The China Factory by Mary Costello

Author:Mary Costello
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canongate Books

THE ASTRAL PLANE

‘I tried to give up God once,’ she said.

It was morning and they were driving along the coast road at the edge of the Burren. On their left the Atlantic lay very still and beautiful and blue, and for a moment she found it almost impossible to think of it as merely sea.

Her husband looked straight ahead. ‘You tried to give up God?’

‘Yes, years ago. Before I met you.’

‘And?’ he said, turning briefly to look at her, ‘How did that go?’

She looked out the window. He had a way of making her smile. ‘Not very well, actually. He punished me—He took away my sleep.’

For as long as she could remember, she had pondered God. It wasn’t so much fear of Him as gratitude for the particular life given, a good life, and a sense that at any moment, in her next breath, it might all end.

They were silent then and she was grateful. She had thought that a week away from the city would reveal some truths, some answers, and fix her thoughts more firmly. Outside the car the sun washed everything in its pale light, giving the stone walls, the lunar rocks, even the morning itself, a feeling of fragility.

Something came adrift in her that day. They drove to Spanish Point and sat on the rocks by the water. Adam took her hand and ran his fingers over hers. That evening they sat in the hotel lounge watching the other guests come and go—middle-aged Americans, young couples with children, businessmen down from the city for the golf at Lahinch. Outside, the light was fading. She got up and went to the window. Soon the moon would rise. There were rose bushes and fuchsias in the borders. There was no tree for miles around. Sometimes on their drives they came upon a lone bush on the roadside and she was stirred by its stark beauty, its forlornness.

Beyond the hotel garden the sea turned grey. She heard its murmur as the night began to fall. The nights here made her unspeakably lonely.

Adam got them drinks. There were lamps lighting in corners.

‘I was thinking we might go back tomorrow,’ she said.

He looked at her. ‘Aren’t you having a nice time? I thought we were having a nice time.’

‘We are. It’s lovely. It’s just that, well… there’s rain coming and we’d be going home on Saturday anyway. I just thought…’ She knew the sky would soon turn purple and send down rain while they slept. In the morning she would gaze out of the hotel room onto grey rocks and she could not bear to think of the emptiness that would follow.

‘Okay, if that’s what you want.’ He looked at her. ‘Aren’t you happy?’

He would always say the right words, do the right thing. He would put himself in harm’s way for her. She should be happy. She should be happy. How then could she explain why she didn’t feel enough? Is there a measure for enough? And when the enough

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