‘Yeah, I think I do.’ He smiled; there was no need to say any more.
‘I should be getting back to the shop. My dad will be expecting me and if I’m late he… well, he worries about me.’ She stood over him for a moment, looking out across the water and back towards the beach. ‘I think it’s going to be a great summer,’ she said softly. ‘Don’t forget Saturday, at two o’clock. You know where my dad’s piano shop is?’
‘Sure, on Garden Square?’
‘Yep, don’t be late,’ she called as she ran back up towards the village.
Niall stayed there for a while, until the sun became a little cooler, covered over by some light passing clouds. He decided to go back to the house and make a cup of coffee for himself and listen to some music until his mother came home.
Just as he closed the front door, he heard the phone ring loudly in the kitchen.
‘Dad?’ His father never rang him, not unless there was something important or it was an occasion.
‘Niall, I’m just trying to catch up with your mother. Is she there?’
‘Um, no. It’s just me, actually.’
‘Ah, how are you?’
‘Good, really good,’ Niall managed, because he was actually; he just realised.
‘And your mother, she’s…’ His father’s words drifted off into silence. When had they forgotten what to say to each other? Niall suddenly realised that speaking with his father had somehow become an effort over the last few years. Perhaps it was the distance? Or maybe it was the fact that their worlds had spun much further than just miles apart? Time too had separated them, so the little everyday things they might have once shared now only stood between them.
‘At work,’ Niall said.
‘Of course she is…’ His father sounded as if he was distracted.
‘Dad,’ Niall said tentatively. ‘I’m really excited about going out to Sydney to you…’
‘I’ll be glad to have you. Now your mother has decided to move to that backwater permanently, I could see why you’d want to get out of there.’
‘She’s told you about the practice, then?’
‘Yep, she even suggested that you start in the school nearest to the village and give country living a go. Of course, that wouldn’t do. I mean we’re city boys, aren’t we?’
‘She never said a word about me moving schools.’
‘Well, maybe she knew how you’d react; no youngster wants to leave the city and the best boarding school in the country to live among a bunch of yokels.’
‘Actually, I have a friend who goes to that school.’ He didn’t add that Zoe Huang was one more friend than he had in his own school.
‘And I suppose all they talk about is fishing and farming.’
‘As it happens, they don’t have a farm. Her father is a piano restorer. She has no interest in farming or fishing,’ so far as Niall knew from their afternoon on the pier. All they’d talked about was books, games and films. Zoe was as big a reader as Niall was, so they’d had lots of books in common.
‘Anyway, what does it matter? You’re coming out to Sydney and I was going to run it by your mother first, but I’ve found an all-boys private boarding school here. It’s pricey and a bit of a track to and from where we are, but you’ll be able to come back here to the apartment in term time. I can’t wait to show you Sydney; you’re going to love it.’ His father sounded excited at the prospect.
‘Aren’t there any day schools, like a college or just a regular secondary school?’
‘Of course, there are, but it’s not like Ireland, Niall. You know, my job means I’m working crazy hours and well, you know how it is…’ His words trailed off, because they both knew his girlfriend didn’t like kids.
‘Sure, no problem. Can I look it up, to see what it’s like?’
‘Of course. I was just about to email everything to your mother, so I’ll send it on to you also, okay?’
‘Brilliant.’ Niall tried to keep his voice enthusiastic, but there was no getting away from the fact that Sydney sounded a lot like his life was in Dublin – just more of the same with warmer weather. Whereas Ballycove, if things worked out as his mother was quietly planning, well, it could be a million times better than jetting off to the far corner of the world. ‘Dad,’ he said just as his father was about to hang up on the other end of the line. ‘Have you enrolled me yet?’