life, I might have turned out a lot better. And even he might have, if he’d had someone to care for and confide in all that time. But I’m sorry to say that I think it is too late to change the way we have turned out. The turning-out process has come to an end, and we are to a very great extent what we are. Our parents are getting older, and Lola is married, and I will probably continue to make poor life decisions and suffer recurrent depressive episodes, and Simon will probably continue to be a highly competent and good-natured but emotionally inaccessible person. But maybe it was always going to be that way, and there was never anything we could have done. It makes me think about the first day I ever saw you, and I remember the knitted green cardigan I was wearing, and the hairband you had in your hair. I mean the life we’ve had since then, together and not together – whether it was already there with us that day. The truth is that I really love Lola, and my mother, and I think that they love me, although we can’t seem to get along with one another, and maybe we never will. In a funny way maybe it’s not important to get along, and more important just to love each other anyway. I know, I know – she goes to Mass a couple of times and suddenly she wants to love everyone.
Anyway, we’re already at Athlone so I should probably stop writing this email. Just remind me that I have an idea for an essay about ‘The Golden Bowl’ that I want to run by you. Have you ever read such a juicy novel?? I threw it across the room when it was finished. Can’t wait to see you. Love love love. Eileen.
25
On the platform of a train station, late morning, early June: two women embracing after a separation of several months. Behind them, a tall fair-haired man alighting from the train carrying two suitcases. The women unspeaking, their eyes closed tight, their arms wrapped around one another, for a second, two seconds, three. Were they aware, in the intensity of their embrace, of something slightly ridiculous about this tableau, something almost comical, as someone nearby sneezed violently into a crumpled tissue; as a dirty discarded plastic bottle scuttled along the platform under a breath of wind; as a mechanised billboard on the station wall rotated from an advertisement for hair products to an advertisement for car insurance; as life in its ordinariness and even ugly vulgarity imposed itself everywhere all around them? Or were they in this moment unaware, or something more than unaware – were they somehow invulnerable to, untouched by, vulgarity and ugliness, glancing for a moment into something deeper, something concealed beneath the surface of life, not unreality but a hidden reality: the presence at all times, in all places, of a beautiful world?
/
When Felix pulled up outside Alice’s house after work that night, the lights were on in the windows. It was after seven o’clock, still bright out, but colder now, and beyond the trees the sea showed green and silver. With a backpack over his shoulder he walked with a jogging step up to the front door, rapping the knocker twice in quick succession against the brass plate. Chill salt air stirred over him, and his hands were cold. When the door came open, it was not Alice standing inside, but another woman, the same age, taller, with darker hair, dark eyes. Hello, she said. You must be Felix, I’m Eileen. Come on in. He entered and allowed her to close the door behind him. He was smiling
distractedly. Yeah, he said. Eileen, I’ve heard about you. Glancing at him she said: Good things, I hope. She told him Alice was cooking dinner, and he followed her down the hallway, watching the back of her head and her neat narrow shoulders proceeding ahead of him to the kitchen door. Inside, a man was seated at the table and Alice was at the stove, wearing a dirty white apron tied around her waist. Hello, she said. I was just draining the pasta. You’ve met Eileen, this is Simon. Felix nodded, fingering the strap of his backpack as Simon greeted him. The kitchen was a little dim, with just the worktop lights switched on, and candles on the table. The back window was fogged with steam, the glass velvety and blue. Can I give you a hand with anything? Felix asked. Alice was patting her forehead with the back of her wrist, as if to cool herself. I think it’s all under control, she said. But thank you. Eileen was just telling us about her sister’s wedding. Felix hesitated for a moment, and then sat down at the table. At the weekend, was it? he asked. Turning her attention on him with a delighted expression, Eileen began talking again about the wedding. She was funny and moved her hands a lot. Occasionally she invited input from Simon, who spoke in a relaxed voice and seemed to find everything amusing. He too paid a good deal of attention to Felix, catching his eye now and then and smiling in a vague conspiratorial way, as if pleased by the presence of another man, or pleased by the presence of the women but wanting to share or acknowledge this pleasure with Felix. He was handsome, wearing a linen shirt, thanking Alice in a low easy way when she refilled his glass of wine. The table was set with small patterned side plates, silver cutlery, white cloth napkins. A large yellow salad bowl, the leaves inside oiled and glistening. Alice brought a plate of pasta to the table and laid it down in front of Eileen. Felix, I’m serving you last, she said, because the other two are my guests of honour. Their eyes met. He smiled at her, a little