter was born with it. He also told him that Peter’s
father was an important man who had deserted me.

The doctor, a qualified psychologist, offered to counsel me. When I told him who the father was, he advised us never to contact
Eamonn, only respond if the Bishop made the first move. He also suggested that if I wanted Peter to have a religion, it should
not be Catholicism but one more compassionate and understanding.

“In my experience, Annie,” he said, “the boy won’t be much interested in his father until puberty. Then he’ll probably want
to know everything.”

By the time Peter was three, he used to ride his little blue tricycle up to the park benches in Peter Cooper. He told the
old people about his grandfather taking his leg off every night and how his grandma gave him candy in the store and forgot
to pay for it so they were known as the candy thieves. The boy was so gregarious and so folksy that he was even known by some
of the retired inhabitants as the Mayor of Peter Cooper.

One day, I overheard him tell a friend that his daddy had nearly killed me and put my blood all over the wall. That was why
my leg turned black every night. Mommy must have been talking, and Peter had heard and misunderstood. I wondered how many
other strange ideas he was picking up from her. It came, therefore, as something of a relief when my parents decided to move
to another apartment. It enabled me to rent a place of my own.

One evening, a friend, Robert Vanstant, invited me to a party. He introduced me to Coln O’Neill, a witty, handsome man. I
only had a couple of drinks, but so low was my resistance to alcohol, I got tipsy. Coln took charge of me. No question about
it, I was his girl.

After three years of marriage, Coln had been divorced three years before. He admitted that he was still in love with his ex-wife,
and I told him about Eamonn. He was fascinated by the different facets of Eamonn’s personality: Eamonn who was kind and cruel,
loving and cold, outgoing and self-centered, incredibly careful and, as Peter’s existence proved, equally careless.

In the summer of 1978, I started to leave Peter in the care of my parents on weekends so I could stay at Coln’s place. I was
experimenting with the idea of a permanent union. Coln took to Peter instantly and included him in all our midweek dates.
It is not true to say I liked Coln just because he was fatherly toward my son, but it was no small consideration.

After our third weekend together, Coln said, “I’d like to spend the rest of my days with you.”

He was my first boyfriend since Eamonn. A new phase of my life opened up. Having loved Eamonn, still loving him in spite of
the pain we had caused each other, I wondered if I, with what I called my hundred-year-old leg, would be able to sustain a
relationship with any other man.

How would Coln compare with Eamonn? Would he be my soul-mate? Would he be able to erase the vivid imprint Eamonn had made
on me so I could love him for himself and not as a substitute for the real thing?

After hesitating for a long time, in the fall of 1978 Coln and I began living together.

T
HOUGH COLN WAS QUIET, funny, and generous, it did not take me long to realize that the strongest link between us was our past
loves. We were both living on what might have been.

Nonetheless, to begin with, we had a lot of fun together. He had a big circle of friends, many of them brilliant if a trifle
crazy. We went to plays and galleries, dined out at the best restaurants, danced, and, on weekends, when Peter was with my
parents, drank a lot.

Daddy was suspicious of Coln’s drinking, but he thought it better for me to work things out for myself. In fact, Coln could
hold his drink very well, while I had no capacity for it. Coln even said I must be allergic to it. A couple of drinks sent
my heart racing. I would jump up on a bar, kick off my shoes, and dance.

Coln wanted to settle down, but every time he asked me to marry him, I was haunted by the thought that I could never give
him children. He kept up the pressure by taking me to doctors, hoping they would say, “Go ahead, have another child,” but
all of them advised against it. I insisted we take precautions. I used a diaphragm and sponges or I asked him to use a condom.

In Needle Park where the junkies hung out, Coln used to buy different drugs and mix them. The dealers had guns and knives
but, like Eamonn, Coln was fearless. I had never taken drugs myself, but knowing the perils he faced when he went to the Park,
I wanted to share the excitement.

Once, I followed him, taking swigs out of a vodka bottle. A drunk tore the bottle out of my hand. I slapped him; he slapped
me back. Fortunately, Coln was on hand to rescue me. But drink made me careless in another way.

One weekend, I forgot to put in my diaphragm. I knew within a couple of weeks I was pregnant because I threw up violently,
couldn’t get up in the morning, couldn’t walk or breathe, and my panic attacks returned. When I missed a period, Coln took
me to see Dr. Reynolds, a middle-aged man with a nervous tic.

“Annie, you are —”

“Don’t say it,” I said.

“If you like, I’ll perform the abortion.”

Coln became hysterical. “Are you
sure
she can’t have this baby?”

“Absolutely not,” the doctor said. “There is no way she could bring it to full term.”

“For God’s sake,” Coln said, “she’s young and healthy.”

Dr. Reynolds said solemnly: “They both would die in the fifth or sixth month.”

That night, Coln and I had a long talk. We both sensed that an abortion would wrench us apart. He had grown to love me and
was keen for us to stay together.

I feared to lose a dear companion. More than that, Peter, now in his fourth year, would be deprived of a father figure. Coln
adored him, and strangers assumed that Peter was his son. Coln carried him to preschool every day on his shoulders. He spoiled
him with expensive gifts. He insisted on taking him with us to Chinese restaurants and parties. Peter even came with us to
galleries, where he played quietly in the background or painted pictures in his big artist’s book.

Coln loved children, and I knew that the destruction of his first child would be too hard for him to bear. “Come on, Coln,”
I said, holding his hand. “Tell me what to do.”

He nodded slowly. We had no choice. What was the point of two people dying?

By this time, I did not set a great value on myself, but I had Peter to think of.

“That bishop,” Coln said, sadly, “lives in our life.”

Honesty compelled me to say, “Yes.”

He went on. “You talk to him sometimes when you drink.”

This really shook me. “I do?”

“I’ve often found you staring out the window, saying, ‘Eamonn, Eamonn,’ and you sing to him. Sometimes you speak his name
in your sleep.”

Tears sprang to my eyes. In spite of my best efforts to forget, how deep inside me was the man I left behind in Ireland. We
were still connected. He was as real to me as the walls of the room, as the couch I was sitting on. “I am so sorry, Coln.”

He brushed my apology aside as if to say that no one can help things like that. Though we had been together less than six
months, I knew this was the end for us as surely as I knew my marriage was over when I miscarried. Strange that Peter should
be surrounded before and after by the loss of another child. It made him so much more precious.