Maeve Binchy - Tara Road

'Oh, there's always a reason,' he smiled.

'Pure misguided niceness, I think,' she said ruefully.

'Okay, so we have to pretend one more thing, which is that you understood this whole getting-on-the-Net thing by yourself and then we can stop pretending, okay?'

'Okay,' she said a little anxiously.

He was definitely sitting too close for friendship. 'Who do we know with e-mail?' he asked.

'Hubie! He said we could send messages any time.'

'Hubie. Yeah.'

'What's wrong? He's a nice kid.'

'Sure.'

'Tell me. I know nothing about what happened, nothing at all. Well, I get the feeling that Marilyn's so private. I felt she wouldn't want me to go round asking questions, that she'd tell me what she wanted me to know, and it's not very much.'

'Do you resent that?'

'I think she should have told me her son was dead. I don't want half of Dublin telling her about poor Ria, poor old Ria whose husband took off with a teenager. So since I get the feeling she's not going to be demanding information from my friends I shouldn't from hers… it's just… it's just…'

'It's just what, Maria?' He had never got the shortened version of her name and somehow she quite liked him calling her something different. It made whatever there was or might be between them something that was out of time.

'It's just that there's a mystery here. There's no mystery in my case, it's as old as time. Man marries wife, man sees newer younger fresher model, man says goodbye to wife. The only mystery is that there's not more of it.'

'Maria, please, you sound so bitter.'

'What, should I be overjoyed about it? At least it's plain to see what happened. Here it's different, quite different. There's like a conspiracy of silence about it all. That room is like a shrine to him. The fact that nobody mentions the accident.'

'But you see…' Andy began.

'No, to be honest I don't see. Do you know what I said to your brother Greg when I was talking to him in Hawaii? I'll tell you what I said, I asked him how Dale was enjoying it out there. My flesh is creeping when I try to think why he thinks I said what I did.'

'He'll know.' Andy soothed her. 'He'll realise that Marilyn couldn't have told you.'

'Look, I'm as sorry as hell that it all happened. I went into that room again and I cried over the child that I thought was out surfing in Honolulu. I cried to think he's dead and buried, but still we should be able to talk about it. Not all the time, as people say we do in Ireland, but just acknowledge it. She left his room like that and didn't tell me. That's not natural, Andy. Even you freeze up at the mention of that kid Hubie's name. Maybe if nobody else tells me what happened I'll talk to Hubie about it.'

'Don't do that.'

'No, of course I wouldn't but I am pointing out that it's odd.'

'Don't you think we all know that?'

'What do you mean?'

'Listen, in this world there was only one marriage that any of us could think was truly happy and that was Greg and Marilyn's. And yet from the night of the accident they were never able to relate to each other as human beings again.'

'Did they blame each other or something?'

'Well, there's no way they could have. Hubie and two other kids and Dale were all crazy about motor bikes, but they were too young and they all had parents who would have as soon let heroin into the house as let a motor bike into their backyards. So on Hubie's birthday the kids went out somewhere. It was meant to be a picnic, I know because I was here at the time.' He got up and started to walk around the study. 'And they drank some beer and they found two bikes and they decided that this was a gift from the gods.'

' They found them?'

'Yes, found as in stole them outside a restaurant. Hubie and the other kid who died, Johnny, were a little bit on the wild side. Not hugely wild but the signs were there. Older too, but not much. But at that age a few months counts.'

'I know.' Ria thought suddenly of Kitty, a year older than Annie but several years ahead of her always.

'And they went for what was described at the inquest as a kind of test drive and they went round a corner and one of the bikes was hit by a truck. Which wasn't surprising really because the bike where Dale was hanging on to Johnny was on the wrong side of the road. Johnny was killed instantly. Dale was on a life-support machine for six months and then they agreed to let him go.'

They sat in silence at the tragedy that had come to this house.

'And Marilyn said that she would never forgive any of them as long as she lived, and Greg said that they would have no peace until they learned to forgive.'

Ria had tears in her eyes. 'And is that what drove them apart?'

'I imagine so. Greg doesn't say much about it. You know how hopeless we men are for talking about feelings.'

'You're not too bad; you've told me that story very sympathetically and it wasn't just idle curiosity on my part, you know.'

'I know,' he said.

'Do you understand how I felt sort of protective about her, how I didn't want to ask Carlotta and Heidi and anyone else?'

'Sure I do, and you understand also why it wouldn't be good to ask Hubie. That kid has had a lot to live with: his birthday, he got them drunk, his friend Johnny driving a stolen bike, and he and another kid walk away alive. I'm kind of impressed with him that he's setting up something like this to make his college tuition.'

'I know, and of course you feel bitter about him,' Ria said.

'It wasn't his fault; he didn't set out to kill Dale or anything,' Andy soothed her.

'But it's awkward, isn't it? I'm sorry to have become involved.'

'Look, it's got nothing to do with you. Come on, Maria, homework time; let's get our assignments done.'

They sent Hubie a message and he sent back Congratulations Mrs. Lynch! You're a natural . Then they sent one to Heidi.

'She's going to die when they tell her in the Alumni Office tomorrow that there's a message for her from me!' Ria pealed with laughter.

'I wish we knew someone else with an e-mail,' she said.

'Well, we could send one to my laptop back in the motel,' he said.

'And you could ring me tonight to say that it had arrived,' she said.

'Or tomorrow?' he suggested gently. It took a moment for it to dawn on her what he was saying. 'It's so nice here, so good to hear laughter in this house again,' Andy said. 'And you and I have no ties, nobody who will be betrayed or hurt. Wouldn't it be nice if we spent the rest of the evening together?' He had a hand under her chin, lifting her face up towards his.

She swallowed and tried to speak. He took the opportunity of her not speaking to kiss her. Gently but firmly. And he put his arm around her shoulder.

She pulled away, startled. Ria Lynch would be thirty-eight this year. In November, on the anniversary of Clark Gable's death. Nobody had kissed her since she was twenty-two except the man who had tired of her and told her that there was nothing left in what she thought was a fine happy marriage.

'I must explain,' she began.

'Must you?'

'Yes. I've had a lovely, lovely evening, but you see I don't…'

'I know, I know.' He was kissing her ear now, gently nuzzling in fact, and it was rather nice.

'Andy, you have to forgive me if I have been giving the wrong signals. I couldn't have had a happier evening. I mean that truly, truly I do, but I don't want it to go any further. I'm not playing games, I never did, not ever, even when I was a kid going out with fellows. But I was often misunderstood and the fault is all mine if you thought things were different. I'm a bit inexperienced, you see.'

'I had hopes when you didn't tell my brother that I was here, you see,' he explained.

'I know, I know.' She knew that was a fair perception.