Colm Tóibín - Brooklyn

What he did once he moved away from her surprised her. He stood up without saying anything, looked at her, smiled and took his shoes and socks off and then removed his trousers and underpants. He knelt on the bed and slowly undressed her, and when she was naked, with her arms covering her breasts, he took off his shirt so that he was naked too. He approached gently, almost shyly, and lifted the bed covers and they both moved in between the sheets and lay together for some time quietly. She realized when she touched him once more, his penis erect again, how smooth and beautiful he was, and how much stronger he seemed naked than when he was with her in the street or in the dancehall, where, compared to men who were taller or bigger, he had often appeared almost frail. When she understood that he wanted to enter her again she whispered to him that he had pushed in too far the first time.

"I thought you would go up into my neck." She laughed under her breath.

"I wish I could," he said.

She pinched him hard.

"No, you don't wish you could."

"Hey, that hurt," he whispered and kissed her, moving slowly on top of her.

This time the pain was almost worse than before, as though he were hitting against something inside her that was bruised or cut.

"Is that better?" he asked.

She tightened as much as she could.

"Hey, that's beautiful," he said. "Can you do that more?"

Once again, as he pushed in further, he seemed to become unaware that she was with him. He seemed lost to the world. And this sense of him as beyond her made her want him more than she had ever done, made her feel that this now and the memory of it later would be enough for her and had made a difference to her beyond anything she had ever imagined.

The next day he was waiting for her after work and they walked from Fulton Street to the subway station without speaking. Once there, they arranged to meet again outside the college when the classes had finished. He appeared grave, almost angry with her, as they parted. Later, when he had walked her home, she turned before going down the basement steps and saw he was still standing there. He gave her a grin that reminded her so much of his brother Frank's way of grinning, so full of mischief and innocence, that she laughed and pointed at him in mock accusation.

It was clear, once she arrived in the kitchen and was waiting for the kettle to boil, that Mrs. Kehoe, who was alone at the table, was not speaking to her. She felt a lightness that almost caused her to ask Mrs. Kehoe what the problem was, but instead she moved around the kitchen pretending that she noticed nothing strange.

It struck her then that Mrs. Kehoe, who generally, Eilis believed, heard every sound and missed nothing, had heard Tony either entering or leaving the basement or, perhaps worse indeed, heard him during the night. In all the outrages that could be committed by the lodgers, this had never even been mentioned as a possibility by the lodgers themselves or by Mrs. Kehoe. It was in the realm of the unthinkable. While Patty and Diana often talked freely about boyfriends, the idea that one of them would spend an entire night in the company of her boyfriend, or allow him access to her bedroom, was out of the question. As Eilis sat in the chilly silence created by Mrs. Kehoe, she determined to deny emphatically and brazenly that Tony had been near her room and declare that such an idea shocked her as much as it did her landlady.

She made poached eggs and toast and was relieved when Patty and Diana came in with news about a coat that Patty had seen and was going to buy if it was still there on Friday when she got paid. Mrs. Kehoe stood up without speaking and left the kitchen banging the door.

"What's biting her?" Patty asked.

"I think I know," Diana said, looking at Eilis, "but as God is my witness I heard nothing."

"Heard what?" Patty asked.

"Nothing," Diana said. "But it sounded lovely."

Eilis slept deeply and woke in the morning exhausted and sore. It was as though Rose's death had happened long ago, and her night with Tony remained with her as something powerful, still present. She wondered how she would know if she was pregnant, how early the signs would come. She touched her stomach, asking herself if at this very moment something could be happening there, some tiny connection like a small knot, or smaller even, smaller than a drop of water but with everything in it that was needed for it to grow. She wondered if there was anything she could do to stop it, if there was something she could wash herself with, but as soon as she thought of that she knew that even the idea was wrong and that she would have to go to confession and make Tony go too.

She hoped that he would not grin at her again as he had done the previous evening and that he would realize the trouble she was in if she was pregnant. But if she was not pregnant, she hoped he would understand, as she did now, that what they had done was wrong, and more wrong because it had been done when Rose was barely in her grave. Even when she went to confession, Eilis realized, and told the priest what they had done, she would never be able to tell anyone that just half an hour before they had been crying. It would seem too strange.

As soon as she saw Tony that evening she told him that they would both have to go to confession the following evening, which was Friday, and that she presumed he understood this.

"I couldn't go to Father Flood," she said, "or any priest who might recognize me. I know it shouldn't matter, but I couldn't."

Tony suggested that they should go to his local church, where most of the priests were Italians.

"Some of them don't understand a word you're saying if you speak in English," he said.

"That's not a real confession, then."

"But I think they recognize some key words."

"Don't make jokes. You are going to confession too."

"I know that," he said. "And will you promise me something?" He moved close to her. "Will you promise to be kind to me after the confession? I mean to hold my hand and talk to me and smile?"

"And will you promise me to make a good confession?"

"Yes, I will," he said, "and my mom wants you to come to lunch on Sunday. She's worried about you."

The following evening they met outside his church. Tony insisted that they go to separate priests; hers, he said, a priest called Anthony with a long Italian surname, was young and nice and spoke English. He himself, he said, was going to go to one of the older Italian ones.

"Make sure he understands what you say," she whispered.

When she told the priest she had had sexual intercourse twice with her boyfriend three nights earlier, he left silence for a long time.

"Was this the first time?" he asked when he spoke eventually.

"Yes, Father."

"Do you love one another?"

"Yes, Father."

"What will you do if you are pregnant?"

"He will want to marry me, Father."

"Do you want to marry him?"

She could not answer. After a while, he asked her again, his tone sympathetic.

"I would like to marry him," she said hesitantly, "but I am not ready to marry him now."

"But you say you love him?"

"He is a good man."

"Is that enough?"

"I love him."

"But you are not sure?"

She sighed and said nothing.

"Are you sorry for what you did with him?"

"Yes, Father."

"For your penance I want you to say just one Hail Mary, but say it slowly and think about the words, and you must promise to come back in one month. If you are pregnant, we will have to talk again, and we will help you in every way we can."

When she got back to Mrs. Kehoe's she discovered that a lock had been put on the basement gate and she had to let herself in by the main door. Mrs. Kehoe was in the kitchen with Miss McAdam, who had decided that she was not going to the dance.