Colm Tóibín - Brooklyn

Eilis went back to work the following day as well and was determined to go to her classes that evening. Since they could not go to a movie or a dance, she and Tony went to a diner nearby and he said he would not mind if she did not want to talk much or if she cried.

"I wish this hadn't happened," he said. "I keep wishing it hadn't happened."

"I think that too," Eilis said. "If only she'd let one of us know. Or if only nothing had happened and she was well at home. I wish I had a photograph of her so I could show you how beautiful she was."

"You are beautiful," he said.

"She was the most beautiful, everyone said that, and I can't get used to the idea of where she is now. I'll have to stop thinking about her dying and her coffin and all that and maybe start praying, but it's hard."

"I'll help you if you like," he said.

Eilis felt, despite the improving weather, that all of the colour had been washed out of her world. She was careful on the shop floor and proud that not once did she break down or have to go suddenly to the bathroom and cry. Miss Fortini told her that she was not to worry if she needed to go home earlier any day, or if she wanted to meet her outside working hours to talk about what had happened. Tony came every night to meet her after the classes and she liked how he allowed her to remain silent if she wanted. He simply held her hand, or put his arm around her and walked her home, where her fellow lodgers made clear to her one by one that if she needed anything, anything at all, she was to knock on their door or find them in the kitchen and they would do everything they could for her.

One night when she went up to the kitchen to make herself a cup of tea she saw that there was a letter for her on the side table that she had missed earlier. It was from Ireland and she recognized the handwriting as Jack's. She did not open it immediately but took it downstairs with her when the tea was made so she could read it without being disturbed.

Dear Eilis, Mammy asked me to write to you because she isn't able. I am writing this in the front parlour at the table by the window. The house was full of people but now there isn't a sound. They have all gone home. We buried Rose today and Mammy asked me to tell you that it was a fine day and the rain kept off. Father Quaid said the mass for her. We came down on the train from Dublin and arrived yesterday morning after a bad night on the mail-boat. She was still being waked in the house when we arrived. She looked beautiful, her hair and everything. Everyone said she looked peaceful, just asleep, and maybe that was true before we came but when I saw her she looked different, not like herself at all, not bad or anything but when I knelt down and touched her I didn't think it was her at all for a minute. Maybe I shouldn't say this, but I thought it was best to let you know what it was like. Mammy asked me to tell you everything that happened, about all the people who came, the whole golf club and Davis 's office shut for the morning. It wasn't like Daddy, when he died you would think he was alive one minute. Rose was like stone when I saw her, all pale like something from a picture. But she was beautiful and peaceful. I don't know what was wrong with me but I didn't think it was her at all until we had to carry the coffin, the boys and myself and Jem and Bill and Fonsey Doyle from Clonegal. It was the worst thing about it in that I couldn't believe we were doing that to her, closing her in there and burying her. I'll have to pray for her when I get back but I couldn't follow the prayers at all. Mammy asked me to say that she said a special goodbye to her from you but I couldn't stay in the room when Mammy was talking to her and I nearly couldn't carry the coffin I was crying so much. And I couldn't look at all in the graveyard. I covered my eyes for most of it. Maybe I shouldn't be telling you all this. The thing is that we have to go back to work and I don't think Mammy knows that yet. She thinks one of us might be able to stay but we can't, you know. Work beyond is not like that. I don't know what it's like over there but we have to be back and Mammy is going to be here on her own. The neighbours will all come in and the others but I think it hasn't hit her yet. I know she'd love to see you, she keeps saying that is the only thing she is hoping for but we don't know what to say about it. She didn't ask me to mention this but I'd say you'll be hearing from her when she's able to write. I think she wants you to come home. She's never slept a night on her own in the house and she keeps saying that she won't be able to. But we have to go back. She asked me if I had heard of any work in the town and I told her I'd ask around but the thing is I have to go back and so do Pat and Martin. I'm sorry for rambling on like this. The news must have come as a terrible shock to you. It did to us. We had trouble finding Martin for the whole day because he was out on a job. It's hard to think of Rose out in the graveyard, that's all I have to say. Mammy will want me to say that everyone was good and they were and she won't want me to say that she's crying all the time but she is, or most of the time anyway. I'm going to stop writing now and put this in an envelope. I'm not going to read it over because I started a few times and when I read it over I tore it up and had to start again. I'll seal the envelope and I'll post it in the morning. Martin, I think, is telling her that we have to go tomorrow. I hope this letter isn't all terrible but, as I said, I didn't know what to put into it. Mammy will be glad I sent it and I'll go and tell her now that it's written. You'll have to say a prayer for her. I'll go now. Your loving brother, Jack Eilis read the letter a few times and then she realized that she could not stay on her own now, she could hear Jack's voice in the words he wrote, she could feel him in the room with her and it was as though he had come in from a hurling match and his team had lost and he was breathless with the news. If she had been at home she could have spent time talking to Jack, listening to him, sitting with her mother and Martin and Pat, going over what had happened. She could not imagine Rose lying dead; she had thought of her as asleep and being laid out like someone who was sleeping but now she had to think of her like stone, all the life gone out of her, and her closed in the coffin, all changed and changing and gone from them. She almost wished Jack had not written but she knew that someone had to write and he was the best at writing.

She moved around the room, wondering what she should do. It struck her for a second that she could get a subway to the harbour and find the next boat going across the Atlantic and simply pay the fare and wait and get on the boat. But she realized quickly that she could not do this, they might not have an empty place and her money was in the savings bank. She thought of going upstairs, and in her mind she went through each of her fellow lodgers but none of them could be any use to her now. The only person who could be any use to her was Tony. She looked at the clock; it was ten thirty. If she could get there quickly on the subway, then she could be at his house in less than an hour, maybe a bit longer if the late trains did not come so often. She found her coat and went quickly into the corridor. She opened and closed the basement door and went up the steps trying not to make a sound.

His mother answered the door in her dressing gown and took her upstairs to the door of the apartment. It was clear that the family had retired for the night and Eilis knew that she did not seem now in a deep enough distress to justify her intruding at this hour. She saw through the door that Tony's parents' bed was already folded out and she came close to telling Tony's mother that it was fine, she was sorry for disturbing them and would go home. But that, she realized, would make no sense. Tony, his mother said, was getting dressed and he was going to go out with her; he shouted from the bedroom that they could go to the diner around the corner.