John Brennan - Dead And Buried

Not that he wasn’t looking forward to seeing that crowd later on – his ma, and Martin, Robert – maybe his sister Patricia would be up from Cork, even. But he was glad they weren’t here. There was enough potential for trouble already without adding the Maguires to the mix.

He got out of the car and took a breath. Shot his cuffs, straightened the lapels of his corduroy jacket. Here goes nothing, he thought.

A thumping bass beat rattled his eardrums when he stepped through the door of the pub. That’d take some getting used to, after the deep quiet of the savannah. He paused and surveyed the room – God, it was full of kids.

Only they weren’t kids. They were sixteen, seventeen, like Ella – they were young men and women. Wondering who this jetlagged old bastard is that’s just come in through the door. He couldn’t see his daughter, so he headed for the bar. A pint would take the edge off his nerves. He pushed his way through a crowd of laughing young people: a redhead in a black minidress, an Asian guy with a punk haircut and chainstore suit, a blonde in a blue halterneck, a skinny guy with glasses and bottle of beer…

‘Guinness, please, pal.’

He leaned on the bar and watched the barman draw the black beer into a straight-sided glass. Now you know you’re home, he thought. You had a job on even getting the stuff in bottles out in Kenya. He was lifting the glass to his lips when the girl in the blue halterneck half-turned, and he caught her profile. His stomach flipped.

Christ Almighty. Ella.

Conor had half a second to notice with angry disapproval that the skinny kid in the glasses had his right hand resting in the small of Ella’s back, and another half a second to tell himself not to be so stupid, that she wasn’t twelve years old any more and that he’d given up his right to play the protective dad quite some years ago.

And then she saw him, came to greet him, Ella, his daughter, a perfect smile splitting her freckled face, a delighted shriek ringing out even over the racket from the sound system. She threw her arms round his neck – and Conor thought: what the hell were you so worried about, man? As he held her close he could smell her perfume, something fresh, delicate, a grown-up’s scent – but beneath that he could smell her : her skin, her hair, her own scent, the way his daughter used to smell, all that time ago.

With her hands on his shoulders, Ella took a step back to look him full in the face. She was a beautiful girl, he could see that. A beautiful, seventeen-year-old girl with his wife’s blue eyes and his baby daughter’s smile. She was lightly made-up. God, the rows she and Christine had had over the lippy and eyeliner his daughter had pinched from Chris’s dresser, when she was eleven. And she was tall, taller than Christine. Her hair was styled in an asymmetric fringe, the rest of it collected with a slip at the back of her head.

‘I’m so glad you came,’ she said.

‘Hello, Ella. Happy birthday.’

‘Look at you, Dad – with your tan . Call yourself an Irishman? Where is it you’ve been again? Marbella?’

‘Close. Exclusive little resort you wouldn’t have heard of.’

‘Ooh, some chichi spot full of the filthy rich and fabulous, was it?’

‘Something like that.’

‘Rich widows and cocktails on the veranda?’

‘Try vultures and endemic malaria.’ He grinned. ‘Hell, it’s good to see you, darling,’ he said.

Ella nodded and blinked and he saw her pinch her lips together, gulping back a sob. He reached out a hand, but Ella had turned away – and now she had the skinny kid by the elbow, and was saying, with a sudden forced bubbliness, that his name was Kieran, that he was her boyfriend, and Conor found himself shaking the skinny kid’s hand.

‘Hi, Kieran,’ he said, doing his best to be friendly. This was uncharted territory.

Kieran’s shake was confident and unhurried. ‘How about you, Mr Maguire,’ he said. ‘So you’ve been away?’

‘Yes, I have.’ Conor said, tucking his hands into his pockets. He felt daft talking about it. ‘Africa. Kenya. I’m a vet,’ he added.

Ella slapped his arm. ‘You needn’t sound so apologetic about it,’ she told him, with a what-are-you-like wave of her hand. To Kieran she said, ‘He’s a great vet. You have to be, don’t you, Dad, to treat, you know, lions, cheetahs, bloody elephants…’

Conor shrugged. ‘They’re all asleep by the time I have anything to do with them,’ he said. ‘I don’t chase them down personally.’

‘Makes a change from goldfish and guinea pigs, anyway, I bet,’ Kieran put in, and Conor laughed – but a part of him cringed, waiting for the question, waiting for Kieran to ask: so why’d you leave?

But Kieran only swigged his beer and said, ‘Africa, so. Not been there yet.’

‘But you’ve travelled?’ asked Conor, happy to change the subject.

‘Oh sure, sure.’ Kieran winked, startlingly. ‘Wanderlust,’ he said. ‘Itchy feet. I’ve been places, all right. Italy. The States.’ He paused for a beat. ‘Portmuck.’

Ella laughed. Conor was surprised to find that he’d finished his pint. That was the nerves. He might even start to enjoy this party, after all.

‘You’re looking beautiful, Ella,’ he said. ‘You look…’ he paused, thought twice, and then said it anyway, ‘you look like your mother.’

And it was true. The blonde hair, the freckles, the sea-blue eyes as big as the world – the look that could freeze you solid just as well as it could melt you to a puddle. Ella smiled.

But then Conor heard a sharp intake of breath behind him. Ella’s eyes went wide. He turned, knowing already who he’d see.

‘Holy mother of god,’ said Christine, and dropped a tray of drinks. The partygoers around her scrambled to get out of the way of the smashed glass – more drinks were spilled, more dresses wine-stained, more neckties sloshed with Guinness. The spilled drinks fizzed and frothed across the floor.

Conor glanced at Ella over his shoulder. ‘You never told her I was coming?’

Ella bit her lip. ‘Oops,’ she said, but her sea-blue eyes were laughing.

Christine hadn’t come alone. As a grumpy-looking member of the bar staff swept up the broken glass, she turned to the man lurking behind her.

‘This is Simon. He’s a teacher – a lecturer, I mean.’ Another handshake. This one wasn’t so warm. ‘And this is Conor,’ Christine added. Her tone said no further explanation was necessary.

Conor and Simon exchanged glad-to-meet-yous. God we’re a pair of lying bastards, Conor thought. He supposed Simon was thinking the same.

Simon was slender, lightly bearded, casually dressed in grey cords and a polo shirt. Dublin accent. His salt-and-pepper hair was swept back. He carried himself loosely, lazily, like an athlete at rest. Conor didn’t like the way he dangled an arm around Christine’s shoulders – but then, of course, that was exactly why Simon was doing it.

Christine remembered about the spilled drinks. Simon promptly volunteered to go to the bar for replacements. Conor proffered a twenty-pound note – ‘I was the silly bugger that made her drop them’ – but Simon waved it away, made it clear that he was the one who bought Chris’s drinks now. Conor and Christine were left alone.

He hadn’t spoken to her since the day she threw him out of the house. After that, the only relationship they’d had had been one conducted through solicitors’ letters.

‘He seems like a good guy,’ he tried, lamely.

Christine had her arms folded defensively across her chest. ‘He is,’ she nodded.

Conor groped for words. He wanted to say that she looked beautiful – he wanted to say that he was sorry – oh, Christ, he wanted to say so many things, but not one of them could you say over drinks at your daughter’s 17th birthday party.