‘Aye, they’re all right,’ he said.

‘I’d say you have all the young ones giddy out in that school. Do the girls be counting your freckles for you?’

He laughed.

‘Do you have a girlfriend?’ she asked.

‘Not really . . . a kind of a one.’

‘Well, a kind of a one is good enough for now, isn’t it, because you wouldn’t want to be too tied down at this stage. Cross here,’ she said, and they made their way over the main road to the little park that fronted the shore. There was an ancient oak with a bench built around the perimeter of the base and more benches lined up in front of the playground. Mothers with prams had already taken up some of these benches but they found an empty seat. In the playground a few very young children were being pushed on swings or caught at the bottoms of slides.

‘So what did he say?’ Barry asked again.

‘What time does lunch break end at the school?’

‘One forty,’ Barry said.

She checked her watch. ‘Well, then you’re back in class in twenty minutes.’

‘Ah fuck,’ Barry said.

She laughed. ‘Oh, you’re good craic, Barry.’

Barry sat forward and placed his elbows on his knees, all his concentration focused on the ground in front of him.

‘Just be damn glad you’re getting another chance.’

‘I know,’ he said, lifting the toe of his boot and bringing it down again on an empty chip wrapper.

‘I wasn’t that fond of school either, but then I wasn’t much good at it. I’ve always thought that was the problem. I was treated like I was stupid.’

‘They all have it in for me out there. Anything that goes wrong, I get blamed for it. I can’t open my mouth but I’m shouted at. I can’t do anything right.’

‘That all sounds very unfair, Barry, but you’re not going to sit there and convince me you’re some angel. Keep your head down, and your mouth shut. No one’s asking you to come top of the class, but what was the point in dragging a school bag out that road for five years if you don’t at least pass your exams? And Master O’Connor will phone your father and you might have to have a meeting with him tomorrow morning, during which I want you to promise me you’ll be on your best behaviour. Agree with whatever he says, and do whatever you’re told. And just get on with it.’

‘It makes me angry, that’s all.’

‘Your mother told me you were born angry. And that she loved you for it.’

‘What else did she say about me?’

‘That you were a lot like her when she was a teenager – that she was so full of the unfairnesses of the world that she fell out with everyone. That she fought with her sister and her parents and her teachers. And that she was like that for the rest of her life, that whatever she felt, she felt it in a big way, whether it was sadness or anger or love, and that when she had children, she felt the love so fully she thought she was going to explode with it. It was so extravagant. That’s what she said, and I remember that so clearly because I adored the way your mother spoke – she loved you extravagantly. And that she looked forward to seeing what you’d do with all the feelings that you held, because you had so many of them. Just like her.’

‘She left us.’

‘She came back.’

‘And if she hadn’t, she’d still be alive.’

‘And you have every right to be angry. But I learned a lot from your mother. She taught me how to write poems, for one thing. Not that I’m any great shakes at that, but she also taught me how to see myself and my life more clearly. She was determined to be happy and to have no regrets and to live her life fully and I will forever admire her for that. But some people, they think if you’ve made mistakes or you’ve suffered, you should kowtow to life. Some people think there’s such a thing as being too free, and your mother didn’t believe that was possible. And I’ll tell you one last thing, Barry – as you get older and things happen to you in life, you’ll realise that what you thought was important meant nothing, and the only things you’ll regret are the times when you were cruel or unkind or ungenerous towards another person, or when you allowed your judgements to get in the way of helping them. And your mother did not have one cruel or unkind thought or intention in her heart.’

Something changed in his face then. She could see the boy was trying not to cry.

‘Oh, Barry,’ she said. ‘You may ignore most of what I said – there’s a chance I’ve got it all wrong. I haven’t made that great a go of things myself as it happens.’

‘Can I go?’

‘I’m not keeping you. And remember – head down, mouth shut.’

He stood and picked up his school bag from the ground and mumbled, ‘Thank you’. She watched him moving away from her but she couldn’t look at him for too long – it seared her heart. Instead she looked out at the sea, and thought about moving and walking to her car, but remained seated. In this position, at this point on the curve of the coast, it occurred to her that she was almost halfway between her own home on one side of the bay and the cottage on the other. For so long her life had stalled, hanging in the distance between those two places. Since walking into the Community Centre for the first workshop, she was changed. And in the past few weeks she had pored over Colette’s new poems, felt that she had come to a deeper knowledge of who she was in the reading of them than in all the time she’d known her. Each poem was like a chastisement for any doubts she may have had about Colette’s suffering. They were ferocious, and the anger distilled by them, the total control that required, frightened Izzy. But what frightened her more was how fully she felt she understood them. And yet, if she had read them correctly, so many of the poems were about the failure of words to describe pain in any meaningful way. And returning to them again and again had done nothing to assuage her guilt.

Months spent in this way, trying to find the language to describe who she was now, when nothing in her day-to-day life had altered in the slightest. She woke beside the same man, they joked and laughed about the same things, she felt so many of the same resentments towards him. And in a month’s time she would step into a small wooden cubicle and a curtain would fall to behind her, and in that secret space cross YES or NO on a ballot paper. And whatever decision she made, she knew she would never leave her husband. Something told her now that they would grow old together, and sick together, and while they might remain strangers to each other, she needed him. She had exhausted herself with stories, spent her life and energy in always wanting things to be another way. The only thing that seemed to offer her comfort was the lesson she had taken from Colette – that acceptance was not the same as resignation.

She rose from the bench. She was ready to move forward, to try again. She was ready to make peace with herself.

Author’s Note

On 24 November 1995 the people of Ireland voted in a referendum to remove the constitutional prohibition on divorce. The amendment to the constitution was approved and signed into law on 17 June 1996. The law was passed by less than one percentage point.

A Note from the Cover Designer

The main thing I wanted to convey with the cover was the emotional weight that Colette, the main character, is facing when she returns to her former town.

I chose this powerful, turbulent Irish sea to be the main character of the cover and have it enveloping the typography, making the tiny characters and house seem so small and at its mercy.

I felt it was a nice visual metaphor for Colette’s journey and resolution.

—Greg Heinimann

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my first readers – Jessica Miller, Emma Flynn, Mikaella Clements, and Onjuli Datta – for the advice that got me started.

To my lockdown writing group – Adam Fearon, Anna Szaflarski, John Holten, Mitch Speed, and Jasmine Reimer – thank you for keeping this book going during difficult times.

To my early readers – Kate Wills, Rozalind Dineen, and Ben Eastham.

Kate Butler, Derek Larkin, Vanessa O’Loughlin, and Marie O’Halloran – thanks for giving so generously of your time to answer my questions.

To my trusted readers – Yeo Wei Wei, Campaspe Lloyd-Jacob, Joe Walsh, and Julie McGee.

To Gabriella Page-Fort and all the team at HarperVia, thank you for your kindness and patience throughout this process.

Special thanks to Anna Stein, Caroline Wood, and Alexis Kirschbaum.

Thank you to the Arts Council of Ireland for their ongoing support.

To my father, Joey Murrin, and to all my family, especially Eilish, Malachy, Edel, and Joseph.