Cecelia Ahern - One Hundred Names

Mary-Rose groggily raised herself onto her elbows and looked around the room, confused as to where she was.

‘Look!’ Kitty said, louder now, excited.

Mary-Rose finally registered the music, got out of bed and joined her at the window. It took her a moment, as it did for Kitty to take the scene in. Slowly, a smile crawled onto her face and she looked at Kitty with delight.

‘Let’s get down there.’

Kitty threw on the clothes she had abandoned before getting into bed and ran downstairs, out of the guesthouse and out onto the road. The night was still, the small town completely shut down, everybody at home and in bed. Above them the clear sky twinkled with a million stars.

St Margaret’s bus had been moved from the car park, and was parked in the middle of the road, blocking off most of it, not that there was any traffic to stop. Its headlights were on full and the engine was running with the windows down. The headlights were pointing directly into the old ballroom, the doors had been opened up, the smell of must and damp drifted out from the abandoned barn, which had been the setting for so many of Birdie’s dance nights.

Dancing in the shadows was Birdie, her eyes closed, her chin lifted to the sky as she twirled round and round, her arms in the air as if dancing with an invisible dance partner to Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong’s ‘Dream a Little Dream of Me’.

Eva was sitting behind the wheel of the bus, holding the bus’s microphone to the speaker of the CD player, and standing beside the headlights of the bus were Edward and Molly.

Kitty was entranced by the scene before her. Leaving Mary-Rose, who was equally enchanted, she climbed aboard the bus.

‘You did this?’ Kitty asked Eva.

‘She told me she and Jamie used to break in and dance here at night. This was their favourite song. It’s a late birthday present,’ she said, her eyes filling as she watched Birdie dancing alone in the old ballroom.

As they were watching Birdie dancing alone, Kitty noticed Molly and Edward in the darkness holding each other close as they slowly circled to the music. Kitty believed she had just witnessed Eva’s magic.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

The next morning, the mood was visibly lifted from the night before. Despite Mary-Rose and Sam not sitting near each other at breakfast, Ambrose and Eugene seemed to be cosy, and Ambrose even shared a few words with Regina, though she would barely look at anybody else. Archie and Regina had shared a room too and their closeness and secret looks the next day were obvious for all to see. Kitty felt a little more awkward around Steve than usual, though, and was battling with how to act around him after their conversation had been interrupted last night, though it was easily covered up by the excitement for Achar and Jedrek’s big moment.

They made sure to eat a healthy breakfast and got plenty of morale-boosting from Archie, who no doubt was still following his plan to help those whose prayers he heard. Kitty didn’t have his ‘gift’ but she could guess what Achar and Jedrek’s prayers were that morning. Steve and Sam were in serious conversation over breakfast, a conversation they continued as soon as they sat beside each other on the bus, and Kitty would have given anything to hear what they were saying. She would have joined in had she not suddenly been at a loss as to how to behave around Steve. Birdie, despite not receiving her money, was in high spirits after her trip down memory lane and her memorable birthday, thanks to Eva, and she was still very much lost in her own mind, falling in and out of conversation as her mind flitted in and out of now and then.

As they were all boarding the bus, the young O’Hara came running out of the bookies with a large envelope in his hand.

‘Bridget!’ he called. ‘Bridget Murphy!’

Birdie paused from stepping onto the bus and turned to him. Edward quickly came to her side and Kitty had no intentions of being anywhere but.

‘I’m glad I caught you. I had a lot of convincing to do this morning,’ he said, red-faced and panting. ‘I’m very sorry about yesterday. My grandmother, she can be … well, she can hold on to some things. Her family loyalty is what we love about her but often it’s her downfall. But I have loyalty too, to my great-grandfather. I know he was as tight as they come, not the most generous man in the world, but he had a great respect for his business and he was a man of his word. If he placed this bet with you, he would like to see you get the winnings. I hope that you’ll accept this money, your winnings, with my greatest respect.’

Birdie looked at him shocked.

‘I was very close to my grandfather Jamie. He spoke about you often,’ he said.

Touched, Birdie held her hands to her mouth, then to his cheeks. He reddened even further. ‘You’re so like him, that when I saw you yesterday, for a moment I thought …’

‘They say there’s a great family resemblance,’ he said, cheeks still blazing.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘God be good to you.’

‘Thank you,’ Edward said.

Kitty helped Birdie on the bus and when they saw the envelope in her hand they all cheered and the celebratory mood was back on again.

‘Come on, college boy,’ Molly called, though her tone was softer this time, and as Edward looked at her, Kitty could see something between them. She was so happy she could have just leaped for joy.

Regina sidled in beside Kitty on the bus.

‘Hello,’ she said shyly. ‘We haven’t had the opportunity to speak yet.’

‘Yes, I’m sorry about that.’

‘Oh, you’ve more important people to talk to,’ she said kindly, ‘For your story. And I won’t keep you, I just wanted to thank you.’

‘No need to thank me, it was a pleasure for your company.’

‘I didn’t mean for the trip, though I am thankful of that, and Archie said you paid for our room and that was very nice of you.’ She looked down at her fingers, thin delicate fingers that looked like they belonged to a doll. ‘But I meant thank you for helping Archie. He said you have done a lot for him. That it was you who told him to talk to me.’

‘I don’t think he needed much persuading,’ Kitty smiled. ‘He had his eye on you every time I spoke.’

She blushed at that.

‘Well, because of you helping him, he has helped me, so for that I’m truly grateful.’

‘He told you about his … ability?’ Kitty couldn’t think of any word for it because in truth she wasn’t sure if it was a gift or a curse. If it had helped him meet Regina and if it led to his happiness then she was sure it was a gift but she didn’t envy him for it.

‘Yes, he did. I heard his entire story and he’s a very special man, that much I’m sure of,’ she said firmly, implying she wasn’t sure if she believed the rest.

‘He’s been through a lot,’ Kitty agreed. ‘Can I ask a personal question? You don’t have to tell me your personal story but … I’m interested to know, was he right about you?’

‘About my prayers?’

‘Yes. He said that you would sit there saying “please”.’

‘I wasn’t conscious of it.’ She looked down at her fingers again. ‘But I suppose that is what I was thinking.’

Kitty nodded, dying to hear more but not wanting to push it. Archie was her story, not Regina, but her interest in people was in her blood, at least that’s what Constance had always told her.

‘I was in a relationship,’ Regina said out of the blue when Kitty hadn’t been expecting any further explanation. ‘For a very long time.’ She had that haunted look again that Kitty recognised from seeing her in the café. ‘But he no longer wanted to be in the relationship. All of a sudden. Just one day. He didn’t give much of a reason. He said it didn’t matter but …’ she shrugged. ‘I found it hard to let go. He moved out, changed his number, changed his job. It was like he vanished off the face of the earth. But then I saw him in there one day, at that time in the morning, when I was passing, and I got such a fright that I couldn’t go to him. I wasn’t ready to say what I wanted to say. I walked on, turned the corner, changed my mind and went back but he was gone. It’s the only place I had ever seen him. People we knew had no contact with him. I think he had an episode of some kind; he just dropped his life and made a new one. He wanted to disappear, but I found him in there. I just didn’t have the nerve to go inside. I thought that maybe he’d go back, that that was somewhere he went to regularly, so I started going. He never turned up but I couldn’t miss a day. I kept thinking: what if today is the day he comes back? And then I couldn’t stop going. And the months went by and I still couldn’t stop going. Even when I tried to go elsewhere it was as if he was pulling me back. I would always end up there. I know it’s odd behaviour.’ She looked at Kitty nervously. ‘My family, they were worried about me. I know it wasn’t normal but I couldn’t stop. It was the only new link I had to him. So I kept going, hoping. I always believed in fate. And destiny. And all of those things that I know most people don’t believe in. I thought it was a sign, that I saw him there once and I would see him there again. But now I don’t really understand the point of it all. I never saw him again. It’s been a year,’ she said, almost ashamed with herself for keeping up that behaviour.