What She Never Told Me by Kate McQuaile

Author:Kate McQuaile
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Quercus
Published: 2016-03-03T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

Sandy has already left when I wake up. I have a vague memory of him kissing me on the nose. He has opened the curtains, so that the sunlight is streaming in. It’s so strong that I have to squint into it while I decide whether to doze for a while longer or get up. I get up. I want to get back to the papers.

I have a quick shower and then make coffee and toast, which I eat on the floor in the sitting room, papers strewn all around me.

I find my First Communion and Confirmation certificates. Although my mother had no interest in religion, she was happy enough that I shouldn’t stand out as being different. So, like the other little seven-year-old girls in my class, I wore a long white dress with a lace veil and a little pearly tiara, and went to the altar with my hands joined as if in prayer, to receive the body and blood of Jesus for the first time.

I root around among the stuff scattered across the floor and I find an old black-and-white photograph showing a group of little girls dressed like miniature brides and beaming at the camera. We had spent months preparing for that day, rehearsing for the first time we would go to confession, stand inside the dark box and wait for the priest to slide back the grille and hear us own up to all the terrible sins we’d committed in our seven-year lifetimes.

I smile now, remembering how I’d agonised over whether something was a sin and, if so, whether it was a mortal or venial sin. How small those worries were. But, back then, they were worries that dominated my life.

I made my First Communion in the church to which my primary school was attached. It wasn’t far from where we lived in Drumcondra and I’ve always assumed that I was also baptised there. But I can’t assume anything any more. A baptism certificate isn’t a legal document, but if I can find mine, it will have on it the names of the church and the priest who baptised me. If he’s still alive, he may be able to help me with even the smallest bit of information. I scrabble among the papers, but can’t find it.

Richard, though, may be able to tell me what I need to know. I dial his number and I’m pleased to hear the lift in his voice when he hears me speak.

‘Ah, Louise, you’re back in the country. Are you going to come and see me?’

‘I am,’ I say. ‘But I’m going to be knee deep in paper for the next few days, and I was wondering whether you might be able to fill in a couple of blanks for me in the meantime.’

‘I can certainly try.’

‘Was I baptised? I think I must have been because I went to a convent school. But I haven’t found a baptism certificate yet.’

‘Yes, you were. In fact –’ he breaks off and clears his throat – ‘I stood for you.

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