Foreign Affairs (18 page)

Please don’t do this to me, Holy God. St Anthony, St Theresa, please let me go to the Dandelion, she babbled to herself.

‘Maybe we’ll go tomorrow. Sean has a match this afternoon, so Daddy will be going to that, and anyway I want to go and see your Auntie Ellen. We’ll go tomorrow then,
girls,’ their mother pronounced as she went downstairs to get the breakfast.

‘Thanks, thanks, thanks,’ Brenda breathed to the Almighty and His saints for their merciful intercession.

‘Thanks for what? Who are you thanking?’ Jenny was curious.

‘No-one, mind your nose!’ Brenda certainly wasn’t going to inform her younger sister of her plans.

After the breakfast dishes were washed up and the kitchen tidied, Brenda spread some newspaper on the big wooden table and took out the Brasso from the bottom of the Welsh dresser. She hated
with a vengeance doing the brasses. The pong of the stuff and the mess it made of her hands annoyed her. Nevertheless, she began polishing her mother’s best brass candlesticks diligently.
Sean was cleaning out the shed in the back, Jenny was dusting while her mother hoovered, Gerard was shelling peas and their father was mowing the grass. The house was a hive of activity as it
usually was on a Saturday morning. Brenda didn’t really like Saturday mornings at all. There was too much to be done. Cora Delahunty’s mother had a woman who came in on Saturdays to
clean her house. Cora was always talking about the maid.

Imagine never, ever having to polish, hoover or do the ironing. If she ever got married to Eddie, as was her greatest desire, she certainly wouldn’t spend Saturday mornings doing
housework. No! They’d spend all day in town, she thought happily as she finished the candlesticks and started on the ornaments.

At twelve o’clock, she had finished her jobs and Kit told her she’d done great work. Anxious to stay in her mother’s good books, she brushed Gerard’s hair despite his
protestations and washed his face. ‘He can come with us to Confession so he won’t be whingeing when the rest of us are gone,’ Brenda offered.

The four of them set off across The Green and Brenda sniffed the air appreciatively. What a relief it was to have all her jobs
and
her homework done. She felt like dancing. It was a
beautiful Indian summer’s day. The sky was blue and little fluffs of clouds drifted towards the Dublin Mountains. The breeze was balmy, all she was wearing was a light cotton summer dress and
she was barelegged in sandals. This afternoon she was going to wear her new Indian fringed skirt and a T-shirt. After all, the Dandelion was where all the hippies hung out, she didn’t want to
look out of place. She wished mightily that she had some beads like Cora’s. Maybe she’d treat herself to some today, Brenda decided. She had quite a bit of baby-sitting money saved.

The blue and silver of the galvanized iron of Our Mother of Divine Grace church shimmered in the heat haze. Silently, they entered through the side door. Gerard insisted on getting some Holy
Water for himself when he saw the rest of them dipping their fingers into the font and blessing themselves. Of course he drenched himself, and Brenda gave out stink to him and told him to behave
himself or she’d lock him in the Confession box in the dark. After that, there wasn’t a peep out of him.

Then Sean and Jenny started arguing about who was going first and she had to haul them back as they galloped down the aisle to the Confession box. There were two rows of people already waiting
outside Father Collins’s box. Her heart sank. They’d be here for ages, she groaned to herself. Just as she was about to lead the trio into the queue, she noticed a small elderly priest
walking up the side of the church. Great, she thought, sometimes visiting priests heard Confession.

‘Quick, quick,’ she hissed, dragging the hapless Gerard behind her in her haste to get over to the other side of the church. They were first, they’d be out in a jiffy. Or so
she thought. There was some shuffling and coughing as the old priest pulled the curtains behind him and arranged himself and his missals and rosary beads to his satisfaction. She motioned to Sean
to go first. He grinned victoriously at Jenny and marched confidently through the Confessional door only to emerge what seemed like an eternity later, beet-red in the face.

Brenda motioned Jennifer to go next, and she seemed to be in there for ages too. Finally it was her turn and she stepped into the dark solitude.

The shutter was pulled across none too gently. ‘Begin your Confession,’ a crusty voice barked.

‘Bless me, Father—’

‘Speak up, I can’t hear you,’ the priest ordered. Brenda scowled in the dark, she didn’t want half the church to know her sins. It wasn’t her fault if he was deaf.
She began again. ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned it’s two weeks since my last Confession, Father. I took the Holy Name, Father. I was inattentive at Mass, Father. I used bad
language, Father,’ she gabbled her usual litany. ‘I had bad thoughts, Father.’ She always slipped that one in in the middle hoping that it wouldn’t be noticed. ‘I told
lies, Father. And I smoked a cigarette, Father.’ She had decided to confess her smoking as otherwise she could be deemed not to have made a full Confession.

‘I see,’ came the ominous voice after she had paused. ‘What age are you?’

‘Thirteen, Father . . . no, fourteen . . .’ she whispered, flustered.

‘I can’t hear.’

God Almighty, Brenda thought, longing for the ordeal to be over. She vowed she’d never go to a strange priest again, no matter how long the queue for the other Confessional.
‘Fourteen, Father,’ she repeated.

‘These are serious sins, daughter. How often have you had these impure thoughts?’

Brenda was flummoxed. She and Paul Newman had wonderful adventures every night. Last night he’d rescued her from a horde of rampaging infidels.

‘Eight times,’ she muttered, saying the first figure that came to mind. Trust him to latch onto that one.

There was a distinct ‘tsk’ from the other side of the grille.

‘You must have respect for yourself, daughter. Your body is a vessel for the Holy Spirit. God cannot abide in an unclean soul. Think of Our Lady when these thoughts come into your head.
Ask her to help you. Ask her to help you to be attentive at Mass also. It is a grave affront to God not to give him his due respect and attention at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and an insult to
use His Holy Name in vain. Give up the smoking, my child, you deceive your parents which breaks the fourth and eighth commandments. Foul language is most off-putting and unladylike. You must guard
your tongue, my child, and model yourself on Our Blessed Mother.’

I bet she never had to listen to someone like you blathering on, Brenda thought irreverently, hoping fervently that nobody outside could hear what was being said.

‘For your penance, say the Rosary and two Our Fathers and now make a good Act of Contrition, my child,’ she heard the elderly priest say. Brenda was horrified. A
whole
Rosary!
And
two Our Fathers. Usually she got five Hail Marys.

She staggered out the door of the Confessional, laden down with her penance. A whole Rosary to say, she’d be here all day.

‘What did you get? I got ten Our Fathers, that’s the worst I’ve ever got.’ Sean was raging.

‘The Rosary,’ Brenda muttered. Her brother’s eyes widened in amazement, and some admiration.

‘They must have been real mortalers.’ His tone was respectful. Side by side the sinners knelt, doing their penance. It was the fastest Rosary she’d ever said.

Rushing back home across The Green, she hoped that lunch was ready. It wasn’t. Her mother had decided to clean out the presses in the kitchen and there were jars and packets and tins and
the like all over the table. Brenda was in a frenzy of impatience. She was meeting Kathy at two-fifteen and they were meeting the boys at the terminus for the half two bus into town. It was already
gone one.

‘I’ll help,’ she offered, trying to hide her frustration.

‘Good girl,’ her mother said gratefully. ‘Did you ever start something and were sorry you started it?’ Between them they got the presses cleaned and it was with immense
relief that she heard her mother say, ‘I think I’ll ask Jim to go down to Cowser’s and get us fish and chips for the lunch seeing as it’s so late, and the lads are going to
the match.’

‘Yippee,’ Sean approved. Fish and chips from the chipper was a rare treat in the Myles household. Thank you, God, Brenda sent up a private prayer. If her dad went for fish and chips,
it would only take ten minutes.

By one-thirty the Myles family were sitting down relishing their takeaway meal. Brenda bit into crisp crunchy golden batter and savoured every mouthful. All she had to do now was to mention
casually that she was going into town with Kathy and the gang and that was that. She was free to go.

‘I’m going into town with Kathy and the gang,’ she remarked lightly, licking her fingers. ‘Do you want anything from the Kylemore?’

‘Would you get me an almond ring?’ Her mother delved into her apron pocket and handed her a half-crown.

‘You’re lucky,’ Jennifer sighed, ‘going into town. Daddy is taking Sean and Gerard to a match and I’ve nothing to do.’

‘When you’re in secondary you’ll be able to go into town with your friends,’ Brenda said with the superiority of age, as she got up from the table.

‘It wouldn’t kill you to take her in with you for once,’ Kit remarked. ‘Actually it would be doing me a great favour if you took Jennifer with you because I want to go
and talk to Auntie Ellen about Grandpa Myles.’

Brenda nearly fainted. Imagine bringing your sister on a
date
. How utterly unsophisticated. Imagine the faces on Eddie and Kenny when they saw Jennifer tagging along.

‘Mammy, I can’t do that,’ she pleaded. ‘None of the others bring their younger sisters.’

‘It’s just for once, for heaven’s sake, Brenda. Poor old Jenny never gets a look-in with you. She is your sister, after all.’

‘I’ll bring her another Saturday,’ Brenda promised desperately.

‘Brenda.’ Her father arched an eyebrow. ‘Bring Jenny with you today to help your mother out, it’s the least you could do.’

‘But she has to do the washing-up and I’ll be late,’ wailed Brenda, frantically.

‘Go on and get ready, the pair of you, I’ll do it,’ Kit declared. ‘And here.’ She reached into her pocket again. ‘There’s a ten-shilling note, give me
back the half-crown and get the almond ring out of this and you can treat yourselves with the rest. You did great work today, both of you, you deserve a treat.’

Normally, Brenda would have been thrilled to bits to be handed all that money. Her pocket money was two shillings a week. To be given extra was a real bonus. But even if it had been a
twenty-pound note, it would not have cheered her up. She was going to be a laughing-stock, having to bring her younger sister on a date. And what if her father found out she was going to the
Dandelion Market? He wouldn’t be a bit impressed. God, she was in such a dilemma. She couldn’t turn around and say she wasn’t going because her parents wouldn’t stand for
it. What if Eddie and Kenny said no way were they going to have a
child
traipsing after them? Kathy would probably go with them and she’d be left to bring Jenny into town on her own.
What a drag.

In silence she marched up to the bedroom with a delighted Jennifer trotting behind her. She flung her dress off her and took the new Indian skirt from the wardrobe.

‘What will I wear?’ Jennifer asked eagerly.

‘You can stay as you are, Miss. It’s just not fair, I can’t even go into town by myself with my friends without you making a fuss.’ Brenda was almost in tears.

‘Oh!’ responded Jennifer, deflated.

Brenda flounced out of the bedroom and went into the bathroom. Slamming the door behind her she let out a string of curses that would probably have earned her a dozen Rosaries had she confessed
them. She didn’t care. God had not played fair. Tears slid down her cheeks. She had been so looking forward to this afternoon. It would have been her big chance to get off with Eddie and now
it was most certainly ruined.

Fifteen minutes later she was knocking on Kathy’s door.

‘Hiya,’ Kathy opened the door looking very fetching in a pair of psychedelic trousers and an orange blouse. She saw Jennifer and assumed she had come calling for Beth, her younger
sister. ‘Beth’s out the back.’

‘She’s coming with us,’ Brenda informed her mournfully. Kathy’s jaw dropped.

‘But . . . But . . . she can’t! What about . . . Well you know . . .’ Kathy was aghast.

‘I know, Kathy, there’s nothing I can do about it. I have to bring her with me and that’s it.’

‘Can’t we leave her here with Beth?’

Brenda wavered. What a brainwave. She looked hopefully at Jennifer.

‘OK,’ said her sister dolefully, recognizing defeat.

‘Now you’re to wait here until me and Kathy get back from town. You can’t go home ’cos there won’t be anyone there. I’ll buy you something nice in
town.’

Jennifer looked very fed up and went out the back to play with Beth. Kit, who was hanging out clothes two gardens away, spotted her. ‘I thought you were going into town with Brenda,’
she called over.

‘I’m playing with Beth,’ Jennifer explained. Unwilling to rat.

‘Are Brenda and Kathy gone yet?’ Jennifer shook her head. ‘Tell Brenda I want her,’ Kit said crossly.

Jennifer went back into the house and called up the stairs to Brenda, who was putting lipstick on in Kathy’s bedroom. Kathy’s mother didn’t mind her wearing makeup, but Mrs
Myles would not allow Brenda to use it until she was older.

‘Brenda, Mammy wants you,’ Jennifer called.

Brenda nearly had a fit. ‘Christ Almighty! What did you say to her?’ she thundered.

‘I never said anything. She was hanging out clothes in the back and she saw me an’ Beth playing and she asked me if you were still here,’ Jennifer explained.

‘You should have ducked when you saw her, or stayed inside until she was gone to Auntie Ellen’s.’ Brenda wiped off her lipstick angrily, throwing her eyes up to heaven.
‘I’ll be back in a second,’ she said to Kathy.