The Women Who Ran Away - Sheila O'Flanagan Page 0,4

need to be first in the queue. But she didn’t want to be late either.

There was no chance of her being late. She could see the ship from her bedroom window, tall and white against the blue sky and teal-green sea. She knew it was far too early to leave, no matter what Ken’s voice was telling her.

She put the laptop into her overnight case and went downstairs.

Claire Dolan, the owner of Portview House, smiled at her and asked if she was planning to leave already.

‘You’ll need me out of the room shortly,’ replied Grace.

Claire told her that there was no rush and that she was welcome to use the living room for as long as she liked. ‘I know you’ve been coming here for years and you’re accustomed to travelling, but it’s the first time you’ve done it on your own,’ she said. ‘So take your time.’

‘I’ll be fine,’ Grace assured her. ‘There’s no need to worry about me.’

There was an infinitesimal moment of awkwardness before Claire reached out and gave her a little hug, one arm around Grace’s bony shoulder. ‘I know you’re a strong woman,’ she said gently, ‘but I’m sure it’s been hard. I was surprised, to be honest, when you made the booking. I didn’t think you’d want to go by yourself.’

‘I hadn’t planned to be by myself.’ Grace gave her a rueful smile. ‘My friend Elaine was supposed to come with me. But then her daughter went into a very early labour and her baby was poorly for a while, so I told her not to even think about me but to go to Megan. She lives in Canada.’ Grace shrugged, as though Canada explained everything.

‘Are you a hundred per cent sure you’ll be OK on your own, though?’ asked Claire.

Grace nodded. ‘Absolutely,’ she said, in a voice that was free of any doubt.

She’d said the same to her elder daughter, Aline, when she’d asked Grace that question too.

‘I’m sure you’ll manage,’ agreed Aline, who’d dropped in on her way home from work to see how her mother was doing. ‘But all that driving without anyone to share . . . I’m sure Dad didn’t expect you to do it alone. He’d have imagined one of us would be with you. Maybe even all of us, like before. You could wait until that was a possibility. I don’t want you to get too tired, and there’s really no rush to—’

‘I won’t get tired,’ insisted Grace. ‘None of the stages are that long. And you know quite well that it would be impossible to get everyone together again this year. So I’m doing it and that’s that.’

‘It’s asking a lot of yourself. Especially when—’

‘When what?’ Grace’s clear blue eyes hardened as she interrupted her daughter again.

‘When you’re grieving.’

‘I’m not grieving!’ The words had come out more forcefully than she’d meant and she registered the dismay on Aline’s face. ‘I mean, yes, I’m grieving but I’m . . .’ She was going to say she was too angry – and perhaps too guilty – to grieve, but she knew that would freak Aline out even more. ‘I’m doing it for closure,’ she said, quietly confident that she’d pressed the right button. Aline was big into closure. She’d had a closure evening for Ken before Fionn and Regan had left the country; they’d gone through his vast library of books, picked one each and then read a chapter out loud to each other. She’d played video clips of him at all their graduations, as well as at the family dinner for Grace’s sixtieth birthday, where he’d called her his constant light. And then she’d recited ‘My Memory Library’ by Sarah Blackstone

Grace had smiled throughout, but her heart hadn’t been in it, especially during Aline’s recitation of a poem Grace knew Ken would have dismissed as sentimental nonsense. Ken had never liked poems that rhymed. So while her children were reading and reciting, she’d been remembering the week after Aline’s graduation, when her daughter had packed her textbooks into a big box and donated them to a local education centre, saying that it was important to have them out of the house and in her past. Ken had been furious with her. He’d said that she’d need to reference them in the future even though she had her degree. She’d mentioned Google. He’d fumed quietly. Ken hadn’t believed much in closure either. Until, perhaps, he had.

Aline celebrated birthdays and Christmas and Easter as waypoints in her life, always