Perfectly Preventable Deaths

6 Calendula

It’s a pale autumn day, bright skies and sharp winds that sliced through the green wool of my jumper earlier, as I gathered mint for the water jug. I was almost grateful to the chill. I needed a distraction from Catlin, who woke me up this morning with an enthusiastic, ‘Morning, Maddy. Would you like a coffee? Let me tell you about the sexy dream I had featuring Lon. In detail.’

And then she did.

She is the worst person I have ever met, and I would sleep for a hundred years rather than re-hear that. I don’t like the idea of her meeting someone right away. She shouldn’t get a safety blanket when she’s supposed to be my one. I need help interacting with the tiny group of people who live here. It’s weird there are so few. Aren’t villages supposed to be, like, communities, where everyone knows everyone’s business and things? I suppose they probably know all our business already. We just haven’t learned theirs.

People are always going in and out to Mamó, sometimes with mysterious boxes and eyes full of tears. That’s probably half of what they pay her for. To keep their dirty small-town secrets like a crap priest. I legitimately saw someone handing her a brown envelope yesterday. It looked like it was full of old dry leaves. She glared at me as she stuffed it in her pocket. I was peering from a turret window so she couldn’t have known I was there. And it’s not like she has resting glare face. She was just glaring in case someone was watching. For fear they’d feel un-small for even a second.

Catlin brought up Lon eighteen times today. I started counting after number five. Now, in fairness, they have been messaging on the regular. I did not reply to the single message he sent me.

Hello Maddy. This is Lon. Now u have my number. And three smiley-face emojis.

I don’t trust people who smile too much. They’re either too happy, or lying. I’m glad he had the good sense not to show up in my dreams, rescuing me from things. But that’s kind of not on him, that’s on my lovely sensible subconscious that doesn’t go wild over people within seconds of meeting them. I don’t really get the whole fancying-people thing. I mean, there are people I prefer seeing to other people. And people who smell better than other people. But I’d generally prefer to read a book, or complain about something. Which is fine, like sexuality is different for different people. And for me it is mysterious and intimidating and possibly another way to fail. When you’re attracted to a person, your brain releases chemicals. You lose your appetite, you might not sleep. Your heart rate increases and you feel what sounds a lot like panic. Catlin doesn’t mind that sort of thing – she wants to be swept up, to fall and burn. But burning is a horrible sensation. And falling’s not much better. Some people die of fright on the way down.

I have spent a good part of the day watching Catlin prance about in an old smoking jacket she found in the attic. She is always finding things in the attics here. Brian’s dad bought up a lot of estate sales, so the castle is full of boxes of old things; Brian says he doesn’t know the half of it, in that voice he gets when he talks about his dad. The deeper one. Our stepdad clearly has daddy issues. He is lucky to have ended up with someone like Mam. And we’re probably lucky to have ended up with him, even if it’s only so Catlin gets to live in a flea market where everything is hers for the taking.

Catlin is grumpy that nobody from school has messaged her or added her on anything. ‘Not even Layla,’ she moaned, as if it is a truth universally acknowledged that Layla is terrible. ‘And she’s staff.’

‘Layla’s all right,’ I tell her. ‘And she doesn’t work for us. Her dad works for Brian. That’s a different thing.’

Catlin might need to check her brand-new privilege. We’ve only been living in a castle for about fifteen seconds. What is she at with her ‘staff’? I don’t like the idea of people having to be nice to us because our stepdad is rich. People should be nice to us because Catlin is charismatic and I’m also there. It is the way of things. At least it was.

Instead of scavenging cool things from our stepdad’s house, I have been spotting old women. One very particular old woman. Every time I visit my plants, it seems Mamó is in the garden, looming. And then I have to say an awkward, ‘Hi,’ and she might nod at me if she feels like it, maybe. My skin gets all crawly around her. Like I’m slightly allergic. And who knows? Maybe I am. It wouldn’t be the weirdest thing to have happened. I’m pretty sure I heard her call the raven ‘Bob’ earlier. While feeding it a piece of raw meat. It’s finger-tongue reached out from the beak to stroke the meat before it gobbled it and croaked its thanks. I’m not sure why I got the urge to spy on her a little. It’s like when you have a big spot, and you hate it, but throughout the day your fingers keep coming back to it. Pressing against it, feeling the little ache. The new disgust. Mamó is a big spot on the face of my life here. And I need to stop picking at her. Or find a good concealer.

At least we have a library, where Catlin flops down on the fainting couch with a deep sigh of existential dread. ‘Ballyfrann is a ridiculous place and I want to go home. Where is my butler?’

Brian doesn’t have servants. Just Layla’s dad, a lot of dust-cloths and a cleaner we never see, who comes for two hours a day. Catlin is very disappointed.

‘Higgins would have ruined both his career and your chances with the beautiful Ultan,’ I tell her. ‘It is hard right now, but you’re better off this way.’ I nod my head as though I am an expert on juggling imaginary boyfriends. Which in fairness I could well be. They are imaginary.

She’s draped despairingly along the couch, like an old-timey woman in crisis. I run my fingers through her hair, untangling snares like roots, like an old-timey maid who isn’t sure what to do in said crisis, but knows the importance of good hair. I do what I can.

‘Everybody hates me. Except Lon.’

Fecking Lon and his constant messaging.

I grit my teeth. ‘I think you mean that they don’t love you yet. Except Lon,’ I say. ‘They will though. It’s a given.’

‘No, it’s not, and Lon doesn’t love me – he’s just being, like, welcoming or something.’ She waggles her eyebrows and flashes of sexy fireman Lon reappear in my subconscious.

I shudder. Pointedly.

‘Stop,’ she says. ‘He’s nice, and kind of hot, and he works in Donoghue’s so he’s probably our best chance for alcohol and shenanigans.’

‘Who says shenanigans?’

‘I do. I say shenanigans now.’ Her voice is full of the certainty that comes from not second-guessing every word that leaves your mouth, or regretting that you haven’t.

Donoghue’s is the local pub, and it does not look like a shenanigans sort of place unless you enjoy yelling at GAA players and singing Republican ballads. Which I, as a rule, do not.

‘He’s fifty-seven,’ I tell her.

‘He is not! He’s probably, like, nineteen? Maybe twenty.’

‘He’s eighty-three,’ I say. ‘He showed me his ID. It was sepia. And the date-of-birth part just said “yore”.’

‘Stop it. He’s four years older, five tops.’ There is a pause. My sister smiles. ‘He’s … mysterious. Intriguing.’

I snort. Lon is as mysterious as a man who offers to show you the puppies he has in the back of his beat-up van. Everything cool about him is suspicious. Leather jackets, old paperback books by important men. Cigarettes that smell like long-dead grandfathers. All things that can be bought. A bit considered. I like my crushes artless. And with pens.

‘He’s kind of desperate,’ I say. ‘You could have that anytime you wanted, then send it back like a bad sandwich.’

‘Ah now,’ she says, but I can see her smiling. It’s nice to be desired. Or so I’ve heard.

We go downstairs for dinner. We are pretending that we are fitting in more than we are. It is very easy. Mam and Brian are all about each other. Cooking together. Going for mountain walks. Watching television curled like kittens on the sofa. It is extremely unimpressive and I hope it will eventually stop.

I’m happy for them though. It’s weird to think of this being a house for only Brian. All the space; you’d get lost in your thoughts. So isolated. I don’t think that it would be good for me. If I were him. Which clearly I am not.

And he is fine. Enjoying his roast potatoes, and the lamb, drizzled with a glaze they made from scratch. His voice is high for a man’s, and quiet. But when he speaks my mother listens, her face intent. She’s made a new best friend. And it is lovely. But it used to be the three of us, and now it feels like we are two and two. On different teams.

I bite into the lamb. It’s tender. I can almost taste the jumping little muscles. I love meat. But I know where it came from. Me and the lamb, we’re made of the same stuff. I clean my plate.

Raven tongue on raw meat. Dew on grass.

Mam wipes a little sauce from Brian’s chin.

‘We’re thrilled you girls are getting on so well,’ she tells us. ‘We’re proud of you.’

‘We are,’ he says. He smiles. I grin right back. I mean, it’s weird, the new dynamic. But he’s good for her, even if he’s a little nondescript. You’d meet him and you mightn’t remember exactly what he looked like, until you’d met him once more. Maybe twice. It’s nice to have another boring person in the family. They’d only been going out six months when he proposed. He asked us first, all awkward in the kitchen. ‘I’d never want to take your father’s place,’ he said, as we eyed the massive diamond he’d picked out, ‘but I love Sheila, and I want us to be family. In a way you’re comfortable with.’

It was probably the most we’d ever heard him say at once. We hugged him and gave him our blessing. He does things by the book. He gets it right. Mam needs that in her life. Romantic drama is kind of better when you’re our age. I can see how Brian would be appealing to my mam. I think she feels that we are safe with him. His house is the most interesting thing about him.

‘If I were to get with Lon …’ Catlin says, as we clear up the dishes.

I make a face at her.

‘What?’ she asks. ‘He’s hot. He is objectively hot. And I’m not saying I’ll fall in love with him or anything. But, like, it’s something to do. Just as, like, an experiment. To see if having a boyfriend would make things easier.’

‘It wouldn’t make things easier for me,’ I point out.

‘It might,’ she says. ‘You wouldn’t have to talk to Lon as much. Because I would be kissing him. On the face.’

‘On the stupid face,’ I tell her.

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘The stupid, handsome face.’

‘Don’t leave me alone though, here. With all the people?’ I say. It comes out whinier than I intended.

‘I won’t,’ she says. ‘You know I have your back.’

It’s true. She always does.

Later, in bed, I count leaves and faces on the hard, dark wood, trying to sleep. It takes a while.

A woman’s face – asleep or maybe dead.

A man with a very small mouth.

Ivy choking round, through hair and hollows.

I think of Brian and Lon. And our dad, Tom. I think about this book we had at home. I think it had been Dad's. It was full of lore and superstition. One of the things that stuck with me was about how certain people believed that getting remarried was a sin, once you'd been widowed. Because, in the afterlife, both husbands would be there, and they’d both want you. They described a woman screaming, sawn in half by demons. Caught between two worlds inside a hell.

I venture to the window and open it a crack. There’s an old nest in the corner of it. Feathers woven soft through twigs and dirt. I put my hand on it. It feels solid. The breeze is cold, although the floor is warm. Almost too warm. It doesn’t feel like winter in this house. The lavender plant I brought with me sits on my desk. I feel for it in the murky dark.

Sometimes it dies in winter. I keep it in a clay pot and only water it a very little.

So far, so good.

It likes the warmth, this soothing little life.

I break a piece off and murmur, ‘Thank you.’

Fall asleep while focused on the scent.