Lifesaving for Beginners by Ciara Geraghty

Author:Ciara Geraghty
Language: ukr
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Published: 2012-08-30T16:00:00+00:00

Auntie May looks almost exactly the same as Mam, especially when she smiles or cries. Not that Mam ever really cried. Just at movies, mostly. Like Up. And Toy Story 3. Toy Story 3 nearly broke her heart clean in two. That’s what she said. Clean in two.

Auntie May is crying. So is Faith. They’re hugging each other and crying. I don’t know why we’re here. Faith said we were going to a hotel. But then, on the bus from the airport into the city centre, she decides we’re going to Auntie May’s house. She just decides. All of a sudden. She doesn’t even phone to let anyone know we’re coming. She just decides, and the next thing is, we’re on a train.

I stand beside the tank and watch the fish. They’re all goldfish. May says she loves the colour of them. Goldfish have really bad memories. That’s why they swim round and round all the time. Because they forget they’ve done it before. Like about a million times already.

Auntie May stops hugging Faith and says, ‘You look frozen, the pair of you. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? I would have met you at the airport, you know that.’

Faith nods. ‘I’m sorry, I just . . . I’ve a hotel booked. For me and Milo. We’re just staying the one night.’

‘Nonsense. You’ll stay here. With us.’

‘No, really, it’s—’

‘Where’s this hotel?’

‘I don’t know. Marlborough Street, I think.’

‘Jesus, Mary and Holy St Joseph, is it raped and murdered and dumped in the Liffey in a suitcase you’re after?’

I look at Faith. I really want to stay here. In May’s house. And it’s not just because I don’t want to be dumped in the Liffey in a suitcase. It’s because . . . well, it’s nice in May’s house. Like, it’s dead clean and the kitchen smells like lunch or dinner or something. Shepherd’s pie, maybe. I love Mam’s shepherd’s pie because she doesn’t put peas in it. I wonder if Auntie May puts peas in her one?

I didn’t tell Faith about being starving because I promised.

May looks at me. ‘You’d like to stay, wouldn’t you, Milo?’ She puts her hands round my face and shakes her head. ‘Cut out of your mother, so you are.’ Then she kisses my cheek and it feels dead gooey, but I have to wait till she turns back to Faith before I can wipe it off. Lipstick, I reckon. Ladies are mad about lipstick.

‘You can’t be dragging the boy to a place like Marlborough Street. Your mother’d lambast you, God rest her.’

Faith doesn’t say anything for a while and then she says, ‘I know, May. I know about Mam. About me and Mam.’

May lowers the kettle back onto the counter. She looks at Faith. She says, ‘What do you mean?’

Faith looks at me and then May looks at me too. I can see them both, in the reflection of the fish tank. Behind me, May picks up my bag. ‘Milo, love, you can sleep in Finn’s room.

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