Jon McGregor: So Many Ways to Begin

She took a bus to the hospital when she could stand it no more, wrapping her saved wages in the middle of her brown paper bundle of clothes, leaving a note that said nothing on her bed and a month's money uncollected. Her waters had already broken by the time they took her on to the ward. When they asked, she told them her name was Bridget Kirwan and that she came from a village near Galway. It took her no more than a few hours to give birth. It was the easiest of the five, she would say, years later. I must have been tougher than I felt, though it still hurt more than enough. When the baby was born, an underweight boy, he was taken from her almost without discussion. They told her it would be the best thing, they told her it would be cruel to do anything else, and she was too shattered by pain and hunger and shock to raise a voice in disagreement.

They barely even let me say goodbye, you know? she would tell someone, eventually.

When she went home, after two weeks in a rest ward, she knew that she would never want to go away to work again. She didn't say, of course, why she had come back across the water before her time, and she did her best to make up for the shortfall of money in the bundle she'd brought back, walking three miles each day to milk and feed and mind the cows on the landowner's farm. And when the men came home towards the end of the year, older and fitter and better fed, swollen with talk and drink and money, she watched them carefully, waiting, choosing, and before the following year's hiring fair she was married to Michael Carr, waving him off the way she used to watch her mother do, turning away before he was out of sight to settle into a house of her own. She scrubbed and cleaned and polished her own pots, her own plates, her own clothes and boots and low front step. She lit a fire in her own grate. She opened the door to her friends, and she waited for her husband to come home.

He brought no money with him when he returned, and she could smell on his breath that she'd chosen wrong.

I can say this now, she admitted to someone, years later, when she lived on her own and waited for her grandchildren to call; it was a wonderful marriage for eight months of the year. And that's a lot more than some folk can say, don't you think? Laughing as she said it, glancing up at the photograph of him on the mantelpiece.

Her four children all had their birthdays in late September. And she wondered, each time she held a newborn child in her hands, where that lost one might have gone. She wondered it with each niece and nephew and grandchild she was given to hold, saying he's a fine one to the mother as she looked into the baby's clouded eyes. She wondered it as she changed and cleaned her own children's nappies, as she fed them, as she mended their clothes and sang them to sleep and sent them off to school. She wondered it as she watched them grow into young adults, going further away to find work, bringing back money when they ducked into the house, bringing back other young men and women with whom they shyly held hands at the supper table. She watched them marry, and she watched them make homes of their own, have children of their own, move away and move back and move away again, and she never stopped wondering, waiting, hoping for some young man to contact her from England, some long-lost solemn-eyed child to come calling across the water and tell her something, anything, of where he'd been gone all this time.

Eleanor was in the kitchen when he got back from her mother's funeral, baking. The air was damp with the smell of spices and burnt sugar, the windows clouded with condensation against the dark evening outside. He stood in the doorway with his suitcase and waited for her to say hello. She had her back to him, her shoulders hunched in tense concentration, her faded brown hair tied up into a loose knot on the back of her head. She was icing a cake. There were oven trays and cooling racks spread across the worktop, grease-stained recipe books held open under mixing bowls and rolling pins, spilt flour dusted across the floor.

Hello, he said gently, not wanting to make her jump. She didn't say anything for a moment.

How'd it go then? she asked without lifting her head or turning around.

Okay, he said, it was okay, you know. The oven timer buzzed, and as she opened the door a blast of hot wet air rushed into the room. She took out a tray of fruit slices, turned off the oven, and went back to icing the cake. He put the suitcase down and stood behind her. The creamy-white icing looked smooth enough to him, but she kept dragging the rounded knife across it, chasing tiny imperfections back and forth. He put his hand on the hard knot of her shoulder and she flinched. He kissed the back of her head. Her hair smelt of flour, and of baking spices, and of her, and he kept his face pressed lightly against it for a moment, his eyes closed, breathing deeply.

It looks like you're done there El, he said quietly, reaching round to take the knife from her hand, putting it down on the side. It looks lovely, he said. He kept his hand on her hand, wrapping his fingers around hers as it clenched into an anxious fist.

It was okay then? she asked, her head lowered.

It was okay, he told her. She turned round, wiping her hands on her apron, and looked up at him, smiling weakly.

Good, she said, I'm glad. She picked up a palette knife, and eased the fruit slices from the baking tray on to another cooling rack. I got a bit carried away, she said, waving the knife around the room to indicate the cakes and buns and biscuit tins. I wanted to keep busy. She smiled again, shaking her head. She carried the baking tray past him and put it into the sink, the hot metal hissing into the water. Did you find the way okay? she asked.

Yes, he said, it was fine. He sat at the table, stretching out his legs, squeezing the muscles on the back of his neck, stiff from the long drive. She tried to undo her apron, her sticky fingers fumbling blindly behind her for a few moments, and gave up, turning her back to him and saying could you? over her shoulder. He picked at the tight double knot, awkwardly, his own fingers thick with tiredness, easing his thumbnail into the knot and unlooping the strings. She sat down, slipping the apron off over her head and folding it into her lap, wiping her fingers clean on one corner. She looked tired. He reached over and ran his hand up and down her thigh.

Hey, he said, you okay? She closed her eyes, resting her hand on top of his.

Yes, she said, I'll be fine. It's just been a long day. It's been a long few days.

They sat like that for a few minutes and he watched the lines around her eyes soften as she began to relax. Long strands of coarse hair had fallen free of the knot on the back of her head and were hanging around her face. He reached over and tucked them back, smoothing them into place. She smiled faintly, already half asleep.

Was it alright coming back? she murmured, just as he was about to slip his hand away and get something to eat.

It was fine, he told her, it took a long time but it was fine.

Not too much traffic about. I stopped off at some services for a break.

You've eaten then? she asked, opening her eyes and rubbing at her face suddenly.

Well, a little something more wouldn't do any harm, he said, looking over at the racks of cooling cakes.

Oh, sure, she said, smiling, be my guest. He took a plate from the cupboard and fetched himself a large rock cake, blowing at the steam that poured out as he broke it open.

What about Kate? she asked, turning round in her chair.

She's fine, he said, I dropped her off at the station this morning. She sent me a text when she got home, she's fine.