Page 54 of One More Day
My mother would happily spend hours of summer here with us, looking out for ships in the distance. She’d point out the protective beam of light spilling onto the sea, and how the angry waves would beat off the rocks but the lighthouse would still stand tall and strong, guiding the boatmen and looking after itself always. We’d try to spot dolphins. We’d take solace in the wild, northerly point that made us feel on top of the world.
George puts his head in his paws, not bothering to budge when I throw a stick for him.
‘You are the laziest dog in the world, you know that,’ I tell him. ‘But I wouldn’t change you. Do you know how special it is here, George?’
George tilts his head and gives out a squeaky groan which makes me want to scratch his ears as I tell him the story of the shipwreck, just as my Granny Molly told me time and time again.
I stare out at the lighthouse and the wild waves that crash below it. Everything around it is, as always, chaotic and turbulent, yet it stands so serene and strong with its light shining from within, giving guidance where it’s needed, just as my mother used to tell me.
It’s only been a few months since I saw her last but I miss her so much right now that my heart aches, and I know that she’s longing to have me home for Christmas.
But I don’t want to ruin her Christmas. I don’t want to take away her joy of this time of year, a time that until three years ago was always filled with celebration and family love.
I’m giving this time of year back to them all by staying out of their way.
I close my eyes, letting the blustering wind take my breath away, and I do my best to ignore the tears that stream down my face. I seem to have cried a lot since I got here, with both physical and emotional pain, but maybe that’s what I need. Maybe I need to let it all out instead of swanning around Dublin like I’m the woman who has it all.
George cuddles in by my side, which ironically makes me feel even more alone. I have so many missed calls from my mum. I have ignored calls from my dad, but he can barely speak to me in person any more, so why is he putting himself out to call me on the phone? I know he blames me for Michael’s accident as much as I do myself. He adored Michael.
I have voicemail messages from them all which I simply can’t listen to. I have texts from my sister, but I can’t bring myself to read them as Christmas comes closer. I desperately want to run to them, but I need to stay away from them for all our sakes.
I imagine them calling and calling me. I wonder when they’ll give up trying, when they’ve heard my faux-happy message more times than they need to.
Hi, you’ve reached Rose. George and I have left the bright lights of Dublin for Christmas, but we’ll be back in action in the New Year. Have a good one! Go easy on the turkey!
But no one apart from Carlos knowswherewe are this Christmas. No one knows that our destination is so close to home, yet far away enough to keep me invisible. No one knows that I’m in this majestic place that was once my playground when I was a little girl, where I was always reminded of how wonderful our world is.
Now, with six sleeps until the biggest family day of the year, I still don’t know if I’m doing the right thing by choosingto spend Christmas alone. I don’t know if by coming here I’m taking steps forward or taking steps backwards in time. The wind catches my throat and I gasp back tears of regret and sorrow for how it’s all turned out.
I shake my head into the blustering clifftop wind, trying to erase the darkness that comes towards me now like a freight train. I hear Michael laughing again, that night when he picked me up on Christmas Eve to come here.
I hear the sound of Slade on the radio, I smell the smoky scent of the second-hand car he’d recently bought and I feel the sense of dread scoop out the pit of my stomach as I anticipate the moment we were heading towards.
He wouldn’t tell me where we were going. He’d only say it was the end of one chapter in our lives and the beginning of the next one.
But that chapter was the end of Michael’s story.
As if in slow motion, I see my hand reach over to hold his. I see his eyes look down at our hands for just a split second.
I cover my ears now as the inevitable crash of metal comes back to me so clearly that it crushes my eardrums. My head bangs from side to side off the window, off Michael, off the window again. I’m reliving the horror once more in the sickening technicolour I haven’t seen in so long. I smell burning. I hear glass smashing, the crunch of metal on metal, the rattle of my brain as we tumble to our destiny.
To Michael’s destiny.
To mine too.
I distracted him. What if … ?
‘Are you out there, Michael?’ I shout out as loudly as I can towards the water below me. ‘I just wish I could hear your voice one more time.’
It’s so windy and the rain is pouring down now, so no one can hear me, not that I’d even care. Not that there’s anyone else around.
‘I’m so sorry, Michael. I’m so sorry we didn’t get to make all our dreams come true.’
I try to stop my tears with the back of my hand. I fall to my knees and I sob into the rain.
What was I thinking?
I should never have come here. It’s too painful.
