NWW Issue 9 Spring and Summer 2018

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NORTH WEST WORDS SPRING / SUMMER 2018 ISSUE 9 Sunday A bang on the door wakes me. The Virgin Mary is still looking down at me, a half smile on her face. I wonder if she approves of the half-smoked joints still on the windowsill from last night. I quickly wipe away any crumbs of weed and crank the window wide open to air the room out. Day 9. I came to Redemption house the day after it happened. My home town of 27,000 people was not enough to dilute the shame. The stares and the nudges. I went to MacBride’s Pharmacy to buy shampoo and the cashier smiled so hard, as if she was in pain. I think she was in the year behind me at school. I remember she got pregnant in transition year with one of the local Adidas hoods in the town. Even she was sympathetic towards me. Downstairs, there is a box of cornflakes and a carton milk on the table. I read the back of the cereal box in silence, letting the morning catch up to me. There is a word search on the back of the cereal box that i peruse through. Sunday means Mass. Optional, but encouraged of course. I will give it a miss this morning. There are some of the other girls, munching on cereal and toast in companionable silence. We are the heathens that skipped church. As it’s Sunday we have some extra free time. I leave the house and head out, taking a different route this time. I hop over a fence and start walking over the blocks of limestone, thinking that God, or whoever, had been playing a giant game of Tetris, the way they had been slotted into each other. I see something up ahead, some sort of plant maybe. I walk slowly up to it and gasp. It is the most beautiful tree, still in its infancy, sprouting small flowers from one of the cracks between the slabs. Green surrounded by the concrete barrenness. I am in awe. My throat catches and I sob silently. Then louder and harder and louder. It is the first time I have cried since. I am shocked by the sound of my cries. I lay there my tears fall into the dusty dry crevices. I wake up and find myself sprawled out under the tree. How long have I been here. A wave hits me. I jolt myself awake and run back to the house, taking care not to tumble over the rocky ground. I take the small business card out with the number printed on it that had been given to me ‘just in case I had changed my mind’. It belonged to a young bespectacled lawyer with kind eyes we had met with the day after it all happened. I had sat in her office in silence and listened as a cascade of words like ‘litigation’ and ‘indictment’ floated over me. I dial the number on the house phone that is only supposed to be used for emergencies. 56
NORTH WEST WORDS SPRING / SUMMER 2018 ISSUE 9 I clear my throat and speak for the first time in weeks. I am surprised at the steadiness and clarity of what comes out of my mouth. ‘Add me to the list. I’ll testify.’ Miriam Nic Lochlainn Painting: Stonewall Secrets—Greencastle’s ruins, Co. Donegal Lorraine Carey 57
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NWW Issue 9 Spring and Summer 2018

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