My Heart Went Walking

1983

You know how it is. Sometimes we plan a trip to one place, but something takes us to another.

—Rumi

1

Una

Donegal, Ireland

September

Wednesday

You stupid, stupid girl!"

I back my way to the door. Mam’s finger is pointing right at my heart. I turn and run.

I have no idea where to run though. Our woods? Cullen’s house is down the road, but that’s the first place she’d come looking for me, probably to call me more names the nuns would put us in detention for at school. Mam’s never called me that before, never shouted at me like that before.

I need to hide for a while until she calms down. I split out the back door and breathe in the view for a minute while I sort myself out: the lofty fir trees along the road, blowing their arms around like priests with holy water; the vast garden of bulbous winter vegetables Frank Jones has growing next door; and the fields embraced by haphazard stone walls and hedges slowly rising all the way to the mountains.

I spy a place to hide, even if it’s really lame and she’d find me in a second—the car. Why did I tell Mam at all? Why, why, why? I open the back door and curl up on the soft seat.

MY TIMEX SAYS IT’S SIX. The two brothers’ heads sparkle past the car window in response to Mam’s call to dinner, oblivious to my scrunched-up body in the back. Ellie’s probably helping Mam get dinner on the table and getting little Ruthie into the high chair.

My stomach is in rag order now. I can smell the shepherd’s pie I helped Mam make earlier, before I told her I was pregnant, before she called me things Father Barry tells us will condemn us to hell forever.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, if you’re up there, help me now. I haven’t a clue what to do.

Forty minutes later and I’m starting to feel like I want to puke and I can’t open the car door fast enough, but Mam put a child lock on the back door and I can’t get out and I puke all over the green back seat of her Honda Civic. Can life get any worse?

Holding my breath isn’t working. I reckon dinner’s over and Ellie’s skedaddled to the bathroom with little Ruthie. I flump onto the front seat to get out and sneak along the hedge of prickly holly leaves to the bathroom window, its dull light weaving through the gloaming onto my feet. My tights aren’t much use against the sweep of wind that’s blowing in through every thread of them. I hope to God Ellie’s in there. Sure enough, the joint blur of one big and one tiny body moves behind the pocked glass, along with the low murmur of Ellie’s voice. She always talks to Ruthie when they’re in there. She always talks to everyone, but Ruthie’s her best listener … when she’s got her trapped like that. I bang my knuckles against the icy glass and wait with a fist under each armpit to ward off the wind.

Ellie’s coffee-colored hair appears first, followed by her Brigette Bardot face—according to every boy in town. What the hell are you doing out there? Are you trying to get in the window?

Not right now; I just need a wet towel. I dangle an arm through the open space.

Ellie sticks a towel in the bathwater and rinses it out a bit. Ruthie starts to cry and stands with her half-naked body on the bath mat with her arms reaching up to the window. She always wants to be with the sister she can’t have.

Thanks. Ellie stares at me for a second before I hunker back down and head for the car.

Wiping the wet towel over the seat is only making this worse. It’s spreading my puke, not mopping it up, and despite the awful stink of it all, I really want some dinner. Maybe Ellie can get me some later, or maybe I can get back into the house when they’ve all gone to bed. Or I could go to Tanya’s house and help myself to her fridge. Best friends and all that.

I do my best with what’s left of the rank, lumpy mess on the seat and wave my hand to fan the air, much good it’ll do my nose.

Ellie’s left the window open a smidgen and she helps me wriggle my hips through and plant my feet on the toilet seat lid. Lucky for me, Ruthie’s out of the bath now, but she’s got her fat little leg trying to reach up and over the edge of it, back into the bubbles. I throw the towel into the water that’s on its way down the drain and swish it around.

Ellie’s acting as if nothing weird is going on at all. That’s how the Gallaghers do things. We pretend everything is normal, no matter what kind of shite is happening, until someone says it isn’t.

God, what have you done to your hair, Una? She reaches up and pats a bit against my ear. You never could get it straight. Someone should invent something for that.

I suppose puking your guts up all over your mam’s car would set the hair dancing.

Ruthie plays with the mess of it while Ellie puts her nappy on. Here we go, Ruthie, she says. First, I fold in each side of the nappy, like this, and then I put the liner in it, like this. She grabs Ruthie’s feet in one hand and dips her fingers into the Sudocrem I just opened for her. And now I’m going to put it on your bum bum, like this, until your bum looks like an ice cream. She smiles, but I don’t know if I have it in me. She sticks the big nappy pins in very carefully, clicks down the pink cap on them, and then stands Ruthie to her feet. We’re like her other mothers.

Ellie looks up at me, into my eyes, and I wonder if she knows, if Mam told her; but Mam’s probably mortified, wondering what everyone’s going to say. It’ll be all over town in hours if she says anything. Father Barry’ll probably use me as an example of Mary Magdalene in his next sermon. Oh God, I’ll be kicked out of St. Joseph’s! What am I going to say? I haven’t told Cullen I have his baby in this deep part of my body, and I don’t plan on telling him either. I’m scared stupid and I have no idea how he’ll react. But if Mam tells?

But I had to tell her. She’s my mam, for God’s sake. I’d kept it in for so long and I knew she’d notice it soon. She’s always gone on at us about telling the truth. I felt evil for not telling her. Do I feel better now? No.

Not at all.

Upsadaisy, Ruthie, says Ellie. Give me your foot so we can get your jammies on. I hold Ruthie’s little body so she won’t fall over. Ellie’s the nice one. I’d trust her, but I don’t want her to have to keep secrets. It wouldn’t be fair on her. But here’s what I didn’t tell Mam. If I had a choice to do it all over again, I would, only with a Durex this time and no drink.

There. I’ve said it. I liked it, and Father Barry and all the nuns at St. Joseph’s can stay in their miserable, sadistic, single lives because they don’t know what they’re missing. No wonder Mam keeps having babies. It’s the only time she’s allowed to do it.

"The A-Team is on at eight, and I want to be sure Ruthie is fast asleep by then so I don’t miss any of it. Can I get you anything?" Ah, Ellie, always thinking of everyone else.

My tummy growls. Do you think you can get me some dinner?

Cornflakes?

I nod and lock the bathroom door after her. I can’t face anyone else right now and pretend I’m okay. Thank God the rest of them are in watching the telly. After a few minutes she knocks on the door.

Thanks. I grab the sloshing bowl of milk and cardboard flakes. She forgot the sugar. I chomp it all down but then have to make my teeth-brushing time longer than usual. It takes a bit to get rid of the scraps of soggy cornflakes in my teeth and that manky taste of sick, and each brush feels like it’ll never get this level of yuck off them. I’m staring at my reflection in the wet mirror, looking at this face with my white skin and my red eyes.

Your face is shaped like a heart because everything in your heart comes out of your mouth. That’s what Cullen told me once. Cullen.… I hiccup.

I make sure no one is in the hallway, other than that picture of Jesus pointing to his glowing heart that kind of gives me the creeps, and place my feet, heel, toes on different spots of the carpet where I know the floor won’t squeak. My hands keep me steady, fingers splayed on the wallpaper’s embossed ferns and crowns that lord over every step. I let out a big breath when I finally get to shut the bedroom door. I won’t be reading tonight. My current book lands on the pile of other library books in the back of the bedside locker. Click, and the bedside light is off. Swoosh, and my icy toes can’t fight through the flannel sheets to reach the hot water bottle fast enough. My cheek sinks into the pillow like quicksand, along with my thoughts. What am I going to do?

I thought about leaving Donegal, leaving these mountains and beaches that feed my soul, and going over to England on the boat. I’ve heard they’ll do you know what over there. I don’t know anyone who’s done it though. I can’t imagine what it would feel like to have something go up inside me and take away the tiny, beating heart that Cullen Breslin put in there. It sounds too hard. I just can’t do that. I’m not that kind of girl. Mam’s sat us down so many times and, smiling, told us she’s going to have another one, and then comes a tiny, squirmy, curled-up ball of eyes and hands and love.

I’ve already thought about it. I want to hold this baby in my arms. I want to bend my face down to hers and kiss her forehead and smell her baby smell. I want to have her tiny eyes look for me. I want to hold her heart close to mine.

She’ll look just like Cullen, of course. She’ll have his soft lips, his blue eyes the color of that hand lotion in the Body Shop—I think it’s called Sea Green, but it’s really blue, I swear. She’ll have a big smile like Cullen’s too, and a dimple on her right cheek, and her hair will be the color of a Cadbury’s chocolate flake.

Mam’s all about us making our own decisions and living with them, like it or lump it. This isn’t something I can like or lump. Maybe Mam will come around and pretend the baby is hers and I can be a big sister to my own child. Maybe everything will be all right … except Mam warned me that day after Mass when we saw Ciara Brady show up with her huge bump. I’m so glad you’re not like that Ciara. I feel sorry for her mother, but I don’t know why she didn’t send her away, she said. And then she said, I will never raise a bastard of a grandchild. But I’ve seen her with her Ruthie. I think that once she holds my baby in her arms, she’ll change her mind. She has to.

The noise of the telly thumps through the walls. Dad’s probably in his chair watching the football, with his hand moving back and forth from his mouth to the tin of biscuits, using his belly as a table, the boys watching every stir of the hand to see if he’ll pass the tin over.

Ellie tiptoes into our room. Her clothes fall to the floor before her static nightie crackles in the darkness. It must be bad out there if she’s not watching the football with Dad—their ritual. I hear her footsteps crossing the carpet between us and feel a fat wad of toilet paper planted next to my face. She must have heard me sniffling. My fingers curl around it. I can see her outline hovering before she moves back to her side. I know she wants to ask me exactly what the deal is, but we don’t do that here, even though we’re almost twins with just the eighteen months between us. We just don’t ask.

Her sheets swish. Una?

Huh?

Are you all right?

I keep my face to the wall, and it takes me a second to get my wits back with the shock of her asking. No. Not really. I smooth the pillowcase crease by my nose. But thanks, Ellie.

The noises in the house trickle to a halt. Ellie’s little snores ripple through the blanket she always pulls up halfway over her face.

I haven’t a clue what to do next. All I could think about earlier was what to tell Mam, and that wasn’t much of a mouthful of words. All I said was Mam, I’m pregnant, before she laid into me. Now I’m lying here like a bag of wet cement and no brains at all. Funny how I can always try and fix everyone else’s problems but when it comes to me, all I can do is hit myself for not thinking and for being so stupid.

I was stupid. I had this stupid idea that she’d sit with me and talk about it. But we don’t talk about things. Ever. I knew better. How can I look Mam in the face in the morning? What’ll Dad say? When will she tell him?

Mam came in a bit ago, but when she looked over at me, she said nothing. She kissed Ellie good night, but then she left and closed the door. Is that her saying she’s never going to talk to me again, or does it mean she’s still thinking about what she wants to say?

2

Una

Thursday

Mam’s tires chomp into the gravel going out the driveway. Ellie is in the kitchen in the blue dressing gown she made in Home Ec. The braiding on the edges is coming loose. She turns from the high chair, the spoonful of porridge in her hand. Mam left you a letter. She nods to the table.

Stomach revolting again, I get the bread knife and slice the envelope right on its edge.

Una,

I haven’t told your dad yet. To be honest, I don’t know what to tell him. Do I tell him that his oldest isn’t headed for college? He was so proud. Neither of us ever made it that far, and we were so sure…

What the hell were you thinking? What the hell was that boy thinking? You haven’t even told me who it was. Do you even know???

You’ll have to go to a doctor. Maybe you’re not even pregnant.

I love my kids, but I have no intention of rearing yours too. How are you going to look after a baby? You’re only sixteen, for God’s sake! Will you even do your Leaving? Will what the government gives you be enough to have a place to live and put food on the table? Can you go to college if you can’t get a babysitter half the time? How will you ever have any future? Sure look at my life. I wanted this once. I wouldn’t change any of it, but sometimes I wish I hadn’t married quite so young. I’d love to have waited a bit and trained up in something and had a decent job. I wanted that for you. I want that for all my kids.

Remember the day you brought that mug home? Mirror, mirror on the wall, I am my mother after all is written around it. We both laughed that day. You said, You always say I’m just like you, Mam, as stubborn as they come. When you drink your tea, maybe it’ll calm you down enough to forgive me for whatever I’ve not done that day. Well, Una, there’s not a whole lot I can say about the sorry state you’re in today. Forgiveness won’t help you much. You’ve taken on a lifetime of everything for a few seconds of sex, and I hope to God you can handle it. This is all in your hands now.

I’m going to see the nuns and ask them to take you in. Then you can put the baby up for adoption once he’s born. Please don’t embarrass the family by doing anything stupid.

Mammy

My whole chest feels like it’s in a nutcracker being squeezed tighter and tighter. That’s when the tears start to track down my face.

Una?

I put my hand up to stop Ellie talking. Every part of me feels like dissolving jelly.

So there’s no point even talking about it. When Mam sets her mind on something, she never budges; there’s no arguing with her. If she says this baby inside me has to be given up for adoption, then that’s what’s going to happen, no matter how much I fight her. But you don’t think about those things when you’re after living scared stupid for weeks. You have to tell and hope for the best.

Could I get Dad on my side? But that might start them fighting and him drinking again, like they did when he lost his job and was on the dole for so long. I hated those years. I don’t want that for the wains. He was disappointed in himself then. Would telling Dad make him go back to the drink because he’d be so disappointed in me?

Forget breakfast. I have to protect this baby. I have to. I walk slowly to the hot press, one foot in front of the other. Breathe, breathe. I have to get away from here. I get a bag down. I need to pack. What do I even pack? My hand’s on the zip, but I can’t pull it back. No. I have to talk to Cullen. He’s the only one who understands me. I have to tell him.

He’ll know what to do.

The wind has picked up something fierce outside; even the grass looks like it’s ready for liftoff. I put on a jumper and run out the back door and across the fields of wet grass to Cullen’s house, my capris flapping against my thighs as my runners squish grass and dandelions and kick their spores free from their inner circle.

Every step has a picture that flashes into my mind with it.

Cullen leaving school before he does his Leaving.

Cullen asking me to marry him because it’s the right thing to do.

Cullen starting a shitty job, maybe even two, just so I can stay at home with our baby.

Cullen slowly dying inside because anything he’s ever wanted in life is locked behind a death sentence … because of me.

And that’s when I know what I have to do. 1. Keep my baby. 2. Never use this baby to glue Cullen to me, even though I would love nothing more than to be with him forever because it’s not his fault.

I stop in the middle of the field, push my hands against my head until it hurts, scream into the wind. I can almost feel physical pain in my chest as it starts to freeze over. My mind continues to war with my heart.

You could stay, you know. Tell Cullen the truth, ignore the gossip and the stares in town, tell your mam to go feck herself, let Cullen take care of you both. You could let him make the decision instead of you making it for him.

No! He’s too kind, too generous, too good. He won’t choose what’s best for him!

And you will?

I know him well. I know what he’ll choose. And I can’t let him ruin his life. I can’t saddle him with us. He needs to be with someone sweet and kind and lovely. I’m none of those things. No, this is not even an option.

My hand turns his back door handle, instantly slippery with the fear from my palms. Mrs. Breslin’s at work, always at work. I push door after door until I burst into his room. He’s lying on his crumpled duvet, staring at the ceiling.

So you’re talking to me now? he says, his eyes still on the flat white above him.

I stand there, lungs expanding, shrinking. Yes.

He rolls onto his side and looks into my eyes, the sea green of his own rich and wild. I want to plant myself in him. This is what I was afraid of. This is what I ran from.

Yes, I say again. I need your help.

He sits up and pats the duvet beside him. Runs a hand through his curls. Puts it back down on his lap to meet the other one.

I can’t look at his face right now, his legs … those hands … but I sit down. Swallow. And begin story time. The one I thought up as I ran through the dandelions and set them free.

It’s not as hard as I thought it would be—lying to Cullen—especially while I’m talking to the door of his bedroom instead of to his face. It’s like I’m walking through foggy woods and all I have to do is keep coming up to the next tree trunk to find my way out.

"So after that party where we, you know … it took me a few days to try and understand what happened. I’ve been in love with you since I was thirteen. I wanted all of you. I will always want all of you. And after about a week, I decided that I was just really drunk and I used you to see what sex was really like. I’m really sorry about that. Using you." My hands are jittering like mad and I can’t hold them tightly enough.

But then I did something even worse. I can’t look at him at all. I know already what his face will say. The pedestal he’s always had me on will crack and I’ll fall through the broken trapdoor.

I’d been talking to Dylan for a few weeks at the caravan park—that fella whose parents left him there for the summer, and whenever I went for a walk on the beach, he always ended up walking with me. I told him about what I’d done, and he said … Here we go. … he said I should have done it sober, and how would I like to see what it’s like when your brain can enjoy it too?

I can see this grand story that never was in my mind, and it almost feels real apart from the sound of Cullen’s wobbly breathing. The fog. Find the next tree.

And then he kissed me and took me back to his caravan and we had sex. And now for the coup d’état. And he was right. It’s much better sober.

Silence.

I can hear the birds chirrup near his window.

The wind surging against the walls.

The RTE radio jingle fading in and out in the kitchen.

But silence.

And I know you always thought I was so wise, but it’s even worse than that. My hand reaches up to my tummy and rests on my scarlet jumper. I’m pregnant, and I think it’s Dylan’s, and I’m going to Dublin to tell him because Mam wants me to give the baby to the nuns and there’s no flipping way in hell I’m going to let her, so all I can do is go and hope for the best.

It’s only now that I look at him, look at his curls flattened by the pillow he was on a few minutes ago, look at the fists he’s made of his hands, look at the way he’s pushed his knees tightly together. His words trip over each other, frostbitten.

Are you sure it’s Dylan’s?

No, Cullen, I know it’s yours because yours is the only skin I ever wanted next to mine. Yeah, because I had my period right after the party. I didn’t. I finished it the day before I put my lips on yours and watched my brain cells dance away.

"It looks like you’ve