Maeve Binchy - Circle of Friends

Sean and Carmel would not be in charge this time. Rosemary would do the food, and her friend Tom would collect the money. The boys started contributing.

"Will we ask Jack?" Bill Dunne said. "Maybe not this time," said Rosemary.

Eve and Benny were going to share a flat next year. The digs in Dunlaoghaire would be closed. They were very excited and kept looking at places now before the vacation so that they'd be ahead of the posse in September.

They were full of plans. Benny's mother would come and stay, maybe even Mother Francis might come and visit. There had been wonderful news from the convent. Mother Clare had broken her hip.

Not that Mother Francis called it wonderful news, but it did mean that Mother Clare would need to be near a hospital and physiotherapy, and all the stairs and the walking in St. Mary's wouldn't be advisable.

Mother Francis was in the middle of the Thirty Days Prayer when this happened. She told Eve that it was her biggest crisis of faith yet.

Could the prayer be too powerful?

As they left one flat they had been examining, they ran into Jack. He looked at Benny. "Hallo, Jack."

Eve said she had to go, seriously, and she'd see Benny later out in Dunlaoghaire. She was gone before they could say anything.

"Would you come out with me tonight?" he asked her. Benny looked at him. Her eyes went all around the face that she had loved so much, every line, every fold of the skin so dear to her.

"No, Jack, thank you." Her voice was gentle and polite. She was playing no games. "I'm going out already."

"But that's just with Eve. She won't mind."

"No, it's impossible.

Thanks all the same."

"Tomorrow then, or the weekend?" His head was on one side. Benny remembered suddenly the way that his mother and father had stood on the steps of their house that night. His mother watchful and wondering.

Little things that she had learned during the past month about the Foleys made her think that this was always the way things were.

Benny didn't want to wonder and watch over Jack for the rest of her life. If she went out with him now, it would be so easy. They would be back to where they had been before. In time Nan would be forgotten like the incident in Wales had been sort of forgotten.

But she would always worry about the next one. The next time she just wasn't around, ever smiling, always ready. It was too much to ask.

"No." Her smile was warm.

His face was surprised and sad. More sad than surprised. He began to say something. "I only did what. . ." Then he stopped. "I never meant it to. . ." He stopped again. "it's all right, Jack," Benny said. "Honestly, it's all right." She thought she saw tears in his eyes and looked away quickly. She didn't want to be reminded of that day on the canal bank.

The firelight danced and they threw more and more logs on. Aidan had said he wondered were he and Eve leaving the conception of their eight children too late; and she assured him that they weren't, it would be wrong to rush these things. He sighed resignedly; he had known she would say this.

Rosemary was flushed and pretty, and Tom paid her the most extravagant compliments; Johnny O'Brien was in disgrace because he had whirled a blazing log and it had set fire to a great bowl of punch. The blaze had been spectacular, but the drink severely diminished.

Fonsie and Clodagh had come up from Knockglen. It would be a long time before anyone forgot their dazzling jive display on the big flat rock.

Sean and Carmel nuzzled up to each other as they had done from the beginning of time, Sheila from the law faculty had a new hair-do and a happier smile. Benny wondered why she hadn't liked her so much in the old days.

It was all over Jack, probably. Like everything had been. The clouds that had been in front of the moon scudded past and it was almost as bright as daylight.

They laughed at each other, delighted. It was as if someone had shone a huge searchlight over them, then more clouds came and made it discreet again.

They were tired now from singing and from dancing to the little record player that Rosemary had provided. They only wanted to sing something gentle.

Not anything that would make Fonsie start to dance again. Someone started the song about "Sailing Alone on Moonlight Bay'. Everyone groaned because it was so awful and old-fashioned, but everyone sang it because they knew the words.

Benny was leaning half against a rock and half against Bill Dunne, who was sitting beside her. Bill was so enjoying the night, and was looking after her, getting her nice bits of burned sausage on a stick and some tomato ketchup to dip it in. Bill was a great friend. You wouldn't have to spend your life watching him and wondering about him.

You wouldn't have to spend the night worrying if he was having a good time or too good a time. She was thinking how comfortable he was when she saw Jack coming down the steps.

It was very dark and to the others it might just have looked like a figure in the distance. But she knew it was Jack coming to join the summer party. Asking to belong again.

She didn't make any move. She watched him for a long time; sometimes he stopped in the shadows, as if doubtful of his welcome.

But Jack Foley would never be doubtful for long. He would know that these were his friends. The long winding steps were quite a distance from the rocks where they sat around their fire.

Probably not very far, but it seemed a long time for him to cross the sand.

Long enough for her to realize how often she had seen his face everywhere. She used to see his face smiling and frowning. She used to see it like Mr. Flood saw visions, up in trees and in the clouds.

She used to see it in the patterns of leaves on the ground. When she woke and when she slept there was no other image in the foreground, and not because she summoned it there. It just wouldn't go away.

That was the way it had been for a very long time, when things were good and when things were bleak.

But tonight she would have difficulty in seeing his face. She would have to wait until he came in to the firelight to remember what he looked like. It was oddly restful.

They were still in full voice when someone saw Jack. The song didn't stop. They were all exaggerating the words anyway, and laughing. A few people waved to him.

He stood on the edge.

Jack Foley on the edge of things. Nobody waved him into the centre of the group. He smiled around him, glad to be back. His nightmares brushed away, his sins, he hoped, forgiven. He seemed happy to be part of the court again. Not even his worst enemy would ever have accused him of having wanted to be king. That's just the way it had turned out.

Across the fire his eyes sought Benny. It was hard to know what he was asking her. Permission to be there? Pardon for everything that had gone before? Or the right to come and hold her in his arms?

Benny smiled the big, warm smile that had made him fall in love with her. Her welcome was real. She looked lovely in the light of the flames, and she did what no one else had done. She pointed him to where the drink was, where the long sticks lay for cooking the food.

He opened a beer and moved slightly towards her. That had been an encouragement, hadn't it?

There wasn't much room on the rug where she sat leaning against Bill Dunne and the craggy bit of rock.

Nobody moved over to make space. They assumed he would sit down where he was.

After a few moments Jack Foley did that. Perched on a rock. On the edge.

Bill Dunne, who had his arm lightly around Benny's shoulder, didn't take it away because she hadn't moved as he had thought she might.

The song was over and someone had started "Now is the Hour'. They sang in exaggerated poses and mimes, in funny accents and pretence of huge passion. Benny looked into the fire.