Mr Moran brought us for a meal to the Shelbourne Hotel. He knew everyone and kept introducing Lauren as his poetic protégée. Mrs Moran said she should stop depending on them for everything. But she said it so quiet that only me and Rebecca heard her. She’s such a bitch!
Love you,
Catriona
Chapter Seventeen
Rebecca’s Journal–1991
She couldn’t believe I’d collected her poems. I tried to persuade her to submit them to a proper publishing house but she refused. Afraid of failure, afraid of everything. Steve Moran took over. Vanity publishing. A big launch. What did it mean in the end? Another crutch.
Silverfish
In the moon skidding hours
I collect silverfish
Somersaulting silverfish
Disco dancing silverfish
Flick flash
Across the ash
And embers dead
Of hearth and home
Sliding in and sliding out
In chink and eave
In weft and weave
Snug in a rug
Smug bugs
In crevices that bleed the night.
Hurry scurry
Playing hide but do not seek us.
Silver scales
Flick flash
Slick slash
Dancing lancing silverfish
Thrashing, slashing twitch-blade runners.
Chapter Eighteen
Letters to Nirvana
15 January 1992
Mother,
Seven years…did you ever exist??????? Where should I address these pathetic letters? Heaven…Paradise…Nirvana…Cloud Nine? Where are you?
Cathy
9 June 1992
Dear Mum,
It’s over. He is now my brother-in-law. Rebecca walked up the aisle on Mr Moran’s arm. The way she smiled when she said, I Do, made me think about the nice times and how she loved me before you died. I kept remembering and remembering and it made me cry. We wore ice-blue with a shimmer when it caught the light. In every wedding photograph we’re smiling fit to burst a gut. Mr Moran made the Father of the Bride speech. Mrs Moran drank too much. Her mouth slid sideways when she was asked to lift her glass in a toast to the bridesmaids and she stayed sitting when everyone else stood up and shouted, To the beautiful bridesmaids.
Jeremy danced with me. His fingers pressed into the small of my back. He said I looked beautiful in blue and that I’d emerged from a chrysalis. I went into the Ladies and stared at myself in the full-length mirror. An ice-blue butterfly emerging from a chrysalis. Flying from a dark place, afraid of my reflection.
X
Catriona
22 August 1992
Dear Mum,
I didn’t think I’d ever get used to it but I have. Jeremy eats muesli and croissants for breakfast. He put photographs of his best ads in frames all over the hall. I sleep with cotton wool in my ears and squeeze my eyes tight so that I won’t think about them in the next room. But I do…I do…In the morning I pretend not to notice when they touch every time they pass each other. I pretend not to hear when they giggle over stupid things I don’t understand. Rebecca looks so young again. A student now, jeans and a ponytail.
I’m not going to write to you any more. What’s the sense in writing to a ghost? I ask myself that question every time I take up my pen. It’s stupid to keep looking for a sign that your fingers touched the paper when it’s obvious you don’t exist!!
X
Catriona
21 September 1992
Dear Mum,
Lauren’s gone to the University of Westminster to learn to be a proper writer. Mrs Moran organised it, the fees and all. Rebecca is furious. She doesn’t want Lauren to leave home but Lauren said it’s got nothing to do with her any more. We’re all growing up and making our own decisions. I haven’t told Rebecca about the night Mrs Moran rang and called me an ungrateful adulterous whore. Her voice was so squeaky and shaky, I didn’t know who she was, at first. When I said, you have the wrong number, this is Cathy Lambert, she hung up immediately. Every time I think about that squeaky voice on the phone something twists inside my chest. When I told Lauren, she stared back at me with her haughty expression that shuts everyone out and never said a word. Mrs Moran is mental to think Lauren fancies her geriatric husband. Lauren doesn’t fancy anyone but herself.
I wanted to tell Julie but I didn’t. I was afraid she’d laugh at Mrs Moran and call her a daft bat. She’s in rotten humour since she discovered she’s pregnant again. Why don’t they take up badminton or marathon running? Sex can’t be the only game they know how to play.
It’ll be easier in the house without Lauren. Not quieter, she never made a sound, but calm like we can open doors without being afraid.
Love you all,
Catriona
1 Nov 1992
Dear Mum,
I’m in deep shit. Grounded for ever, as far as Rebecca is concerned. Remember I told you about Melancholia’s idea for the Halloween Goth party? My date with disaster, as it turned out!! Rebecca thought I was sleeping over at Melancholia’s house and had even checked with Leah, who pretended I was.
We held the party in a warehouse down on the docks. It used to belong to Melancholia’s uncle. All the buildings around are empty too so it was creepy and perfect. We made a papier-mâché coffin and a tombstone and put black netting over the walls. We only invited Goths so it was hush-hush. Or so we believed. Melancholia sneaked vodka from Leah’s cocktail cabinet. Two bottles. Sharon had wine and Kevin brought beer. I drank vodka for the first time. It was like a volcano inside my chest. One of the Goths kept giggling ’cause you’re not supposed to drink it neat. It was easier going down with the orange juice…smooth and easy…easy and slow.
More people came, gatecrashers, not Goths. We all danced together but not touching. Goths don’t touch or invade private space. The gatecrashers didn’t care. Jobbo Boland called me a vampire bitch and begged me to bite his neck. They started a fight and broke bottles
