Colm Tóibín - Brooklyn

He told her about his work, with a story of two Jewish sisters who wanted to feed him, who had a huge meal ready for him when he had restored their hot water, even though it was only three o'clock in the afternoon. He did an imitation of their accents. Even though he spoke as if nothing had happened between them on the previous Friday night, Eilis knew that this funny fast talk of his, as story followed story while they walked to the trolley-car, was unusual for a Thursday night and was partly a way of pretending that there had been no problem then and that there was none now.

As they came close to her street she turned to him. "There's something I need to say to you."

"I know that."

"You remember when you told me that you loved me?"

He nodded. The expression on his face was sad.

"Well, I didn't really know what to say. So maybe I should say that I have thought about you and I like you, I like seeing you, I care for you and maybe I love you too. And the next time if you tell me you love me, I'll-"

She stopped.

"You'll what?"

"I'll say I love you too."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Holy shit! Sorry for my language but I thought you were telling me that you didn't want to see me again."

She stood beside him looking at him. She was shaking.

"You don't look as though you mean it," he said.

"I mean it."

"Well, why aren't you smiling?"

She hesitated and then smiled weakly. "Can I go home now?"

"No. I want to just jump up and down. Can I do that?"

"Quietly," she said, and laughed.

He jumped into the air waving his hands.

"Let's get this straight," he said when he came towards her again. "You love me?"

"Yes. But don't ask me anything else and don't mention wanting kids who are Dodgers fans."

"What? You want kids who support the Yankees? Or the Giants?"

He was laughing.

"Tony?"

"What?"

"Don't push me."

He kissed her and whispered to her, and when they reached Mrs. Kehoe's house he kissed her again until she had to tell him to stop or they would have an audience. Even though she was studying the following night and would have to miss the dance, she agreed to see him and go for a walk with him, if only around the block.

The exams were easier than she had expected; even the law paper had easy questions, requiring only the most basic knowledge. When they were over she felt relief but knew also that she would have no excuse now when Tony wanted to make plans. He began by setting a date for her visit to his parents' house for supper. This worried her, since she already believed that he had told them too much about her; she now understood that she was going to be presented to them as something more than a girlfriend.

On the evening in question when he collected her he was in a relaxed mood. It was still bright and the air was warm and children were playing on the streets as older people sat on the stoops. It was something that had seemed unimaginable in the winter and it made Eilis feel light and happy as they walked along.

"I've got to warn you about something," Tony said. "I have a kid brother called Frank. He's eight going on eighteen. He's nice and he's smart but he's been talking of all the things he's going to say to my girlfriend when he meets her. He's got a real big mouth. I tried to pay him money to go and play ball with his friends and my dad has threatened him but he says none of us are going to stop him. Once he gets it off his chest, you'll like him."

"What will he say?"

"The thing is we don't know. He could say anything."

"He sounds very exciting," she said.

"Oh, yeah, and there's one more thing."

"Don't tell me. You have an old granny who sits in the corner and she wants to talk too."

"No, she's in Italy. The thing is that all of them are Italians and they look like Italians. They are real dark, all except me."

"And how did they get you?"

"My mom's dad was like me, at least that's the rumour, but I never saw him and my dad never saw him and my mom doesn't remember him because he was killed in the First World War."

"Does your dad think…" She began to laugh.

"It drives my mom crazy but he doesn't really think it, he just says it sometimes when I do something funny that I must be from some other family. It's a joke."

His family lived on the second storey of a three-storey building. Eilis was surprised at how young Tony's parents seemed. When his three brothers appeared, she saw, as he had told her, that each of them had black hair and eyes that were deep brown. The two older ones were much taller than Tony. Frank introduced himself as the youngest one. His hair, she thought, was astonishingly dark, as were his eyes. The other two were introduced to her as Laurence and Maurice.

She realized immediately that she should not comment on the difference between Tony and the rest of the family since she imagined that every single person who entered this apartment and saw them all together for the first time had a great deal to say on the subject. She pretended it was something that she had not even noticed. She presumed at the beginning that the kitchen was just the first room and that beyond it lay a parlour and a dining room, but slowly she understood that one door led to a bedroom where the boys slept and another door led to a bathroom. There was no other room. The small table in the kitchen, she saw, was set for seven. She imagined that there was another bedroom beyond the boys' room where the parents slept, but once Frank began to talk, he explained to her that each night their parents slept in a corner of the kitchen in a bed that he showed her was on its side against the wall, discreetly covered.

"Frank, if you don't stop talking you won't be fed," Tony said.

There was a smell of food and spices. The two middle brothers were studying her carefully, silently, awkwardly. They both, she thought, looked like film stars.

"We don't like Irish people," Frank suddenly said.

"Frank!" His mother moved from the stove towards him.

"Mom, we don't. We've got to be clear about it. A big gang of them beat up Maurizio and he had to have stitches. And the cops were all Irish too, so they did nothing about it."

"Francesco, shut your mouth," his mother said.

"Ask him," Frank said to Eilis, pointing to Maurice.

"They weren't all Irish," Maurice said.

"They had red hair and big legs," Frank said.

"Don't mind him," Maurice said. "Only some of them had."

Frank's father asked him to follow him into the hallway; when they returned after a few moments Frank was, to the amusement of his brothers, suitably chastened.

As Frank sat opposite her, quiet while food was brought to the table and wine poured, Eilis felt sorry for him and noticed how much he resembled Tony just now; feeling down seemed to have affected his entire being. Over the previous weekend, Eilis had received instructions from Diana about how to eat spaghetti properly using a fork only, but what was served was not as thin and slippery as the spaghetti Diana had made for her. The sauce was just as red, but was filled with flavours that she had never sampled before. It was, she thought, almost sweet. Every time she tasted it, she had to stop and hold it in her mouth, wondering what ingredients had gone into it. She wondered if the others, so used to this food, were being careful not to look at her too closely or make any comment as she attempted to eat it using only a fork as they did.

Tony's mother, who spoke at times with a strong Italian accent, asked her about the exams and if she intended to do another year at the college. She explained that it was a two-year course, and that, when she finished, she would be a bookkeeper and could work in an office rather than on the shop floor. As Eilis and Tony's mother discussed this, none of the boys spoke or looked up from their food. When Eilis tried to catch Frank's eye so she could smile at him, he did not respond. She glanced at Tony, but he too had his head down. She realized that she would love to run out of this room and down the stairs and through the streets to the subway to her own room and close the door on the world.